A paper dealing with the origin of Slavic speakers, titled
Ancient DNA connects large-scale migration with the spread of Slavs, was just published at
Nature by Gretzinger et al. (see
here).
The dataset from the paper includes eight fascinating ancient samples from Gródek upon the Bug River in Southeastern Poland. These individuals are dated to the so called Tribal Period (8th –9th centuries), and, as far as I know, they represent the earliest Slavic speakers in the ancient DNA record.
The really interesting thing about these early Slavs is that they already show some Germanic and other Western European-related ancestries.
In the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) plots below, three of them cluster near present-day Ukrainians, while the rest are shifted towards present-day Northwestern, Western and Southern Europeans. The plots were produced with the excellent
Vahaduo G25 Global Views tool using the data
here.
These results aren't exactly shocking, because the people who preceded the early Slavs in the Gródek region were Scandinavian-like and associated with the Wielbark archeological culture. In other words, they were probably Goths who also had significant contacts with the Roman Empire.
However, it's not a given that the ancestors of the Tribal Period Slavs mixed with local Goths. It's also possible that they brought the western admixture, or at least some of it, from the Slavic homeland, wherever that may have been.
That's because the early Slavs who migrated deep into what is now Russia also showed Western European-related admixture. This is what Gretzinger et al. say on page 74 of their supplementary info (emphasis is mine):
The only deviation from this pattern is observed for ancient samples from the Russian Volga-Oka region, where we measure higher genetic affinity between present-day Southern/Western Europeans and the SP population compared to the pre-SP population (Fig. S17). This agrees with the pattern observed in PCA and ADMIXTURE that, in contrast to the Northwestern Balkan, Eastern Germany, and Poland-Northwestern Ukraine, the arrival of Slavic-associated culture in Northwestern Russia was associated with a shift in PCA space to the West, a decrease of BAL [Baltic] ancestry, and the introduction of Western European ancestries such as CNE [Continental North European] and CWE [Continental Western European].
Thus, it's highly plausible that the Tribal Period Slavs from Gródek were very similar, perhaps even practically identical, to the proto-Slavs who lived in the original Slavic homeland. Hopefully we won't have to wait too long to discover whether that's true or not. More Migration period and Slavic period samples from the border regions of Belarus, Poland and Ukraine are needed to sort that out.
On the other hand, most of the post-1000 CE individuals from Gródek are shifted closer to present-day Balts. This is probably due to admixture from nearby Baltic-speaking populations. At the time, Baltic speakers still occupied much of northern and eastern Poland.
I'm still going through the Gretzinger et al. paper and I'll probably have a lot more to say about it in the near future.
However, unfortunately, I've already spotted a silly mistake in the supplementary info that will probably have some very annoying consequences for us on this blog. On page 109 the authors make the false claim that South Asian ancestry is present in a wide range of ancient Eastern European and Central Asian populations from the Bronze Age to the Scythian period.
Furthermore, Sycthian groups from Ukraine show varying fractions of South Asian ancestry (between 5% and 12%), a component present in many ancient individuals from Moldova (e.g. Moldova_IA, Moldova_LBA and Moldova_MBA), Ukraine (Ukraine_Alexandria_MBA and Ukraine_BA_Catacomb.SG), Western Russia (e.g. Russia_EarlySarmatian.SG, Russia_MLBA_Potapovka, or Russia_MLBA_Sintashta) and the Caucasus (Russia_Caucasus_LBA_Dolmen and Russia_North_Caucasus_MBA) but (nearly) absent in the SP genomes from Central and East-Central Europe (<5%) (Fig. S42b).
All ancient and present-day South Asian populations carry what is commonly known as Ancestral South Indian (ASI) ancestry, while all of the above mentioned ancient groups lack it. Ergo, it's impossible for these ancients to have actual South Asian ancestry.
What happened is that Gretzinger et al. created a genetic component in ADMIXTURE based on present-day South Asians. However, South Asians today have very complex ancestry from several different sources, including early pastoralists from the North-Pontic steppe in Eastern Europe and early farmers from Central Asia and what is now Iran. As a result, the groups that share significant amounts of alleles with South Asians via these sources also show so called South Asian ancestry in the Gretzinger et al. analysis.
Unless this problem is corrected we're likely to see some nutjobs online using this paper to claim all sorts of nonsense about the origins of ancient Eastern Europeans and Central Asians, especially the Sintashta people and Scythians.
See also...
High-resolution stuff
Leo Speidel & Pontus Skoglund
349 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 349 of 349Modern Greeks have ~20% Slavic admixture, so they're expected to form a cline with Slavs.
Well, if you define Siberian as East Asian, then you are by definition correct. If, instead the Siberian gene pool is considered more North Asian then not so much. I see East Asian as closer to Devil's Cave than Yakutia and Siberian the inverse.
This is a pretty neat tool:
https://genarchivist.net/showthread.php?tid=1950
It's unfortunate that it's missing data from 2023 onward.
@ambron
Yes, I was mistaken. Spiginas2 falls into the Corded Ware (East)-related cluster, not the Bell Beaker-related one, as I thought. That argument is invalid. This individual may, of course, have some Corded Ware admixture.
@Davidski
In any case, as far as I understand, all the earliest samples with Balto-Slavic R1a subclades also have a high admixture of Ukrainian hunters, and this cannot be a coincidence.
The Balto-Balkan cline also includes the Greeks of the islands, who have little or no Slavic admixture, so that's not the issue here.
@dancingfragments
Again, you're misinterpreting the data and being biased.
First of all, there's no evidence that Spiginas2 has ancestry from Ukrainian hunters that's not found in other Corded Ware samples. The evidence shows that he is actually closely related to Polish Corded Ware, so he probably got his extra hunter-related admixture from Poland.
Secondly, the earliest samples with Balto-Slavic R1a subclades actually have Baltic-related ancestry. That is, they share a lot of genetic drift with modern Balts and Slavs. And currently there's no evidence that this drift was present in Ukrainian hunters.
@dancingfragments
How do you manage to continually miss the fact that R1a-Z645 is both a Corded Ware and Balto-Slavic subclade?
And how do you simultaneously ignore that "Ukrainian hunter" I5884 doesn't even belong to R1a and doesn't show any specific relation to Balto-Slavs?
Are you mentally retarded?
Dancing fragments does seem to suffer from cognitive diarrhoea. Even his acronym is dumb.
He’s not had a reality check because he’s been posting random crap on DunceArchiver in blissful ignorance
@ Slovak
NELT - northeastern La Tene groups. A term used by Shchukin amongst others to describe groups in Central east Europe with La Tene influenced traits, but in reality more Pomeranian and Jastorf influences than La Tene propper
Poienesti-Lukashevka is also basically a regional variant of ZC
Both disappeared. The emergence of “Kiev culture” developed 300 years later and is different in almost every way. In the post PL area, a new Getic group emerges
The ZC continuity theory is equally as problematic as the claim that Prague-Korchak derives from Przeworsk C
@Davidski
I don't understand what you're trying to say. All the earliest samples with Balto-Slavic subclades of R1a, as far as I understand, also have a very high admixture of hunters, which is completely atypical for Corded people. This applies to Spiginas2, poz794, Trzciniec poz554 and poz711, and others. You can provide counterexamples if you disagree. But what does R1a-Z645 have to do with this? How can R1a-Z645 in Corded Ware people refute a high admixture of hunters in people like Spiginas2? Perhaps you're saying that there was some special group of Corded people with Balto-Slavic subclades of R1a, and that it was this group that interbred with hunters, and that's why we only see Balto-Slavic subclades of R1a in people with a high admixture of hunters? Well, say it outright; why should anyone else speculate for you? Yes, this theory still has some merit.
The primary source of Spiginas2's hunting admixture is debatable. I'm absolutely certain it was Ukrainian hunters. But let's say Polish hunters. I'm not so concerned. In any case, Spiginas2 has a second, additional source of hunting admixture, which goes hand in hand with his farmer admixture, and it was this mixed source that gave Spiginas2 the Balto-Slavic drift. The same mixed source is present in I5884. Therefore, this individual is related to the Balto-Slavs, as reflected in Gerber's article. Quote: "Taking into consideration all of the genetic parallels, their dates, and geographic locations, one plausible scenario is that the EHG characteristic core of Bk-II (which ultimately could be best modeled as Ukraine_EBA by composition) moved northward from the region of today's Eastern Romania, Moldova, or Western Ukraine, subsequently mixed with FBC- or Globular Amphora culture (GAC)-related populations, and then split into two groups: one taking a route to Transdanubia and the other moving further north."
Gerber likely refers to I5884 by Ukraine_EBA. This doesn't mean I share Gerber's idea that I5884 represents the original core.
@dancingfragments
That's the problem, you don't understand much. You take in a lot of data but you're not able to process it logically.
I've explained to you repeatedly that R1a-Z645 expanded with the Corded Ware people, and this subclade is shared between many Corded Ware samples, Balto-Slavs, Indo-Iranians and Germanics (ie. Indo-Europeans).
