Origins of the Indo-Europeans: the Uruk expansion and Cucuteni-Trypillian culture

[LeBrok]

@Adberdeen: As a step-son of a Chinook, I can assure you that oral tradition is how we presented history instead of writing it.

Although it appears watching documentaries in Native Latin America over the years that symbols were written

But it is also preserved in symbols "printed" on cloths and comforters. Almost like writing.

[Twilight]

Perhaps the Swastika has a map or it could be of an earlier date, who knows for now :/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika#North_America

[Tabaccus Maximus]

I haven't previously heard of Native Americans using the swastika symbol and I was wondering if you know whether this is something that's common to all tribes or just some. You mentioned that the symbol is used by the Navaho, who happen to be one of the tribes that speak a Dene language. This may be relevant because although the first wave of people in the Americas apparently arrived about 15,000 years ago, some archeologists believe that the Dene arrived in a second wave, about 8,000 years ago. So certain symbols and practices could be common to both Eurasia and the Americas without necessarily having to be +15,000 years ago. However, if these symbols and customs go back to the ancient mammoth hunters, one would expect to find them among most Native American tribes.

It was used widely among the Mississippian Cultures, Woodland Culture and throughout the Southwest. It was also used in some Meso-American cultures but I'm not sure which or how clearly depicted. You mention a possible later migration about 8,000 or so, I have also thought that a possibility and I suppose that would have to be true to show a genetic relationship between Na-Dene and Yenesian, which I think has been shown.

[bicicleur]

That's the first time I see that, but if it is indeed a precursor to the Indo-European swastika that would mean that would confirm that cultural traits, and perhaps also linguistics ones, could be transmitted for many millennia even before the development of civilisations. Fascinating.

What also piqued my interest is that the sub-Saharan African R1b1c (V88) is found essentially among the Fula people, who are nomadic, pastoralist cattle herders, just like Bronze Age Indo-Europeans in the steppe. That is a pretty amazing coincidence since R1b-V88 is thought to have split from the branch of R1b1a (P297, the ancestor of the Proto-Indo-European M269) approximately 15,000 years ago, i.e. a few millennia before the domestication of cattle in the Near East. Now both dates could be wrong. Cattle domestication could have taken place a bit earlier and the split between the two R1b branches could have happened later, in which case it would be possible that the very first people to domesticate and herd cattle were R1b1 (P25) people, who then split in three groups: V88 in the Levant and Africa, M335 in Anatolia, and P297 (M269 + M73) in the Pontic-Caspian Steppe. R1b1-P25 is found around eastern Anatolia and Armenia, where cattle are thought to have been domesticated. It would make perfect sense.

I stumbled onto something even more amazing :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika#North_America

If all that is true, the swastika should be originating from Mal'ta people.
There is R1 among nativ (north-) Americans.
Some ascribe all of this to contamination by early European colonizers.
But I believe this R1 is coming from Mal'ta. Some travelled northeast to follow mammoths and along the way developped the precursor of the Clovis knife (Dyuktai culture)

[srbo]

Your I2a theory is incorrect in my opinion, I challenge it. I believe I2a was once found all across Europe with a center of weight/origin in Central Europe before some type of environmental/natural phenomenon pushed them into the Bosnian refuge where they are still most numerous today. Early European cultures such as Aurignacian have been linked to the men of y-DNA I.

Haplogroup I isn't linked to Aurignacian(45.000-31000). It is linked to the Gravettian culture (32.000-22.000). The origin of Haplogroup I cant be central Europe, because this Haplotype came from Anatolia that means this people must go first through the Balkans to come to center Europe. And there is one more important point. It is the Ice Age. People at Ice Age where centered in South and South East Europe, thats is "natural", because the north was unhabitable.

Settlement of Gravettian cultrue (Ice Age):

Sorry cant post links. Just google for it.

[Sile]

Perhaps the Swastika has a map or it could be of an earlier date, who knows for now :/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika#North_America

but the swastica was always sitting upright and never slanted like the nazis

[srbo]

Indeed the swastika is very interesting, there are many theories about it, but let look from an archeological view. The oldest swastika were found in Ukraine Mezin(10000bc). There is also a direct link to the Ice Age and mammut hunters of the stepes.
Later we can find the swastika in neolithic Balkans.(starcevo körös cris complex). Vinca culture is the most prominent example. So where is the link between starcevo körös cris and the mezin hunters from ukraine. In my eyes the people from Mezin where the ancestors of the neolithic balkan cultures outside of greece. Sure there was a big impact of neolithic movements from south east (anatolia/levante) araound 6500-6000bc. But the people from starcevo körös cris complex adapted the tehnoligical advantage and transformed it for their self benefid. The art of starcevo körös cris complex has both sides, one is anatolian neolithic the other is european mesolithic. Just watch the art of mezin culture in ukraine. It s obvious.


