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Tuesday, August 12, 2025

Tripolje, Dereivka, and the Sredni Stog phenomenon (guest post)


This is another guest post by an anonymous contributor. Again, I don't necessarily agree with the author, but is he wrong? Feel free to let me know in the comments below.

The definition of Sredni Stog phenomenon (SSP) varies and is often a loosely applied term to refer to pretty much any individual in the Dnieper and Don regions between the ‘Neolithic’ and Yamnaya periods.

In order to elucidate the SSP, some brief remarks on the preceding Mariupol phenomenon are warranted. Understanding the Mariupol horizon is fairly straightforward – its development was catalysed by an intrusion of groups from somewhere west of the Dnieper, ~ 5500BC. The ‘proto-Mariupol’ group were genomic and economic ‘hunter-gatherers’, lacking any discernible EEF admixture, and with Y-hg I-L702 uniparental ‘trace-dye’. The Mariupol phenomenon predominantly impacted the lower reaches of the Dnieper and Azov steppe (Lower Dnieper- Azov group, ‘LDA’), but extended toward the Don, Volga and even the Kuban steppe in an attenuated form. The elevated levels of “Ukr N’ in Golubaya Krinitsa and the Y-hg I2a-L702 individual at Berezhnovka attest to this movement. The Mariupol phenomenon is associated with the development of formal cemeteries, linking them with Late Neolithic mixed farmer/HG groups in the northeast Balkans. Individuals were buried in a ‘supine straight-legged’ inhumation, with grave goods such as boar-tusk pendants for select males and adorning shell beads for females. This might signal the emergence of gender-differentiation in burials and the rise of local leaders or ‘chiefs’.

Data sets treat the ‘Neolithic’ in Ukraine as a monolithic phenomenon, however it is important to note that Dereivka stands apart – it is 200km north of other “Ukraine_N” sites such as Volnienski, Igren and Vovnigi, beyond the ‘Dnipro bend’. Moreover, male individuals from Dereivka are overwhelmingly assigned to Y-hg R1b-V88 and the burial pose (N-S) at Dereivka deviates from the more common E-W orientation seen elsewhere. Quite a few of the published ‘Sredni Stog’ individuals are from Dereivka, and often earlier than 4500BC, and N. Kotova assigns them to the Dnieper-Donets culture. Moreover, the recently published middle Don individuals, such as those from Golubaya Krinitsa and Vasilyevsky Cordon -17, are also not Sredni Stog, but can be thought of as ‘partially Mariupolised hunter-gatherers’. In another example, the (undated) ‘Sredni Stog’ individual I27930 from Igren was assigned to Y-hg Q and he can be modelled as a 2-way mix of EHG & WHG. This individual is actually from the Mesolithic.

So what occurred during the Sredni Stog period? In contrast to the Mariupol phase, the population dynamics associated with SSP are complex: at least three external flows can be highlighted (i) the advance of Tripolje communities from the Carpathians to the Dnieper (ii) arrival of South-Caucasian/CHG agro-pastoralists in the north Caucasus, and (iii) arrival of ‘central Asian’ populations in Volga-Caspian region (represented by “TTK individual’); in addition to intra-steppe shifts and flows. Notwithstanding, the ‘ideological background’ of SSP is rooted in the Mariupol horizon. The stereotypical SSP burials features individuals buried on their back, but increasingly with legs up-flexed. And we see the beginnings of kurgan constructions, which vary from stone cairns to soil-thrown barrows. Most are buried in simple pits, however some have more complex ‘catacomb’ pits.

What happened in the Dniester-Dnieper-Don region during the SSP? We can begin by orientating ourselves with a PCA to observe two main clines developing. One cline develops between ‘Ukr_N and EEF and a second cline pulls toward Lower-Volga Caucasus groups. The first cline mostly comprises of ‘Farmers’ from Tipolje and ‘hunter-gatherers’ from Dereivka. The second cline consists of individuals from Dereivka and the lower Dnieper-Azov group pulling toward Lower Volga-Caucasus groups.


Admixture analysis with qpAdm reveals 3 groups within the 2 broad clines. The first group can be thought of as ‘core Sredni Stog’. These individuals are 2-way mixes of ‘Ukr_N’ and ‘Steppe Eneolithic’ (sometimes Progress works, sometimes Remontoye or Berezhnovka). They are both males and females. In our examples, the females are from Kopachiv Yar (4000 BC) and Dereivka (3500BC). The males come from Dereivka (4300BC), Moluykhiv Bugor (4000BC), Vynohrado (4000BC); they are all derived for Y-hg I2a-L703+. These results represent a blending of social networks between the LDA and various lower Volga-Caucasus groups, and the subsequent expansion by LDA further West. The terminus ante quem of 4300 BC matches the corrected dating of the Kuban steppe sites such as Progress & Vojnuchka.


Another subset comprises of individuals from Dereivka and Verteba cave who situated on an ‘Ukr-N’ < - - > EEF cline. Many of the earlier Dereivka individuals are almost 100% Ukr_N. Verteba cave Tripolje can be modelled as 80% EEF + 20% Ukr_N. One individual from Dereikva (I3719) falls outside the Dereivka <-> Tripolje clin, as he plots further ‘south’ with Balkan-LBK farmers. Consistently, he comes out as ~100% EEF with qpAdm. Dating to ~4700BC, he precedes the arrival of Tipolje groups to the region by hundreds of years. FtDNA have assigned him to I2-Z161- FTH81, which is distinctive to the LDA haplotypes and is phylogenetically linked to a Czech LBK individual.


A third group consists of individuals with more complex 3-way ancestries, consisting of EEF, Ukr-N and Steppe_En and/or Maikop. These come from late Dereivka and late Tripolje groups, in archaeological literature often termed as ‘Soldanesti’, ‘Zhivotilovksa-Volchansk’, Cernavoda (Kartal). Once again, the males from Soldanesti and Cernavoda derive from LDA-related Y-hg I2a-L703 in some shape or form.


Conclusions:

1) Firstly, we note that the Dereivka group was subject to early EEF influence, as soon as eastern LBK groups reached Ukraine after 5000BC. However, their main interaction occurred with the younger, Tripolje group, which expanded toward the Dnieper after ~ 4300 BC.

2) In the LDA group we observe patrilineal continuity. These clans created expansive social-networks. They initially mixed with groups from the lower Volga-Caucasus area. Some then moved west, and ‘took over’ the Tripolje region and acquired high levels of EEF.

3) As a third conclusion, we can reject the commonly held notion that Tripolje was ‘conquered by Yamnaya pastoralists’. Our analysis instead highlights that their core structure fragmented as they became intertwined with powerful networks to their west (Trpolje) and east (Sredni Stog). The ‘take-over’ was due to the expansion of LDA/ SS groups. Mixed groups emerged such as Cernavoda and Soldanesti, which retained Tripolje ancestry and some cultural traditions. By the time Yamnaya groups reached the Dniester forest steppe, Tripolje had been long gone.



See also...

‘Proto-Yamnaya’ Eneolithic individuals from Kuban steppe c. 3700 BC ? (guest post)

180 comments:

MAD said...

There is a book published in 2008 that contains a detailed look at the cultural layers, artifacts, burials and also suggests which cultures likely interacted, and where. If the guest post aligns with the actual materials findings in this book, then there is support for the conclusions. Because the book provides more details than the guest post, it would be interesting to see if the post needs modifications to align with the material evidence in the downloadable book: "Early Eneolithic in the Pontic Steppes" by Nadezhda S. Kotova, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, May 2008. It describes: "the process of Early Eneolithic culture formation in the Pontic steppe. The cultural environment, represented mainly by the bearers of Tripolye culture and inhabitants of Northern Caucasus, played an important role in historical destiny of the steppe population. Moreover, with the help of available materials we can examine cultural interactions of steppe population from the Volga to the Danube.
Special attention is devoted to the reconstruction of social and
economical structure of steppe population in the Early Eneolithic. Faunal materials together with imprints of cultural plants on ceramics and palynological data have given the information about the cattle breeding, agriculture and hunting. Burial materials have allowed me to reconstruct social structure in the Early Eneolithic society." There are also comments on possible climactic reasons for population movements. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/351748092_Early_Eneolithic_in_the_Pontic_Steppes

Davidski said...

@The Last of the Maharuls

I'm not a boomer you fucking moron.

Rob said...

@ maharul - funny thing is the “out of Caucasus” theory was formulated by dullard Boomers

Rob said...

@ MAD

“ Because the book provides more details than the guest post, it would be interesting to see if the post needs modifications to align with the material evidence in the downloadable book?”

Yes it’s a great book. But in reality, local archaeologists should update their views to the assessment in this post
👍

Shomu said...

@Rob
target left weight se z
1 Russia_Samara_EBA_Yamnaya.AG Ukraine_N.AG 0.191 0.0206 9.29
2 Russia_Samara_EBA_Yamnaya.AG Armenia_Aknashen_N.AG 0.162 0.0242 6.71
3 Russia_Samara_EBA_Yamnaya.AG PB_Group 0.647 0.0371 17.4

$rankdrop
# A tibble: 1 × 7
f4rank dof chisq p dofdiff chisqdiff p_nested

1 2 9 9.20 0.419 11 443. 5.28e-88

East Caucasian capacity 💪

Shomu said...

@Rob
yes

Gioiello said...

You know what I think: I-M223 and R1b from Palaeolithic Italy (above all) and Q from Siberia. Before 20000 ybp R and Q from eastern and western Siberia and I from Europe. Interesting that there wasn't any J and R1a: J olderly linked with I and R1a with R1b. Perhaps we sould think just to the Siberian corridor with R1a in the North and J in the South who were doing other... The same for the Indo-European languages. Nothing to do with the "Southern Ark theory" and Gamkrelidze/Ivanov.

Gioiello said...

To respond to the question of the languages I should get the age of my grandchildren (6 and 2 years) and begin to study now. So far I don't consider the theories of the Basque-Caucasian-Na Dené and Nostratic wrong etc. Of course also these groups interacted. Why in Italian to-day we say: “di-glie-lo” [dic illi illum] = “say-to him-that”? Probably in a Nostratic language we use a Basque-Caucasian-NaDené form.

Rob said...

@ Shomu
Yes Yamnaya have high levels of Caucasian related ancestry, mostly due to complex dynamics within the steppe itself.
In terms of Sredni Stog, some subsidiary contacts were established with communities in the Northwest Caucasus.
As you know, Eneolithic northeast Caucasus sites like Ginchi were instead part of the Sioni complex. Hopefully we get some genomes from there

Rep

Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

@Rob
Do you think there's any substance in Begazy-Dandybai and Sargari cultures being East Iranian speaking?

Tom said...

What are the implications for the formation of post-3500 BC steppe groups like Yamnaya proper and proto-CWC?

Davidski said...

I think the main implication is that the importance of Caucasus-related ancestry in Yamnaya is overstated in peer reviewed papers and the influence from the west on the steppe is largely ignored.

By the way, I added two maps to the post right at the end of the post.

Shomu said...

@Davidski
https://i.ibb.co/S7mYD6DH/1755293695284.jpg

Rob said...