In fact, all of the typically Balto-Slavic subclades of R1a phylogenetically derive from this Corded Ware subclade, including R1a-CTS1211.
No other populations are associated with R1a-Z645 in ancient DNA like Corded Ware. Certainly not any Ukrainian hunter-gatherers.
So, the only logical conclusion is that Balto-Slavs descend from R1a-Z645-rich Corded Ware people, via Corded Ware-derived groups that were also rich in R1a-Z645 and its subclades. And this is also why Balto-Slavs speak Balto-Slavic (ie. Indo-European) languages.
The fact that the Corded Ware people mixed with other populations, largely via female admixture, and late Corded Ware and Corded Ware-derived people were genetically quite different from the original and early Corded Ware populations doesn't contradict this you moron.
There's no evidence that Balto-Slavs inherited their R1a-Z645 and derived Balto-Slavic subclades of R1a from Ukrainian hunter-gatherers instead of the Corded Ware people.
This would be a very stupid hypothesis considering that R1a-Z645 is associated with Corded Ware people rather than Ukrainian hunter-gatherers, and that the Balto-Slavic language was derived from Corded Ware.
There's also no evidence that I5884 has any special relationship with Balto-Slavs or Spiginas2. The idea that I5884 shares genetic drift with Balto-Slavs, like Spiginas2 and Baltic_BA do, is just your imagination.
In fact, there's no evidence that I5884 and people like him even survived the Yamnaya expansion in Ukraine.
@Rob
It is common in mainstream scholarship to connect the Kiev culture to the preceding Zarubintsy culture and both to the Proto-Slavs.
Are you drawing on the work of archaeologists or other scholars that dispute this connection? If so, it would be helpful to name them so that we can evaluate their work.
I'm talking about Ted, you're talking about a blockhead. I asked you if there are any examples of typical Corded Ware people without additional hunting admixture who would have Balto-Slavic R1a subclades? I don't know, I admit they could exist. You're not answering my question, and instead you're philosophizing on another topic.
Let's say you're right, and such Corded Ware people still exist, but we don't see them now only because Balto-Slavic R1a subclades were rare during the Corded Ware era. How can this negate the fact that Spiginas2 has a hunting admixture of 50%+ and some farming admixture on top of that? How much is left for the Corded Ware admixture? For Spiginas2, it's a minor admixture anyway.
Gerber's work showed a connection between I5884 and the Balto-Slavs, so it's not my imagination. But let's say Gerber was wrong. In any case, there's no fundamental difference between I5884 and Spiginas2, other than the fact that Spiginas2 has an additional admixture of Corded Ware people. They're next to each other on the graph.
There's no point in discussing this further. We'll wait for more data.
@ Synome
“ It is common in mainstream scholarship to connect the Kiev culture to the preceding Zarubintsy culture and both to the Proto-Slavs . Are you drawing on the work of archaeologists or other scholars that dispute this connection?”
Really ? Where is your literature review on this alleged consensus; have you had attended any conferences or symposium where there was a vote and tally?
Or are you basing your claims on the collective views of GA - a malignant collective of losers who have never been right about anything, and - worse lie, distort data, and plagiarise ? And you have the gall to ask me what I’m basing my view on? Have you thought about the fact that maybe your knowledge is inadequate and your bibliographic is limited ?
“ ? If so, it would be helpful to name them so that we can evaluate their work.
”
Lol you evaluate? You don’t you evaluate, just regurgitate the same crap over and over again, as you and DF have documented here, and your scumbag buddies from GA have over the last 10 years for pretty much every other topic
So please sit the fuck down.
@ psynome
And I recall, you’re one of the morons swooning over the garbage written by David Anthony and the Reich lab
You’re an established moron, I have little respect with you and have no time to waste with someone down at my feet.
@Davidski, given the latest developments for M58, what's your understanding as to how and when it became a part of the Slavic ethnogenesis? It appears that the vast majority of the branches of M458 that are now recognized as Slavic, formed in the era shortly before the Migration Period, perhaps even shortly before the Slavic Period.
@sds
I think the broad history of R1a-M458 has been obvious for a while now.
Corded Ware R1a-Z645 > post-Corded Ware > Balto-Slavic > Slavic R1a-M458
But I can't fill in the details. No one can without more post-Corded Ware samples leading up to Slavic ethnogenesis.
@dancingfragments
I'm guessing you're probably autistic or something like that, and you can't grasp how Y-chromosome phylogeny works. So this is my final reply to you.
- R1a-Z645 expanded with the Corded Ware expansion
- R1a-Z645 is the ancestral mutation to all Balto-Slavic R1a subclades
- most Balto-Slavic R1a subclades are younger than Corded Ware, so they won't appear in Corded Ware samples, or if they do they'll only appear in late Corded Ware samples like Spiginas2
- Balto-Slavs are the direct paternal descendants of the Corded Ware people.
If you don't understand these simple facts, then that's not my problem.
What’s the story with GeneArchiver anyway? Is it a site that was founded by a particular clique of Anthrogenica refugees when that was shut down? I used to be on AG there but the moderation team made things unbearable after a while with their double standards and tribalism.
For an exercise on the East Baltic
We can begin with a chromometric model of C14 dates
https://imgur.com/a/EFf5E5P
We see 'gaps' in dating, but that could be for several reasons - (a)actual gaps in settlement (b) various 'biases' in the record (lack of research, material loss, 'archaeological invisibility', etc)
Now, looking at the Baltic CW group - there is a significant degree of variation in Yamnaya/ EEF/ HG ancestry proportions. But in summary, they can be modelled as ~ Yamnaya 55%, EEF 30%, Latvia-HG 15% with qpADM
Aside from the time gap, the younger Bronze Age East Baltic individuals are different, requiring a slightly more western HG source. Latvia_HG is rejected (too much EHG), whilst Narva works. And the proportions change to ~ Yamnaya 45% EEF 25% Narva 30%
Using Ukraine_N & Iron Gates fail as sources (P < 0.005)
Spiginas 2, which has the same profile as the LBA individuals, but dates to ~ 2000 BC.
Overall, we can surmise there was a 'turnover' of the early Baltic CW population, due to some sort of population collapse. But the group which replaced them came from nearby, and obviously their R1a-Z645 ultimately comes from a regional CW group. Spiginas2 might represent an early venturer norh, but the main population expansion occurred ~ 1000 bc
@Davidski
What study are the G25 coords for Ukraine_Chernyakhiv and Ukraine_IA_WesternScythian from? I'm looking at Saag 2025 https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adr0695 and having some of those Iron Age samples in G25 would be great but they are labeled differently.
@Rob
Even in a "Pre-PS from the Middle Dnieper" scenario, based on the archaeology I would expect Baltic admixture from the Upper Dnieper cultures in the immediate pre expansion PS community, maybe quite a substantial amount. And so modeling with Baltic+Chernyakhiv is helpful for understanding the PS community ancestry in a general way but as always it would be good to have more data from the proximate cultures to Kyiv, which runs into the cremation problem.
Just a shot in the dark, but I wouldn't be surprised if "Zarubinets culture" with it's many subvariants, especially of the late/post-Zarubinets horizon were in fact not actually one population or even typologically the same archaeological culture. This is especially in the eastern regions, where Kiev culture would later emerge.
left pops:
Lithuania_Bailuliai_BarrowCulture.SG
Latvia_BA
Poland_Weklice_WielbarkCulture_Roman.SG
best coefficients: 0.672 0.328
tail prob 0.647
@Synome
G25 data for the samples from Saag et al. 2025 are in this sheet. Always look for individual IDs to find samples, because population codes often differ from those in papers.
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/0q39lrsynq7prjc7mm8gq/G25-Ancients.txt?rlkey=33i5tycf3nd6glv1w7z6dleco&e=7&dl=0
@ Synome- Baltic-like ancestry trotting down the Dnieper basin with the Kiev culture seems unproblematic from an archaeological perspective.
But my arguement has been that the Kiev culture cannot be traced back to Zarubintsy culture or the 'Scythian Farmers' of the Milograd culture, at least in a straighforward linear descent, Milograd is different to Zarubintsy, and Zrubintsy is different to Kiev C. This is based on Mark Shchukin's critical work, amongst others
Tried adding to the WE PCA the right bank Dnipro "Scythians Illyrian/Thracian basis" samples from Saag 2025 which are in fact in the right time and place to be related to some of the Middle Dnieper cultures in question like Chernoles, Zarubintsy etc and not Thracians, Illyrians, or Scythians.
https://imgur.com/a/RQ4mocB
Quite a bit of overlap with Grodek_Tribal_Period already, for what it's worth.
Yeah, the so called Right Dnipro Scythians from Kyiv look a lot like modern Poles.
But their ancestry appears to be very complex, with significant Germanic-like ancestry.
@Synome
How do we explain this result? This is an individual from 660 BCE.
