Whatever new ancient genomes are added to the record, they are interpreted in relation to MA-1 and to the model of Ancient North Eurasian ancestry that the 2014 paper established.

This is the nature of foundational scientific findings: they define the terms in which subsequent research is conducted.

The MA-1 result defined the Ancient North Eurasian component of Native American ancestry, and every subsequent study that engages with that component is building on the foundation that the 24,000-year-old genome from Mal’ta established.

The child beneath the stone could not have imagined the laboratory in Copenhagen.

But the laboratory in Copenhagen is still, in a meaningful sense, working from the grave he was buried in.