The Checua individuals in the 2025 study date to approximately 6,000 years before the present — well within this Preceramic window, roughly halfway through the period before pottery appears on the plateau.

They were hunter-gatherers living in a world without ceramics, without formal agriculture, and without the social complexity that would develop much later with the Herrera and Muisca periods.

They were, in the genetic analysis, something quite specific.

What Ancient DNA Actually Requires

Before going further into what the genome analysis showed, it is worth spending some time on what ancient DNA work actually involves — because the gap between popular understanding and scientific reality is significant, and because understanding the methodology helps clarify what conclusions can and cannot be drawn.

The extraction of DNA from ancient human remains begins with the selection of the best possible source material.