Distance to: Ukraine_Kyiv_Scythian_RightDnipro_IllThr_EIA:UKR042__BC_660__Cov_16.42%
0.04071566 Swedish
0.04246472 German_Hamburg
0.04581022 Danish
0.04651020 Norwegian
0.04749257 Czech
0.04840422 German_East
0.04904666 Polish_Silesian
0.04952718 Icelandic
0.05055581 Slovakian
0.05117483 Polish
0.05138277 Dutch
0.05151283 Polish_Kashubian
0.05175450 German_Erlangen
0.05223314 German
0.05295338 Orcadian
0.05422773 Welsh
0.05430453 Sorb_Niederlausitz
0.05452890 Scottish
0.05456600 Afrikaner
0.05511746 English
0.05546082 Shetlandic
0.05601350 Hungarian
0.05646128 Ukrainian_Rivne
0.05672583 English_Cornwall
0.05736119 Irish
@Davidski
I don't have a great explanation other than mobility from Iron Age Scandinavia. This was the era that began the Germanic expansion and so without having looked closely at the archaeological context for this sample yet my best guess is someone involved in long distance trade, a slave, or a skilled artisan from Scandinavia.
This one also has Germanic-like admixture, but a bit less. They probably all do to some extent.
Is this actually Scandinavian/proto-Germanic ancestry or something from Hallstatt/La Tene?
Distance to: Ukraine_Kyiv_Scythian_RightDnipro_IllThr_EIA:UKR043__BC_650__Cov_32.42%
0.03464773 Hungarian
0.03613708 Austrian
0.03758381 German_Erlangen
0.03842037 German_Hamburg
0.03939365 German
0.03968793 Slovakian
0.04038879 Croatian
0.04125093 Ukrainian_Zakarpattia
0.04131425 Czech
0.04190707 Afrikaner
0.04213971 German_East
0.04339961 Slovenian
0.04340034 Moldovan_o
0.04453429 Dutch
0.04622912 French_Seine-Maritime
0.04717310 Moldovan
0.04730541 Swedish
0.04742902 Polish_Silesian
0.04743858 BelgianB
0.04796227 Danish
0.04810279 Bosnian
0.04812333 French_Alsace
0.04966910 BelgianA
0.04990094 Welsh
0.04995624 French_Pas-de-Calais
@ Davidski - don't you think these 'modern distance to' calculators are BS / backwards ? It's the kind of tool the muppets on GA use.
It doesn't actually determine direct genomic ancestry input, just chance similarities in PCA space
Unfortunately, the labels used by the studies of 'forest-steppe' Scythians barely correlate with genetic ancestry. E.g. the 'illyro-Thracian' 'LeftDnipro_IllThr_EIA:UKR078" is basically a central-steppe Scythian.
Some of the 'western Scythians' from Ukraine preserve high levels of Srubnaya ancestry
Otherwise, they're very diverse.
Baltic_BA ancestry peaks in Luzatian culture individuals, as I'm sure people have noted.
@Rob
It might be a coincidence, but what's the chance that an early Iron Age population from northwestern Ukraine just happens to resemble a mixture of Germanics and Slavs?
I think IBD stats might reveal something very interesting for this group.
David, Gretzinger's work includes two Western Ukrainian Scythians (MJ-16 and MJ-14) who form a common IBD cluster with the Polish Trzciniec and Strzyżów populations, the Western Ukrainian Komarów population, and the Slovak Vekerzug population. This was to be expected, as Scythians also inhabited southeastern Poland (Chotyniec).
@ Davidski
''It might be a coincidence, but what's the chance that an early Iron Age population from northwestern Ukraine just happens to resemble a mixture of Germanics and Slavs?
I think IBD stats might reveal something very interesting for this group.''
Balto-Slavic ancestry in some forest-steppe Scythians is of course not surprising, but 'Germanic' ancestry at ~ 600 BC is, given that is its much earlier than even the Jastrof culture itself
Aalthough there has been a Komarov culture individual with Y-hg I1. So could be some early Nordic-Lusatian conects, but more analysis is req.
Here's the context from the supplement on those right bank Dnipro samples:
There are several kurgan groups near the village Medvyn, Boguslav district, Kyiv region, in the
Girchakiv forest tract. They are located on the elevated right bank of the Khorobra river (a tributary
of the Ros river, a right tributary of the Dnipro). This necropolis belonged to the forest-steppe
agricultural population, which preserved archaic burial traditions (decarnation through exposure
to the elements and scavangers) (148). The time range when the necropolises were used can be
attributed to the Zhabotyn period and the beginning of the early Scythian period (second half of
the 8th until third quarter of the 7th c. BCE) (147).
The burial rite of the Medvyn necropolis has direct analogies in the burial ground of the early
Zhabotyn period near the village of Tyutky in the Southern Bug basin, where these traditions have
no local basis (149). Burials with a similar set of artefacts are found in the earlier dated kurgans of
Saharna-1 burial ground (Cigleu) in forest-steppe Moldova (150). These facts allow to assume the
movement of the population from Middle Transnistria (the oldest complexes) through Pobuzhzhia
(Tyutky, Nemyriv, Vyshenka-2) to Porossia in the early Zhabotyn period. The migrants moved
into regions sparsely populated by people of the late Chernolis culture, where mixing of different
ethno-cultural groups occurred. The funeral rite and the set of moulded dishes indicate either the
participation of the Chornolis-Zhabotyn population of Porossia in the genesis of this population,
or the influence of migrants on the material culture (151).
So who are these people most closely related to via IBD?
@Davidski Is there radiocarbon dating for UKR042? Germanic Sciri tribe raided near Odessa in 3rd century before Christ
Yeah, it's 779-539 cal BC.
By the way, this is a female with mtDNA T2a2. The others are males with Y-hg R1a.
@David
I don't believe the Saag et al. paper includes any IBD analysis.
Someone would need to run ancIBD themselves (I'm not able to right now, but it would be cool if someone became familiar with using it, as many new papers are only publishing IBD results between their newly published samples).
The Ringbauer sheet only goes until 2022.
I can't run any IBD tests on these samples and won't be able to for a while.
But based on the G25 these people really look like the result of some very early Germanic, or at least Nordic, incursion into western Ukraine.
I think at this point it's reasonable to say that because Eastern Europe was much more of a crossroads of Eurasia from virtually all directions from the Bronze age forward, modeling Proto-Slavs is going to be more complicated than for example Proto-Germanics who spent long periods (relatively) isolated in Scandinavia. As Rob mentioned, this could lead to many samples occupying deceptively similar PCA spaces or bouncing around as they receive admixtures from different parts of Eurasia. IBD and uniparentals are going to have to do more work, plus denser sampling.
I havent merged the new data yet, but the previous published Scy010 from middle Dnieper also looks like a Baltic + Nordic mixwith G25
However, the qpAdm shows something different :
Ukraine_Scythian010
Russia_Srubnaya
Bulgaria_EIA
Germany_Tollense_BA.SG
best coefficients: 0.323 0.183 0.494
tail prob 0.215
Baltic_BA instead of Srubnaya is a soft fail (0.03)
Scy 009 also comes out rather Welzin like, but I have yet got a clear pass as yet.
I think this result^ makes sense. Becasue the forest-steppe EIA (~ 'Zhabotin culture) is said to show 'Thracian Halstatt influences (e.g. From Oxford Bronze Age Europe - Zhabotin I contains pottery that has a connection with late Chernoles culture, and also the Cozia-Sakharna and Bessarabi- I cultures on the lower Danube..Fluted Ware is typical of the younger Zhabotin II)
Yet we also see a northwestern connection in this aDNA, but 'northern' seems to have been mediated via Tollensee-groups
It will take a lot of painstaking work validate these Iron Age individuals from central-northern Ukraine , as the current published models are limited to Steppe, EEF, WHG
but qpAdm is difficult & clunky with proximal modelling
Probably need to rely on (1-F3)MDS, IBD & uniparentals
@Davidski
“How do we explain this result? This is an individual from 660 BCE.
Distance to: Ukraine_Kyiv_Scythian_RightDnipro_IllThr_EIA:UKR042__BC_660__Cov_16.42%
0.04071566 Swedish
0.04246472 German_Hamburg
0.04581022 Danish
0.04651020 Norwegian
0.04749257 Czech
0.04840422 German_East
0.04904666 Polish_Silesian
0.04952718 Icelandic
0.05055581 Slovakian
0.05117483 Polish”
Very easy to explain:
Distance to: Ukraine_Kyiv_Scythian_RightDnipro_IllThr_EIA:UKR042__BC_660__Cov_16.42%
0.03130764 Poland_Trzciniec_Culture:poz720
0.03324103 Poland_Trzciniec_Culture:poz712
0.04078951 Poland_Trzciniec_Culture:poz655
0.04200021 Poland_Trzciniec_Culture:poz651
0.04201803 Poland_Trzciniec_Culture:poz719
0.04249066 Poland_Trzciniec_Culture:poz717
0.04633107 Ukraine_Komarow_Culture:poz296_dr
0.04997584 Ukraine_Komarow_Culture:poz296
The Scythian_RightDnipro_IllThr_EIA samples are most likely related to the Lusatian/Vysotska horizon, which in turn derives from the Trzciniec–Komarów complex. There’s no need to invoke Germanic ancestry here. These are best explained as western Proto-Slavic groups descending from Trzciniec.
