JOHEN :
I think this 2015 research result is extremely important to understand the bronz/iron age central asia
We can easily catch the two gene flow.
1.1
st flow started in Malta, continued to Okunevo, karasuk and finally iron age Altai scythian.
Except, Malta boy, we can explain the others anthropologically.
The results suggest that the Irmen people originated in the Novosibirsk and Baraba areas from a mixture of Andronovo (Fedorovka) and autochthonous groups. Dental data are inconsistent with the idea that the Karasuk tribes might have taken part in this process. The Karasuk people clearly descended from the Okunevo people, as evidenced by the elevated frequencies of the Carabelli cusp and deflecting wrinkle. None of these traits is present in the Irmen people, who display dental gracility evidently introduced by Andronovo (Fedorovka) tribes.
Dental Affinities of The Irmen People, Western Siberia(2013)
Moesan : phenotypes means and individuals say : the Karasuk period saw new ‘mongoloid’ types from N-China, different from the badly defined autochtonous pop of the Ob/Ineissei regions of Neolithic (if true neolithic!) : here I recall culture is not always ethny or race : the Okunevo settlements in some places Tuva/Yenulino high Ob/Yenisseiclose were of more on the‘europoid’ side, even a bit western (it’s true some archeologic traits would show ties with West there) -
The Late Scythian population considered in this study proved to be genetically homogeneous, although some connections with the Sarmatians were found. We also revealed similarities between the Scythian groups and the local Bronze Age population of the Srubnaya culture, as well as, to a lesser extent, a group representative of the Central Asian Bronze Age Okunevo culture.
Nonmetric cranial trait variation and the origins of the Scythians(2017)
Craniometrically, prehistoric populations of Gorny Altai are mostly intermediate between Mongoloid and Caucasoid populations. Genetically, individuals from Neolithic and Bronze Age burials display only Western Eurasian mtDNA haplotypes.
The morphological trait combination that is predominant among the Pazyryk(scythian) tribes appears to be autochthonous and probably derives from the Neolithic population of Gorny Altai and from people associated with an Okunev-type culture(Karakol).
---> The one thing is for sure that west scythian genetic admixture is similar to yamna.
2, 2nd gene flow is from yamna or afansievo to sintashta and andronovo.
The problem is there was no airplan at that time. How come yamna culture jumped to the Altai?
Moesan : on feet and after on horses and wagons ? Nomadic pops change lands faster than peasants ones (and can go back faster too) and the concerned periods dured some centuries, let’s remember – enough time to get very far – all the way, it seems it’s not the very Yamna people who got there but pops with a good % of common steppic ancestors, shown by auDNA and metrics too -
MtDNA Haplogroup A10 Lineages in Bronze Age Samples Suggest That Ancient Autochthonous Human Groups Contributed to the Specificity of the Indigenous West Siberian Population (2015)
The craniometric specificity of the indigenous West Siberian human populations cannot be completely explained by the genetic interactions of the western and eastern Eurasian groups recorded in the archaeology of the area from the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC
even if afanasievo culture is explained not to be local, their culture was closely related to the yellow ural culture.
The ural archaic people in the yellow zone is related with the Okunevo, who merged with afanasiveo.
The Okunev tribes of the Minusinsk Basin, those associated with Karakol, Ust-Tartas, and Krotovo cultures as well those buried in “Andronoid” cemeteries of Western Siberia at Yelovka II and Cherno-ozerye were apparently descendants of the local Neolithic tribes. All these groups display highly peculiar and apparently very ancient trait combinations which could hardly have resulted from an admixture between Mongoloids and Caucasoids. The role of the European component in their origins remains unclear.
The calibrated C14 dates of Afanas'evo material are generally slightly earlier than those taken from Yamnaya contexts in the western steppe, which complicates a diffusionist explanation of the emergence of pastoralists in the eastern steppe. Although their origins may be obscure, communities associated with Afanas'evo materials still represent the earliest mobile pastoralists east of the Ural Mountains... [their] incipient strategy of cattle and sheep/goat herding, supplemented by hunting and fishing.
The Afanas'evo subsistence economy might best be characterized as a mixed or transitional form between hunting/fishing and localized pastoralism, arising from local antecedents or combining native strategies with diffused domestic innovations among local populations.
