Ancient DNA shows domestic horses in southern Caucasus, Anatolia during Bronze Age

[CopperAxe]

The point made was that Carlos was an idiot, which is indisputable

Now this is exactly what I like about you and eurogenes hahaha!

All Indo-European speaking equestrian cultures had Sintashta horses not DOM2 horses.

No one knows yet when the modern domestic Sintashta clade was domesticated or where, and when people started riding. But the current evidence suggests that riding in war became widespread in the Andronovo culture.

https://phys.org/news/2020-07-ancien...ronze-age.html

That article about the psalies from around 1600 bc was pretty much exactly what I was thinking about. Reminds me of this bit in The origin of Indo-Iranians by Helena Kuz'mina (p.97):

Considerable changes in the steppes during this period are shown by the appearance of hoards of bronze objects. There are hoards of two types: family
and founders hoards (Kuz’mina 1966: 98). Family hoards (Brichmulla, Turksib, Sadovoe, Sukuluk, Issyk-Kul’, Shamshi, Tuyuk, etc., Figs. 43, 114) contain various types of used objects, which were family property. The appearance of such hoards reflects the process of property stratification of the late Andronovo tribes. The concealment of hoards in the earth indicates the tense situation in the steppe, more frequent military confrontations, which is proved by the spread of numerous types of new defensive weapons and the appearance of cheek-pieces that were used by mounted warriors. All this is evidence of a uniform process connected with the transition to nomadic cattle-breeding.

So basically horse riding got them all amped up and violent (raiding became easier than it already was), and then I guess the Karasuk living around the Altai got really got at it and became the first Scythians, who then spread across the steppes and assimilated the other Andronovo and Srubnaya tribes. Or alternatively, it was really violent and they were mainly replaced. It's kind of weird how this is a very interesting period in prehistory yet nobody in the general public has ever even heard of the Sintashta and Andronovo cultures. Try telling someone that once upon a time redheaded Iranic speaking people used to live in modern day Khakassia, people will think you're part of the Ancient Aliens crew (who did make an episode about Sintashta actually).

[Alain]

I think horse riding spread to Central - Western Europe through contact and trade with Kimmeri and Scythians in the early Iron Age (Hallstatt C Period). And later we even find the chariot up to the 100th century AD because we know from the Sintashta culture with the Celts in Britain, which means close trade contacts. How (contact zones West Ukraine, Balkans / Black Sea coast). The Celts would be pushed from the north to the south and east by pressing Germanic tribes from the north and parallel to this the Scythians from the pressing Sarmatians from the east to the west, which I think Trade contact and influence has increased again and we need more data and information. With the bell beakers and corded wares, the horse was used as a draft and pack animal and only as this thread already mentioned was the Andronovo cultural horizon decisive for the early riding of modern domestic horses and then surely quickly found its way into Eastern Europe (Srubnaya Culture) because both cultures almost Act promptly.

[Huck Finn]

A sidenote: there's a quite sizeable horse DNA research project going on in Finland. One of the questions the research group is looking at is the reason and timing of Botai type of horse genes getting into Finnhorse gene pool. It seems that Finnhorse is the only modern tamed horse type having that feature.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnhorse

[Silesian]

I think horse riding spread to Central - Western Europe through contact and trade with Kimmeri and Scythians in the early Iron Age (Hallstatt C Period). And later we even find the chariot up to the 100th century AD because we know from the Sintashta culture with the Celts in Britain, which means close trade contacts. How (contact zones West Ukraine, Balkans / Black Sea coast). The Celts would be pushed from the north to the south and east by pressing Germanic tribes from the north and parallel to this the Scythians from the pressing Sarmatians from the east to the west, which I think Trade contact and influence has increased again and we need more data and information. With the bell beakers and corded wares, the horse was used as a draft and pack animal and only as this thread already mentioned was the Andronovo cultural horizon decisive for the early riding of modern domestic horses and then surely quickly found its way into Eastern Europe (Srubnaya Culture) because both cultures almost Act promptly.

The central position and spread of Yamnaya-pastoralists who would have specialized in animal husbandry, is like a chess board, controlling the centre. They would have access to different breeds of horses from Botai, Mongolia, Caucasus, Balkans, Hungary- Western-Europe.

