Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots have common paternal roots! (new study)

[Amathusian]

Y-chromosomal analysis of Greek Cypriots reveals a primarily common pre-Ottoman paternal ancestry with Turkish Cypriots.

Alexandros Heraclides , Evy Bashiardes , Eva Fernández-Domínguez, Stefania Bertoncini, Marios Chimonas, Vasilis Christofi, Jonathan King, Bruce Budowle, Panayiotis Manoli, Marios A. Cariolou A. PlosOne (Published: June 16, 2017).

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0179474

The paper also includes an overview of Y-haplogroup distribution among Greeks and Turks by region, after combining all relevant data from the literature.

[wandering_amorite]

Y-chromosomal analysis of Greek Cypriots reveals a primarily common pre-Ottoman paternal ancestry with Turkish Cypriots.

Alexandros Heraclides , Evy Bashiardes , Eva Fernández-Domínguez, Stefania Bertoncini, Marios Chimonas, Vasilis Christofi, Jonathan King, Bruce Budowle, Panayiotis Manoli, Marios A. Cariolou A. PlosOne (Published: June 16, 2017).

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/art...l.pone.0179474

The paper also includes an overview of Y-haplogroup distribution among Greeks and Turks by region, after combining all relevant data from the literature.

Always good to see the cousins. Yet another study that has Greek Cypriots w/the highest rate of E-M34 of any large-sample population. Can anyone glean any downstream markers?

[kingjohn]

about e-m123 in the paper from what i understand
that there is a diffrence between greek cypriotes{13% m123} and turkish cypriotes{6.3% m123 } in the frequency %
the paper say e-m123 is probably south levantine in origin have to agree.......
regards
adam

p.s
that is The second paper who found e-m123 in greek cypriotes the previews paper found 10% e-m123 it is there for sure ....
maybe it arrived in bronze age period or even before
who knows maybe george michael or cat stevens were e-m123 lol

[Amathusian]

Indeed the frequency of E-M123 among Cypriots is surprisingly high.. Most of it belongs to subclade E-M84, although the specific SNP has not been tested in this paper. In my opinion it is very likely that E-M123 entered Cyprus from the Levant as early as the Neolithic.

[Principe]

I manually Nevgen Predicted all the Turkish Cypriot J2 from this study and there is 83:

The Breakdown according to the Nevgen Predictor:

1. J2a1-Z7700: 16 (J-F3133 on Yfull)
2. J2a1-M319: 11
3. J2a1-Z500: 11 (would be interesting to see how many are M92)
4. J2a1-PF5191: 11
5. J2a1-Z387: 7 (I think the breakdown would be interesting)
6. J2a1-Z6065: 6
7. J2a1-L210: 5
8. J2b-M205: 5
9. J2b-M241: 3 (All most likely under L283)
10. J2a2-PF5008: 3
11. J2a1-PF7431: 3
12. J2a1-S25258:1
13. J2a1-Z7671: 1

I will do the same for the Greek Cypriots and see the differences.

[Afshar]

Wow they have the same haplogroups so they are cousins...what a mess.

[Agamemnon]

I'm not so sure E-M123 entered Cyprus from the Levant during the Neolithic, that's certainly a possibility, however the authors state that:

"The MJN analysis revealed that GCy haplotypes (coloured blue in Fig 2) appear in a more basal position than TCy haplotypes.(coloured red in Fig 2) in specific haplogroups, such as E-M78, while other haplogroups do not have any specific structure. Only two haplogroup networks (E-M123 and E-M78) reveal star-like agglutinations of some haplotypes or sub-clusters compatible with population expansion events (black ovals in Fig 2). Time expansions for these were estimated at 4018 years ago (+/- 507 DS) and 753 years ago (+/- 329 DS), respectively. Repeating the analysis using 12 STR loci, resulted in somewhat differently shaped networks, which however provided the same results, with only the aforementioned haplogroups showing evidence of star-like constructions (S3 Fig). Expansion times using an alternative formula (see Methods) and using 12-loci were very similar to those reported above. Overall, haplotype variation appeared to overlap between GCy and TCy, with no clear clustering of haplotypes based on ethnic background observed."