Extra context:
The apparent similarity to modern Scandinavians or Germans comes from the shared Corded Ware background rather than any direct “Germanic” migration. This interpretation is reinforced by the lack of typical Germanic Y-DNA markers (I1, R1b-U106) among the Right-Bank Scythians, who are dominated instead by R1a-Z282/Z93 and R1b-M269 lineages common among Balto-Slavic and steppe populations. In other words, Right-Dnipro Scythians were heterogeneous, but UKR042 clearly represents the Lusatian/Trzciniec-derived variant.
These are the individuals I include in the Balto-Slavic cluster in my Iron Age G25 calculator...
https://www.academia.edu/144100839/The_Migration_Era_Calculator_The_Age_of_the_Huns_G25_Ancestry_Calculator_
https://www.exploreyourdna.com/calculator/186/the-migration-era-calculator-the-age-of-the-huns-scaled-by-karl-o-hogstrom.htm
R9673, 147 CE (U5a2d, R-FTG35614) from Viminacium, Serbia.
R6759, 150 CE (U5a2a1, R-YP578) from Viminacium, Serbia.
HVF-4, 153 CE (H5a5, R-FGC2555) from Hodmezovasarhely, Hungary.
PCA0002, 200 CE (H28a1_R-CTS11962) from Kowalewko, Poland.
R3657, 282 CE (T2b) from Mursa, Croatia.
R10840, 338 CE (U5a1a1a_R-YP4258) from Bailuliai, Lithuania.
There are two other samples from Hodmezovasarhely in Hungary that also have Slavic-like profiles so Hodmezovasarhely seem to have been a hotspot for early Slavs. These individuals are designated as Sarmatians but they are obviously early Slavs when you look at their Y-DNA and autosomal DNA.
HVF-21, 175 CE (U5a2b1a, R-YP335) from Hodmezovasarhely, Hungary.
HVF-8, 250 CE (H6a1a4) from Hodmezovasarhely, Hungary.
HVF-8 seem to carry 15-20% Germanic-like admixture though. Hodmezovasarhely is located just west of the Sântana de Mureș–Chernyakhov area. It is noteworthy that HVF-4 and HVF-21, dated between 150 CE and 175 CE, do not carry any Germanic-like admixture, while HVF-8, dated to 250 CE, carry a substantial amount of Germanic-like admixture, likely not a coincidence.
By the way, the Scythian sample AS23 from Novozavedennoye is now designated as Q-L937 by FTDNA. The fact that this individual lived 400-500 years prior to the estimated TMRCA of Q-L937 implies that the actual MRCA of Q-L937 were one of these Scythians from North Caucasus. R11559 from Sarrebourg with Q-L937 is a late Scytho-Sarmatian. There are a handful men in Sweden and Norway that belong to Q-L937. None of them have taken a Big Y test yet.
I see that the best fun is chasing the rabbit, not catching it. But the rabbit has already been caught. As I wrote above, the Scythians of Miedwyn form a common IBD cluster with the Polish populations of Trzciniec and Strzyżów, the western Ukrainian population of Komarów, and the Slovak population of Vekerzug. Thus, they descend from the population of the northeastern Carpathians, indigenous since the Early Bronze Age, from which also the early Slavs derive most of their ancestry, as can be seen in Table S39 from Gretzinger's supplementary materials.
In G25, using AC - BC against either Marvele or Lithuania_BA, I get results consistent with Thracian-like or Urnfield-related admixture in each of UKR042, UKR043, SCY009, SCY010.
When actually modelled, UKR042 does seem to have a chunk of Scandinavian ancestry, but also perhaps something Urnfield related, and surprisingly little Baltic ancestry.
For around this same time period, the Himera Balto-Slavs seem closer to what we would be looking for.
I'm pretty sure there's Northern and Central European admixture in these supposedly Scythian samples, probably via the Hallstatt, La Tene and/or Lusatian (Pomeranian) cultures.
@ Karl
Wow R9673 is essentially 100% 'Baltic '
very interesting that they were foederati as early as ~ 150AD. If i've looked at it right, Y29965 is under Z92 ('southeast Baltic' ?)
I wonder how these folks came into Roman orbit; probably too eastern to be Aesti
@Rob
R1a-Y29965 is given by YFull 3800 ybp, thus you should reach the terminal SNP to know more.
Anyway the oldest samples to-day are in Skandinavia and in the Balkans only from the date of this sample, about 250 AD.
The oldest upstream samples might have lived around the Baltic.
@Rob
If you remember a little the Italian Language of when you lived in Italy, you may read this interesting link: https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omero_nel_Baltico.
@All
UKR042 definitely has Scandinavian ancestry. It shows up very clearly in f4 stats.
I'll post the stats and some graphs in a new blog entry.
Maybe that ancestry arrived there through the river trade routes. They were used since the early bronze age and before
People from the Nordic Bronze Age were probably moving around Central and Eastern Europe a long time before the Germanic mass migrations started.
David
The people of the Nordic Bronze Age came from Central and Eastern Europe.
@ Rob & David
I could be wrong but my impression is that R9673 carry 10-15% Germanic-like admixture.
R-Z92 was present among both the Kamarow culture and the eastern part of Trzciniec culture who both likely spoke Balto-Slavic dialects. The sister clade R-CTS1211 has a predominantly "Baltic-like" distribution while R-Z92 has a predominantly "Slavic-like" distribution even though they, just like the other R-Z282-derived branches, are deeply intertwined.
My guess is that the original homeland of R-Z92 is to be found in the region south of the Neman/Neris rivers in Southeast Lithuania and east of the Bug river in western Belarus and Northwest Ukraine. There is an early R-Z92 sample from Ternopil Oblast in Ukraine. The presence of an early I1 sample in Ternopil Oblast at this point should not be understood as the consequence of larger population movements from Scandinavia but rather as anchor points for the mercantile I1-men, i.e. the mythological Vanir.
Groups carrying R-Z282 seem to have also migrated along this north-south axis, but likely due to other reasons since this whole region likely belonged to the same larger Balto-Slavic speech community that was held together by related R-Z282 clans which would also have simplified trade along this north-south axis which the mercantile I1-men would have made well use of, likely marrying off or selling Scandinavian women to these Balto-Slavic groups to get access to these trade routes. At the eastern and southern boundaries of this larger speech community, these Balto-Slavic groups would later have come in contact with Scythians (even pre-Scythians) and Sarmatians with whom they intermixed, and sometimes they would have passed on these Germanic women to them which would have spread Germanic-like admixture even further east.
I do not think it was Scandinavians in the wider sense that was moving around Central and Eastern Europe during the Bronze Age and the Early Iron Age but more specifically the mercantile I1-men who moved about and leaving a genetic footprint. If it were larger population movements, we would have substantial Y-chromosomal evidence of that, but we don't.
When I put forth the I1 hypothesis, almost everyone countersignalled me, especially the I1-men (LEL), but soon after that we discovered I1 on the island Cyprus... The draft about I1 on Academia, just like some of the other drafts, are a bit outdated and needs to be updated.
My belief is that it is not only the I1-men in Scandinavia during the Late Neolithic and onwards who had a unique mercantile role due to the expertise in seafaring but also that OST003 with pre-I1 belonged to a similar mercantile context. It is even possible that the early pre-I1 sample SF11 belonged to a mercantile context. My impression is that SF11 from Stora Karlsö in Sweden is not really a Scandinavian Hunter-Gatherer. He carry 25% Anatolian-like admixture + excess Western Hunter-Gatherer admixture which suggests that he may have had an Anatolian grandparent or an Iron Gates Hunter-Gatherer parent.
By the way, the Swedish aDNA sample KRO009 with R-FGC45993 is not really a Swede or even Germanic. He only carries 15-20% Germanic admixture. His origins are in the eastern Baltic.
Which of the Bronze Age samples from Ternopil Oblast belongs to I1?
@ Norfern
You might be interested in this result on Sargary culture sample,.
left pops:
Russia_LBA_Priobrazhenka
Russia_Andronovo.SG
Russia_Tyumen_HG
Russia_CentralYakutia_LN.SG
best coefficients: 0.674 0.243 0.083
tail prob 0.377
https://pastebin.com/HuGh66HA
2-ways don;t work
Also interesting is
left pops:
Russia_MLBA_Sintashta_o1 (I1007)
Russia_Tyumen_HG
Turkmenistan_Gonur_BA_1
best coefficients: 0.797 0.203 tail prob 0.138
I also showed the Mezhovskaya is overwhelmingy Srubnaya-Andronovo in origin.
