Who destroyed the Uruk culture circa 3100 BCE ?

I would add yDNA L to Elamites and Sumerians.
 
Ancient Persians are from Southwest Iran, but if we speak about modern Persian speakers, they live in Southwest, Central, North and Northeast Iran.

..............

But the Persians invaded what is now Iran long after the Uruk culture was destroyed.
 
But the Persians invaded what is now Iran long after the Uruk culture was destroyed.

I never claimed something different. I just wanted to clarify were the Persian majority lives.

The "Persian" indeed did invade Iran later. If we actually can speak of them already as Persian when they came. Considering the genetic and linguistic origin it appears allot more likely that Persians did not immigrate to Iran as a a separate ethnicity but emerged in Iran as the product of Medes and Elamites. The Medes must have been a source population of the Aryan immigrants into Iran.

You might ask How I come to this conclusion. The Persian it is said by historic traditions descend from a Median group which lived in the historic region known as "Parsua" which meant "borderland" and was located just South of lake Urmiya in Media. They either immigrated or were driven out to Southwest Iran.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parsua
Also the ancestors of the Achaemenid dynasty in which for the first time in history the Persian ethnicity appeared most likely descend from the province Parsua.


The Persian language itself as part of the Southwest Iranian language group likely derived from the Northwest Iranian group. Since Northwest Iranian languages show allot more ancient characteristics and before the Persian speakers pushed forward to North Iran there was a fluent transition from East to Northwest Iranian languages, as we can see on small linguistic groups in North Iran like the Talysh, Gilakis, Mazandaranis, Semnanis (almost died out).

This is one of the major reasons why there is so much debate about whether a group is Kurdish or Persian especially on the bordering territories. There is still a fluent transition from Kurdish tribes in West Iran to Persians. Just a Century ago Big Lors like the Bakhtiyaris were considered as Kurds. In the book Sherefname of Sherefhan al Bidlisi from the 16th century, it is written that the Lors, Bakthiyaris were one of the basic and major groups of Kurds. Nowadays they are so assimilated that their language is considered as Southwest Iranian, though showing very typical Kurdish loudshift, their customs and dances are all typical for Kurds.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sharafnama


Ironically even the name of the Bakthiari capital is "Shahre Kurd" which means basically "city of Kurds" :LOL:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shahrekord
Name of the city in Kurdish and Persian means "the city of Kurds".

Up today there are still remnants of Kurds even in the province of Fars. They speak a very archaic form of Laki/Lori Kurdish.

In one sentence. It looks to me like Persians are basically Kurds which have merged with Elamites.
 
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Seems to me like Omani Arabs and shirazi Persians first followed by Saudi Arabians (Arabian peninsulars) later.
 
I still believe that T (and probably L too) was a significant Haplogroup among Elamites and Sumerians and I don't see anyone actually arguing against it. And the Persian got it in connection to J2a from the Elamites.
 
Seems to me like Omani Arabs and shirazi Persians first followed by Saudi Arabians (Arabian peninsulars) later.

No. Oman is part of the Arabian Peninsula. And Arab trading networks along the eastern coast of Africa are quite ancient. And none of these people destroyed the Uruk culture.
 
No. Oman is part of the Arabian Peninsula. And Arab trading networks along the eastern coast of Africa are quite ancient. And none of these people destroyed the Uruk culture.

so what was the haplogroups of the Uruk
T, L, J1 ............?
 
so what was the haplogroups of the Uruk
T, L, J1 ............?

Nobody knows, IMO. But advances in DNA analysis may soon allow us to find out that information, whether other haplotypes replaces the Uruk haplotypes in the Uruk territory after the culture declined and where those other haplotypes came from. Then Maciamo may get an answer to his question. Until then, we're all just guessing, IMO.
 
Omanis and emirians still have 10% T nationally today.

"No. Oman is part of the Arabian Peninsula. And Arab trading networks along the eastern coast of Africa are quite ancient. And none of these people destroyed the Uruk culture."

