Human societies exhibit a vast diversity of kinship systems, with different rules of descent, residence and alliance. Despite this variation, patrilineal systems appear to be predominant. In this presentation, I will show how DNA can shed light on the origin of patrilineality in humans. I will present the results from fieldwork conducted in Central Asia and Southeast Asia that allowed us to characterize the genetic signatures left by different descent systems. I will show that it is likely that patrilineal segmentary descent systems (in which lineages regularly segment into sub-lineages) emerged in different parts of the world at the end of the Neolithic and drastically reduced the genetic diversity of the Y chromosome, through the growth of certain lineages to the detriment of others.