过去不少西方与东方历史学家都提出过横扫罗马的匈王阿提拉与他的部族匈人
可能源自于被汉朝打败而西迁的匈奴。但是，这个观点因为间隔年代的史料空白太大，也
几乎无任何中西方的史料可以佐証，而只能是假说。
近年来拜基因科技的发展之赐，死人骨头已经可以用来做基因定序，来确定其祖先来源。
在2022年欧洲终于出版了一篇对于匈人(Huns)、阿瓦尔人(Avars)及匈牙利(马札尔)征服
者的移民遗骸进行的大型基因(DNA)研究报告。研究的结论是匈人(Huns)与阿瓦尔人
(Avars)的祖先确实可以追溯到蒙古。也就是过去西方与东方历史学家主张的的匈人阿提
拉可能源自于东方匈奴的说法，是符合基因研究的结果的。
论文名称:The genetic origin of Huns, Avars, and conquering Hungarians
全文可在此上连结下载
https://www.cell.com/current-biology/pdf/S0960-9822(22)00732-1.pdf
总结 (SUMMARY):
研究结果显示匈人(Huns)与阿瓦尔人(Avars)移民群的核心可能是起源于今日的蒙古
，而他们的起源可追溯到匈奴人，正如许多历史学家过去的主张一样。
Our results reveal that this "immigrant core" of both Huns and Avars likely
originated in present day Mongolia, and their origin can be traced back to
Xiongnus (Asian Huns), as suggested by several historians.
{
Huns, Avars, and conquering Hungarians were migration-period nomadic tribal
confederations that arrived in three successive waves in the Carpathian Basin
between the 5th and 9th centuries. Based on the historical data, each of these
groups are thought to have arrived from Asia, although their exact origin and
relation to other ancient and modern populations have been debated. Recently,
hundreds of ancient genomes were analyzed from Central Asia, Mongolia, and
China, from which we aimed to identify putative source populations for the
above-mentioned groups. In this study, we have sequenced 9 Hun, 143 Avar, and
113 Hungarian conquest period samples and identified three core populations,
representing immigrants from each period with no recent European ancestry.
Our results reveal that this "immigrant core" of both Huns and Avars likely
originated in present day Mongolia, and their origin can be traced back to
Xiongnus (Asian Huns), as suggested by several historians. On the other hand,
the "immigrant core" of the conquering Hungarians derived from an earlier
admixture of Mansis, early Sarmatians, and descendants of late Xiongnus. We
have also shown that a common "proto-Ugric" gene pool appeared in the Bronze
Age from the admixture of Mezhovskaya and Nganasan people, supporting genetic
and linguistic data. In addition, we detected shared Hun-related ancestry in
numerous Avar and Hungarian conquest period genetic outliers, indicating a
genetic link between these successive nomadic groups. Aside from the
immigrant core groups, we identified that the majority of the individuals
from each period were local residents harboring "native European" ancestry.
}