The mixed genetic origin of the first farmers of Europe

[Riverman]

I didn't follow entirely the topic, but how did it switched to the PIE question from the original post?

The origin of different language groups associated with the spread of farming and cultural groupings and the fact that Semites being dominated by J, while E1b1b seems to be most clearly associated with AA as a whole. From the origin of PAA to the second big West Eurasian language group its just a small leap.

[Agamemnon]

There's hardly a consensus on Omotic among linguists. They can't even decide whether it's a valid node within AA even when assuming that it should belong to AA.

Linguists seldom agree on anything, so well that some controversies are given undue weight on this forum... That being said there isn't a single major or even introductory work on the Afroasiatic family which excludes Omotic, both Orel & Stolbova and Ehret's reconstructions of PAA include Omotic for instance (not that its exclusion would be very important, after all Ehret excluded Berber in his reconstruction of PAA). At best you'll get a paragraph about the controversies on the classification and phylogeny of Omotic... In a chapter on Omotic within AA.

The skepticism over the inclusion of Omotic into AA arises only when some (most prominently Ehret) recognise that it is the most basal branch and that therefore the phylogeny of AA is really Omotic vs the rest of the family. There is some degree of hypocrisy over the wholesale exclusion of Omotic because the linguists who support this view generally tend to retain at least one or two of the Omotic subgroups as AA, in fact the terminology for the so-called "Ta-Ne" (North Omotic) branch is based on the pronominal evidence with a division between an Ani-Ati branch (ʔani & ʔati meaning "I" and "you" in most Cushitic languages) and a "Ta-Ne" branch ("I" and "you" in North Omotic) which brings us back to a time when North Omotic was better known as "West Cushitic" and the last time I checked there never was any skepticism over the inclusion of Cushitic in AA.

For this reason alone, the wholesale exclusion of Omotic from AA is an extreme fringe proposal. The real controversy isn't whether Omotic is AA but rather whether Omotic is a coherent branch as opposed to four distinct families which share areal features, some of which (such as North Omotic and Maji) are AA and others aren't, so far the evidence shows that Omotic is coherent as a single branch (the subgroups of Omotic are clearly related to one another), the issue being not the validity of the branches but the place of certain languages within those branches (some of which may indeed be non-AA). Unfortunately, Omotic is the least-studied branch of AA, so such controversies tend to linger, however even among those who rejected Omotic's membership within AA (such as the late Hans-Jürgen Sasse) there was a tendency to acknowledge the morphological and phonological evidence which supports Omotic's inclusion. Another aspect that is often overlooked is how the Agäw languages have an Omotic substrate, and that this is really described as a "divergent AA substrate" in most of the literature.

What bearing does this have on the genetic make-up of the earliest AA-speaking groups? Not much I'd say, other than firmly anchoring the family in an African setting this remains an open question. Omotic's basal position in AA by itself isn't the strongest argument for an African origin of the phylum, rather it is the weakness of the arguments in favour of a West Asian homeland which highlights the importance of Omotic. Without a better understanding of the pre-Neolithic populations of North Africa (NE Africa in particular) a lot of the models put forth here are just educated guesses, E-M35's branches as the major uniparental marker following early AA dispersals seems certain so there's that, and while I do think some sort of ANA-type component was related to this the very antiquity of PAA (spoken some ~13,500 yBP) prevents us from being too dogmatic. In the long run there's no doubt the genetic evidence will provide very useful hints as to where, how and when AA dispersals first occurred, but for that we'll need ancient data throughout the AA-speaking areas dating back to the Epipaleolithic to make a reasonable assessment, and we're not there yet.

[Keneki20]

Slightly off-topic but I've noticed the same in SE-Nigerians like Ogoniland people and Ekoi/Ejagham folks from Calabar. Of course Igbo have been well known to harbor such phenotypes, I can think of a slavery-time example between slave traders and slave cultivators/collaborators but can't find the source rn so won't quote it regarding the light coloring of SE people. Outside of skin color call me crazy but there's a distinct 'Eurasian' [I dislike using this term in this context but bear with me] phenotype in Nigerians from south to middle-belt that isn't present west or east of the country i.e. not present in non-admixed Senegambians or Bantus. Sometimes I attribute IBM admixture to this but who knows.

