Photos of the Maltese people.

Where did you see they are from Trapani?
In that map the points are in Trapani and Siracusa and one sample from north Calabria.
5oatzp.jpg

We have also more mesolithic european but however the differences are minimal and is consistent with the explanation of Maleth about the maltese population. Cypriots have quasi no mesolithic euro and Greece are mostly from the north and other samples from Athens, no south greeks and islanders unfortunately.
 
In that map the points are in Trapani and Siracusa and one sample from north Calabria.
5oatzp.jpg

We have also more mesolithic european but however the differences are minimal and is consistent with the explanation of Maleth about the maltese population. Cypriots have quasi no mesolithic euro and Greece are mostly from the north and other samples from Athens, no south greeks and islanders unfortunately.


Island Greeks would be similar to Sicilians, more so than the Greek sample is -- the only difference might be no North African (they do not score any in Dodecad usually) and possibly slightly more Caucasian. But yes, Maltese have slightly less Mesolithic European, but then again I suspect if the Sicilian sample was from Agrigento the same would be true compared to the average.

Also, Messina and Catania might be similar to Crete, if the three were sampled, based on past results I have seen.
 
Thats very true Angela, while one can get a picture of a general trend it still remains pretty vague with the deeper testing upgrades. With any other data collection presented on papers I have always been very skeptical when one sees the sample sizes taken to reflect a whole country. On the positive side I believe that Dna testing is still in its infancy and in comparision, it did come a long way. I think data all in all is improving from one year to another, so its just a matter of time to get the desired accurate ideal picture.

Angela whats your take on ancient dna testing in warmer climates? Is it really such a problem compared to testing being done to the North of the Alps? Love to know your opinion.

Sorry, just got back to this...

I don't know anything specific, unfortunately, other than something said in a recent paper about it looking more hopeful given some advances they've made recently.

The BEAN project was supposed to be working on Anatolian samples, which should be able to provide decent results one would think, but other than the Sandra Wilde paper on the Catacomb culture people etc., they've been very quiet.
 
Sorry, just got back to this...

I don't know anything specific, unfortunately, other than something said in a recent paper about it looking more hopeful given some advances they've made recently.

The BEAN project was supposed to be working on Anatolian samples, which should be able to provide decent results one would think, but other than the Sandra Wilde paper on the Catacomb culture people etc., they've been very quiet.

Thank you Angela, as always eloquent, and only interested in true facts of history with what ever technology and tools available at the time and getting to the most reliable sources available possible. There are tons of DNA to be deciphered to the South of the Alps, to have a complete picture. Exciting times ahead. :wary2:
 
There are tons of DNA to be deciphered to the South of the Alps, to have a complete picture.
And not only south of the Alps imo but everywhere. :grin:
 
:grin:
And not only south of the Alps imo but everywhere. :grin:

No doubt....just to remain on an European contest....:), but so much in the Middle east and all the early civilizations there, not to mention it was probably the first land to roam on, as homo sapiens started traveling out of Africa 60,000 years ago (or the dates have changed now?, I have to keep on checking updates) :grin:. I am particularly interested in the Natufuians who seem to have covered much of the costal area and the inner parts, prior to all the civilisations we know of - Maybe descendants of the Canaanites?.
 
:grin:

No doubt....just to remain on an European contest....:), but so much in the Middle east and all the early civilizations there, not to mention it was probably the first land to roam on, as homo sapiens started traveling out of Africa 60,000 years ago (or the dates have changed now?, I have to keep on checking updates) :grin:. I am particularly interested in the Natufuians who seem to have covered much of the costal area and the inner parts, prior to all the civilisations we know of - Maybe descendants of the Canaanites?.

It's very important indeed to get whole genomes from the ancient Near East. As Lazaridis and company pointed out, the whole model for the making of the "Europeans", might change, depending on what it shows. As an E-V13 bearer, I'm sure you know that some have speculated that the Natufians carried it. I'm not so sure about that. I don't think we know enough yet to know when and where that particular mutation took place. I would think some form of "E" might be a good bet, however.

As to the Canaanites, I think it's likely that they were formed by the various strands that went into making the first Near Eastern farmers, which from the archaeology would seem to also include a group from nearer the Zagros mountains. Given that many of the first farmers moved from the northern coastal Levant around Anatolia and then by sea all along the northern Med all the way to Spain (and then inland all around the route) according to Paschou et al, and that so many of those men were G2a, that seems like a pretty good bet for them.