@ Norfern- ''Do you think there's any substance in Begazy-Dandybai and Sargari cultures being East Iranian speaking?''
Yep seems logical

Shomu said...

https://www1.ru/news/2025/08/15/rossiiskie-arxeologi-bolse-ne-otdaiut-naxodki-dlia-geneticeskix-analizov-inostrannym-kollegam-v-ros.html 🥵

"Russian archaeologists no longer give their finds to foreign colleagues for genetic analysis. Russia has replaced import technology"

quote from the article

"In the summer, the results of the first completely domestic study of the genetics of the Scythians were published"

how these scoundrels, liars, scoundrels and hypocrites love these words, like "completely domestic", "import substitution", "no analogues"

but now let's figure it out in more detail, what completely domestic technologies do they have there?

100 percent of the sequencers of this laboratory are American-made 😁
, namely:
HiSeq 2000 / HiSeq 2500 and NovaSeq 6000, MiSeq FGx / MiSeq FGx Forensic Genomics System, Verogen (also in San Diego, USA). (Otherwise, "FGx" is sometimes understood as Forensic Genomics-variants of Illumina.)

Rob said...

@ Tom , Dave
The map speculates the possible area of Yamnaya - early CW genesis. Not sure if it’ll be proven right or wrong. But somewhere between western (Azov-Dnieper) and southeastern (Kuban) Sredni Stog seems plausible.

Rob said...

Although the focus isn’t Yamnaya here, but to correct the gaslighting / misrepresentation specifically on western Sredni Stog culture by lamestrream academics suffering from an echo-chamber effect & cognitive impotence. Recently even some seasoned commentators here were performing mental gymnastics. So it’s important basic issues are addressed informally before a later, formalised KO :)

Tom said...

@ Davidski

Of course, this post was informative and necessary; I am in agreement with its conclusions. I’m just pondering what exact processes led to the relatively homogeneous autosomal profile that we see a few centuries before the main IE expansion.

@Rob

Is your general idea that wheeled transport technologies becoming widespread on the steppe around 3500 BC facilitated greater mobility among the proto or “majority ancestors” of Yamnaya & CW of the Middle Don, leading to expansion and establishment of kinship networks between them LDA, Derievka, late Tripolye and, in the latest stages, GAC?

And I hope such issues continue to be addressed.

Rob said...

@ Tom - a few things seemed to have happened in the late 4th millenium, just before the big 'Corded-Yamnaya' expansion :
the final fragmentation of Tripolje, expansion of GAC, fragmentation of Majkop, emigration of the Cernavoda/ west Sredni Stog block to the Balkans. So that created certain push & pull factors which led to the emergence of C-Y from comparative obscruity. Perhaps wheel technology helped their expansion
Some authors invoke climate changes, but so far the data on the steppe are too coarse grained

Shomu said...

the populations of the steppe Eneolithic and Berezhnevka are literally NEC, only without the Middle Eastern admixture, sorted by the distance parameter so that it would be clear that, as in the steppe Eneolithic, the selected group of Dagestanis has a "peculiar" CHG, not similar to the Georgian

https://i.ibb.co/VPQLRRv/Screenshot-20250818-211906.jpg

I also presented this in the form of 2 graphs, the dependence of the parameters CHG+Iran_N and Distance on the selected individual of the steppe Eneolithic and Dagestani

https://i.ibb.co/B5NfkvMM/Screenshot-20250818-213109.jpg

CordedSlav said...

@ Shomu

''the populations of the steppe Eneolithic and Berezhnevka are literally NEC''

Sure Jan
And by extension CW, Slavs and Celts are also just Dagestanis deep down


Shomu said...

@CordedSlav
Yes

Shomu said...

https://www.hibiny.ru/murmanskaya-oblast/news/item-uchenye-polnostyu-rasshifrovali-dnk-yakuta-kotoryy-jil-10-tysyach-let-nazad-hatystyrskiy-chelovek-pozvolil-luchshe-ponyat-evol-424735/

Scientists have completely decoded the DNA of a Yakut who lived 10 thousand years ago: Khatystyrsky Man has allowed us to better understand evolutionary processes

"...Researchers have found that the Khatystyrsky man was related to the ancestors of the Uralic-speaking peoples. This means that in ancient times, Yakutia played an important role in the settlement of Northern Eurasia. "

homeland of the finnougrians😄

Tom said...


@ Davidski

Can you stop letting “Shomu” spam the comment sections of your blog with his Dagestani nationalism because he is clearly trolling and detracting from the subject matter.

@ Rob

Which camp do you fall into when it comes to Corded Ware... brother group derived from the same genetic pool of forest-steppe borderland clans as Yamnaya, or an unsampled Yamnaya sub-group not buried in kurgans as per Anthony? I used to reject the latter explanation, but certain archaeological connections between Budzhak and CWC are interesting.

Davidski said...

David Anthony's hypothesis about the origin of Corded Ware is terrible.

It doesn't really match anything we have from genetics and archeology.

I don't understand how someone with his experience can just come up with a story like this based on nothing.

JVTRPLZZ said...

David, how feasible is this theory:

1. Everything starts with Iron Gates HG as being Pre-Proto-IE.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_Gates_Mesolithic

2. They bear all the right haplogroups, and they did have contacts with Anatolian HG before the Anatolian Farmer expansions.

3. The Iron Gates HG descendants migrate east and start the PIE story and link with Steppe expansions on what's today Ukraine.
https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/doi/10.1515/opar-2022-0266/html

4. We know that Anatolian HG and Farmers already had WHG ancestry before even entering Europe. So, two new hypothesis here:
4A. The one most likely to be correct in my view is that there was a cluster os such Anatolians that remained there and which were to become the Anatolian IE Speakers.
4B. There were more Anatolian-IE languages among the farmers who went to Europe - of course, not all of them.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anatolian_hunter-gatherers

What do you think? Is it worth running some tests? The only doubt remaining would be from which HG (WHG or EHG) Pre-Proto-IE comes from, and I tend to side with EHG, as I believe that, along with the Middle Easterners of the time, WHG spoke Afro-Asiatic - I believe that because I to me, R1b in Africa was carried by them through Italy and Sicily, then onto the Green Sahara.

Davidski said...

Iron Gates HG doesn't really have the right Y-chromosome haplogroups and subclades to be considered pre-proto-IE.

And there's no evidence of Iron Gates HG autosomal admixture in any ancient or preset-day Indo-European speaking population.

Shomu said...

@Tom
no, don't do this 🥺

Gioiello said...

@ JVTRPLZZ 


“Is it worth running some tests? The only doubt remaining would be from which HG (WHG or EHG) Pre-Proto-IE comes from, and I tend to side with EHG, as I believe that, along with the Middle Easterners of the time, WHG spoke Afro-Asiatic - I believe that because I to me, R1b in Africa was carried by them through Italy and Sicily, then onto the Green Sahara”.

I don't know if you know my hypothesis, i.e. that R people belonged to the HG of the Siberian corridor, and R2 expanded Southward, in fact we find it in India/Iran and for what I know not elsewhere. R1 spoke a language of the Siberian corridor. R1a remained easternmost, in fact we find it in eastern Europe in the oldest aDNA. Certainly R1b was in the Alpine region from 14000 but perhaps already 17000 ybp, and after the expansion after the Younger Dryas it was in the Baltic region and central Europe. Probably the IE language developed among R1a group, because we don't know if R1b maintened that language because in the Alpine region the dominant group was I, and certainly I-M223 in Italy from 20000 to 10000 ybp, and they spoke a basco-caucasian language that we find to.day only in old sardinian and basque. It is the linguistic group of the I/J group. Difficult to think that the tiny R1b group imposed its language upon the most numerous hg. I. Which language did speak the R-V88 group? And which all the other tiny old hgs due to the expansion of what I'd call the Villabrunas? And don't forget that all thought R-V88 as becoming from Middle East (or others from the Green Sahara) and I demonstrated wrong that theory just for the prejudice “Ex Oriente lux” as also that hg J were “semitic”, but actually it was around the Caucasus and there were no semitc language up there. To think that hg R-V88 did speak an afro-asitic language is absurd, because all these languages were in Northern Africa, probably of the E-L19 group and they couldn't have been carried by the tiny R-V88. Which language did speak the other tiny R1b languages after the expansion of the Younger Dryas like R-V1636 or R-M73 etc? It is possible that they (both R-L51 and R-Z2103) met the IE languages between central and eastern Europe. There is no doubt that the closest languages to IE were the Uralic ones and that demonstrates their formation in the east and we know now that the expansio of the hg N westward was vey old. The theory that the origin of the Sanskrit was older than many thought is interesting, and we spoke about that already so long ago. But we need a great work between linguistics and genetics now, but the genetic group who brought that is certainly R1a, and we have a proof also from R-YP4141, that I began to study 20 years ago and now is contributed by some friends who belong to that hg. Of course there were exchanges (of genetics and linguistics) between Northern Africa and Southern Europe, but only wanderwörter like names of plants and animals.

Kyu said...

It's doubtful that AHGs already had WHG, from what I've seen they're basically just Dzudzuana
Though during the Ceramic period some I2 does come to the Marmara region

Also, R1b-V88 was brought to Africa by farmers from the Cardial culture in Iberia who expanded into North Africa

Gioiello said...

@Kyu

“Also, R1b-V88 was brought to Africa by farmers from the Cardial culture in Iberia who expanded into North Africa“

Of course, Cardial Culture was centred in Italy and Adriatic coasts, and they migrated to Iberia with the Zilhao migration of 7500 years ago.

Gaska said...

The conclusions of the post seem reasonable, but it is a pity that he did not conduct a more detailed study of the uniparental markers of the cultures mentioned.

-Regarding the CWC, Anthony's theory about its origin is not only absurd, it is simply the acknowledgment of his major archaeological-genetic failure.

-Regarding the forest-steppe theory, well, R1a-M417 had to be somewhere between 3300-2800 BCE, and it seems reasonable that it would be in a territory where R1a has been documented thousands of years earlier.

-In my opinion, the CWC has a dual origin: on the one hand, the eneolithic cultures of Central Europe (Poland, Bohemia-Moravia), which contributed certain customs (for example, polished battle axes), and then migrations originating in the steppes, first of women due to exogamy (from 3000 BC) and then of men and women (from 2750 BC) who incorporated themselves contributing some of their own traditions.

-The uniparental markers involved were R1a-M417, R1b-Z2103, and Q1b2a-Z5902. This means that somehow R1a-M417 was incorporated into the Yamnaya culture from their northern refuge (forest-steppe) at a late stage (perhaps 2800 BC), joining other male lineages previously documented in that culture and migrating together to the west. That is why M417 has not yet appeared in the Yamnaya culture.

And then, we find what we have been seeing in the European archaeological and genetic record for many years, namely an incredible network of genetic, commercial, and cultural exchanges between different regions. This dual model may explain why R1a-M417 occupied the northern and central domain of the CWC (Russia, Scandinavia, the Baltic, Poland, Bohemia, and Germany) without any trace of other steppe male markers such as R1b-Z2103, and why local neolithic lineages controlled other regions of the CWC (such as Switzerland).

Therefore, my conclusions are as follows:

1-YES, there were migrations originating from the Yamnaya culture, first linked to exogamy (3000 BC) and later with male & female uniparental markers (approx. 2800 BC). These mass migrations produced the genetic change observed not only because they were massive but also because of the small population that remained in the rest of Europe

2-The CWC expanded not only through population movements but also by weaving a cultural network that brought its customs and traditions to distant territories such as the Netherlands and Switzerland

3-This is where the story ends because the BBC has absolutely nothing to do with either the CWC or Yamnaya in terms of its origins. Their male uniparental markers do not match, nor does their culture.

