Nature, Published online: 05 February 2025; doi:10.1038/s41586-024-08531-5Ancient DNA reveals how the explosive expansion of Yamnaya steppe pastoralists began with a small community north of the Black Sea speaking ancestral Indo-European, and detects genetic links with Anatolian speakers, stemming from a common Indo-Anatolian homeland in the North Caucasuslower Volga region.