The evidence is incontrovertible - 'proto-Indo-Iranian' groups like Sintastha and Andronovo were not initially in close contact with FU speakers, but instead groups on the WSHG cline. The WSHG then 'collapsed; and Yakutia-LN groups speaking final-proto-Uralic expanded east to west.
This explains why Indo-Iranians lack Uralic loans - they were not in direct contact initially, but I-I loans made it into post-Samoyedic Uralic.
The alternative explanation - Uralics were too 'low status' to impart loans on Iranics is simply an ubsinstatiated assumption, and bizarelly nihilist (? do Finns have some sort of complex?).
Looks like final nail in the coffin for the 'phantom circum-ural' FU homeland that is irrationally defended by Jaska, Synome, Finngreek, VladMC and other so-called ''linguists'' on FudgeArchive, most recent renditiion being the Kopyataki bullcrap they pulled out of thier ass.
@Rob
I6047 is actually from Irmen culture.
Kurgan 19, burial 5.
Figure 62 pot 14 is from the same burial.
https://arheologija.ru/molodin-irmenskaya-kultura/
Preobrazhenka-3 is in the Baraba forest-steppe, while Sargari culture is more so in the Miass-Tobol-Ural intefluve.
Sargari culture seems to overlap geographically and temporally with the Mezhovskaya culture somewhat, although I suspect that there are micro-regions where either dominates.
@David
POZ643 with I-CTS10937, dated to c. 1800 BCE, is from Beremiany in Ternopil Oblast. He was found within a Kamarow/Trzciniec context, but as I said, he likely represent the later offspring of one of these I1 anchor points along these trade routes. When you look at his autosomal DNA and his mtDNA (W6a2), the latter inherently Balto-Slavic, it is clear that this I1 lineage has been in this part part of Europe for several generations.
@David
If you look at the historical and modern distribution of I-CTS10937, and even the distribution of the parent clade, it is very clear that I-CTS10937 has nothing to do with Ukraine and the Kamarow/Trzciniec cultures, and instead represent one of these early I1 anchor points along these trade routes. I-FGC72688 likely represents another anchor point. A third anchor point is represented by the presence of I1 on Cyprus during the Bronze Age. I will most likely be right about these things...
@ Norfern - Yes you're right - Irmen culture, for some reason I mistyped. But the point is - we have samples all around the Sintastat periphery, not many, but the few we do have are telling.
@ Dave - as mentioned 'Komarov' culture ~ 1800 BC, poz643 (ChyelinskI)
@ Karl - maybe this might be relevant
https://ndownloader.figstatic.com/files/28433411/preview/28433411/preview.gif
(except reverse the arrows - the trade was due to Scandic eplorers going south then back home ?)
I think some people were justifiably sceptical of the I1 in Cyprus. This specimen just happened to be curated by Danish archaeologists. We’d have to check the contamination rate
@Rob
Yes, exactly, except that the arrows should be pointed in the opposite directions... There is a figure (map 24) by Ørjan Engedal (2010) that also illustrates this very well, actually even better. It is possible that I1 in Cyprus is due to contamination but I think it is legit. With my point of view, you would almost expect to find I1 in places like Cyprus. We of course have to wait and see if these samples are contaminated but my guess is that they are not, and if that's the case, I think it will be very difficult for anyone to argue that there is not mercantile dimension to I1. By the way, I think you are at least partially right about the WSHG.
@Davidski and @Rob
this is unrelated to your post but I wanted to ask if all Europeans have some degree of Iran N and Natufian admixture? I heard from some people that Anatolian Farmers had Iran N and Natufian admixture and that Eneolithic Steppe has Tutkaul and Neolithic Caucasus which has some Iran N, but I want to know your opinion on this
@Fcv
Claiming that Europeans have Iran N or Natufian ancestry because Anatolia N and Steppe N are shifted closer to Iran N/Natufians than their predecessors is a very abstract way to look at the world.
At best, all we can say that is that even Anatolia N and Steppe N have Iran N/Natufian-related ancestries, because they just share alleles with Iran N/Natufians, and there's no evidence of any migrations of Iran N/Natufian populations into Anatolia or the European steppe.
So, we can only say the same for Europeans. That is, Europeans have very distant ancestry that is in some way related to Iran N and the Natufians.
@ Karl - yes I was simplifying. For example, there is WSHG-CCC-EHG ancestry in the Bolshoi Oleni individuals.
@Fcv
Claiming that Europeans have Iran N or Natufian ancestry because Anatolia N and Steppe N are shifted closer to Iran N/Natufians than their predecessors is a very abstract way to look at the world.
At best, all we can say is that Anatolia N and Steppe N have Iran N/Natufian-related ancestries, because they just share alleles with Iran N/Natufians, and there's no evidence of any migrations of Iran N/Natufian populations into Anatolia or the European steppe.
So, we can only say the same for Europeans. That is, Europeans have very distant ancestry that is in some way related to Iran N and the Natufians.
@ FCV, Dave
Well some Mediterranean Europeans do have excess Natufian & Iran-CHG ancestry over that present within 'ANF' & 'Steppe herders' Founders, such as certain post-Eneolithic populations from southern Greece, Hellenistic and Imperial Roman individuals, and perhaps more recently historic movements (? Paulicians).
But the proximal source of this are better considered as 'Aegean folks', as one example. Looking at them in such distal terms is somewhat pointless for modern Europeans, but distal models are useful for the source populations themselves.
As an aside, it looks as if the Minoan genetic profile was already being established by 4000 BC (i.e. Peloponesse N. outlier)
@ Rob
Yes, exactly
@Rob
"As an aside, it looks as if the Minoan genetic profile was already being established by 4000 BC (i.e. Peloponesse N. outlier)".
As I said above, I have close links at he IBD level with Minoans of 4000 Years ago, but strangely only with Minoan Lasithi and not with Minoan Moni Odigitira...
Yes, from the South Caucasus, the CHG/Iran mixture reached Anatolia, then Greece and southern Italy. Caucasian haplogroups are more common there than in Northern Europe.
If we ignore the fact that early European farmers (Barcin) in qpAdm are modeled as a mixture of AHG + Iran + Levant, if memory serves, I could be wrong, the Italians and Balkans have the Caucasus Iranian squat on top of this
The new materials and the new calibrated radiocarbon dates significantly amend the understanding of many processes that took place during the Bronze Age both in Central Asia and far outside of it. Materials of the Early Tulkhar Necropolis (South Tajikistan) are often used to prove active contacts between the steppe livestock-farming Andornovo people and the settled crop-farming Central Asia people. Andronovo influences in the first place are found in the cremated burials of this necropolis. E.E. Kuzmina considers these burials archaeological evidence of her hypothesis about the Andronovo people (Indo-Aryans) migrating across Central Asia (Bishkent culture) to the North-West Pakistan (Swat culture) and North India. The new materials and the new calibrated radiocarbon dates recently appeared. They prevent relating the Andronovo people and the cremated burials in the Early Tulkhar Necropolis. The South Urals Fedorovo culture stands out with cremated burials and dates back to 1742–1451 calBC according to the latest data. The Tulkhar cremated burials appeared a lot earlier, namely no later than in the early 3rd millennium BC. The new dates also throw a shadow of doubt over the Andronovo people participating in establishment of the Bishkent culture in Central Asia, in migration of the Bishkent culture southward and its contribution to Swat culture in the North-West Pakistan. Probably, the process went otherwise. The author believes that the cremated burials in the Early Tulkhar Necropolis can be associated with particular small groups of people moving from Balochistan (Kulli culture) or the North-West Pakistan (Swat culture). The new dates change the perspective of the process that used to be considered the result of the Andronovo culture influence of the Bronze Age livestock-farming and crop-farming cultures in Central Asia. Cremated burials in the Sapalli culture necropolises in Central Asia (Bustan VI, Djarkutan 4a) should not be directly associated with the impact or contribution of the Andronovo Fedorovo people. Furthermore, as a matter of a fact, particular groups of Andronovo people regularly entered Central Asia throughout the entire Andornovo culture period. This allows to assume that Central Asia is exactly the place to reveal the origin of the Andronovo cremation rite.
@ Shomu
''Yes, from the South Caucasus, the CHG/Iran mixture reached Anatolia, then Greece and southern Italy. Caucasian haplogroups are more common there than in Northern Europe.
If we ignore the fact that early European farmers (Barcin) in qpAdm are modeled as a mixture of AHG + Iran + Levant, if memory serves, I could be wrong, the Italians and Balkans have the Caucasus Iranian squat on top of this''
Not quite. As I stated above, excess CHG &/or Natufian in modern Europeans is limited to the Mediterrean such as Cypriots, Crete, southern Italy. It is absent in central - northern Italians, Serbs, Croats, Bulgarians, even northern Greeks.