JVTRPLZZ said...

I think WHGs might speak Afro-Asiatic due to me reading sometime ago that there was a link between WHGs and Middle Easterners (specially considering that they 'suddenly' appear in Europe, totally different adna and ydna from before), and exactly that link between I and J ydna. But this is all speculative of me.
Also, I agree with the R ydna being linked to Siberians, IE, Uralic, etc. I even believe that Tupi and Guarani languages of South America have links to the macro family. But, as you said, just as say, the Basques today, who have IE ydna without spoking IE, this might have happened to the WHG group who got V88.
The thing is: there is European HG adna in Anatolians pre-migration, and this might be a huge clue.

@Kyu
There are many papers showing this European HG adna in Anatolians. Even the "Massive Migrations from the Steppe" one shows that. And I don't think the V88 Chad mystery got solved yet.

Carlos Aramayo said...

@Davidski

This is a recent qpAdm run uploaded on X, what do you think?:

https://x.com/kadian_anurag/status/1955580828131700768

"The DS32 R1a-Y3 sample from the Semiluk site, dated to 3rd-4th century BC, appears to have distinctive IVC admixture. My qpAdm (ancestry) model for sample DS32 passes with a p-value of 0.21 (threshold is 0.05) and establishes this sample (DS32) to be 86% Sintashta + 14% IVC West"

Can we find the same sample run on G25?


Davidski said...

What's the sample ID of the R1a-Y3 individual?

Kyu said...

@JVTRPLZZ
The closest link between WHG and Middle Easterners is Caucasus UP (Dzudzuana-like) from before 20kya
But we know that Y-DNA I and mtDNA U5 were already in the Gravettian Vestonice cluster and they also contributed to WHG, also that the TMRCA of IJ is all the way back in 42kya

From what I've seen, Anatolia HG just seems to be descended from Caucasus UP, so the more European links (e.g. C1a2 in Pinarbasi downstream of UP Europeans) may already be present in Dzudzuana, perhaps it could have to do with the slight affinity to Muierii in comparison to other UP Europeans
The Marmara I2 also doesn't serve much, it doesn't show up until the Ceramic period and it's only found in well, Marmara
And as a final note, older models with Anatolians as WHG + Natufian are representing a pseudo-profile, with Dzudzuana we know that Anatolians are in fact the closest to the source population and that WHG and Natufians are admixed

Now back to R-V88, it's pretty clear that it was Cardial that spread it, first during the Mesolithic V88 was pretty much only in the Balkans (Villabruna has an older upstream clade and even then it's the only Mesolithic R1b in Western Europe as far as I'm aware), with EEF picking it up and spreading it
Another thing is that we have Cardial samples with V88 who are upstream of African V88 (also that the shared TMRCA is in around 5600 BC)
And we also know the Cardial culture spread to North Africa

Rob said...

@ Tom

''Which camp do you fall into when it comes to Corded Ware... brother group derived from the same genetic pool of forest-steppe borderland clans as Yamnaya, or an unsampled Yamnaya sub-group not buried in kurgans as per Anthony? I used to reject the latter explanation, but certain archaeological connections between Budzhak and CWC are interesting.''

DA just has a boner for his little Yamnaya corner because that's all he knows, which isn't much. Yamnaya is neither the source of CW, nor PIE. Im tired of reading this nonsense by pseudo-pop scholars

Btw I dont think Somu even realises he's trolling - he's just lonely and a bit simple

Carlos Aramayo said...

@Davidski

"What's the sample ID of the R1a-Y3 individual?"

The sample ID is DS21, actually Y2, considered Scythian, the site is Kolbino I, in Russia. Yfull dot com puts it under Y2.

Davidski said...

@Carlos

I can't see any genuine South Asian ancestry in this sample. It only shows up at very low levels when there's a lack of more plausible Central Asian and East Asian alternatives.

Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21,0.125205,0.082258,0.056945,0.071383,0.011079,0.031236,0.000235,0.006692,-0.009204,-0.034989,0.000974,-0.004796,0.006244,0.003853,0.003529,0.003182,0.000261,0.001014,-0.006913,-0.000125,-0.001497,-0.000247,0.00493,-0.005543,-0.000599

Carlos Aramayo said...

"I can't see any genuine South Asian ancestry in this sample. It only shows up at very low levels when there's a lack of more plausible Central Asian and East Asian alternatives... Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21..."

Thanks David, anyway the other sample mentioned was DS32: Non_Scythian Middle Don, Semiluk.
And this one was claimed to be: 86% Sintashta + 14% IVC West, p-value of 0.21.

Davidski said...

Again, no actual South Asian ancestry.

Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian:DS32,0.126344,0.099522,0.061471,0.061047,0.019388,0.022311,0.004465,0.005077,-0.019225,-0.026242,-0.000812,-0.013038,0.010109,0.000275,-0.002579,0.013259,0.015125,-0.004561,-0.006788,0.006378,-0.005116,-0.000371,-0.002711,-0.004579,-0.008382

Shomu said...

@Carlos Aramayo
Target: Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian:DS32__BC_300__Cov_92.95%
Distance: 1.4694% / 0.01469353 | R3P
65.0 Poland_Trzciniec_MBA
22.4 Armenia_NerkinGetashen_LBA_son.I18166.AG
12.6 Russia_Karasuk_oRISE.SG

Shomu said...

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21
Distance: 0.9578% / 0.00957832 | R3P
66.6 Poland_Trzciniec_MBA
24.6 Kazakhstan_IA_Tasbas.AG
8.8 Armenia_Areni1_Chalcolithic.AG

Carlos Aramayo said...

OK, thanks David and Shomu.

Gioiello said...


@JVTRPLZZ

“The thing is: there is European HG adna in Anatolians pre-migration, and this might be a huge clue”.

In fact I have been seeing for so long that the theory of the migration from Anatolia to Europe of the EEF is a fake, because the same theorists of “Ex Oriente lux” took the Northern Anatolia data as they were all the Middle East, even Sardinians were taken as Anatolian EEF, but they were people of the northern Mediterranean coasts. The same mistake was made with Etruscans, also because they were probably of the hg G-L497, but there is the hg G-L91 of Oetzi, 5300 ybp, and there was some sample of that hg already many centuries before in central Italy. Probably the genetist Paolo Francalacci, a great scholar of the Sardinian DNA, thought to demonstrate that through a study funded by some banks of the eastern Ligurian/Northern Western Tuscany for the initiative of who was once a friend of mine, but I dont know at which point is that study.

@Kyu
“There are many papers showing this European HG adna in Anatolians. Even the "Massive Migrations from the Steppe" one shows that. And I don't think the V88 Chad mystery got solved yet”.

The YFull tree (and all the others occurred after) demonstrates that R-V88 was in Europe long before the migration to Africa about 7500 years ago (I remember you the Zilhao migration). The aDNA demonstrates so far its origin in central Europe/Balkans. I think the Villabrunas before.

Gioiello said...

@ Kyu

“Now back to R-V88, it's pretty clear that it was Cardial that spread it, first during the Mesolithic V88 was pretty much only in the Balkans (Villabruna has an older upstream clade and even then it's the only Mesolithic R1b in Western Europe as far as I'm aware), with EEF picking it up and spreading it”.

After Villabruna a similar sample was found in the western Alps, at Les Iboussiéres, of 12000 ybp, and Villabruna was at the autosomic level the same as I-M223, found only in Italy between 20000 and 10000 ybp from Tagliente 2 to Apulia, thus its presence is at least 17000 years old in the Alpine zone.

Kyu said...

@Rob
I've known about that, and I also addressed it in my comment
As it's doubtful that AHG has anything extra in comparison to Dzudzuana, then perhaps this European component that brought C1a2 was already in Caucasus UP
It could also relate to the Muierii affinity in Dzudzuana

And for the difference between Anatolian C1a2 and I2, the C clade has an older TMRCA and is more widespread while the I2 has a younger TMRCA and is only found in Marmara

Kyu said...

I previously thought about C1a2 being from Early WHG (preferably before the minor ANE, so just Dzudzuana + Vestonice) but again it's doubtful that AHG has anything extra in comparison to Dzudzuana
But either way Marmara I2 is probably from a later wave

Rob said...

@ Kyu
''I've known about that, and I also addressed it in my comment
As it's doubtful that AHG has anything extra in comparison to Dzudzuana, then perhaps this European component that brought C1a2 was already in Caucasus UP. It could also relate to the Muierii affinity in Dzudzuana

And for the difference between Anatolian C1a2 and I2, the C clade has an older TMRCA and is more widespread while the I2 has a younger TMRCA and is only found in Marmara''

Yes I2c and C1a in Anatolia probably represent 2 different phenomena.
The "Marmaran' I2c expanded in NW Anatolia, and to a modest degree back to SEE (e.g its in Varna). So the 'TMRCA" (of ~ 7000 bc, acc ftDNA) is an 'expansion commencement time'. It is one specific subclade of I2c which split from the main bulk of European I2c, with a estimated 'split time' of ~ 14000 BC. This is consistent with an late Paelo or early Meso move from Balkans to Marmara. It's associated with a specific type of 'bullet core' technology which looks mesolithic ('Ponto-Danubian"), so I'd favour a date later than the upper limit inference of 14000.

As for C1a in AHG, the situation apperas complex. I agree that AHG doesn't have any WHG in it, it's essentially the same as Dzudzuana.
From a Y-DNA perspective, Pinarbasi has been assigned to C-PH428, which is within C1a-V20. Its closest affinities are with Gravettian indivduals from Europe (Vestonice & Spain), and more distantly Sunghir, Goyet, Kostenki-12, Fournol etc). Moreover, C-PH428 splits into C-BY1463 (which is only found in Europe) and C-PH428- which is found in Pinarbasi, Anatolian Farmers, and later EEF.
This can only mean that C-PH428 is a marker of some sort of migration from Europe to Anatolia, it cannot represent a vestigeal, archaic or basal remnant. The two subgroups split c. 20000 BC, so it probably moved there during the Ice Age. This is also clear because post-Ice Age individuals from the rest of West Asia belong to very different Hgs like G2, H2, J2, E, etc
A major issue is that we are somewhat in the dark about pre-Dzudzuana West Asia. Whatever the case, it looks like a Sunghir like group moved from Eastern or SE Europe to the Caucasus and Anatolia during the Ice Age

JVTRPLZZ said...

About WHG and AHG, from the Wikipedia AHG article:

"In addition, their position in this analysis is intermediate between Natufian farmers and Western Hunter-Gatherers (WHG). This last point is confirmed by the ADMIXTURE and qp-Adm analysis and confirms the presence of hunter-gatherers of both European and Near-Eastern origins in Central Anatolia in the late Pleistocene. Mesolithic individuals from the Balkans, known as Iron Gates Hunter-Gatherers, are the most genetically similar group to the Anatolian Hunter-Gatherer lineage. Feldman et al. suggest that this affinity is not due to a genetic flow from the AHG to the ancestors of the Villabruna cluster, but on the contrary: there was a genetic flow from the ancestors of the Villabruna cluster to the ancestors of the AHG."

The study:
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6425003/

Kyu said...