Believe it or not, but you're not the first person I've seen make that observation. I can't speak for everyone, but my guess has been local evolution in some way. There's the oft-circulated correlation between climate and phenotype that leads many to suggest that having lighter skin and/or light eyes, for example, is primarily the result of colonization in places like West Africa. In my case, on occasion, some have assumed that I was mixed in some way because some believe I don't necessarily fit the common profile of someone from Nigeria. However, ascribing that to colonization has its limitations, especially since I haven't seen any Nigerians, for instance, (myself included) show European ancestry in DNA tests.

Plenty of exceptions exist, however. I know many Nigerians who have European ancestry, and, for the most part, they look the part. But that can't properly explain those who have no known European ancestry. I did think about Iberomaurusian connection contributing to that, but that has its limitations as well. For instance, Iberomaurusians didn't appear to have alleles associated with lighter skin, and, at least for the Kiffian population, their crania looked quite distinct from what one would see in West Eurasian populations. The Kiffians were still readily connected to Iberomaurusians farther north, but then they seem to have resembled only some Iberomaurisians (e.g., a cranium from Mechta el-Arbi in Algeria). So, again, that's what's lead me to thinking that the relative phenotypic distinctiveness of some in Nigeria may be due to local evolution in some way.

[DgidguBidgu]

[QUOTE=CopperAxe;723687]PIE was spread by EHG lineages from the PC Steppe. R1a-m417 and r1b-m269 are examples of such lineages. But EHGs also had other haplogroups like I2, J and Q. Therefore those lineages could've been spread by the early Indo-Europeans as well.

Q and R are related Y-dna haplogroups, and they are equally intrusive to Europe.


This is your personal statement that cannot be committed to legitimacy, especially among scientists. There is no consensus among them on this issue.
" R1a-m417 and r1b-m269" in the best case are simply influenced by the first IE and nothing more. They were not the primary speakers of the IE language.
In both cases of Q, whether Altaic or ANE, it was not in any way part of the PIE. To put it mildly, there you enter the area of ​​non-Indo-European languages.
"Q and R are related Y-bottom haplogroups, and they are equally INTRUSIVE to Europe." -and that is why they have no direct connection with IE languages. Cultures engaged in innovation specific to PIE are situated in the much southwestern geographical range.
In my opinion, the EE farming component is the main one in this process.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burned_house_horizon
Do you notice the distribution area of ​​the Burned house horizon?
Don't you find it interesting as a geographical distribution?
Which societies inhabited such large settlements for their time? Only developed as a culture and social organization societies, carriers of innovation, gave them a temporary advantage over others.
Note the dating of these cultures ("as early as 6500 BCE"), they are much older than Yamnaya and Corded ware, just as PIE is more than 4000-5000 years old and does not fit their late formation.

[JRD]

Succeeding the Kiffian is the Tenerian. Maybe the lighter alleles came from the latter.

[davit]

Believe it or not, but you're not the first person I've seen make that observation. I can't speak for everyone, but my guess has been local evolution in some way. There's the oft-circulated correlation between climate and phenotype that leads many to suggest that having lighter skin and/or light eyes, for example, is primarily the result of colonization in places like West Africa. In my case, on occasion, some have assumed that I was mixed in some way because some believe I don't necessarily fit the common profile of someone from Nigeria. However, ascribing that to colonization has its limitations, especially since I haven't seen any Nigerians, for instance, (myself included) show European ancestry in DNA tests.

Plenty of exceptions exist, however. I know many Nigerians who have European ancestry, and, for the most part, they look the part. But that can't properly explain those who have no known European ancestry. I did think about Iberomaurusian connection contributing to that, but that has its limitations as well. For instance, Iberomaurusians didn't appear to have alleles associated with lighter skin, and, at least for the Kiffian population, their crania looked quite distinct from what one would see in West Eurasian populations. The Kiffians were still readily connected to Iberomaurusians farther north, but then they seem to have resembled only some Iberomaurisians (e.g., a cranium from Mechta el-Arbi in Algeria). So, again, that's what's lead me to thinking that the relative phenotypic distinctiveness of some in Nigeria may be due to local evolution in some way.