At their center close to where modern descendants of Sarmatian-Alan live(Ossetian) is where you find the clues to oldest wagon burials with signs of riders injured. Also in the field of languages with characteristics, for example, proto-Kartvelian words like wine shared (wine)with Hittite, Armenian, etc.... and Indo-Aryan words shared between different groups like Mordvins, Chechens, Inguish etc....It is also how the Indo-Iranian-Vedic would have picked up the word for Turtle since the European turtle habitat overlaps nicely in this region.



https://bellbeakerblogger.blogspot.c...antas-six.html

Szigetszentmiklós Cemetery (Santa's Six Foot Elves)

R1b-Z2109+ is also Sarmatian

When you look at grave 688 (I2787), you will see below his Y-chromosome haplogroup is identified as R1b1a1a2a2 (Z2103) which is unlike almost all Bell Beakers (that can be discerned) but absolutely like many of the Yamnaya sequenced to date. This can mean several things, but one reasonable possibility is that I2787 was ethnically half Bell Beaker and half Tisza Yamnaya. I could imagine his father as a relatively unmixed Yamnaya pastoralist from across the Tisza River and that his mother was an ethnic Central European Bell Beaker, which is why he was entitled to Beaker rites at Szigetszentmiklós.

It could also be viewed as fray from a region that in some past time sent out founder lineages; but whether true or not, I don't think that would really describe this man's personal history, not on Csepel Island. Some sites on the island have ridiculous quantities of horse remains. I2787's family history may reflect the horse trade and networks that connected different peoples in this area. Maybe his parents were some of those different peoples.

The Sanskrit word 'Kurma' (Devanagari: कूर्म) means 'tortoise' and 'turtle'.[1] 'Kurmaraja' (कूर्मराज) means 'king of tortoises or turtles'.[2] The tortoise avatar of Vishnu is also referred to in post-Vedic literature such as the Bhagavata Purana as 'Kacchapam' (कच्छप),

[Alain]

The central position and spread of Yamnaya-pastoralists who would have specialized in animal husbandry, is like a chess board, controlling the centre. They would have access to different breeds of horses from Botai, Mongolia, Caucasus, Balkans, Hungary- Western-Europe.

At their center close to where modern descendants of Sarmatian-Alan live(Ossetian) is where you find the clues to oldest wagon burials with signs of riders injured. Also in the field of languages with characteristics, for example, proto-Kartvelian words like wine shared (wine)with Hittite, Armenian, etc.... and Indo-Aryan words shared between different groups like Mordvins, Chechens, Inguish etc....It is also how the Indo-Iranian-Vedic would have picked up the word for Turtle since the European turtle habitat overlaps nicely in this region.



https://bellbeakerblogger.blogspot.c...antas-six.html

Szigetszentmiklós Cemetery (Santa's Six Foot Elves)

R1b-Z2109+ is also Sarmatian

Thanks for the information, but unfortunately riding would be developed in the Andronovo cultural horizon and not with the Yamnaya pastoralists and the eastern Yamnaya culture came into contact with the Botai and probably also with the Przewalski horse (Afanisevo culture). T he animal husbandry was with the Yamnaya- and the catacomb burial culture dominant predominantly cattle but not domesticated horses or access to different horse breeds and please leave out Quiles' representation

And one more thing, everything does not always start from the Yamnaya culture but also follow cultures and extensions with new genetic admixtures (impact) the direct genetic Yamnaya influence went as far as the Pannoic Plain in the Caucasus and the Volga region, as is the case today living Udmurts, CWC / Sintashta and BBs were more formative than Yamnaya

[Silesian]

Thanks for the information, but unfortunately riding would be developed in the Andronovo cultural horizon and not with the Yamnaya pastoralists and the eastern Yamnaya culture came into contact with the Botai and probably also with the Przewalski horse (Afanisevo culture). T he animal husbandry was with the Yamnaya- and the catacomb burial culture dominant predominantly cattle but not domesticated horses or access to different horse breeds and please leave out Quiles' representation

And one more thing, everything does not always start from the Yamnaya culture but also follow cultures and extensions with new genetic admixtures (impact) the direct genetic Yamnaya influence went as far as the Pannoic Plain in the Caucasus and the Volga region, as is the case today living Udmurts, CWC / Sintashta and BBs were more formative than Yamnaya

No, thank you!
It's your posts that have sparked the idea, on how to not conflate Corded-Ware-Sintashta-Andronovo with Yamnaya/Poltavka/Catacombe-R1b-Z2109+(also found in Sintashta burials)and/or stratified in other later Steppe burial cultures.