That doesn't sound wholly consistent with an entry during the Neolithic, Neolithic data from Cyprus is needed to clear this up. What I can say however is that the authors are dead wrong as far as J1 is of concern:

"The main feature distinguishing Cypriots from Lebanese and other Middle Easterners included in our analysis is their much lower frequency of haplogroup J1. This observation clearly suggests that although Cypriots and Lebanese share common paternal roots, the latter received a substantial influx from populations high in J1, probably during the early Arab conquest era (7th cent. AD). Similarly, North Africans also are particularly high in haplogroup E-M81, which is extremely rare (TCy) or absent (GCy) in Cyprus."

While Arabian branches of J1 are found in Lebanon, most of the J1 in Lebanon does not seem to be Arabian in origin, much less related to the expansion of Islam. J1-P58 was already present in Lebanon during the Bronze Age (as demonstrated by its presence in one of the Middle Bronze Age Sidonians), so I very much doubt that the current J1 frequencies in Lebanon are to be attributed to an "influx from populations high in J1" during the 7th century CE.

Either way, it's a shame they didn't take the time to uncover the subclades under each marker.

[Amathusian]

I manually Nevgen Predicted all the Turkish Cypriot J2 from this study and there is 83:

The Breakdown according to the Nevgen Predictor:

1. J2a1-Z7700: 16 (J-F3133 on Yfull)
2. J2a1-M319: 11
3. J2a1-Z500: 11 (would be interesting to see how many are M92)
4. J2a1-PF5191: 11
5. J2a1-Z387: 7 (I think the breakdown would be interesting)
6. J2a1-Z6065: 6
7. J2a1-L210: 5
8. J2b-M205: 5
9. J2b-M241: 3 (All most likely under L283)
10. J2a2-PF5008: 3
11. J2a1-PF7431: 3
12. J2a1-S25258:1
13. J2a1-Z7671: 1

I will do the same for the Greek Cypriots and see the differences.

Great Principe, please let us know! Given that the majority of Greek Cypriot samples have been SNP-tested, it would be good to see whether the Nevgen predictor is in agreement with the SNP testing..

[Amathusian]

@Agamemnon

I see your point about E-M123, but still to me it makes sense that since E-Z830 (ancestral to E-M123) has been found among Natufians in South Levant, very likely E-M123 has evolved there, some time during the Neolithic and moved from there to Cyprus. Unless there were no population movements from the Levant to Cyprus during the Neolithic, which I find hard to believe. The mystery however is why E-M123 is much more common among Cypriots than among modern Levantine populations (maybe with the exception of Jordanians)?

[Agamemnon]

@Agamemnon

I see your point about E-M123, but still to me it makes sense that since E-Z830 (ancestral to E-M123) has been found among Natufians in South Levant, very likely E-M123 has evolved there, some time during the Neolithic and moved from there to Cyprus. Unless there were no population movements from the Levant to Cyprus during the Neolithic, which I find hard to believe. The mystery however is why E-M123 is much more common among Cypriots than among modern Levantine populations (maybe with the exception of Jordanians)?

I'd argue that the Natufians being E-Z830*, that is to say negative for M123, does a disfavour to this scenario, M123's absence is hard to explain considering the fact that E-M123 is roughly 20,000 years old... That doesn't mean E-M123 wasn't already present in the area, it might even turn out to be a prominent marker among the Natufians. That being said, the expansion estimate suggests an arrival during the EB IV period in Cyprus, the authors themselves state that...

"Also, our MJN analysis revealed a population expansion for two clusters within two major haplogroups (E-M123 and E-M78) which happened the earliest ~3500 years ago for the former and ~400 years ago for the latter. The population expansion in the former haplogroup appears to have occurred during late Bronze Age / early Iron Age, while for the latter the expansion could overlap the end of the Venetian era and start of the Ottoman era in Cyprus. Overall, the networks do not support differential mutations in the two populations, indicating that GCy and TCy haplotypes expanded together at a large extent, but at the same time this analysis cannot prove that one population is derived from the other."

There's much to bet the same observations could be made for J1 in Cyprus, as E-M34 and J1-P58 are often found in the same places, however the authors chose not to focus on J1. Regarding your last question, I think the answer is rather simple, namely, because E-M123 was far more common in the region by the past, around ~17% of Ashkenazi Jews are E-M123, so Western Jews are, along with Cypriots, one of the populations with the highest M123 frequencies out there. Incidentally, many Jews are E-Z830 (xM123) as well, so this just gives more weight to such a scenario. The only places in the Levant with high E-M123 frequencies are the Jordanian coasts of the Dead Sea, a relatively isolated area. So I'd wager Cyprus' insular character contributed to the high E-M123 frequencies we're seeing.