So what is my conclusion?
When we say Haplogroup is pre neolithic in Europe and was "centered" in south-east europe, because of the Ace Ice. It is possible that the starcevo körös cris cultures were carriers of hapogroup I. This opens a new question for me. Where does Haplogroup I came from in kurdish area? We have some archeological facts that are linked to balkans in neolithic times. Its the time of Halaf and Hassuna Samarra Culture. The art and lifestyle was indeed similiar, because of the anatolian/levante complex. But there is artwork which isnt a part of anatolian/levante complex. As example the swastika. This Swastika is 5500-5000bcyears old. Around 5600bc there was a big flood around the black sea. Around 5500 the Ubaid time begins. Please watch the earliest ubaid artwort, it is very similiar to balkanic artwork. whatch the shoulders of their figurines and the morphological aspekt and compare them with the art of the vinca culture.
Couldn't it be that the ubaid people where people from the balkans which lived around the black sea? this could exlain how haplogroup I2 came to kurdish area where this cultures exists millenia before.

[srbo]

The history of the Indo-Europeans is relatively clear from the Maykop and Yamna periods onwards, as I have described in the R1b and R1a pages on this site. The biggest question marks in my head at the moment are:


- When did the R1a and R1b lineages arrive in the Pontic Steppe and North Caucasus ?
- Where did they come from before that ?
- What were the influence of older neighbouring cultures, notably on agriculture, cattle and woolly sheep herding, and metal working ?

Maciamo. In dont thinks people of cucuteni were exclusive r1b and r1a carriers. You forgot that the cucuteni culture evolved from the starcevo körös cris. There was indeed influence from bug-dniester culture. In my eyes the cucuteni culture could be the cradle of I.E origin. The timeline fits perfect. Linguists linked I.E speakers always with the development of the car and the wheel. Archeological facts prove that the erliest evidence of "wheel" and car came from the cucuteni triplian culture, see: Cucuteni-Trypillian cow-on-wheels, 3950-3650 B.C. People from the steppes adapted it from this advanced culture. Don't forget that cucuteni was by far the most devolpet culture in the world at that time.


But what happend beforce 4000bc? We know that there was always a peacfull exchange with cultures from the steppest. this cultures could be r1b and r1a carriert. bug dniester culture is a good example.
before gimbuntas theory of barbaric expansion of Kurgan peoples. this people were peacufull neolithic farmes which where influenced by anatolian/levante complex and the starcevo cörös cris. so the people known for long time each others.


The cucuteni triplian culture seems for me a perfect melting point for people from the balkans and the stepes and it could explain how the aryan movement to the "east" carriersd artwork(swastika) and religion(belief in the trinity in vedic Trimurti) from neolithic balkans to india.
You ask youreself now: Trinity? The Vinca culture beliefed in the holy trinity. There were found many figurines with 3 fingers, 3 foods and also the geometric art of faces symbolizes the triangle. i don't know if the cucuteni culture has similiar belieft, but if they had it, it could explain "how the vedic" religion evolved.

[MOESAN]

Haplogroup I isn't linked to Aurignacian(45.000-31000). It is linked to the Gravettian culture (32.000-22.000). The origin of Haplogroup I cant be central Europe, because this Haplotype came from Anatolia that means this people must go first through the Balkans to come to center Europe. And there is one more important point. It is the Ice Age. People at Ice Age where centered in South and South East Europe, thats is "natural", because the north was unhabitable.

Settlement of Gravettian cultrue (Ice Age):

Sorry cant post links. Just google for it.

it is not of too much worth for this very thread but I precise (again) that there were human settlements at the latitude of southern Belgium and Moravia during the strongest of Last Glaciation - perhaps they were not permanently occupied (sommer only?) but they were! for South East Europe it is only a "good sense" statement because settlements there were very very seldom, for I know even if it seems surprising.