@JVTRPLZZ
I've answered this in my previous reply, the WHG + Natufian represents a pseudo-profile, and in reality AHG is the closest to the source population (Dzudzuana-like), while WHG and Natufians are admixed (WHG with Gravettians and a bit of ANE, Natufians with ANA via Iberomaurusian-related backflow)
As for Iron Gates, it seems to show a bit of extra Anatolian in comparison to WHG

Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

WHG also has some complex relationship with BK1653 and maybe GoyetQ116-1, although that may be due to the unresolved nature of Upper Paleolithic Europe

Kyu said...

@Norfern-Ostrobothnian
I can see the Vestonice-like group that contributed to WHG picking some extra BK1653, especially as they were pushed southwards
As for the Fournol connection, it's probably really late and is it even present in the oldest samples?

Rob said...

Afro-Asiatic expanded from northeast Africa, because all the main branches seem to radiate from there. Chadic represents a western expansion across Africa, and someehow modern Chads picked up R1b-V88. This was probably via post-Cardial Iberia, because we know Moroccan N have Cardial admixture. So obvoiusly R1b-V88 has nothing to do with AA, but was just assimilated into one specific sub-group.
Moreover, neither WHG, nor AHG, nor Anatolian Farmers spoke anythign resembling AA, but some Natufians might have spoken an early form of Semitic, as they have some north African admixture over AHG.

@ Norfern
''WHG also has some complex relationship with BK1653 and maybe GoyetQ116-1, although that may be due to the unresolved nature of Upper Paleolithic Europe''

Im not seeing any direct links between BK1653 (or Goyet) with WHG, but Vestonice has BK1653 admixture. However, itself BK1653 looks like it became locally exinct, pointing to discontinuities in the Balkan Paleo History

Shomu said...

@Kuy

https://phys.org/news/2025-08-neolithic-agriculture-hunter-farmers-coexisted.html

Neolithic agriculture's slow spread: Study shows hunter-gatherers and farmers coexisted and gradually interbred
by University of Geneva

Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

R1b-V88 dynamics likely requires further study of later population dynamics and not just Neolithic sources. This study implies that Baggara Arabs may be the source of R1b-V88 in Chad.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6240361/

EthanR said...

Phylogenetically, sub-saharan R-V88 is is very likely prehistoric, if not neolithic. There's likely too much diversity for it to have been much more recent.
https://discover.familytreedna.com/y-dna/R-FGC21028/tree

Gioiello said...

@ Norfern Ostrobothnian

The oldest R-V88 in Africa is R-FGC21028, less than 7500 ybp, thus the origin of the haplogroup is in Europe and not elsewhere. That it came to Africa from Iberia and not Italy or the Balkans is a possibility, also because it was brought to Iberia from Italy through the Zilhao migration of 7500 years ago.
I exchanged hundreds or even thousands of letters with Sam Vass more than 15 years ago, a Hungarian Jew who knew all that this paper says (paper of 2018, 7 years ago). I concluded that his haplogroup entered the Jewish pool in Iberia probably from an Arabn Y after the Arab conquest of Iberia. This paper belongs to a tentative similar to the “Ex Oriente lux” one.
More difficult was to accept the position of the same Cruciani, the discover of the V SNPs. I disproved his position in 2010 on Worldfamilies.

Rob said...

That was an interesting article, within the limits of inferring from modern data. They concluded ''We also found that the spread of R1b can be attributed to Baggara Arabs, not ancient Eurasians or Near Eastern farmers'.'
Doesn't quite address our quasi-Cardial scenario.
R1b-V88 is spread in Sudan, Libya, Chad, and some Arabs from Saudi. Could in fact be gene flow from Africa to some Arab regions, not vice versa. It does seem that these fall under (distantly) Iberian branches rather than Italian-Sardinian or Balkan ones, but no clear trail as yet.
As a side issue, it had been proposed that Morrocan Neolithic influenced the Cardial culture of western Europe, but it turns out it is the other way around.

Shomu said...

https://t.me/AskerkhanProDagestan/865?single

The fourth month of our excavations at the Zidyan-Kazmalyar settlement is coming to an end, and I am eager to share with you a selection of the 10 most interesting finds: 1) a ceramic figurine with distinctly emphasized female features symbolizing motherhood and fertility; 2) a complete ceramic storage vessel buried upside down; 3) a ceramic model of a wagon wheel; 4) a hearth stand; 5) a fragment of an imported ceramic vessel, presumably from the Near East; 6) a flint insert from a composite sickle blade; 7) a child’s burial with bent elbows and knees; 8) a ceramic disc engraved with diamond-shaped patterns and lines; 9) a vessel handle decorated with a stylized human face; 10) an amulet made from a predator’s tooth with a hole for threading a cord.
And these are not all of our discoveries. There are many more: fragments of stone querns and grinders, ceramic vessels, bone tools, flint inserts, and much more. Special mention should be made of the remains of dwellings and several burials.
The finds and complexes from the Zidyan-Kazmalyar settlement date to around 5500 years ago and provide important information about the life of people in Dagestan during the Early Bronze Age.

Shomu said...

older than Kura Araks

Shomu said...

one of the first models of a wheel? who here is interested in wheeled transport, when and where did wheels first appear?

Ash said...

Target: Russia_Stavropol_Sarmatian:AB109__BC_307__Cov_9.92%
Distance: 1.9571% / 0.01957113
74.2 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
17.2 Iran_ShahrISokhta_BA2
5.4 Mongolia_LBA_Khovsgol_6
3.2 Russia_Shamanka_EBA

This sample is picking IVC signal...

Rob said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Ash said...

This samples mtdna is C4a1...

Modern population with this mtdna
Pamiri 7
Pakistan 7
Iran 9

Kangju also has this mtdna...mediated by steppe females in India and Iran?

Ash said...

Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian samples are pretty close to Moksha...


Target: Moksha:MOE-433
Distance: 1.8769% / 0.01876889
45.4 Latvia_BA
28.4 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
20.0 Greece_PalaceOfNestor_BA
6.2 Russia_Krasnoyarsk_BA


Target: Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian:DS92__BC_300__Cov_64.66%
Distance: 1.6787% / 0.01678737
43.8 Latvia_BA
32.2 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
19.2 Greece_PalaceOfNestor_BA
4.8 Russia_Krasnoyarsk_BA

If less than 5% ancestry can topple language of steppe_chads...even BMAC can do it with Steppe_MLBA...

Ash said...

Scythian paper was right...
No special affinity for sintashta in the Y2 samples...


Target: Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian:DS90__BC_300__Cov_93.25%
Distance: 1.6107% / 0.01610747
75.8 Poland_Trzciniec_MBA
18.6 Greece_PalaceOfNestor_BA
5.6 Russia_Shamanka_EBA

Target: Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian:DS32__BC_300__Cov_92.95%
Distance: 1.8615% / 0.01861487
79.6 Poland_Trzciniec_MBA
15.4 Turkey_Hatay_Alalakh_MLBA
5.0 Russia_Shamanka_EBA

Target: Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian:DS90__BC_300__Cov_93.25%
Distance: 1.4526% / 0.01452632
81.2 Poland_Trzciniec_MBA
13.8 Turkey_Hatay_Alalakh_MLBA
5.0 Russia_Shamanka_EBA

Davidski said...

C4a1 is a Siberian and East Asian lineage.

It arrived in South Asia recently.

Ash said...

3rd Y2 sample...

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21__BC_375__Cov_90.51%
Distance: 1.4804% / 0.01480370
79.2 Poland_Trzciniec_MBA
14.0 Turkmenistan_Gonur_BA_1
6.8 Russia_Shamanka_EBA

So all samples are showing affinity to Poland_Trzciniec_MBA...any idea which linguistic association this culture has?

Ash said...

500 years? 1000 years? Or more recently?

Davidski said...

These samples are only distantly related to Trzciniec via shared R1a-rich Corded Ware ancestry.

They're actually derived from Sintashta and Abashevo, but with significant Central Asian ancestry.

The Central Asian ancestry was mostly mediated by females.

Gioiello said...

@ Davidski

In fact C4a1 and subclades is very recent in Europe (I'd say medieval), but in Iran it could be also only less than 4000 years ago (only the subclade C4a1a3). Don't consider the YFull ages, that are largely underestimated.

Davidski said...

Well, obviously, C4a1 was in Europe as early as the Iron Age, because Sarmatians and Scythians are an Iron Age people.

Shomu said...

and when did the wheel first appear in Europe?

Erik Andersson said...

Voronezh samples are just a two-way mix of iron age steppe and Baltic-related ancestry, e.g.:

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21__BC_375__Cov_90.51%
Distance: 1.8696% / 0.01869625
50.4 Russia_EarlySarmatian_SouthernUrals.SG
49.6 Hungary_IA_LaTene_o3

Rob said...

It's interesting now that we have a scattering of samples from Iron Age forest-steppe Ukraine & Russia, often favoured as a 'proto-Slavic' cradle. These groups don't quite fit the proto-Slavic profile, as they're either nomad admixed or too 'Thracian-oid'. Would suggest that P-Sl come from elsewhere, perhaps somewhere further north/ northwest. Although I havent looked at the new data from Gretzinger et al.

Rob said...

@ Shomu
''and when did the wheel first appear in Europe?''

By at least 3500 bc, essentially the same time in late TRB, Baden, steppe & Majkop.

Rob said...

@ Erik

''Voronezh samples are just a two-way mix of iron age steppe and Baltic-related ancestry, e.g.:

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21__BC_375__Cov_90.51%
Distance: 1.8696% / 0.01869625
50.4 Russia_EarlySarmatian_SouthernUrals.SG
49.6 Hungary_IA_LaTene_o3'

The paper suggests they correspond to historical Budini & Geloni
Can you do another model without using the La Tene outlier, but a more robust alternative ?

Ash said...

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21__BC_375__Cov_90.51%
Distance: 1.4041% / 0.01404055
52.6 Russia_Sarmatian
38.0 Latvia_BA
9.4 Greece_PalaceOfNestor_BA

Erik Andersson said...

@Rob

UKR116 is probably the best option:

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21__BC_375__Cov_90.51%
Distance: 2.0628% / 0.02062836
55.0 Ukraine_Kharkiv_Scythian_SivDon_NomEl_3_EIA:UKR116__BC_645__Cov_46.54%
45.0 Russia_EarlySarmatian_SouthernUrals.SG

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21__BC_375__Cov_90.51%
Distance: 1.7088% / 0.01708835
57.8 Ukraine_Kharkiv_Scythian_SivDon_NomEl_3_EIA:UKR116__BC_645__Cov_46.54%
42.2 Kazakhstan_Sarmatian_IA.AG:SGZ001.AG__BC_276__Cov_85.79%

Either way it's basically an even mix between Belarusian/Lithuanian-like and Sarmatian-like ancestry.

Ebizur said...