...Perhaps the strongest evidence that divides the Yamnaya and Afanas'evo pastoralists in the mid-fourth millenium BCE is the discontinuity of pastoral economic strategies among societies living between these territories." [6]
In summary, current evidence suggests that the knowledge of smelting copper was widespread, though rare and sporadic, across Eurasia during the third millennium BC in arange of socio-cultural contexts. Some of the societies familiar with metal processing, such as Longshan, were settled and had evidence of incipient complexity. Nomadic pastoralists like the Afanasievo exploited at a low intensity the copper ores in southern Siberia. Other societies, such as those in Karelia, in the forest and forest-steppe zones of northern Eurasia,and the Surtandy culture of the eastern Urals, demonstrate that relatively non-complex societies, including settled hunter-fishers, or smaller mobile groups, could mine and smeltcopper and produce simple tools and ornaments when close to ore sources (Chernykh 1992,p. 187)
In the past two decades, an explosion of information on the prehistoric nomad groups in theformer USSR has shown that copper-base tech-nology has a rich history east of the Urals prior to the second millennium BC. Various instances of copper-base metallurgy dating within the third and even the fourth millenniumBC in Asia east of the Urals (Linduff 2004b)
And anthropologically, afanasievo is not closely related with yamna:
CRANIOMETRIC EVIDENCE OF THE EARLY CAUCASOID MIGRATIONS TO SIBERIA AND EASTERN CENTRAL ASIA, WITH REFERENCE TO THE INDO-EUROPEAN PROBLEM Article (PDF Available) in Archaeology Ethnology and Anthropology of Eurasia 37(4):125-136 · December 2009
Nor are these affinities shown by the Afanasyev people disregarding isolated Central and Western European ties of Saldyar and Afanasyeva Gora. Despite this, the ties of the Afanasyev groups with the early and late Catacomb are distributed approximately evenly. The general conclusion is rather modest: Afanasyev roots apparently lie in Eastern European steppes and forest-steppes, but relating them to a specific culture is impossible.
Moesan : Afanasyevo groups had similarities with Pit Graves Yamnaya even if they had more with Timber Graves and Catacombs – maybe Khvalynsk was the common denominator of all means of types?
Moreover, srubna(R1a-z93)/ Poltavka culture(R1a-z94) and andronovo(R1a-z93) is anthropologically related to Afanasievo than yamna.
Moesan : Andronovo was a bit different from Afanasyevo too, at least as different as was Yamnaya, and Yamnaya was not so different – but yes, a direct link between Yamna and Afanasyevo is not evident nor attested – again a between pop needed!
The other ancient R1a-93 are related with Karasuk(okunevo) and Mongolo bronze chandman in the Altai
And horse-riding, chariots and bronze weapons are closely related with afanasievo-okunevo culture in altai
In southern Siberia, the Okunevo culture probably learned about copper-base metallurgy from the Afanasievo (Chernykh et al. 2004, p. 28). However, while the rare Afanasievometal artifacts are of unalloyed copper, gold, and silver, the Okunevo used both copper andtin-bronze for knives, awls, and bracelets. Okunevo finds include one bronze cast socketedspearhead, the earliest such spearheadthis far east
David Anthony (2007, pp. 434–444) has commented, ‘the tin-bronze spears, daggers, and axes of the Seima–Turbino horizon were among the most technically and aesthetically refined weapons in the ancient world, but they were made by forest and forest-steppe societies that in some places…still depended on hunting and fishing’
==> why did they use them in the forests?
I think the relationship between seima-turbino and sintashta looks like to be same as the relationship between okunevo and afanasievo.
Moesan : OK Johen : what is the demonstration ? That Bronze was imported in Central-West Siberia by East-Asian people before reaching later Finno-Ugric regions ? OK. Or maybe new Bronze technics only ; but the Steppes people were the first to reach this regions where they found the autochtnoes – Okunevo rather ‘East-Asian’ oriented pop learned with Steppics at first – more culture exchanged than genes, as it can arrive more than a time (it’s the difficulty to conclude sometimes on diverses sorts of data) – After cam the new metal technics, from South-East apparently (Altay ? South-East the Altay?) ; but what was the remote origins of the metals even in these S-E regions ? – witthout certainty I would bet rather from S-W, from S-C Asia finally – have you some clues ?
To come back to the very topic, I don't find Afontova Gora is ancestral to Afanasyevo as a whole, either for auDNA basis or for material culture basis - Okunevo learned by Afanasyevo - only later at Karasuk times, an influence from South reached the SW Siberia with new mtallurgy technics; I think it's these technics which were learned to ancestors of the Finnic-Ugric tribes and perhaps explain their westwards expansion (or reinforcement) towards the Baltic shores, at a time they were no more completely the "poor parents" of the I-Eans? - Not a military advantage at first place, but technical advantages on every plan of material life? Just amateur thoughts.