Which reminds me, what does the private testing show about G2a in Malta, and do you know how that compares to the figures for Sicily, for example?

It also would be great to get the genomes of some ancient people from Sicily or from the earliest Maltese settlements, right? How much would you give for that? :)
 
It also would be great to get the genomes of some ancient people from Sicily or from the earliest Maltese settlements, right? How much would you give for that? :)

I'd have liked to see a Sikel, a Sicanian, and an Elymian, to see if there were significant genetic differences between them or whether the divide was simply linguistic.
 
It's very important indeed to get whole genomes from the ancient Near East. As Lazaridis and company pointed out, the whole model for the making of the "Europeans", might change, depending on what it shows. As an E-V13 bearer, I'm sure you know that some have speculated that the Natufians carried it. I'm not so sure about that. I don't think we know enough yet to know when and where that particular mutation took place. I would think some form of "E" might be a good bet, however.

you are right only assumptions and speculations so far and no results. Waiting for more sophisticated equipment to start drawing the picture

As to the Canaanites, I think it's likely that they were formed by the various strands that went into making the first Near Eastern farmers, which from the archaeology would seem to also include a group from nearer the Zagros mountains. Given that many of the first farmers moved from the northern coastal Levant around Anatolia and then by sea all along the northern Med all the way to Spain (and then inland all around the route) according to Paschou et al, and that so many of those men were G2a, that seems like a pretty good bet for them.

Some very ancient G2a has been found in Spain (also Otzi) and other are, also a skeleton near stone Hendge was found carrying this hapolgroup.



Which reminds me, what does the private testing show about G2a in Malta, and do you know how that compares to the figures for Sicily, for example?

Even thou we have small samples in both Islands there is a trend emerging. Sicily so far scoring 11.52% for G's and Malta scores 11.36%.


It also would be great to get the genomes of some ancient people from Sicily or from the earliest Maltese settlements, right? How much would you give for that? :)

INDEED......Bones found in Megalithic temples, in numerous Punic tombs, bones from early Christian catacombs (from the Roman era) We also have bones from an ancient Jewish cemetery.................all waiting for the scan. (Although I am not sure if the bones from the Jewish cemetery will be allowed to be tested as there was alot of objection from the Jewish community for being unearthed, something to do with Religion I think). Wouldnt that be a story worth telling?:)
 
I'd have liked to see a Sikel, a Sicanian, and an Elymian, to see if there were significant genetic differences between them or whether the divide was simply linguistic.

you are right oreo, these were groups in Sicily that in reality both Greeks and Phoenicians got assimilated with.
 
you are right oreo, these were groups in Sicily that in reality both Greeks and Phoenicians got assimilated with.

This has no basis in fact since we will never have access to information about these groups unless there is a miracle, BUT I suspect they were all similar genetically and only differed due to language, because as we know it does not take a large settlement to shift languages from one to another.

The genetic components in Sicily are all fairly evenly dispersed for there to have been a large-scale genetic division. Either way you have a stake in this too, because whatever the Sicanians, Sikels, and Elymians were, they are running through the blood of the Maltese too!
 
There are a lot of hypothesis about sicanians and elymians. The sicels were probably italics (idem for the morgeti and ausoni) for the other two there are other theories but an interesting book "Siculi, Sicani, Elimi" by Rosa Albanese Procelli said that they were probably the same italic people divided in different tribes, she is an archeologist and she said that about archaeological findings that were all similar. The same hypothesis is for the megalithic people of Malta, many archaeologists think they was sicanians but there aren't similar archaeological sites here or at least have not yet been found.
 
This has no basis in fact since we will never have access to information about these groups unless there is a miracle, BUT I suspect they were all similar genetically and only differed due to language, because as we know it does not take a large settlement to shift languages from one to another.

I believe the biggest genetic difference would be between the Sicels (who are believed to originate from Italic tribes that originally crossed through the Alps. The Elymians and Sicani could be close genetically since they seem to have arrived from other Mediterranean origins

The genetic components in Sicily are all fairly evenly dispersed for there to have been a large-scale genetic division. Either way you have a stake in this too, because whatever the Sicanians, Sikels, and Elymians were, they are running through the blood of the Maltese too!

I have no doubt. In fact the first people known to inhabit the Maltese Islands arrived from Sicily too around 7000 BP (as pottery shreds are similar to those found in Sicily in the caves they inhabited) and later went on in developing the Megalithic culture.