Wrong Aberdeen, on a national level, Oman is one of the countries in which T is most frequent, about half the frequencies found in Jordan (20%). United Arab emirates has 10% T as well, so it's deffinetly present near the Persian gulf.
 
The massive Sile; what are your views on this?
 
I have moved the discussion about haplogroup T's relation to the Kurds, Azeri, Persians and Omani to a new thread.
 
Around 3100 BCE, all Sumerian colonies were suddenly destroyed, and contact ceased for several centuries between Sumer and surrounding regions. What happened ?

The events happen to coincide with the expansion of the Maykop culture (3700-2500 BCE) from the Northwest Caucasus to the Northeast and Central Caucasus, and the consequent displacement and expansion of the Kura-Araxes culture (3400-2600 BCE) from the Caucasus (Daghestan, Georgia, Armenia) toward eastern Anatolia, northern Syria, northern Mesopotamia and north-western Iran. Both Maykop and Kura-Araxes were Bronze Age cultures - the world's two oldest. Both produced an amazing number of metal objects (esp. Kura-Araxes) and metal weapons (esp. Maykop), although the two cultures were radically different in many other respects (burial style, settlement types, stratification of society, artistic style, etc.).

It was tought that the first origins of bronze was in Mesopotamia, and that Maykop was influenced by the Uruk civilization.

A new discovery sheds a whole new light :

http://dienekes.blogspot.be/2014/01/6500-year-old-tin-bronzes-from-serbia.html

I would think the Balkan smiths went to Maykop after the Vinca collapse. Uruk got bronze metallurgy from Maykop and not the other way around.
 
Overall, it seems that both J1 and J2 spread from mountainous regions of Anatolia, the Caucasus and western Iran (Zagros). I believe that J1 and J2 people were originally mountain herders who lived too high in the mountains to practice cereal farming. The original homeland of J1 and J2 might correspond to the region where goats, sheep, cattle and pigs were first domesticated (although R1b surely played a role in the domestication of cattle too, either jointly or independently).

Chiaroni et al. 2010 explain that in more detail. They estimate that J1-P58 started expanding from 7000 BCE, first colonising the Levant, Iraq, Ethiopia, Yemen and Oman. The colonisation of Arabia itself (Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrein), northern Syria, Anatolia and Sudan took place during the Bronze Age, between 5000 and 3000 BCE. In light of this, if the timing is correct, it is very possible that J1-P58 was already present in both Sumer and Elam in the 5th and 4th millennium BCE.

I think this is true for J1 who's origin is the Zarzian culture, Zagros mountains.

I think J2 was involved with the origins of farming, after Natufian culture. J2a originating in the Levant, J2b in the upper Euphrates.
 
It was reported as early as the reign of Shar-Kali-Sharri of Akkad (c. 2100 BCE) that the Gutians, semi-nomadic tribes from the central Zagros mountains, had invaded Mesopotamia, settled in Akkad and Sumer and even came to rule several city-states there. Mountain pastoralists have invaded the plains of the Fertile Crescent during most of ancient history. I believe that many mountain tribes in the Near East were J1 and J2, although in the case of the Gutians they might have been R1b people, as the Gutians were described as fair-skinned and light haired. Rather than an early Indo-European invasion, these Gutians might have been remnants of the R1b (P25, P297, M269 or M73) that did not migrate to the Pontic Steppe.

Gutians were probably not Indo-European, so indeed M73 or maybe V88.
 
After giving this some thought...

let me propose that the Mespotamian Uruk civilization was destroyed by the invading Sumerians around 3100B.C. (ironically)

The Sumerians might represent a migration from the periphery of the Uruk influenced economy of the North Caucasus, specifically in the area in or just north of the Maikop cultural area. Having been influenced by, and in communication with North Mespotamian people, a combination of the volitility of the Yamnaya to the north of the Caucasus and the weakness of the core Uruk homeland was cause for the trans-caucasus inmigration into Mespotamia.

In this scenario, the Uruk and the earlier Halafian/Samarran/Ubaidian cultures could be described as Proto-Indo-European or Proto-Euphratean who were conquered by North Caucasian, non-IE Sumerians.

