A Transient Pulse of Genetic Admixture from the Crusaders in the Near East Identified from Ancient Genome Sequences.

During the medieval period, hundreds of thousands of Europeans migrated to the Near East to take part in the Crusades, and many of them settled in the newly established Christian states along the Eastern Mediterranean coast. Here, we present a genetic snapshot of these events and their aftermath by sequencing the whole genomes of 13 individuals who lived in what is today known as Lebanon between the 3 and 13 centuries CE. These include nine individuals from the "Crusaders' pit" in Sidon, a mass burial in South Lebanon identified from the archaeology as the grave of Crusaders killed during a battle in the 13 century CE.