Even in the advent of depopulation and re population up the more recent times in the 1000's AD, these people would have been assimilated with the new comers through the centuries (In Sicily) and left their mark in the gene pool represented in later migrations the Maltese Islands.
 
There are a lot of hypothesis about sicanians and elymians. The sicels were probably italics (idem for the morgeti and ausoni) for the other two there are other theories but an interesting book "Siculi, Sicani, Elimi" by Rosa Albanese Procelli said that they were probably the same italic people divided in different tribes, she is an archeologist and she said that about archaeological findings that were all similar. The same hypothesis is for the megalithic people of Malta, many archaeologists think they was sicanians but there aren't similar archaeological sites here or at least have not yet been found.

Very possible theory. It is also now believed that probably The Maltese Megalithic culture evolved as a seperate cult from any others such as Stonehenge that was constructed some 1000 years later.
 
The maltese girl with surname Formosa told me that in 1930 circa there was a pro italian revolt against the british government.

My Italian teacher was of mixed British/French/Maltese ancestry who grew up in Malta.

He wrote a book: The Malta Language Question: A Case Study in Cultural Imperialism.

In short, the book laments the loss of Malta as an Italian-speaking nation, with increasing tendency for English to be the preferred second-language of the island.

To be honest, who could blame them for preferring English over Italian. Half their luck, if only Sicily could have shared the same modern history as Malta, and have had Sicilian and English as official languages.
 
Where I grew up in Melbourne, it was considered little Malta. Most of my friends were Maltese, and I've enjoyed countless meals of pastizzi.

Anyway, what I remember clearly was that the Maltese girls at school were absolutely gorgeous, all of them.

Personally, overall, I see a distinction between Maltese and Southern Italians/Greeks (and I have to say, it favours the Maltese on this occasion).
 
These ones look quite Semitic even for South Italian standards.

77ba1c975a10f0ef9994f1e0b862fa4f447019779-1301396957-4d91bddd-620x348.jpg

Sarah%2BMarcieca%2B-%2BMiss%2BGrand%2BMalta%2B2015.jpg

miss-malta-2016.jpg
 
These ones look quite Semitic even for South Italian standards.

77ba1c975a10f0ef9994f1e0b862fa4f447019779-1301396957-4d91bddd-620x348.jpg

Sarah%2BMarcieca%2B-%2BMiss%2BGrand%2BMalta%2B2015.jpg

miss-malta-2016.jpg

Defiantly not unknown phenotypes in the South of Europe. What is Semitic anyway? Can Veronik Bodisz (Miss Hungary) qualify as 'Semitic'? Its not exactly an unknown type in the Middle East and to a lesser extent in North Africa.

Veronika-Bodizs-miss-hungary.jpg


849_missgrandthailand_ahklouw23567.jpg


This is another picture of Sarah Mercieca, I am not sure she qualifies as looking 'Semetic'.

14463215_1737446276505265_5641216700520977418_n.jpg


Anthea Zammit can maybe easily pass as North African or Middle eastern.
 
Defiantly not unknown phenotypes in the South of Europe. What is Semitic anyway? Can Veronik Bodisz (Miss Hungary) qualify as 'Semitic'? Its not exactly an unknown type in the Middle East and to a lesser extent in North Africa.

Veronika-Bodizs-miss-hungary.jpg


849_missgrandthailand_ahklouw23567.jpg


This is another picture of Sarah Mercieca, I am not sure she qualifies as looking 'Semetic'.

14463215_1737446276505265_5641216700520977418_n.jpg


Anthea Zammit can maybe easily pass as North African or Middle eastern.

Among Hungarians such types doesn't exist. We overlap with Turkmens, Tatars and Anatolian Turks to some extent due to some shared Asiatic ancestry but Arabian and North African characteristic is absent except Jewish minorities.

Sarah Mercieca looks like many Levantine women i've seen. She could pass here as a Gypsy admixed Hungarian.
Anthea Zammit has an exclusively Near East phenotype which exists in South Italy, Iberia, Greece but that's all.
 
Sarah Mercieca looks like many Levantine women i've seen. She could pass here as a Gypsy admixed Hungarian.
Anthea Zammit has an exclusively Near East phenotype which exists in South Italy, Iberia, Greece but that's all.

This would be the average Levantine look (and I know these backgrounds as my partner is Lebanese, some like anywhere else are incredibly attractive). without much cherry picking. There are a number of people you see on the street locally who can fall under this category, but not Sarah Mercieca I'm afraid. Not a good example ;)
175287760.jpg
 

This thread has been viewed 47036 times.

Back
Top