In Roman times, such ancestry could indeed be found well north into Italy and central Balkans, but the 're-ruralization' (demise of migrant-loaded cities), Slavic and Germanic migrations revsersed this trend
Some Greeks and Italians have additional "southern arc” ancestry mediated by the peoples of western Anatolia in successive waves during the Bronze Age, Hellenistic and Roman periods. The first wave can be associated with “old Anatolian” types that impacted Pelasgian and Mycenaean civilizations, the next two with back migrations of Greco-Anatolian profiles from coastal cities to other parts of the Hellenic world, such as the Aegean and Cyprus islands, mainland Greece and Magna Graecia. This ancestry mix ultimately traces back to the eastern Anatolia / upper Mesopotamia region and is not "Iranian". And it’s not found in any other Europeans outside of trace amounts in Southern Europe.
More broadly, this “Iran_N” obsession began when fish-boned Hindutvatis decided to cope by claiming CHG were the exact same population as that which founded BMAC, Harrappa, etc. in Central Asia and Pakistan, because they wanted to claim basal PIE comes from Zagrosian origins, as opposed to the proto-Europoid lads of the eastern European steppe.
Where do you bring this from? Is it modified OIT ? OutOfTurkmenistan?
@ Tom ''What’s the story with GeneArchiver anyway? Is it a site that was founded by a particular clique of Anthrogenica refugees when that was shut down? I used to be on AG there but the moderation team made things unbearable after a while with their double standards and tribalism.''
Basically a lamer spin-off from an already lame forum. Weird personalities of leftoids and Boomers, hopelessy devoid of critical thinking but depsarate to be seen as 'in the know'. From a scan of their current threads
- Slav thread: in a state of bumpkinville, full of irrelevant posts about 'muh PCA'. Refer to DF's entertainment here
- V13-Thrace Thread: 75.000 posts on the same thing about Fluted Ware by one poster, claims in thread about Transylvania all wrong; yet but the ''opposing'' position is that of a of a person who thinks Harvard are experts and that all PIE comes from Yamnaya; can't seem to grasp why Ezero culture aren;t from Balkans despite being EEF-rich
- Bekear/ AOC thread: outdated and wrong. OP is a cock, and not in a good way
- Uralic threads: autistic denials of the obvious.
- Germanic thread - curated by a menopausal chicken 'archaegenetic officiando' advancing biazzre pet theories, then banning, closing & redacting threads when proven wrong. Closely linked to ^ above, also links with I1 theories, but no credibility as main data curators are morons due to association with above 2.
- PIE thread: not much activity after their butthurt, but biased leftoid adminning favouring an unholy alliance of Laz-fanboys, J2b-'we was Yamnayans' and dregs from the OIT camp
- Paleo threads: mostly mumbo-jumbo, but well meaning
That about sums it up
Funny sample from 3000-2000bce Tajikistan.
Target: TajikistanBAFarkhorlcAG10551-HW-sim_scaled
Distance: 2.8139% / 0.02813940
100.0 Ukraine_CernavodaI_Kartal_C
Wonder if swat I-L704 male came via such a population.
BTW male is E1b1b and only 12000 snps.
@Ash Are these simulated coordinates?
Analysis of thirty individuals from the Steppe Barbaricum, the 150-km flatland strip between the Danube and Tisza rivers, revealed extraordinary genetic complexity that predates traditional accounts of Slavic presence by several centuries.
The population composition shows remarkable balance among five ancestral components (Supplementary Figure S3): Germanic (21.5%), Balkan Iron Age (20.8%), Proto-Slavic (20.2%), Byzantine (19.1%), and Steppe Sarmatian-Hunnic (16.9%). This balanced distribution, confirmed through qpAdm modeling with high statistical confidence (p = 0.73), suggests extensive intermarriage and cultural exchange rather than segregated ethnic communities.
Significantly, Proto-Slavic signatures absent in second-century samples emerge clearly in 5th-century individuals, suggesting Slavic presence in the Hungarian Plain by at least 400 CE—over a century before historical documentation. Temporal analysis reveals progressive increase in Proto-Slavic components from 0% (2nd century) to 20.2% (5th century), while Sarmatian components decrease from 35% to 16.9% over the same period.
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/genetics/articles/10.3389/fgene.2025.1610942/full
@George
https://uavestnik.ru/en/arxiv-nomerov/2024/volume-24,-no.-4/migrations-climate-chronology/materials-of-the-early-tulkhar-necropolis-in-the-light-of-the-hypothesis-of-andronovo-population-migration-to-the-south-problems-of-chronology.html
@shomu
Yes...sample is low quality so not on g25.
@Davidski
Map of the Caucasus in 5000 BCE
https://i.ibb.co/d0nNywV6/G2-F8-Oxp-W0-AAs-Zmw.jpg
full size quality👌
https://nsgnforlqltuuebdvocw.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/maps/caucasus_5000bce.png
A funny reconstruction from Sulkalmakh, many questions
https://x.com/Sulkalmakh/status/1973055600146739699
https://i.ibb.co/d0nNywV6/G2-F8-Oxp-W0-AAs-Zmw.jpg
I think it's a pretty good map, the sites/ cultures are accurate, proposed gene flow reasonable and overall good aesthetic
I'd quibble minor points of their other maps, for ex 6000 bc one depicting Late Mesolithic groups in the west as 'proto-Neolithic' and the 4500 bc map depcting the LCV as PIE, but I suppose each remains to be seen
@ Shomu - interesting phenotype. My beard goes red if I grow it long
He doesn't have the 6000 BC maps yet, but he probably will soon.
Finally, Map of the Caucasus in 6000 BCE
https://x.com/iraklimaps/status/1973450986258833592
Full qiality
https://nsgnforlqltuuebdvocw.supabase.co/storage/v1/object/public/maps/caucasus_6000bce.PNG
the most interesting and important period for the Caucasus
Keep in mind that Ancestral Whispers and his inner circle are Georgian nationalists and so the “reconstructions”, maps etc. put out by them are not only speculative, but following a region centric worldview.
Naturally, like Lazaridis (another Kartvelian), they are big on the idea that PIE homeland was the immediate North Caucasus and that PIE is potentially from Anadolu-Kavkazy farmers.
Facial recons are always going to be speculative, fun but not exactly hard Science. I glance and move on.
I remember AW was at one point trying to claim that I2a-L699 is also from the Volga-Caucasus region, so I cant vouch for their scientific depths, or perhaps they were brainwashed, like many others, by the 'usual suspects' in DNA publication :)
This '6000 BC map' should be better termed 'early quarter 6th Millennium'', because Sho-Shu C14 calibration curves fall 5800-5300 BC
@ Norfern
Do you realy think that the names for pinetrees, and other year-1823 linguistic methodologies our frined JH is employing, is really going to 'prove' that FU is from the Volga region. Seesm that Finnish linguists are doing poorly in updating themselves with current evidence.
@All
Here are G25 coords for the Grodek and other samples based on the official genotypes from Gretzinger et al.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IcEwVEvymiABXMvnV75Qs5oo6m8oeExK/view?usp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1M_1TZcFypT--8NfpS4QdGqECfzDPzxUx/view?usp=sharing
David, I'm with interest awaiting your statistics, as I see in Gretzinger's f4 statistics that medieval Poles trace most of their origin from the TCC population. I see the same in Table S39, but not in alleles, but in autosomal haplotypes. In this situation, it doesn't matter what happened in Poland during the Iron Age (the cremation period), as we are 100% certain that medieval Poles are descendants of people who inhabited Poland during the Bronze Age.
AW-Lazaridis, like Stalin-Erdogan of anthropology, woah
@Tom
..."Keep in mind that Ancestral Whispers and his inner circle are Georgian nationalists and so the “reconstructions”,"
At least they are doing something and trying to do something, maybe they are dragging history in favor of the Caucasus and Georgia, well, no one is without sin...
It's been very disappointing to see how extremely biased Iosif Lazaridis' work has turned out to be on the topic of the PIE homeland.
He couldn't even work out that there was steppe ancestry in Anatolia. And that was really his main argument for an Armenian or Iranian homeland.
Very poorly done all round, by him as well as David Reich and Nick Patterson.
@Rob
I don't think that he considers that possible anymore, although he seems convinced that Uralic Indo-Iranian contact happened in the Urals.
@ AW
No need to get dramatic. People just need to be aware that your "project" has its own ethnic and ideological biases. That is all.
@ Davidski
I've seen a lot of people mentioning IBD analysis lately, what’s your opinion on it? Are you able to run it on ancient samples? I’d be interested to see what an independent analysis of certain samples shows, including BA Anatolian's.
@ Norfern-
JH is a 'local expert' but global clown. His takes on historical linguistics & anthropology read like AI-generated post-modernist cliches like 'pots aren't peoples' and 'genes don't speak languages'.
