About

Bryan K. Miller is an Assistant Professor of Central Asian Art & Archaeology in the Department of the History of Art and serves as an Assistant Curator of Asian Archaeology at the Museum of Anthropological Archaeology. His academic background includes a PhD in East Asian Civilizations from the University of Pennsylvania, an MA in Archaeology from the University of California Los Angeles, and a BA in Archaeology & East Asian Studies from Washington University in St. Louis. His research investigates the politics of visual culture and the intersections of art and ecology in early Eurasia. His recent book, 'Xiongnu: The World's First Nomadic Empire,' interweaves textual analyses with archaeological examinations to challenge normative constructs of nomadic societies, highlighting the sophisticated arts, institutions, and polities they created. His current work expands these investigations to explore the active roles northern steppe societies played in shaping Eurasian exchanges and the amalgamation of material culture associated with the 'Silk Roads.' His scholarly focus includes East and Central Asian nomadic societies and Eurasian exchange.

Research topics

• Biology
• Ecology
• Archaeology
• Geography
• Genetics
• Evolutionary biology

Selected publications

• Ancient genomes reveal trans-Eurasian connections between the European Huns and the Xiongnu Empire

  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences · 2025-02-24 · 10 citations

  articleOpen access

  The Huns appeared in Europe in the 370s, establishing an Empire that reshaped West Eurasian history. Yet until today their origins remain a matter of extensive debate. Traditional theories link them to the Xiongnu, the founders of the first nomadic empire of the Mongolian steppe. The Xiongnu empire dissolved, however, ~300 y before the Huns appeared in Europe, and there is little archaeological and historical evidence of Huns in the steppe during this time gap. Furthermore, despite the rich 5th to 6th centuries current era (CE) archaeological record of the Carpathian Basin, the cultural elements of connections with the steppe are limited to few findings and even fewer solitary eastern-type burials. In this study, we coanalyze archaeological evidence with 35 newly sequenced and published genomic data for a total of 370 individuals-from 5th to 6th century CE contexts in the Carpathian Basin including 10 Hun-period eastern-type burials, 2nd to 5th century sites across Central Asia and 2nd c. before current era (BCE) to 1st c. CE Xiongnu period sites across the Mongolian steppe. We find no evidence for the presence of a large eastern/steppe descent community among the Hun- and post-Hun-period Carpathian Basin population. We also observe a high genetic diversity among the eastern-type burials that recapitulates the variability observed across the Eurasian Steppe. This suggests a mixed origin of the incoming steppe conquerors. Nevertheless, long-shared genomic tracts provide compelling evidence of genetic lineages directly connecting some individuals of the highest Xiongnu-period elite with 5th to 6th century CE Carpathian Basin individuals, showing that some European Huns descended from them.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• States of Mobilities

  2025-05-27 · 1 citations

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  Theories surrounding the rise of complex polities have long deemed nomadism as fundamentally incongruous to state development. Taking the case of the first nomadic empire, the Xiongnu (ca. 200 BCE–100 CE), this chapter argues the contrary: (a) that pastoralism can be a stable economic basis for a political economy and can provide institutional foundations for intensification of production and the maintenance of surplus, and (b) that mobility, being a strategy for community adaptability in response to shifting ecological or political circumstances, was not the antithesis of governance but rather could foster large-scale communication, exchange, and mobilization of resources to adeptly overcome the purported tyranny of distance. By redressing the designation of xing-guo (“mobile state”) used to describe nomadic polities during the Xiongnu era, I propose a concept of “states of mobilities,” in which the political economies that bolstered these regimes hinged on the control not so much of static territories of resources but more so of the movements of numerous and diverse resources, including raw materials, labor, products, soldiers, administrators, and knowledge.