MtDNA haplogroup C4a1 total among Han Chinese (Li Yuchun et al. 2019)
6/342 = 1.8% Tianjin Han
7/437 = 1.6% Heilongjiang Han
5/381 = 1.3% Jilin Han
1/77 = 1.3% Xinjiang Han
8/652 = 1.2% Shanxi Han
11/900 = 1.22% Hubei Han
2/176 = 1.1% Inner Mongolia Han
6/562 = 1.1% Shaanxi Han
9/898 = 1.0% Beijing Han
3/310 = 0.97% Gansu Han
23/2471 = 0.931% Jiangsu Han
10/1099 = 0.910% Hebei Han
4/497 = 0.80% Jiangxi Han
5/646 = 0.77% Liaoning Han
151/21668 = 0.6969% Han Chinese total
12/1844 = 0.651% Shandong Han
12/1912 = 0.628% Zhejiang Han
6/1016 = 0.59% Henan Han
5/1099 = 0.45% Shanghai Han
2/452 = 0.44% Chongqing Han
3/738 = 0.41% Anhui Han
3/805 = 0.37% Hunan Han
2/620 = 0.32% Fujian Han
4/1330 = 0.30% Sichuan Han
2/1562 = 0.13% Guangdong Han
0/6 Macau Han
0/18 Hong Kong Han
0/25 Qinghai Han
0/39 Ningxia Han
0/49 Hainan Han
0/94 Taiwan Han
0/157 Guizhou Han
0/222 Guangxi Han
0/232 Yunnan Han

It is worth keeping in mind that mtDNA haplogroup C4a1 (& subclades) is fairly common among present-day Han Chinese, accounting for approximately 0.7% of all mtDNA among them. Y-DNA haplogroup R1a1a is also fairly common among present-day Han Chinese, accounting for approximately 0.875% of all Y-DNA among them (cf. Tao Yichen et al. 2023). This contrasts starkly with Finnish types of Y-DNA haplogroup N, which are not found among Han Chinese at all.

Rob said...

Erik cool.. I do like Ash’s model as it uses core meta populations, although an Aegean influenced Thracian n might be more appropriate than mycenean

Rob said...

@ Ethan , Shomu
have you looked at the specific links of the mtDNA for the CHG (2 x Kotias, Satsurblia), .e.g. is there an mtDNA of ftDNA Y trees ?

EthanR said...

@Rob
The mtdna is fairly obscure. They aren't on their mtdna tree yet but:
The two Kotias samples should be under:
https://discover.familytreedna.com/mtdna/H13c/tree
Satsurblia:
https://discover.familytreedna.com/mtdna/K3/tree

Unfortunately only newly published samples are reliably posted yet on their mtdna trees, but that does mean that almost all the new Yamnaya samples are there.

EthanR said...

The Y-dna for Kotias seems to show up again where you would expect it (ctrl f for both):
https://discover.familytreedna.com/y-dna/J-M172/tree
Satsurblia Y-dna is an obscure branch (although an Usatovo sample should end up somewhere on here):
https://discover.familytreedna.com/y-dna/J-FT265251/tree

Rob said...

@ Ethan, Thanks I was aware about them neing K3 and H13, but would be nice to visualise them in tree form to gain perspective on their broader affinities. Actually Y Full have them, but I prefer the ftDNA time tree better

Gioiello said...

@ Rob

Whereas we knew that K3 was old in the Caucasus, but not K1 and K2, about H13 we have in the Caucasus and Near East H13c, but H is clearly from Europe, many thought to the Franco-Cantabrian refugium, but I wrote thousands of letters about the old samples in Italy.

Rob said...

@ Gio, thanks for your description. I think that K3 and other related K lineages represent the bi-directional or possibly even out of Europe movements to West Asia, paralleling Y-hg C1a.
MtDNA H I think is west asian in origin. It has not shown up in any properly sequenced European ancient sample before the Neolithic

Gio said...

@ Rob

When the first K3 was discovered, many Years ago, was a surprise to me but to all people. I am K1a1b1e, and we were searching for the K1 and K2 haplogroups, and was a surprise the Caucasus and eastward.
About hg H all thought to the Franco-Cantabrian refugium, but I found many very old subclades also in Italy. To know more about a hg H with 12 extramutations, I contacted Barbara Ann Lewis, an adopted American, and in three Years, through 23andMe, I found her parents, and she resulted full blooded Italian, with an 8% of Greek/Balkans for old contacts but also for a recent Arbereshe intake. This is the percentage in Adriatic coast, but I have very strong links with the Minoans of 4000 Years ago. She resulted H105*, and it is in Italy at least for 10000 Years.
I'll look at the more recent findings, but, as for the Y, the findings in aDNA are many thousands of Years after their origin, and of course I use other methods in my previsions, otherwise I never had supposed Villabruna. Let's wait.

Rob said...

If anyone is interest in CHG and other West Asian Paleo groups, I did a little exercise here
https://x.com/DrRob82/status/1959909104950067267

(not that I really post much or 'promote' on X )

Finngreek said...

@Rob

"The paper suggests they correspond to historical Budini & Geloni"
What paper is this? Do you have a link? Thanks.

Rob said...

@ Finngreek

From this study https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.ads8179

Rob said...

@ Finngreek
You might find these interesting from above study

Russia_Udmurtia_Pyanoborskaya
~ Srubnaya 60% Yakutia LN 30% EHG-SHG 10%

Finngreek said...

@Rob
Thanks, I wanted to make sure it was the right one. I recently discussed the problems with the "Budini + Geloni" association of this article here: https://genarchivist.net/showthread.php?tid=96&pid=56783#pid56783

@Ash
I'd be interested in seeing for Moksha and non-Scythian Voronezh how Archaic Greek samples from Miletus, Olbia etc. would perform as a substitution for Nestor Palace BA, since the former would be more synchronous with Finno-Mordvinic, and more relevant to the Ionic Black Sea expansion.

Ash said...

What is your take on this Hasanlu_IA sample?

Target: Iran_Hasanlu_IA:I6430__BC_900__Cov_74.92%
Distance: 1.3476% / 0.01347634
59.2 Turkey_Hatay_Alalakh_MLBA
27.4 Iran_ShahrISokhta_BA2
13.4 Russia_Steppe_Catacomb

Iran_ShahrISokhta_BA2/BA1 both works and better than BMAC sample...

Ash said...

Does this model pass on qpadm for Mitanni era Hasanlu sample?

Target: Iran_Hasanlu_IA_o:I4097__BC_1354__Cov_86.75%
Distance: 1.2493% / 0.01249324
56.8 Iran_ShahrISokhta_BA1
27.6 Turkey_Hatay_Alalakh_MLBA
15.6 Russia_Steppe_Catacomb

Seems like someone from Afghanistan...

Rob said...

@ Finngreek

''https://genarchivist.net/showthread.php?tid=96&pid=56783#pid56783'

Yep it's hard to match archaeological digs to poorly & briefly described peoples in Greek texts. A simplistic reading of Herodotus and dubious archaeological paradigms have misled a lot of people about Scythians as a whole.
Still, it is interesting that some groups on the northern border of steppe Scythians are a mix of Baltic BA -like ancestry + Srubnya

For me, the most interesting part is it dissolves the bullshit about historical Scythians coming from the Altai.

The Real Scythians from Zaporizha steppe & Stavropol derive ~ 70% of their ancestry from Srubnaya, ~ 20-30% from MBA Caucasus populations, and some individuals have ~ 10% Khovsgol/ south Siberian ancestry

Compared to the Fake Scythians from Tuva & east Kazakhstan, who are ~ 60% Khovsgol + 40% Srubnaya.

Then Sarmatians are 60% Srubnaya 30% Gonur 10% Khovsgol

Obviously, these are all very different groups, and their only clear link is Srubnaya-Andronovo ancestry, with only some minor later flow between them, usually due to mobile individuals

Rob said...

Correction
Russia_Udmurtia_Pyanoborskaya
~ Srubnaya 60% Yakutia LN 30% EHG-WSHG 10

Ash said...

@finngreek

Baltic_BA + Voronezh_Srubnaya/Steppe_MLBA + Siberian + ANF related...

Replaced Palace of Nestor with Turkey_Aegean_Mugla_Degirmendere_Ancient...getting similar result...for both non scythian and Moksha...

That is why paper has modeled some of these samples with Baltic_BA+Siberian+Greece...all these samples are related to Baltic_BA or Poland_Trzciniec_MBA like population due to that HG shift in their steppe ancestry which the original Srubnaya sintashta population don't have...

Question though is was it Steppe_MLBA population that mixed with HG population or cordedware population that mixed with HG population to form Latvia_BA or Poland_Trzciniec_MBA like population....and eventually was it this population that mixed with Siberian ANF ppl or was Steppe_MLBA also involved in the process...

Ash said...

Latvia_BA has 3 R1a-CTS1211, 1 R1a-Z645 (Fatyanovo > Steppe_MLBA, Unetice, oldest one is in Estonia) , 1 R1a-Z2123 (this is specifically Steppe_MLBA branch), 2 R1a-M417.

Ash said...

Y2 scythian can be modeled like this...

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21__BC_375__Cov_90.51%
Distance: 1.2937% / 0.01293654
43.4 Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian
39.2 Kazakhstan_Sarmatian_IA
17.4 Latvia_BA

Or

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS21__BC_375__Cov_90.51%
Distance: 1.6836% / 0.01683551
71.0 Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian
29.0 Kazakhstan_Sarmatian_IA

Ash said...

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:Dev4__BC_267__Cov_99.89%
Distance: 1.7723% / 0.01772271
98.4 Kazakhstan_Sarmatian_IA
1.6 Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:Dev3__BC_288__Cov_61.94%
Distance: 1.7526% / 0.01752574
75.6 Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian
24.4 Kazakhstan_Sarmatian_IA

Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:Dev2__BC_290__Cov_95.92%
Distance: 1.6580% / 0.01658032
65.0 Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian
35.0 Kazakhstan_Sarmatian_IA

Shomu said...

@Ash
listen... not bad... excellent 👍😯

Ash said...

Another interesting data point...

Early Alan 230CE

Target: Russia_Stavropol_EarlyAlan:AB105__AD_230__Cov_25.23%
Distance: 2.2315% / 0.02231501
63.2 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
20.0 Uzbekistan_SappaliTepe_BA
16.8 Mongolia_LBA_Khovsgol_6

Alans from 600CE onwards are KuraAraxes shifted with lower sintashta and no BMAC...which makes them similar to Koban guys...but koban guys have higher Steppe_MLBA

Ash said...

I wonder if these later Alans are basically non-Indo Iranian ppl who adopted Indo Iranian languages...Only the early Alan resemble Indo Iranian ppl while the others are closer to Caucasians...same goes with Koban samples..

Ash said...

PCA on this topic

https://ibb.co/7NZp4PVx

Ash said...

Unless I have gone color blind AS20 and AS21 have 0 BMAC contrary to the admixture image shared in the scythian paper...

Ash said...

Target: Ukraine_Zaporizhzhia_Scythian:AS34__BC_575__Cov_24.26%
Distance: 2.5457% / 0.02545685
69.8 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
20.0 Uzbekistan_SappaliTepe_BA
10.2 Russia_Shamanka_EBA


Target: Ukraine_Zaporizhzhia_Scythian:AS34__BC_575__Cov_24.26%
Distance: 2.6128% / 0.02612763
67.8 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
21.2 Armenia_Berkaber_KuraAraxes_EBA
11.0 Russia_Shamanka_EBA

Difficult to say from G25 if its BMAC or KuraAraxes related...

Ash said...

@rob

Check this PCA

https://ibb.co/gMwGbWjv

Carlos Aramayo said...