[MOESAN]

If we rely on N-E Romania (Bessarabia-Moldavia) Y-DNA distributions (tiny sample it is true) where Y-R1b seems very scarce (more than in other places of Romania), for previous Cucuteni culture, Y-R1b was not typical at all in this late culture (the strong elements were Y-E-V13 and Y-J2b, not even Y-R1a -

[srbo]

it is not of too much worth for this very thread but I precise (again) that there were human settlements at the latitude of southern Belgium and Moravia during the strongest of Last Glaciation - perhaps they were not permanently occupied (sommer only?) but they were! for South East Europe it is only a "good sense" statement because settlements there were very very seldom, for I know even if it seems surprising.

You are totally right. I didn't mean that there weren't settlements in north europe during Ice Age. But its just logical that the most living being always chose habitats that fit most to them and in human case that are warmer regions like south europe.

[srbo]

If we rely on N-E Romania (Bessarabia-Moldavia) Y-DNA distributions (tiny sample it is true) where Y-R1b seems very scarce (more than in other places of Romania), for previous Cucuteni culture, Y-R1b was not typical at all in this late culture (the strong elements were Y-E-V13 and Y-J2b, not even Y-R1a -

And what is with I? And where is G2?

[Twilight]

I I Captain

[Twilight]

Lol, kidding. XP

On the side note, I just stumbled on a link claiming that the Pre-Maykop/Pre-Celtic Tribes called themselves the Circaesir in apparently Modern Kazistan. Just wanted to put it out there for either objections or able to produce logic. http://www.angelfire.com/home/thefaery5/

[MOESAN]

And what is with I? And where is G2?

I think a 'southern' people (broad meaning) element was present around the Black Sea from the earlier Neolithic period and that other people of close stock later introduced metals - so I' do'nt exclude Y-G2 bearers at all but they appear being scarce enough there nowadays - Y-E1b was there with Y-G2 and with some first Y-J2 - at metals ages came maybe other Y-G2 but it is not evident - MORE (maybe other SNPs) Y-J2 came more numerous then, I think - the Cucuteni-Tripolje culture with its huge towns seems to me the result of successive Anatolia-Near-Eastern waves of geographically close enough populations even if with improving new cultural skills (we can estimate the autosomals 'sardinian' or 'west-central-mediterranean' was stronger among the first waves, 'west-asian-/'caucasian' stronger among the metals waves, as a bet) - at some stage of evolution, Cucuteni-Tripolje involved by acculturation local population of Y-I2a1 from the Carpathian highlands, but maybe the osmose never became "average" and the Y-I2a element remained stronger in North than in South (S: close the Black Sea) -
by the way I was just gaving some partial data about Bessarabia, knowing current DNA could mistake us concerning ancient DNA - just a matter for brain-strom !

(I cannot go further in details by lack of archeoligic knowledge baout western Black Sea shores)

[Alan]

the Swastika is basically symbolizing the sun. You will find this symbol anywhere where the sun was worshiped.

[Robert6]

Patterson said that linguistic evidence has tracked the ancestral language, called “late proto-Indo-European” to about 3,500 years ago in the Caucasus, among a people who had wheeled vehicles at a time when they were just being put into use.
Genetic evidence ruled out one likely related group in the region, the Yamnaya, because their DNA showed the group had hunter-gatherer ancestry, which is inconsistent with the fact that two Indo-European groups, Armenians and Indians, don’t share it, Patterson said. That made Patterson look south, to the Maikop civilization, which likely had significant contact with the Yamnaya, as a plausible culture where Indo-European languages originated. Samples have been obtained from Maikop burial sites, but the DNA work to test that proposal is pending, Patterson said.http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/stor...-of-europeans/

[Angela]

Yes, interesting isn't it? I'm assuming, if the work on the Dna from Maikop itself is still ongoing, that the people at the Reich Lab are leaning in that direction because of their analysis of the data from Yamnaya (not yet published), and their modeling indicates this is probably the region from which "late proto-Indo-European" spread. Or, they may have preliminary results which confirm their original suspicions.

That would mean, I think, that "Indo-Europeans" or "Indo-European culture", by their definition, originated from an area between the Black and the Caspian Seas, and radiated out from there, with the Indo-Iranians, for example, having their origin very near there. Wouldn't this also place it temporally at 1500 BC?

