The Yamnaya were a pastoral society that emerged on the Pontic–Caspian steppe around 3300–2600 BC. They are known for their use of wagons, early horseback riding, and their distinctive burial mounds, or kurgans. Their mobile herding lifestyle allowed them to expand rapidly across the steppe and into Europe and Central Asia. This movement is now understood as one of the most influential population shifts in prehistory. Genetic and archaeological evidence shows that the Yamnaya mixed with local fa