Somewhat different to the Sintashta 'status quo', but more accurate, is that Indo-Iranian is a post-Fatyanovo-Abashevo development, following early input from 'Turan' and 'Siberian' groups; locating it east of the Urals. Western post-Sintashta + Srubnaya groups contibuted to development of Thracian and Armenian.
As we've discussed above, the Koptyaki culture, Irmen, Mezhovskaya, etc -'circle of Andronovoid cultures' -are overwhelmingly Srubnaya-Andonovo derived genetically, culturally, Y-hg R1a-Z93 etc, although they are of course distinctive in some respects. These were probably a major source of 'Iranian' loans in FU rather than FU speakers. From the linterature I;ve read, the feeling is early 'NW IE" loans are fleeting at best, and the couple which are valid can be easily explained as retained 'archaisms'.
Samoyedic groups are distributed across the Ob-Yenesei region, which is precisely where Yakutia-LN ancestry appears c. 2200 BC. Trying to derive these from the Volga or Ural has no basis.
I think post-Ugric group established themselves in the Pechora region, from where they dispersed subsequently, some as late as the Iron Age (e.g. Mordvins moving south after the notable ~ 1200 BC population shifts). The relevance of BOO will be finally determined if we get LBA data from north/eastern Finland, but i'd bet they were early 'Fino-Sami' groups.
@Tom
IBD is a good method when done properly and I pushed for its use in ancient DNA work years ago. I even emailed the Reich Lab to try and get them to incorporate it into their workflow, and they eventually did.
https://eurogenes.blogspot.com/2017/09/ancient-ibdcm-matrix-analysis-offer.html
But I don't have the time anymore to run IBD analyses.
The results in recent papers look reasonable. The only thing that bothers me is that they're sometimes taken too literally.
That is, picking up real IBD tracts isn't easy, so haplotype links can be misinterpreted as IBD links, and this does seem to be happening in ancient DNA studies.
@Tom
There was nothing dramatic about what I wrote, it was a joke. But if I were to get dramatic, I’d say I’ve noticed a recent trend among the “androgynous men-boys,” as Rob put it, to adopt the victim-complex mentality of their subjugators. They do this to the extent that they feel the need to reinvent history and well-established borders, coming up with bizarre ideas like Lazaridis being a Kartvelian or “Volga-Caucasus” as some kind of border, just to continue portraying themselves as victims.
If I had more time, I’d make a large compilation of the countless times different groups accused us of bias, but this is just from mostly over the past week: https://i.imgur.com/29CuJHi.png
Ironically, your emotional outburst is the most androgynous comment on this blog in recent memory. I don’t know what you're talking about when it comes to “victims”, "subjugators", etc. but you sound unhinged. I merely pointed out that your amateur project has its biases and should be taken as something fun and artistic as opposed to scientific reality.
As for Lazaidis, he is a Pontian. These people irrespective of linguistic affiliation are known to be Colchian/Kartvelian in origin. And I have an issue with the PIE homeland being obfuscated because it hurts their feelings.
None of this is irrational.
@ancestralwhispers.org Bro are you a Godoberi?
@Fcv Because barcin (early European farmers), as I wrote above, is Pinarbasi + Iranian Neolithic + Natufian
@ Tom - bias in academia often relates to paradigmatic platforms, hubris/ echo chamber effect, defending one's previously published model, pet obsession with a certain methodology (e.g. the dubiuos IBD_based admixture), over deeper genomic affinities of indiidual authors, but all possible.
@Tom
Broski, this entire blog has been in meltdown ever since Lazaridis’ Southern Arc broke some of the bucks in here. For the record, I disagree with it, I believe that PIE was formed in the Lower Don area or the western part of the Lower Volga, by the foragers inhabiting those regions. But the obsession with disproving it has people like you seeing ghosts, and, as our friend Corded Slav and Rob would say, barking like chihuahuas. Plus, from my observation, the current political climate in the West also plays a role in shaping this into a victim complex.
As an example, one of our maps Arsen posted made the victims of the Southern Arc recoil, dismissing archaeological consensus (I imagine it was the Nalchik/Unakozovskaya-Steppe bidirectional flow) as “made up.” Meanwhile, someone like Rob, who has actually read the archaeological material and followed the DNA research of the region, pointed out that it’s based on actual scholarly consensus. Complaints about our project being “unscientific” usually come from people like the former, who haven’t bothered to familiarize themselves with more than one field at a time in order to get a clearer picture of the PIE question. The irony is doubled when they obsess over “science”, while most of the recent posts on Eurogenes have been devoted to pointing out the flaws of scientists themselves. And if peer review is what you’re hung up on, we’ve had several collaborations with "esteemed scientists". You can read more about that in our blog posts and other parts of the website.
As for Pontics, they are more Anatolian than Kartvelian from a genetic pov. And if you even glanced at Lazaridis' Twitter, you’d see how much of a Perfidious Kartvelian he is (he's not).
@Shomu
No brother, not a Godober but a Khwarshin
Well, we have pretty much got the full picture for steppe- Caucasus interactions. The only weakness in sample coverage is Eneolithic southern Caucasus (5000 - 4000bc), but that doesn't impact our understanding of steppe groups.
@ AW
It’s quite normal to have discussions about an ongoing, unresolved subject matter.
Anyhow, you have now gone on two estrogenic, emotionally charged 4chan tier rants. I’m assuming your fascination with homosexual violence is a trauma-induced projection vis-a-vis the Lezgins, Ossetians and Russians. I can’t say I understand, but you have my sympathies.
That said, I do appreciate your unhinged comments because it rather perfectly highlights why my initial comment about your “project” was indeed correct.
https://arkeonews.net/7000-year-old-eneolithic-settlement-unearthed-in-dagestan/
judging by this archaeological site near derbent, the spread of the shomu tepe culture to the north caucasus and then to the steppes occurred through the caspian derbent pass
https://i.ibb.co/7t80KmG2/1759620364887.jpg
@Davidski
Thoughts on AS13, a 200-50BC Zarobintsy period CTS10228 sample, possibly representing a late Proto-Slav?
@Tom
Weirdo
Do we have G25 coords for AS13?
AS13 is an undated allegedly 'late Scythian' individual from Crimea from Andreeve et al 2025
@ AW Lol I called "Car" a chihuahua a while ago when he was getting lippy- it's got nothing to do with either of you. I'm not sure what your beef is, but I think you & Tom both do good work for your respective regions. I think it's great that Tom & Dan Davis also bring forth 'Neolithic' Europe, not just the currently fashionable topic of steppe & Corded Ware
@ Tom what is happening in Europe isn't Lazaridis' or AW's fault (although paradigmatic ethos in academia is shaped by, and in turn shapes, socio-political narratives) but mostly due to trans-Atlanticist 'think-tanks'. (pred. of A-S ancestry).
@Davidski
"Do we have G25 coords for AS13?"
We don’t, but it might be worth checking the sample with other tools.
@Rob
"Well, we have pretty much got the full picture for steppe- Caucasus interactions. The only weakness in sample coverage is Eneolithic southern Caucasus (5000 - 4000bc), but that doesn't impact our understanding of steppe groups."
Given the current data, your and Frank’s blog posts on Adnaera have aged quite well.
Frank knew a lot of about archaeology, but his overall rationalisation of all the info wasn’t optimal. Ultimately he & Alberto seemed determined on proving IE coming from Iran, when this is not feasible. Refer to their latest post, which unfortunately is a caricature
@ Dave - cant seem to find these in your G25
https://genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13059-025-03700-9#Sec38
@Rob
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/0q39lrsynq7prjc7mm8gq/G25-Ancients.txt?rlkey=33i5tycf3nd6glv1w7z6dleco&e=7&dl=0
Yes, my buddy William Anderson makes these lists 😊
I think that Quiles might have been onto something when bringing up the so called flowerpot ceramics complex of cultures, or the "Okunevo-like" cultures, when discussing Yeniseian hydronyms in the Irtysh. I don't see how any other migration pulse could have brought them there after that. The cultures are also more aligned with the Samus-Kizhirovo type of metallurgy as opposed to just Seima-Turbino type metallurgy.
https://indo-european.eu/2021/04/proto-yeniseian-homeland/
After these cultures there's the Fëdorovka wave that reaches the Yenisei, after which the Andronoid complexes dominate until the migration wave of Atlym culture from the north at the turn of the LBA/EIA. There are not really any migration waves from the east that could be associated with Yeniseian speakers. At most some of them could have dispersed alongside Kulai culture migrants. But given that the Kulai culture itself does not match with these Yeniseian hydronyms in their distribution at all I doubt that.
https://indo-european.eu/2021/04/proto-yeniseian-homeland/
https://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/server/api/core/bitstreams/1430d847-44a3-44a0-ab83-88f57718eeb1/content
https://www.alkuperasivusto.fi/Late_Proto-Uralic_from_the_Altai_Region.pdf
Meant to link this as well
https://nationalatlas.ru/tom4/28-30.html
Could you do these samples from Zeng et al.
https://www.mediafire.com/file/3kvj49ozpui0fqe/Zeng_2025.zip/file
Here you go...