@Ash

These are the models by Andreeva et al. (23 July 2025):

DS21: 80% Latvia_BA, 11.1% Uzbekistan_Bustan_BA, 8.9% Russia_Krasnoyarsk_BA

DS32: 70% Latvia_BA, 22.2% Greece_BA_Mycenaean, 7.8% Russia_Shamanka_EBA

DS90: 74.4% Latvia_BA, 20% Turkey_Alalakh_MLBA, 5.6% Russia_Krasnoyarsk_BA

[Fig. S6. Proximal qpAdm admixture proportions for the tested IA samples. Each bar represents
the admixture proportions for each individual, based on the most suitable model with the
highest p-value. The results of qpAdm modeling are provided in detail in tables S59-S60.
For samples marked by asterisks (*) the fitted admixture models were only revealed when the
ancient Ethiopia_4500BP sample was excluded from the outgroup populations (see details in
Supplementary Note 9)].

Rob said...

@ Ash
please add more of the 'Scythians' - 3-4 of each of following subsets, non -outliers for now:
Aldy Bel, Tasmola/Central Saka, Tagar, Tian Shan Saka; Sarmatians (fine as are), Ural 'Scythian' MJ42;
UkrKharkiv_Cimmerian UKR066 (Saag); Ukr_Zaporizhzhia_350BC:UKR014 _ UKR013; Moldova 'Commerian 259 + 359; + the 2 new Zaporizhzhia from here + 1x Stavropol

Then also substrate Pops: Sintashta, Tyumen/ WSHG; Gonur/ Bustan; Khovsgol/ Shamanka EBA; Caucasus MBA + Kura Arax; Bulgaria IA, Latvia _BA

That should give a good overview


Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

What are the relevant linguistic facts for Proto-Samoyedic and Proto-North and South Samoyedic? Some linguistic contact layers, hydronyms, words that may reveal the environment of the language etc. Dating is not that relevant if it's not substantiated by some other linguistic dating such as contact layer matching.

Rob said...

@ norfern
Is a certain “linguist” from GA suggesting that the YakutiaLN profile spread Yukaghir languages ? 😂

Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

I think he jumped the gun with that conclusion based on putative loans found in Khanty. There's not enough to work with to speak in definitives.

Mostly I am trying to see what led to the conclusion of Tagar culture being considered proto-Samoyedic among some linguists.

Rob said...

@ Ash - correction, MDA Cimmerian should be 379 & 359

Finngreek said...

@Norfern
To my understanding, Samoyedic as Tagar goes back to Janhunen 1983, "On early Indo-European–Samoyed contacts." However, I don't have a copy. This discussion is continued in Janhunen 2009: 72, "Proto-Uralic - what, where and when?" (https://www.sgr.fi/sust/sust258/sust258_janhunen.pdf). Although not mentioning Tagar, Janhunen 2012 discusses the hydronymic evidence for Samoyedic on the Yenisei (https://www.academia.edu/44351079/Etymological_and_ethnohistorical_aspects_of_the_Yenisei).

Parpola 2013: 164-166 continues the discussion on Samoyedic as Tagar (https://www.academia.edu/23437942/Parpola_Asko_2012_2013_Formation_of_the_Indo_European_and_Uralic_Finno_Ugric_language_families_in_the_light_of_archaeology_Pp_119_184_in_R_Gr%C3%BCnthal_and_P_Kallio_eds_A_Linguistic_Map_of_Prehistoric_Northern_Europe_MSFOu_266_Helsinki). I personally don't consider many of the conclusions in Parpola 2013 to be thoughtful, but it is commonly cited. The conclusion of "East Uralic" as the Cherkaskul' culture, for example, has lost its linguistic substantiation since the status of "East Uralic" and even "Ugric" was challeneged by Holopainen & Aikio 2023 (https://www.academia.edu/117104280/The_development_of_sibilants_and_the_divergence_of_Ugric). Blazek 2016 has also concluded that Samoyedic is lexically closest to Finnic (https://www.academia.edu/81743635/On_the_classification_of_the_Samoyedic_languages_Finnisch_Ugrische_Forschungen_63_2016_79_125), and even Janhunen 2009 discussed the similarities of Finnic and Samoyedic: "Samoyedic is in some morphological and phonological respects so similar to the likewise conservative Finnic branch in the west that this has misled Ago Künnap (most recently, 2008) to postulate secondary contacts or ‘language shifts’ between the two extremities of the family."

Khanina & Kaheinen 2023 discusses the history of Northern Samoyedic (https://blogs.helsinki.fi/language-diversification-and-spread-north/files/2023/11/khanina_kaheinen_diversification_withlexicon.pdf). There is also some discussion on the linguistic history of Samoyedic in Saarikivi 2022: 47 (https://www.academia.edu/61676595/The_divergence_of_Proto_Uralic_and_its_offspring_A_descendent_reconstruction).
The inconvenient truth is that most Uralicists actually don't associate Samoyedic with Tagar, because they generally don't associate the proto-languages with cultures at all, since cultural anthropology is seen as a separate discipline. The correlation of Proto-Uralic with Seima-Turbino is the closest we've gotten thus far to a more widespread view among linguists, but it's often just mentioned in passing without any original views. The ST correlation leads to individual authors coming up with views that e.g. Proto-Uralic was spoken in Netted Ware or Okunevo, East Uralic was Cherkaskul', Samoyedic was Tagar etc. With Samoyedic at least, there appears to be linguistic evidence (i.e. "Yenisei") that the homeland was somewhere on or near the Upper Yenisei, e.g. along the Chulym as presented in Saarikivi 2022, which provides geographical support to it having been spoken in the Tagar culture. However, as I've expressed many times, I am highly skeptical that Proto-Uralic should be correlated with ST at all, and will eventually publish that discussion.

Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

@Finngreek thanks!

Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

Yenisei seems to have been borrowed from Samoyedic into Evenk.
"The conclusion from the above is that the name of the Yenisei was, indeed, transmitted from Samoyedic to Tungusic, and not vice versa. The borrowing took place fairly late, which means that Samoyedic has been spoken in the Yenisei region much longer than Tungusic. Clearly, the Yenisei has been one of the central geographical points of reference for Samoyedic speakers of all times, while for Tungusic speakers it represents a marginal feature, only known to a
few specific (western) sections of one of the Northern Tungusic groups, the Ewenki. All of this should, of course, also be evident from the overall dialectological situation, for Ewenki (Ewenic) is a remarkably uniform language with little dialectal variation all over Siberia and Manchuria. This can only mean that it has spread to its historically known area of distribution very rapidly and very
late. Without going into the details, it has to be added that other “evidence” quoted in favour of an early Tungusic presence on the Yenisei, including the alleged Tungusic “loanwords” in Khanty (Futaky 1975), also involves serious problems."
Page 81
https://www.academia.edu/44351079/Etymological_and_ethnohistorical_aspects_of_the_Yenisei

Rob said...

Why do we need to place proto-Samoyedic in the yenesei if the proto-Uralic profile developed in the Lena basin (as ~ Lena Meso + Baikal N) ?

Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

@Rob
Proto-Samoyedic is a later phenomenon. The main arguments I've seen so far are
1. common name for the Yenisei river
2. Turkic contact on the proto-Turkic stage
3. (pre-)proto-Samoyedic contact with proto-Yukaghir
4. Samoyedic language dispersal

None of these in my personal view necessarily put proto-Samoyedic in any particular place along or near the Yenisei, the criteria could be met on places like the Ket or Chulym rivers which reach for the Yenisei river. The most interesting factor I see is the proto-Turkic contact layer, that ties the language somewhere southern enough for that to happen.

Rob said...

Actually, I am not getting a "Pass' with Baikal + Kolyma _mesolithic, instead solid pass as Baikal or Shamanka + Devils Gate. WSHG also fail, as does the Bazaika individual from the upper Yenesei. This makes the Yakutia_LN very 'eastern' indeed.

What are the views about Indo-Iranian/ proto-Iranian loans into Samoyedic vs Uralic as a whole (present/ absent, more limited) ?

Rob said...

@ Norfern
Aren't Yeneseian speakers 'native' to the Yenesei basin, a relict ANE-rich population ?
Then, the preferred proto-Turkic homeland is in central-eastern Mongolia and Transbaikalia. It is not required for a southern FU & Samoyedic homeland for such contact to occur. Adding in the Samoyedic-Yukagir contacts, this triangulates their origins to northeastern Siberia.
With regard to your point (4), a direct west/northwest dispersal of Samoyeds is parsiminous over a loopy route. Perhaps post-Samoyedic Uralic groups were more southern, c/w the ancestry profile of Pyanbor and larger set of proto-Iranian loans.

Ash said...

@rob

https://ibb.co/Mk8Yh80L

Shomu said...

Mystical Tombs and Lights: 150 Unique Burial Mounds Discovered in Kazakhstan
"These ancient sites, believed to date back to the Early Iron Age, may be linked to an unknown civilization or possibly the Sarmatians, nomadic tribes known to inhabit the steppes."
👇
https://arkeonews.net/mystical-lights-and-ancient-tombs-150-unique-burial-mounds-discovered-in-kazakhstan/

Rob said...

@ Ash

Nice. I did a slightly different PCA. Trziniec is not particularly relevant for steppe Scythians so we will exclude it. We will also exclude Vorezhneh and other forest-steppe 'Scythianoids', Thracians, Hungarian-Halstatt, southern Balto-Slavs, etc.
Instead, we use steppe Scythians from Zaporizhzhia & Stavropol; I have added in some Caucasus groups as well.

https://imgur.com/a/gp4WxIi

The first major group are Altai 'Scythians', which includes a few early IA nomads from Ukraine & Moldova (conventionally termed 'Cimmerians') and the Ural 'Scythian'. The 'Cimmerians' date as early as 1000 BC, and thus predate or are at least as old as Altai Scythians. But none of those are really Scthians.
The second major cluster is composed of historical Scythians from the Ponto-Caucasus region and Sarmatians.

Formal analyses & downstream Y-DNA are required to determine whether the similarity between historical Scythians & Sarmatians is real or coincidental, and in any case historical 'Sarmatians' might represent a later, second wave. Some of the Scythians are pulled toward the Caucasus, consistent with the archaeologial trail of Koban contacts. Centuries later, some Sarmatians also pulled toward the Caucasus to produce the Alans.

If my hypothesis is true, it would explain why historical Scythian & Sarmatians spoke similar Iranic languages.

As a side note, MJ-08 individual from Kumy in eastern Ukraine. Not sure why she has been labeleld as 'late Srubnaya', as that culture ended c. 1100 BC and the individual dates to ~ 600 BC- in line with Bondarika-Belogrudivka culture. Nevertheless, she is a straight-up Srubnajan, demonstrating a degree of population continuity.

Rob said...

@ Finngreek

'Parpola 2013: 164-166 continues the discussion on Samoyedic as Tagar''

Tagar as Samoyed, recently Torok proposed Mezhovskaya as Ugric. Others have variously linked Uralic branches with Karasuk culture, another with Okunevo. Haakinen recently Koptyaki for 'late Uralic' as a whole.
The issue here is all these proposals are off by a football field or two (to be metaphorical). These groups overwhelmingly derive from Sintashta ->Andronovo, with Y-hg R1a-Z93, and the 'eastern hunter' ancestry they do have is the 'wrong type' (Okunevo is an exception here, which is ~ 90% BZK + 10% Afansievo). Of course, some post-Andronovo groups could have 'language switched' to non-IE or been biglossic, I have made this arguement for Siberian 'Saka', but it is a non-viable to explain the dispersal of Uralic as a whole.
Im not sure that even the S-T scenario captures the entire complexity of Uralic dispersal to the west, however the Zheng et al study is certainly a step in the right direction.

EastPole said...