How would you describe Iberomaurusian crania in relation to SSA and West Eurasian crania?

[Ariel90]

Omotic's basal position in AA by itself isn't the strongest argument for an African origin of the phylum, rather it is the weakness of the arguments in favour of a West Asian homeland which highlights the importance of Omotic. Without a better understanding of the pre-Neolithic populations of North Africa (NE Africa in particular) a lot of the models put forth here are just educated guesses, E-M35's branches as the major uniparental marker following early AA dispersals seems certain so there's that, and while I do think some sort of ANA-type component was related to this the very antiquity of PAA (spoken some ~13,500 yBP) prevents us from being too dogmatic. In the long run there's no doubt the genetic evidence will provide very useful hints as to where, how and when AA dispersals first occurred, but for that we'll need ancient data throughout the AA-speaking areas dating back to the Epipaleolithic to make a reasonable assessment, and we're not there yet.

Thank you! After years and years of IE discussions I still don't understand this argument, or why a basal clade of a family is the proof that the urheimat of the entire language family has to be from the very region in which that language is currently spoken, it seems so illogical and conjectural, sorry, it makes be angry for some reason, especially in the post Anatolian Hypothesis world. I'm very very glad that you acknowledge that Omotic is not by itself a great argument for PAA in East Africa. I thank you immensely.

[Ramses]

Linguists seldom ..

Couldn't the distinctness of the Omotic be explained simply by it connection with Pre-Omotic speakers of Horn africa who were very different from the influences found in Chadic and Cushitic and others..?

We know that Omotic speakers carry a very distinct Genetic compositions very different from East africans or North africans , in fact East africans are much closer to North africans and Semitic speakers genetically than those Omotic speakers.

While the Omotic speakers carry the least Eurasian DNA , the rest of there ancestry is very unique "divergent" so maybe the distinctness of there language is not because its the most Basal or the Oldest branch at all , its just that its structure was built upon a very distinct group of people "those pre-Omotic speakers"...We need now linguists Not to doubt genetic data but to be helpful and try to find us or reconstruct the Pre-Omotic language (the indigenous language of Ethiopia before the Eurasian pastoralists migrated there).

[Riverman]

Succeeding the Kiffian is the Tenerian. Maybe the lighter alleles came from the latter.

How would you describe Iberomaurusian crania in relation to SSA and West Eurasian crania?

Compare:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mechta-Afalou

Outdated in some respects, but to give you an impression:
https://mathildasanthropologyblog.wo.../tag/mechtoid/

Just search "Mechta-skull". The best description might be that of very robust West Eurasian-like forager phenotypes. In the modern context they would be, in any case, much closer to West Eurasians than Subsaharan Africans morphologically, just like their DNA suggests:
https://eurogenes.blogspot.com/2018/...aurusians.html

[CopperAxe]

I think you both raised the question and provided the answer: if CWC that we know for sure was 100% IE speaking had flat burials like SS that means that there is no substantial connection between kurgans and PIE. Building kurgans it is a universal thing in different culture around the world to begin with. They were fashionable among the IE in a particular stage of their history. But that does not mean no kurgans no PIE.

You're definitely right there. But it certainly matters that kurgan burials were so prominent in many of the steppe cultures which were connected to or derived from the Sredny Stog horizon, including Corded Ware derivations such as the Single Grave culture.

Especially if you consider how particular burial rites might be linked to cultural ideologies or ethnic affilities. Corded Ware and their axes, Bell Beakers with their daggers and wristguards, Sintashta and their chariot burials etc. If you forward the time towards the Urnfield cultural horizon you have another good example with the mass adoption of cremation burials (unfortunate for us).

So yeah while I definitely agree that Kurgans are not the defining component of what makes a culture PIE or not, they certainly are an important piece of the puzzle.

Oh and yeah maybe lets not derail the thread any further. Sorry folks!