Mitochondrial DNA has been successfully extracted from 10 specimens from tour tombs at Jiangjialiang. Hypervariable region I (HVRI) in the mitochondrial DNA has been amplified and sequenced. Altogether 10 distinct haplotypes with 15 polymorphic sites have been obtained. A phylogenitic tree of the 10 sequences has been constructed by means of the maximum likelihood method. Four clusters,corresponding to the four tombs, have been presented in the tree. The fact that mitochondrial DNA is inherited exclusively in the female line and the features of graves in matriarchal society suggest that the Jiangjialiang population should not be taken to be a matriarchal community.