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tfZeCpXftei2Pm4RQtgSIySohyVXvsae/view?usp=sharing
many thanks
@ Norfern - is there evience that Okunevo culture migrated toward the central Yenesei basin ?
There is the 'flower pot' complex scenario. Interesting article, not sure it tracks actual Okunevo people. What are your thoughts ?
@Rob
Not really, there's plenty of ceramic traditions on the Lower and Middle Angara with connections to Yakutia and the Cis-Baikal.
https://www.academia.edu/29884012/Pottery_of_the_Northern_Angara_region_Bronze_Age_%D0%9A%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%BC%D0%B8%D0%BA%D0%B0_%D0%B1%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%BD%D0%B7%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%BE_%D0%B2%D0%B5%D0%BA%D0%B0_%D0%A1%D0%B5%D0%B2%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%BD%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%BE_%D0%9F%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%B0%D0%BD%D0%B3%D0%B0%D1%80%D1%8C%D1%8F_In_Russ_
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/337883196_Ceramic_complexes_of_the_bronze_age_on_the_Lower_angara_problems_of_chronology_and_cultural_belonging
Okunevo culture is seemingly considered part of the so called flowerpot ceramic complex as can be see on Fig. 22.3
https://bedlan.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/OHAL_Uralic_Vesakoski-Salmela-Piezonka.pdf
As for Okunevo ~ Yeneseian, what is to support that scenario over a more 'archaic ANE' origin.
Also look for trail of Okunevo-related Y-hg Q
https://www.sciepublish.com/article/pii/504
Not sure if they have much data on Yeneseian speakers.
Ket apparently have Q-L330
https://cyberleninka.ru/article/n/genofond-yuzhnyh-selkupov-v-kontekste-istoricheskih-i-arheologicheskih-dannyh
@Norfern-Ostrobothnian
@Rob
A simple association between Okunevo and Proto-Uralic is problematic because of its heavily Paleaosiberian/ANE rich ancestry and Yhg Q that is not a common thread in Uralic speakers, as well as the already existing link to Yeniseian, although the actual Proto-Yeniseian homeland was probably further east, around the Glazkovo culture. Taking the Zeng et al samples into consideration, there seems to be a 4.2kya genetic trail from Yakutia thru Krasnoyarsk and Tatarka Hill towards the Altai that could account for the movements of Yakutia_LNBA people into Southern Siberia/Altai and then westwards through the flowerpot complex. They probably would have interacted with Okunevo on their way.
I can pretty confidently say that Lesosibirsk culture is associated with the ancestors of Kets and Yugh, maybe Pumpokols too.
https://cyberleninka.ru/article/n/keramicheskaya-posuda-lesosibirskoy-kultury-voprosy-tipologii-i-genezisa
@ Synome
''A simple association between Okunevo and Proto-Uralic is problematic because of its heavily Paleaosiberian/ANE rich ancestry and Yhg Q that is not a common thread in Uralic speakers, as well as the already existing link to Yeniseian,''
Yep. As an aside, Q-L74 is common in Selkups, which covers a whole host ancient samples under it, ranging from Glazkovo BA to Okunevo and Scythianoids
''Taking the Zeng et al samples into consideration, there seems to be a 4.2kya genetic trail from Yakutia thru Krasnoyarsk and Tatarka Hill towards the Altai that could account for the movements of Yakutia_LNBA people into Southern Siberia/Altai and then westwards through the flowerpot complex. They probably would have interacted with Okunevo on their way.''
Thats a possible route
New model for scythians...
Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:Dev4__BC_267__Cov_99.89%
Distance: 1.8795% / 0.01879489
72.0 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
15.8 Uzbekistan_SappaliTepe_BA
12.2 Russia_Shamanka_EBA
Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS65__BC_350__Cov_92.53%
Distance: 1.6792% / 0.01679228
58.2 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
18.0 Uzbekistan_SappaliTepe_BA
14.8 Russia_Shamanka_EBA
9.0 Bulgaria_EIA
Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS38__BC_350__Cov_64.28%
Distance: 1.6514% / 0.01651448
71.8 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
18.2 Uzbekistan_SappaliTepe_BA
10.0 Russia_Shamanka_EBA
Target: Ukraine_Dnipropetrovsk_Scythian:AS39__BC_322__Cov_33.43%
Distance: 1.5208% / 0.01520773
57.4 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
17.4 Uzbekistan_SappaliTepe_BA
14.8 Bulgaria_EIA
10.4 Russia_Shamanka_EBA
Target: Russia_Voronezh_Scythian:DS67__BC_362__Cov_99.21%
Distance: 1.1008% / 0.01100798
73.2 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
13.2 Uzbekistan_SappaliTepe_BA
9.2 Russia_Shamanka_EBA
4.4 Bulgaria_EIA
Y2 sample
Terrible distance with sintashta
Target: Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian:DS32__BC_300__Cov_92.95%
Distance: 3.8680% / 0.03867990
92.0 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
4.2 Armenia_Berkaber_KuraAraxes_EBA
3.8 Russia_Shamanka_EBA
With Poland_Trzciniec_MBA
Target: Russia_Voronezh_NonScythian:DS32__BC_300__Cov_92.95%
Distance: 1.6149% / 0.01614909
78.2 Poland_Trzciniec_MBA
17.2 Armenia_Berkaber_KuraAraxes_EBA
4.6 Russia_Shamanka_EBA
Any idea what is the context behind these people?
Six months ago, there was some news in Genarchivist that a new article would be ready by fall on samples from the Neolithic to the Iron Age for Azerbaijan and the South Caucasus. Is there any recent news on this?
“Taking the Zeng et al samples into consideration, there seems to be a 4.2kya genetic trail from Yakutia thru Krasnoyarsk and Tatarka Hill towards the Altai that could account for the movements of Yakutia_LNBA people into Southern Siberia/Altai and then westwards through the flowerpot complex. They probably would have interacted with Okunevo on their way.''
However the problem with this scenario remains as outlined above- the post-ST cultures on this route (Mezhovska, Irmen, etc) remain overwhelmingly Andronovo derived / R1a
The scenario I proposed a couple of years ago envisaged a northerly migration of Uralics from the Siberian forests to eastern Europe . I suspect that my “northern route hypothesis” will be proven correct
Voronezh_Scythian is beating Sintashta with ease probably due to BMAC ancestry found in these groups...? I don't know...
Target: Arain
Distance: 1.5034% / 0.01503435
71.6 Iran_ShahrISokhta_BA2
28.4 Russia_Voronezh_Scythian
Target: Kamboj
Distance: 1.3713% / 0.01371272
64.6 Iran_ShahrISokhta_BA2
35.4 Russia_Voronezh_Scythian
Target: Khatri
Distance: 1.1470% / 0.01147008
68.2 Iran_ShahrISokhta_BA2
30.6 Russia_Voronezh_Scythian
1.2 Russia_MLBA_Sintashta
I managed to squeeze out some data from the new samples here
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09192-8
https://www.mediafire.com/file/45mr52546hq7oqy/Sikora_2025.zip/file
I'll have a look but I'm away until Sunday.
'' I suspect that my “northern route hypothesis” will be proven correct''
I should be called NostraRobbo
https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(25)01033-5
The Maklasheevka individual is Y-hg N1a. But even this is too 'southern'/ admixed. I want to see the Lebyazhskaya, Atamannyur, Korshakov movements, which might be more 30% Andronovo, 70% Yakutia, probably a major source for 'west Uralic' and a key link for the BOO group
Ananyino might at least in part be a north to south colonization by Uralic people after the collapse of late Srubnaja settlement c. 1200 BC
FTDNA added the rest of the Nikitin samples to the time tree, but unfortunately the eneolithic samples were almost all placed too far upstream to say anything interesting about them.
"On the other hand, most of the post-1000 CE individuals from Gródek are shifted closer to present-day Balts. This is probably due to admixture from nearby Baltic-speaking populations. At the time, Baltic speakers still occupied much of northern and eastern Poland." Why do you think this is due to admixture? Perhaps they had not yet drifted further apart? Linguistically, we know that in the eastern part of Northern Indo-European, there was a Balto-Slavic stage before it split further.
@ Ethan
''FTDNA added the rest of the Nikitin samples to the time tree, but unfortunately the eneolithic samples were almost all placed too far upstream to say anything interesting about them.''
all looking like a dispersal from lower Dnieper, even L703 looks like east-bank Dnieper origin. Berezhnovka looks like a downstream, minor clade within. Most Yamnaya - Catacomb fall onto I-FTJ77.
Looking forward to seeing Kalehoyuk & Kullolba when released.
What do you think?
https://i.ibb.co/YFB1ff8q/IMG-20251022-091443-783.jpg
@All
This early Slavic data is very cool. I've been immersed in it for the past week and it's nice to have that feeling again about ancient DNA.
I will do a new blog post about it very soon.
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