I wonder how this sits with David Anthony, who is supposedly a co-author or consultant on their Yamnaya paper?

Certainly, there are specific quotes in Anthony's work where he places the culture and language of the Indo-Europeans on the Pontic Caspian Steppe from 4000 t0 3000 BC. Granted, I had, and have, a problem with that, because that probably excludes horse riding, and certainly excludes chariots, which are much younger and further east. (2000 BC), and also because of the well known problems with "Armenian" and with the fact that there's no sign of agriculture east of the Volga until you get to Siberia. (There are also problems with the other theories, as we know.)

However, isn't that a very late date for even "late proto-Indo-European"? Patterson says linguists support that date. Does anyone know the linguists to whom he's referring?

If this should turn out to be true, would this mean that western Europeans, for example, adopted Indo-European languages at a very late date indeed? That would certainly take care of the Basque language/genetics problem.

[Aberdeen]

Patterson said that linguistic evidence has tracked the ancestral language, called “late proto-Indo-European” to about 3,500 years ago in the Caucasus, among a people who had wheeled vehicles at a time when they were just being put into use.
Genetic evidence ruled out one likely related group in the region, the Yamnaya, because their DNA showed the group had hunter-gatherer ancestry, which is inconsistent with the fact that two Indo-European groups, Armenians and Indians, don’t share it, Patterson said. That made Patterson look south, to the Maikop civilization, which likely had significant contact with the Yamnaya, as a plausible culture where Indo-European languages originated. Samples have been obtained from Maikop burial sites, but the DNA work to test that proposal is pending, Patterson said.http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/stor...-of-europeans/

I can only assume the reporter badly mangled the story, because I can't imagine David Reich and friends getting it that wrong. There are written examples of Hittite, Mycenaean Greek and Vedic Sanskrit that are about 3500 years old, so it's very unlikely that Proto-IE still existed anywhere at that point. Wheeled vehicles have been around for about 6000 years and perhaps longer and chariots have been around for about 4000 years. And while I can't find any autosomal details about India, there's definitely a lot of R1a in the higher castes of Northern India. The Vedas are all about IE bros having fun invading from the west, so we know IE folk were already in India 3500 years ago.

[bicicleur]

Could there be a typo : shouldn't it say 3500 BC instead of 3500 years ago?
By that time, the wheel was invented.

[Aberdeen]

Could there be a typo : shouldn't it say 3500 BC instead of 3500 years ago?
By that time, the wheel was invented.

The article says "3500 years ago in the Caucasus" but 3500 years ago would make more sense. And we still don't know where IE originated - it could have started with the "Armenian" portion of the Yamnaya population, i.e., Maykop, instead of with the "Karelian" portion of Yamnaya or a mixture of the two. So if they're only talking about the language and not the cultural package, and the researchers actually said 3500 B.C. instead of 3500 BP, that might almost make sense.

[bicicleur]

Yes, interesting isn't it? I'm assuming, if the work on the Dna from Maikop itself is still ongoing, that the people at the Reich Lab are leaning in that direction because of their analysis of the data from Yamnaya (not yet published), and their modeling indicates this is probably the region from which "late proto-Indo-European" spread. Or, they may have preliminary results which confirm their original suspicions.

That would mean, I think, that "Indo-Europeans" or "Indo-European culture", by their definition, originated from an area between the Black and the Caspian Seas, and radiated out from there, with the Indo-Iranians, for example, having their origin very near there. Wouldn't this also place it temporally at 1500 BC?

I wonder how this sits with David Anthony, who is supposedly a co-author or consultant on their Yamnaya paper?

Certainly, there are specific quotes in Anthony's work where he places the culture and language of the Indo-Europeans on the Pontic Caspian Steppe from 4000 t0 3000 BC. Granted, I had, and have, a problem with that, because that probably excludes horse riding, and certainly excludes chariots, which are much younger and further east. (2000 BC), and also because of the well known problems with "Armenian" and with the fact that there's no sign of agriculture east of the Volga until you get to Siberia. (There are also problems with the other theories, as we know.)

However, isn't that a very late date for even "late proto-Indo-European"? Patterson says linguists support that date. Does anyone know the linguists to whom he's referring?

If this should turn out to be true, would this mean that western Europeans, for example, adopted Indo-European languages at a very late date indeed? That would certainly take care of the Basque language/genetics problem.