@Rob

"If my hypothesis is true, it would explain why historical Scythian & Sarmatians spoke similar Iranic languages".


Claiming Scythians and Sarmatians “spoke similar Iranic languages” is not hard science — it’s speculation. We have no texts, just a few names and glosses with ambiguous etymologies that can be read in multiple ways. Genetic and archaeological evidence shows huge diversity among these groups, so assuming a single Iranic language is an oversimplification. And your reasoning is circular: you assume they were Iranic-speaking, then use that assumption to “explain” why they spoke Iranic. That’s not evidence, that’s self-confirmation.

Rob said...

@ East Pole

We have no texts from CW, but according to your Turbo-Slav beliefs, they were obviously Slavs. On the other hand, we do actually have some textual and inscription evidence of steppe-Scythian female and male names to be Iranic, yet you find this presumptive and self-confirmatory.

Clearly you have little grasp of the
deductive process



Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

At the very least the Issyk Saka seem to have spoken something broadly East Iranian

EastPole said...

@Rob

So the proof that they spoke Iranic is… that you believe they spoke Iranic? Convenient
With no texts and a few shaky etymologies, declaring Scythians and Sarmatians ‘Iranic-speaking’ is like calling a handful of Lego bricks a cathedral.

Rob said...

@ East Pole
Etymologizing isn’t my thing, I’ll defer to linguists. If you want to suggest that historical Scythes actually spoke something else - feel free to shows the arguments.
But linguistics isn’t the focus of my discussion. The discussion is really about the problem i have about the claim that Scythians come from the Altai which is either wrong, or pitched from a wrong paradigm. And yes I am seeing close links with sarmatians.

Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

We do have inscriptions from Scythian regions
http://biblio.darial-online.ru/text/Voinikov/08-1.pdf

Rob said...

And obviously across 'Scythia' as a whole + 'vassal groups' several languages would have been spoken. I thought it was clear who I am referring to as per specifications and citations.

Simon_W said...

A David Reich talk on the genetic origin of the Indo-Europeans, dating from last year. He argues for a steppe origin of PIE, or rather PIA, combined with an eastern route for Proto-Anatolians, and for a direct derival of early Corded Ware from Yamnaya, mediated to a considerable degree by females.

https://youtu.be/TLNRGGWpOmA?si=5nZbdTaRw2yopllK

Rob said...

@ SimonW - old (& Fake) News

CordedSlav said...

''for a direct derival of early Corded Ware from Yamnaya, mediated to a considerable degree by females.''

So these guys are claiming that CW males emerged as a hidden underclass from Yamnaya, but mostly due to females ?

Davidski said...

David Reich appears to be really struggling there with the concept of rapid population expansions from a small but genetically varied ancestral gene pool resulting in larger but genetically less diverse derived populations.

I'm not sure why? Doesn't he have a whole team of extremely qualified people to help him with this sort of stuff?

Gaska said...

This paper is interesting for this debate

Spatiotemporal reconstruction of Corded Ware and Bell Beaker burial rituals reveals complex dynamics divergent from steppe ancestry-Quentin P. J. Bourgeois

By contrast, early BB burial rituals, with their distinct focus on
archery equipment, copper artifacts such as tanged daggers, and the
eponymous bell-shaped beaker, appear to have originated in populations
with no steppe ancestry as observed previously (4). Once this
new burial rite had developed and spread, groups with steppe ancestry
co-optedand adapted it within their own ritual frameworks.
This adoption and transformation likely occurred along the Rhine
(22) and may have been mediated by a substantial demographic
event that also affected the spread of BB toward the British Isles






Rob said...

The interpretation of the IE sequence seems to be
- PIA/PIE: complete horseshit, internally inconsistent
- CWC: overestimate of steppe migrations
- BB : underestimate of migrations into SW Europe

The data itself is fine

Steppe said...

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adx2262

For All !

Rob said...

Well, I can’t see any analysis of specific sites to support their contention. Again, just some Fantasmical “statistical deductions”, which seem to be the opposite to empirical reality.

Gaska said...

@Rob

You only have to read the supplementary information with the list of sites analyzed and discarded. The work confirms what we have been saying for over a hundred years: the origin of the BBc in Western Europe (not in the Tagus estuary but in the Pyrenees, where the oldest sites are located), and the origin of the CWC in Bohemia-Baltic (they also refer to the Narva signal mentioned by Papac in his work). The CWC sites in Russia, Ukraine, etc. are more modern than those in Central Europe.That is to say, the antiquity of burial customs in the CWC contrasts with the dispersion of steppe ancestry throughout Europe

Rob said...

@ Norfern & Finngreek

Interesting results for the Bolshoy oleni (BOO) individuals, essentially come out as ~
36% Yakutia, 18% Andronovo, 30% EHG, 17% WSHG (Tyumen).
I recall that the site contained a couple of pieces of ST metalwork and Ymyyakhtakh-like pottery (although the latter view was contested by Finnish archaeologists).

The Mezhovskaya individuals are also interesting. They come out as ~ 80% Srubnaya-Andronovo, and 20% 'eastern'. For the latter, Yakutia-LN and Shamanka-Khovsgol both work, even with rotating/ competitive pRight, ie cannot exclude one vs another.

Balancing the evidence, it seems fairly clear that post-ST groups rich in Yakutia_LN ancestry were entering northeast Europe, predominantly via a boreal forest route, by at least 1500BC. IMO also hard to argue against the proposal that these were early Uralic groups

Ash said...

Dzharkutan_BA2 1950bce and ShahTepe_BA 3200bce have samples with mtdna U5a2+16294. Some interesting samples are under it.

I wonder if Swat_IA I males moved via south Caucasus into Northern Iran and then into BMAC-Swat.

https://ibb.co/jPznLdp9

Ash said...

Any guess who these guys were...

Target: Uzbekistan_Dzharkutan_BA_2:I5608__BC_1950__Cov_79.99%
Distance: 2.4336% / 0.02433611
59.6 Georgia_Kotias_Mesolithic
28.2 Turkey_Marmara_Barcin_N
8.0 Russia_Tyumen_N
4.2 Israel_Natufian

Target: Uzbekistan_Dzharkutan_BA_2:I4901__BC_1950__Cov_67.51%
Distance: 4.1825% / 0.04182475
41.4 Georgia_Kotias_Mesolithic
28.8 Turkey_Marmara_Barcin_N
17.0 Russia_Tyumen_N
6.4 Iran_GanjDareh_N
6.4 Israel_Natufian

Something is missing in these Dzharkutan_BA2 models I believe...

Ash said...

On PCA

https://ibb.co/s9d07KDQ

Rob said...

@ Ash - Dzharkutan_BA_2 are an undated set ('context' only). They must be some kind of Caucaus group whose provenance has been mixed up

Shomu said...

The mini yet mighty stapes: a comparison of ancient DNA yields among ossicles and the petrous bone

"The petrous bone is considered the most efficient source of endogenous DNA across skeletal tissues in ancient DNA research as well as in forensic work. Recently, ancient DNA (aDNA) in auditory ossicle bones was shown to be comparably well-preserved as in the petrous, although no attempt was made to distinguish among the three ossicle bones. In this study, we used a total of 114 human ossicle- and petrous-derived sequencing libraries from similar contexts (c.10,000 BP - 7,000 BP Anatolia), including 34 matched libraries prepared from the same individuals’ ossicle and petrous bones. Our results suggest that endogenous human aDNA preservation in the stapes is on average two times higher than in the petrous bone; it also tends to be higher than in the malleus and incus. Similarly, aDNA fragment lengths were higher in the stapes than in the petrous, whereas postmortem damage, clonality and contamination rates were comparable. Despite being the smallest bone in the human skeleton, the stapes may be the most optimal aDNA source yet identified."
👇
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.07.17.664655v1

Ash said...

Wrongly dated? What is your opinion regarding Swat_IA like 1500bce sample and 1800bce Modern Iranian like SappaliTepe_BA sample? I feel SappaliTepe_BA_o ancestry is pretty odd for 1800bce central Asian. This ancestry formed much later in NW Iran.

Ash said...

This sample

Target: Uzbekistan_SappaliTepe_BA_o:I7493__BC_1800__Cov_28.79%
Distance: 2.0330% / 0.02033029
37.8 Iran_DinkhaTepe_BA_IA_1
33.4 Uzbekistan_SappaliTepe_BA
21.2 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
7.6 Kazakhstan_Kumsay_EBA

This ancestry should not exist in 1800bce central asia.

Finngreek said...

@Rob

I don't think anyone is denying that Yakutia_LNBA Y-DNA played an important role in the Proto-Uralic ethnogenesis (although it seems that Jaska may be considering exploration of a hypothesis that this input was rather from Yukaghiric speakers). My concern is that, as exciting as the archaeogenetic prospects may be in how it correlates to ST sites, it does not correlate well with the linguistic evidence.

First of all, although I have yet to publish it, academia is going to have a very difficult time trying to disprove my layer of Hellenic loans into Samoyedic, which are phonologically regular and reconstruct clear semantic categories (e.g. riparian contact, food preparation). This is something that research into Indo-Iranian loans has not been able to achieve over several decades. The lingering considerations of a couple Yukaghir and Tocharian comparanda have yet to achieve this, either. This is on top of the pre-existing research in Uralic linguistics, which argues that lexical parameters confine Proto-Uralic to the Central Urals region, regardless of its cultural assignment. Part of the "kra-001 was Proto-Uralic" hypothesis includes the claim that Samoyedic would have stayed near the Upper Yenisei, while the Finno-Ugric languages traveled westward towards Europe. I am letting everyone know in advance that such a model simply won't work: A solution will have to be found that likewise gets Pre-Proto-Samoyedic to the Central Urals before the disintegration of a Late Proto-Uralic or Archaic Uralic sprachbund - and that this disintegration could not have taken place before 800-700 BCE. As long as it can fit into these criteria, I am open to discussing any ideas about how Yakutia_LNBA was (or wasn't) the source of Proto-Uralic speakers.

I don't think we should draw any conclusions about the "eastern" DNA in Mezhovskaya until we have Gamayun samples, since the fall of the former and the rise of the latter are directly intertwined.

Rob said...

@ Gaska

Nothing here, there's been no attempt to scrutinise the sites & samples.
This is what they wrote ''Cluster 1 (Western Iberia) - Only one aDNA sample has been included in our dataset (I1970), as the other sampled individuals are from uncertain Bell Beaker contexts''
And for some reason, they think the Basque country is in 'West Iberia"
""West Iberia- Alto de la Huesera, Alava, Basque country"


If their point was that warrior burials, in general, such as those in Remedello, preceded the arrival of steppe migrants, that would be a valid point, but to claim CW or even BB burials have no affinitiy to steppe ancestry is quite false.

Rob said...

@ Finngreek

''This is on top of the pre-existing research in Uralic linguistics, which argues that lexical parameters confine Proto-Uralic to the Central Urals region, regardless of its cultural assignment.''

Says you, Jaako and Parpola, based on 'muh linguistics'. These claims are cringely erroneous and completely miscontextualised. Your views about Hellenic loans in Samoyedic are unorthodox to say the least. If you are convinced of them- publish in a high impact language journal rather than Academia

Finngreek said...

@Rob
No offense, but I'm out of your league with this last statement. Just stick to what you know.

Davidski said...

@Finngreek

Unfortunately, when it comes to things like fine-scale historical linguistics you really need a consensus to make a convincing point.