At some point, Sumerian culture imported as its chiefest gods four of the oldest of the PIE pantheon, as well as some cultural and liguistic attributes. This areal influence could have happened in the North Caucasus, Mespotamia, or both.\

**edit** It's worth noting that the Maikop disappears from history at this time. At this time Yamnaya expands in all directions which most likely caused a domino effect on neighboring cultures. So for several reasons seeing a population migrating out of the trans-Caucasus heading south makes sense. Linguistically and cranometrically.
 
To give somewhat crude example of "reaping the whirlwind"...

The British Celts had a cultural influence on the Northern Germanics. They were very active sending missionaries to the northern Jutland and hiring Anglo and Saxon mercenaries to defend Britian following the collapse of the Roman empire.
The Anglos, Jutes, Saxons and Danes were so thankful they decided on a wholesale invasion of the British isles that lasted several centuries.

Uruk had a similar influence on its neighbors, especially the Caucasus, where it had a marked influence on the natives. When the epicenter of Uruk was weakened, the native Caucasian cultures seized its cities and farmlands.
 
After giving this some thought...

let me propose that the Mespotamian Uruk civilization was destroyed by the invading Sumerians around 3100B.C. (ironically)

The Sumerians might represent a migration from the periphery of the Uruk influenced economy of the North Caucasus, specifically in the area in or just north of the Maikop cultural area. Having been influenced by, and in communication with North Mespotamian people, a combination of the volitility of the Yamnaya to the north of the Caucasus and the weakness of the core Uruk homeland was cause for the trans-caucasus inmigration into Mespotamia.

In this scenario, the Uruk and the earlier Halafian/Samarran/Ubaidian cultures could be described as Proto-Indo-European or Proto-Euphratean who were conquered by North Caucasian, non-IE Sumerians.

At some point, Sumerian culture imported as its chiefest gods four of the oldest of the PIE pantheon, as well as some cultural and liguistic attributes. This areal influence could have happened in the North Caucasus, Mespotamia, or both.\

**edit** It's worth noting that the Maikop disappears from history at this time. At this time Yamnaya expands in all directions which most likely caused a domino effect on neighboring cultures. So for several reasons seeing a population migrating out of the trans-Caucasus heading south makes sense. Linguistically and cranometrically.

Just one problem with this theory. The Sumerians were the same people as those of the Uruk culture... Uruk was a Sumerian city, where Sumerian language was spoken, and Sumerian religion practised.
 
I'm not sure that you can positively equate Uruk culture with Sumerian.

Wedon't know what language was spoken in Uruk prior to 3100 only that proto-literate/logographic writing in the Jemdet Nasr period "might be" Sumerian. The further development of writing in the dynastic period could possibily even be interpreted as the re-tooling of the original script to a new language (Sumerian).

The Sumerians themselves reference their first semi-mythical king, Gilgamesh, to around 2700 b.c., more or less. I think the appearance of Sumerian-like, short-headed people during this period has been refered to as the "Sumerian problem".

Uruk and Eridu might have been cities overtaken by Sumerians, but I don't think there is straight-line continuity from Ubaid to Sumer.
 
If we go by the script then its Cuneiform scripts, belongs to Akkadia, then Sumer, then Elamits, Babylonians, Assyrians, Hurrians and later Hittites.
All of the great Mesopotamian civilizations used cuneiform
 
Sumerian themselves were the most likely destroyers of the Uruk civilization (3000s BC).
I say this because after the chaotic Yem Det Nasr period (3100-2900 BC), we see the appearence of more centralization, more kings, and the expansion of the use of scripture.
It reminds me to the Pharaonic Egypt, that substituted the Predynastic period around the same time this happened in Sumer.
It seems to have been a civilizational change between 2 different societal models.

Maybe the Early IndoEuropeans from the Caucasus, which are reported to have produced the first bronze sword, were tribes that attacked periodically the Sumerians. Since early ancient history was full of Kingdoms fighting nomadic tribes. The closeness to Sumer, maybe helped the IndoEuropeans to advance too.
 

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