David Anthony wrote a nice story in 2007.
It seems he's convinced now and will have a new story to tell..
I hope horse riding will be told as well, although the timing will probably be dalyed.
As for 3500 years BP, I don't think it's correct.
Charriots appeared 4100 years BP near the southern Urals.
Italic tribes arrived on the Po plain 3300 years BP
Halstatt iron age culture was 2800 years BP, by then continental Celts were allready seperated from Atlantic Celts.
Nordic bronze age started 3700 years BP.

[Aberdeen]

Even apart from the date, nothing in that article makes sense to me. The information that's leaked out so far about the upcoming paper had to do with people in the Yamnaya culture being seen as IE and being a mix of "Armenian" and "Karelian". And I don't think anyone can deny the link between R1a and IE, or between IE and the European Bronze Age, even though many parts of Europe didn't become IE speaking until the Iron Age.

[bicicleur]

it doesn't make sense to me either
we should ignore it untill they come out with the full story

[Angela]

Even apart from the date, nothing in that article makes sense to me. The information that's leaked out so far about the upcoming paper had to do with people in the Yamnaya culture being seen as IE and being a mix of "Armenian" and "Karelian". And I don't think anyone can deny the link between R1a and IE, or between IE and the European Bronze Age, even though many parts of Europe didn't become IE speaking until the Iron Age.

Sorry,. I just got back to this:.


I don’t know precisely what Patterson means by these snippets. I don’t even know if he was talking about 3500BC or 3500 KYA, a very different time.


In so far as the genetics angle is concerned, I think we know, if early leaks are correct, that they see genetic admixture in the general area between an “Armenian like” group, which would perhaps be mostly EEF/ANE, to use those terms, and an eastern type hunter gatherer group in which the representative sample seems to have given them some difficulty in terms of getting a precise fix on how much ANE he carried, but which I have been assuming definitely had some WHG.The map to which I pointed some time ago shows a definite arrow from south of the Caucasus onto the steppe, despite the emphatic protestations of some in the internet community that the Caucasus was an absolute barrier to migration. So. that's likely the source of the "Armenian like" genes. Then there’s the snippet from Lazaridis at the genetics conference supposedly saying Yamnaya=Indo-European. Perhaps what is meant by that statement will turn out to be much more nuanced when we actually read the Yamnaya/Corded Ware paper.

Now, the members of the Reich Lab seem to be saying that the “Indo-Europeans” who went on to India, and other places, i.e. the Indo-Iranians, did not have any WHG,, which would mean that they were a strictly EEF/ANE group. Was that the case with the Samara samples? One would think not, as they carried unremarkable eastern European/northern Eurasian Mesolithic mtDna. Was that the case on the western steppe? I don’t know. Could Cucuteni have absorbed quite a bit of WHG before it mixed with a mixed Yanmaya group? I don't know that either. . I guess we’ll find out soon enough.

As to the cultural aspects of the Yamnaya "package", the scholarship that has been coming out in the last few years indicates to me that it is more than possible that much of what is considered to be an integral part of the Yamnaya package also came from further south, i.e. kurgans themselves, social stratification, most of the developments in metallurgy, perhaps even the wheel.


Then there’s the question of language, of course. All of the work on the Indo-Europeans has seen the language and the genetics, or ethnicity, as joined. It seems a little too convenient to now wish to uncouple them because the genetics don't work out. The most “popular” theory has it arising on the Pontic Caspian steppe. Perhaps it did develop only there, from these admixed people. Does the Reich group thinks that it actually arose either close to or in or slightly south of the Caucasus, near the Caspian somewhere and, was first spoken by people who were “Armenian” like, and Yamnaya was “Indo-Europeanized” later both genetically and linguistically? I don’t know. Might this all have something to do with the Kura Axes culture and R1b is tied to that, while R1a Is more tied to Yamnaya? I don’t know that either. Ialso don’t know if David Anthony is still a consultant on one or more of these papers (or walked off in a huff!), and whether he is or he isn’t, what he would have to say about any of this, if anything.

I think we're just going to have to wait for the papers.


Maybe he and Ivanov and Mallory and Grigoriev had a virtual meeting, sat around a virtual campfire, sang Kumbaya, and decided on a two-step development of Indo-European, with the steppe being the secondary urheimat. That would be nice…thank God almighty, consensus at last!

Ed. Sorry, I don't know why some of this is coming out in bold.