One person can't just claim that it's a fact that there are Hellenic loans in Samoyedic, because you might just be imagining things.

I mean, claiming that there are Hellenic loans in Samoyedic isn't anywhere as obvious and objective as pointing out that all Uralic speaking populations share a very specific type of Siberian ancestry that spread west into Europe at the same time as Uralic languages.

There are many examples in academia where one scholar was absolutely certain about something, but that something turned out not to be real.

Finngreek said...

@David

I already said in that very comment that I have not published it yet, so there was no point for Rob to bring up that it's only on Academia. I am aware of the protocol to have the work formally published and responded to by other Uralicists (most of whom are, by the way, already aware of my work, and have discussed it with me). It's insulting that one would think I am oblivious to the need for formal publication when I deal with the formal material every day, and am evidently more well-versed in Uralic historical linguistics than anyone else who has participated on this blog (I believe Jaska was banned?).

I wouldn't tell any of you how to plot: So please don't tell me how to reconstruct. The authors who will need to respond to my work do not (unfortunately) visit archaeogenetics websites. I'm also not the one who brought it up under this post, and responded only as a favor. Have someone write a guest post here about Uralic historical linguistics if you'd like, and see what happens when it's Rob vs. myself at the podia. Mercifully, I expect you will allow us all to save our time - and what is left of Rob's equanimity.

Finngreek said...

There is a difference between "academia" and "Academia", by the way. Hope this helps.

Rob said...

@ Fingreek
You obviously got triggered there. Yes, nobody knows the loanward stratigraphies of Hellenic into Uralic quite like you. Cool
Feel free to explain the expansion of Uralic langauges from the Ural mountains...


@ Davidski
''I mean, claiming that there are Hellenic loans in Samoyedic isn't anywhere as obvious and objective as pointing out that all Uralic speaking populations share a very specific type of Siberian ancestry that spread west into Europe at the same time as Uralic languages.''

The issue is - a certain group of people either don't understand this, or are desparate to explain it away as a 'momentary coincidence'. The claim then proceeds - why would the Uralic language dispersal be associated with central-Siberian ancestry when Uralic groups also have 'west Eurasian' ancestry. As we can see, the discussion is stuck in 1998, and then still wrong. The personalities (nerdy echo chamber hubris) dont help them either

Rob said...

And there’s a big difference between a “grammarian”” and historical linguistics. To be a good Historical linguist, competence and understanding across all fields is required. Niche specialisation becomes almost irrelevant.

Davidski said...

@Finngreek

It's not even necessarily a matter of getting your hypothesis past peer review, because quite a bit of nonsense gets published in peer reviewed papers.

The consensus I'm talking about is simply a general agreement among people who know their stuff that your hypothesis is logical and backed up by strong evidence, and thus probably reflects reality.

But I've never seen anyone claim that there are Hellenic loans in Samoyedic, not even in passing, so either you've made a sensational discovery or there's a very serious problem with what you're doing. Unfortunately, sensational discoveries like this are very rare.

Finngreek said...

@Rob

My current view on Uralic expansion from the Urals has already been discussed here in great detail, which you should be able to remember since you were part of the discussion. By the way, which "high-impact journal" have you been published in?

@David

You have seen me claim it, and have had plenty of time on this blog to see whether or not I am a person who is logical and values evidence. Should I ignore your views on Indo-European archaeogenetics when they are not shared by e.g. David Anthony, David Reich, Iosif Lazaridis, or Nick Patterson? If I were an author in Indo-European studies, or simply needed to reference them, it seems that I could spend my lifetime citing those who are seen as the foremost experts in their field without ever needing to know your name or perspective. However, I have spent time here because I was interested in being part of an informal dialogue with people who share and debate their original views.

If you think that my views are preemptively unworthy of consideration whenever they aren't what you'd like to hear, or are used to hearing, then I will gladly spend my time discussing these matters elsewhere. This means that, whenever you host a discussion about the history of the Proto-Uralic language, there will be zero participants who actually study Uralic historical linguistics. If that is the sort of informational vacuum you would like to maintain here, then more power to you. Still, there is a difference between being skeptical about new information in a field you do understand, versus being dismissive about new information in a field you don't. The Dunning-Kruger bias of some archaeogenetics laymen, i.e. that historical linguistics are unimportant in understanding the history of a language, will only contribute to the decline in quality that these discussions have suffered. I should hope that you want more for your blog, lest it suffer the same fate of turning into a defunct hugbox as Quiles' did. Good luck with your research.

Gaska said...

@Rob, in Iberia and France, many BB sites that have no steppe ancestry have already been analyzed, including the oldest known ones. If you want, I can send you a list of their uniparental markers, but we'll bore everyone

Fcv said...

@Rob would you say that TTK has Iran N admixture?

Davidski said...

@Finngreek

But you're the only one who has ever claimed that there are Hellenic loans in Samoyedic.

On the other hand, my views about the PIE homeland are standard and basically in line with the consensus.

David Reich, Iosif Lazaridis and Nick Patterson are the ones who are arguing against the consensus, with very weak evidence too.

Rob said...

@ Fcv - they come out as ~ 80% ANE ~ 20% Iran_N with qpADM

Rob said...

@ Gaska
the Iberian aDNA BB data is essentially from Olalde 2018/19? We already went through this when those papers first came out, many of the samples labelled BB are not actually associated with BB artefacts. Is there anything new?

Dospaises said...

Bourgeois et al. 2025 Supplementary Data S2 has a lot of BBC samples that were never DNA tested that they used for the 14C BP dating, especially the older specimens which are more important. All of the samples from Spain that have been DNA tested were in Olalde 2018 and/or 2019. Not all of those that were in Olalde 2108/2019 are in G25 as far as I can tell. There are some that were accepted as belonging to BBC that were DNA tested that do not seem to have Steppe autosomal DNA. The older specimens that have not been tested need to be tested, if they can be, so we can get a clearer picture of what happened and when. I really like that there is are academic archaeologists whose have a focus on CWC and ceramics took the time to identify which burials should be considered CWC or BBC.

Rob said...

If B. et al use many samples which haven’t been DNA analysed, then how did they draw conclusions about the correlation of DNA ancestry & burial style? I don’t think it is possible.
Instead of a speculative approach as they take, a better one would be to focus on the samples that do exist, but analysing in a more specific way than was offered by Olalde et al. Mind you, going beyond binary definitions of BB vs non-BB. Certainly on the cards

Radiosource said...

/offtopic

If the new autosomal test is not ready to be finished this year, it's totally fine to finish it in 2026 instead of rushing to finish it before Christmas. When it comes to a choice between speed & quality, the latter is a higher priority.

Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

I can get a model to pass with no Iran N and Anatolian in the right, however the p-value does go down a bit if Pinarbasi is in there as opposed to if it's not so there may indeed be some Iran Neolithic ancestry. TTK001 ANE however represents the closest ANE source in Iran Neolithic and CHG.

CordedSlav said...

Two new Slav papers

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09437-6

https://genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13059-025-03700-9

Should make for a good post Dave. Kiev culture homeland confirmed ?

Shomu said...

@Norfern-Ostrobothnian

absolutely right, everything looks as if this ANE in Tutkaul is similar to the one that participated in the ethnogenesis of CHG (but I'm not sure that this is the same ANE that participated in the ethnogenesis of Iran_HG, since Iran_HG could have been a product of a more early migration of ANE)

Norfern-Ostrobothnian said...

The ANE ancestry in Tutkaul is more of a sister branch to both rather than a direct ancestor since it dates to the Neolithic, Late Upper Paleolithic DNA from Central Asia might turn up something actually ancestral. Iran Mesolithic and CHG both formed during the LGM so they're actually pretty similar in age.

Gioiello said...

Even though I couldn't study the paper of Gretzinger et al. deeply, because I didn't pay for Windows365, for what I could see, it is interesting to me that only one R-Z2110 (my hg.), present in the aDNA, is from Brucken in East Germany, and the upstream samples (less than the fingers of a hand) aren't reliable until the terminal SNP, and the only downstream sample is from Croatia, probably from the substrate. Where in the Slav world are all the Yamnaya samples?

Gioiello said...

Also the subclades of I-M223, that were in Italy and only in Italy , for what we know so far, betweeb 20000 and 10000 years ago, seem to belong to the substrate rather than to the IE and above all the Slav migration. The study of the uniparental markers could say much about our questions. Very likely hg R1a is the haplogroup of the Slav branches, or at least it was dominant among others in their formation if it happened in central/eastern Europe.

Gioiello said...

Also the presence of the hg. J2b goes from subclades separated at the end of the Palaeolithic (Bubi's cave, Karlovac, Croatia) to the most recent subclades that may indicate when they entered the Slav pool or they too from the substrate, just because they were in Croatia before the Slav migraton.

Gioiello said...

To greeting Gaska, I could say that neither I-M223, nor R1b, nor J2b spoke an IE language, and that is reinforced by the fact that the Indo-Iranian branch was brought by the R1a subclade.

Gaska said...

@Rob & dos paises

The oldest BB pottery (maritime) is found in the Tagus estuary, but this study only analyzes BB burials (which I find logical and interesting).

All BB burials analyzed in Portugal and some in Castile (Humanejos) , Catalonia (Cerdañola) are I2a-M438. In France-Hegenheim, woman-100 % EEF.

In any case, the oldest BB burial excavated to date is in Catalonia (province of Lleida-Eastern Pyrenees). Reguers del Seró-Beta-230406: 4150±50 BP; calibrated to 2 sigmas 2879-2589 cal. ANE=2734 BCE. Here is a link to the excavation

https://repositori.udl.cat/server/api/core/bitstreams/772046d4-000c-4ae1-a86b-7a67bf7d4c52/content

It is written in Catalan, but if you speak Spanish, it is easy to understand. It is a burial site (megalithic tomb) of two men with BB pottery of the maritime, Pyrenean, and regional incised styles, arrowheads, V-shaped perforated buttons, stone steles etc....

The human remains have not been analyzed, and we are eager for the University of Barcelona to do so, as requested by some archaeologists. It will be interesting to see the results, and bets are welcome. The Pyrenean style is very similar to the Ciempozuelos style and has been found in sites where R1b-P312>Df27 is present (Narbonne, El Hundido).

Dospaises said...

Bourgeois 2025 used Racimo 2020 and Allentoft 2024 for the prediction of the arrival date of steppe ancestry. Yet the spreadsheet has the oldest accepted BB specimen as uncalibrated 4150 BP which according to reference source is 2871–2640 calBC (Soriano 2015) which as not DNA tested. The study is more concerned with peak and widespread adoption of CWC and BBC burial rites even though they also mention at times initial arrival and area of origin. Part of the conclusion that is, in other words, pots aren't people they are created by a mixture of people, is not wrong but there are a lot of details not discussed. There needs to be more studies that deal with specifics and with DNA testing of the older specimens that have not yet been tested.

Dospaises said...

There are 18 BBC specimens dated to 4150-4000 BP counting Beta-230406 from Lleida that have not had any DNA testing. The oldest CWC is STD003 dated to 3011-2887 calBC per Papac 2021. No Steppe DNA. OBR003 MAMS-30795 is the oldest male CWC that I could find at 4259 BP per the study or 2913-2786 calBC per Papac 2021. It is Obříství 166 at FTDNA and placed at the R-L151 level. Lots of Steppe DNA.