You see we know the age range and geographical range of each of the above. Therefore we can conjecture on the fauna, including horses. For example we can not conflate the origin of each cultures horse, since they would have access to different gene pools of unique horses within their time and region! For example, say R1b-Z2109 Eastern Bell Beaker wanted a specific trait[say strong legs for example] found only in Botai, or Mongolian, or Caucasus horses, or even western Iberia. They would have been able to relay that information through there territory.

BTW
I keep asking for Corded Ware R1b to be compared with Hungarian Bell Beaker Eastern R1b-Z2109+ like the one mentioned in Bell Beaker Blogger. Seems like no one wants to tackle the project, to un-conflate the two.

[Michalis Moriopoulos]

Try telling someone that once upon a time redheaded Iranic speaking people used to live in modern day Khakassia, people will think you're part of the Ancient Aliens crew (who did make an episode about Sintashta actually).

It's not that most people wouldn't believe you; they just wouldn't care. Most people lack the requisite background knowledge to even contextualize what you're saying. You think they've heard of Khakassia or Iranic? Lol, they would have no idea what you're talking about.

I assure you most people have never even heard of Indo-European and don't realize that English and Hindi are related. They couldn't point to the Black Sea on a map. What's child's play to us is unearthed arcana to your average Joe.

[Alain]

Diet and subsistence in Bronze Age pastoral communities from the southern Russian steppes and the North Caucasus

Corina Knipper, Sabine Reinhold, Julia Gresky, Nataliya Berezina, Claudia Gerling, Sandra L. Pichler, [...view 8 more...], Kurt W. Alt
Abstract
The flanks of the Caucasus Mountains and the steppe landscape to their north offered highly productive grasslands for Bronze Age herders and their flocks of sheep, goat, and cattle. While the archaeological evidence points to a largely pastoral lifestyle, knowledge regarding the general composition of human diets and their variation across landscapes and during the different phases of the Bronze Age is still restricted. Human and animal skeletal remains from the burial mounds that dominate the archaeological landscape and their stable isotope compositions are major sources of dietary information. Here, we present stable carbon and nitrogen isotope data of bone collagen of 105 human and 50 animal individuals from the 5th millennium BC to the Sarmatian period, with a strong focus on the Bronze Age and its cultural units including Maykop, Yamnaya, Novotitorovskaya, North Caucasian, Catacomb, post-Catacomb and late Bronze Age groups. The samples comprise all inhumations with sufficient bone preservation from five burial mound sites and a flat grave cemetery as well as subsamples from three further sites. They represent the Caucasus Mountains in the south, the piedmont zone and Kuban steppe with humid steppe and forest vegetation to its north, and more arid regions in the Caspian steppe. The stable isotope compositions of the bone collagen of humans and animals varied across the study area and reflect regional diversity in environmental conditions and diets. The data agree with meat, milk, and/or dairy products from domesticated herbivores, especially from sheep and goats having contributed substantially to human diets, as it is common for a largely pastoral economy. This observation is also in correspondence with the faunal remains observed in the graves and offerings of animals in the mound shells. In addition, foodstuffs with elevated carbon and nitrogen isotope values, such as meat of unweaned animals, fish, or plants, also contributed to human diets, especially among communities living in the more arid landscapes. The regional distinction of the animal and human data with few outliers points to mobility radii that were largely concentrated within the environmental zones in which the respective sites are located. In general, dietary variation among the cultural entities as well as regarding age, sex and archaeologically indicated social status is only weakly reflected. There is, however, some indication for a dietary shift during the Early Bronze Age Maykop period.

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ar...l.pone.0239861