  PublisherDOI

• [Re]Integrating a dispersed agenda: advancing archaeological research in Central Eurasia

  Antiquity · 2024-05-31 · 3 citations

  articleOpen access

  Amid resurgent geopolitical fissures and in the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic, there is a growing awareness in the sector of the need for, and concern about, national and international collaboration in archaeological projects. This article reflects on present-day challenges for international collaboration in central Eurasian archaeology and furthers a much-needed discussion about (re)integrating local narratives with inter-regional trends in future research. Responsible and practical proposals for bridging collaborator differences in institutional or publishing obligations, language capacities and access to resources are discussed.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Cauldrons of Bronze Age nomads reveals 2700 year old yak milk and the deep antiquity of food preparation techniques

  Scientific Reports · 2024-06-05 · 8 citations

  articleOpen accessSenior author

  Cauldrons, vessels that are simultaneously common and enigmatic, offer insights into past cultural and social traditions. While assumed to possess a special function, what these cauldrons contained is still largely mysterious. These vessels, such as those made from bronze or copper alloys, function as reservoirs for ancient organics through the antibacterial qualities provided by the metal surfaces. Here we show, through protein analysis, that cauldrons from the Final Bronze Age (ca. 2700 BP) were primarily used to collect blood from ruminants, primarily caprines, likely for the production of sausages in a manner similar to contemporary practices in Mongolia's rural countryside. Our findings present a different function from the recent findings of cooked meat in copper-alloy vessels from the northern Caucasus 2000 years earlier, exposing the diversity in food preparation techniques. Our secondary findings of bovine milk within the cauldron, including peptides specific to Bos mutus, pushes back their regional domestication into the Bronze Age.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Copyright Page

  2023-12-14

  other1st authorCorresponding

  Extract Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America. © Oxford University Press 2024 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form

  PublisherDOI

• Masters of the Steppe

  2023-12-14

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract This chapter recounts the endeavors of the early Xiongnu rulers to formulate a new political order and, through a succession of rapid conquests, establish centralized imperial rule over all of Inner Asia. Attention is given to the ways in which they established hegemony over neighboring polities, especially against the peer empire of Han China. The chapter details the ranks and hierarchy of the imperial regime, centered on a handful of noble nomads under a supreme leader, as well as the varied resources, including animals, people, grains, and luxuries, which the Xiongnu sought to control in order to feed their growing empire.

  PublisherDOI

• Notes

  2023-12-14

  other1st authorCorresponding

  Subject Regional and National History Collection: Oxford Scholarship Online

  PublisherDOI

• Hunnic Heritage

  2023-12-14

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract This chapter probes those vestiges of the Xiongnu Empire that lived on in the culture, politics, and folklore of Eastern Eurasia. Archaeological remains exhibit straggling adherences to materials and practices of Xiongnu political culture, while historical accounts demonstrate the use of the Xiongnu name and its affiliated institutions in subsequent regimes established by groups from Inner Asia. Last, the chapter provides an overview of the longer history of Asia to demonstrate the persistent potency of the model of empire formulated by the Xiongnu and of the primacy of the Xiongnu legacy in literature and folk tales, just as in diplomacy and policy.

  PublisherDOI

• Xiongnu

  2023-12-14 · 10 citations

  book1st authorCorresponding

  Abstract This book raises the case of the world’s first nomadic empire, the Xiongnu, as a prime example of the sophisticated developments and powerful influence of nomadic regimes. Launching from a reconceptualization of the social and economic institutions of mobile pastoralists, the collective chapters trace the entire course of the Xiongnu Empire starting from before its initial rise, leaping into its founding conquests, shedding light on the peoples and communities that maintained its Inner Asian realms, traversing the wars that challenged it and the reformations that made it stronger, and at last reflecting on the legacies that lived on after its eventual fall. By weaving together archaeological examinations with historical investigations, the book presents a more complex and nuanced narrative of how an empire based firmly in the steppe more than two thousand years ago managed to formulate a robust political economy and a complex political matrix. The nomadic regime capitalized on the mobilities of resources and agents and fostered alternative forms of political participation, allowing the Xiongnu to consume and dominate vast realms of central Eurasia and to have lasting geopolitical effects on the many worlds around them.

  PublisherDOI

• Consuming the Herds:

  2023-12-31

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Alicia Ventresca Miller

  University of Michigan–Ann Arbor

  38 shared

• Nicole Boivin

  Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History

  36 shared

• Jamsranjav Bayarsaikhan

  Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology

  27 shared

• Shevan Wilkin

  Griffith University

  23 shared

• Patrick Roberts

  17 shared

• Jessica Hendy

  University of York

  16 shared

• Christina Warinner

  15 shared

• William Taylor

  University of Colorado Boulder

  15 shared

Education

• PhD, East Asian Languages & Civilizations

  University of Pennsylvania

  2009

• MA, Cotsen Institute of Archaeology

  University of California Los Angeles

  2000