Ancient Genomes suggest Basque are descended of Late Neolithic Iberians

[Fire Haired14]

Source: "Illustration of every day life in the El Portalon cave during the Neolithic and Copper Age"


The Official name of the Paper is: Günther et al. (2015) Ancient genomes link early farmers from Atapuerca in Spain to modern-day Basques, PNAS.

It has not been published yet but will be soon here at PNAS. Here's a list of articles discussing the upcoming paper: Article#1, Article#2, Article#2, Article#3.

Summary of information given by the Articles: 8 genomes ranging 5,500-3,500 years old from the El Portalón in Northern Spain were sampled. Of modern day Iberians they most closely resemble Basque. Other Iberians have ancestry from outside of Iberia that Basque lack(IMO, not completely). The El Portalón individuals had Lighter skin and darker eyes than Mesolithic Europeans and were lactose intolerant.

EDIT: Nature article with new Info LINK: It says non-Basque Iberians have 10-25% ancestry from new people who arrived in Iberia after the Neolithic and Basque and El Portalon genomes have 0%.

Of Ancient genomes Basque are closest to El Portalon. What this may mean is they're direct ancestors/close relatives of Basque not just generic EEF.

Also, 4/8 of the El Portalon genomes are Male. This means we'll get Y DNA. I hope we get Y DNA ranging each era. If R1b-L11 pops up with no ANE that'll debunk a Steppe origin for that lineage, if it doesn't and there's no ANE, that'll support a Steppe origin of R1b-L11.

Also from another Article LINK: Quote from one of the authors: It doesn't make sense because Basque have ANE ancestry, the could not have been isolated for 5,000 years.

“Even though they clearly share common ancestry with early European farmers, we can see now that they have been rather isolated, genetically speaking, for at least the last 5,000 years,” says Jakobsson.

[Brennos]

Source: "Illustration of every day life in the El Portalon cave during the Neolithic and Copper Age"


The Official name of the Paper is: Günther et al. (2015) Ancient genomes link early farmers from Atapuerca in Spain to modern-day Basques, PNAS.

It has not been published yet but will be soon here at PNAS. Here's a list of articles discussing the upcoming paper: Article#1, Article#2, Article#2, Article#3.

Summary of information given by the Articles: 8 genomes ranging 5,500-3,500 years old from the El Portalón in Northern Spain were sampled. Of modern day Iberians they most closely resemble Basque. Other Iberians have ancestry from outside of Iberia that Basque lack(IMO, not completely). The El Portalón individuals had Lighter skin and darker eyes than Mesolithic Europeans and were lactose intolerant.

EDIT: Nature article with new Info LINK: It says non-Basque Iberians have 10-25% ancestry from new people who arrived in Iberia after the Neolithic and Basque and El Portalon genomes have 0%.

Of Ancient genomes Basque are closest to El Portalon. What this may mean is they're direct ancestors/close relatives of Basque not just generic EEF.

Also, 4/8 of the El Portalon genomes are Male. This means we'll get Y DNA. I hope we get Y DNA ranging each era. If R1b-L11 pops up with no ANE that'll debunk a Steppe origin for that lineage, if it doesn't and there's no ANE, that'll support a Steppe origin of R1b-L11.

Also from another Article LINK: Quote from one of the authors: It doesn't make sense because Basque have ANE ancestry, the could not have been isolated for 5,000 years.

We finally are at the door of truth about R1b history: I read your links and I underline this: all the articles point to an early migration of farmers from the East, so Y-DNA could be G2a or I2a. But, if they linked atapuerca with Basques, then I'd be prone to think they found some R1b-M269.

And also, I quote the last link, "We’ve seen in both Scandinavia and throughout central Europe that migration of people from the Fertile Crescent in the Near East brought farming techniques to Europe,” says Mattias Jakobsson, professor of genetics at Uppsala University, Sweden, and co-author of one of the new studies.“Now we can finally say the same for Iberia,” he says, talking about the new research, which has just been published today in the scientific journal PNAS." and the title itself, "Scientists have sequenced the genomes of early farmers from Spain, confirming that they descended from the same group of migrants who brought farming to Northern Europe."... so they are I2a like Motala?

[gyms]

...so they are I2a like Motala?

No.Motala I2a is Mesolithic and not M26.

[bicicleur]

interesting

I wonder what is the ratio G2a/I2a
maybe it will give insight in the expansion of I2a1a-M26

3500 yo R1b may be present, more than 5000 yo R1b-M269 would be a surprise

the fact that todays Baks are similar to neolithic Basks suggests the later R1b arrivals were males without wives

[Maciamo]

This is probably the most interesting study since Haak et al. 2015 seven months ago.

It confirms what I wrote about the origins of the Basques in the Genetic history of the Spaniards and the Portuguese:

The Baques are indeed somewhat different genetically from other Spaniards. They have a bit more Northwest European ancestry (inherited from Mesolithic hunter-gatherers), and completely lack Red Sea, Southwest Asian and Caucasian admixtures (see autosomal maps). The absence of Red Sea and Southwest Asian admixture indicates that the Basques do not have any Phoenician, Jewish, Greek, Roman or Arabic ancestry. Looking at maternal lineages, the Basques also stand out from the rest of the peninsula, lacking many haplogroups, be it those associated with African or Southwest Asian ancestry (HV, L, M1, U3, U6) or those linked to the original Indo-European homeland in Eastern Europe (H2a1, H4, H7, H8, H11, H15, I, T1a1a1, U2, U4, W). They make up for it with higher frequencies of Mesolithic and Neolithic lineages (H1, H2a2a, H3, H5a3, J2a1a, J1c, K1a, T2, U5, V and X). This is in perfect agreement with the fact that Basque language is non-Indo-European. What generally comes as a surprise is that 85% of Basque paternal lineages belong to the Proto-Celtic R1b-P312. This can be explained by the fast replacement of male lineages due to warfare with neighbouring Proto-Celts and the establishment of a Celtic ruling class who quickly spread their Y-DNA through polygamy.

I very seriously doubt that any R1b-M269 will be found before 2500 to 3000 BCE at earliest, and not at high frequencies until 1500 to 2000 years ago, which is the TMRCA for the Basque R1b-M153. In all likelihood the Neolithic ancestors of the Basques belonged primarily to I2a1a (M26) and G2a and perhaps to a minority of E1b1b, J1, J2 and R1b-V88. Since this paper analysed samples dating from 3500 BCE to 1500 BCE, the more recent samples could already include R1b-M269, as PIE Bronze Age people had already reached France by 2500 BCE, Britain by 2200 BCE and and even central Iberia by 1800 BCE. On the other hand Atapuerca is is not so near from France and not in a region associated with early bronze cultures in Iberia, so it could very well be that no R1b-M269 shows up at all, even in samples from 1500 BCE.

[Fire Haired14]

This is probably the most interesting study since Haak et al. 2015 seven months ago.

It confirms what I wrote about the origins of the Basques in the Genetic history of the Spaniards and the Portuguese:



I very seriously doubt that any R1b-M269 will be found before 2500 to 3000 BCE at earliest, and not at high frequencies until 1500 to 2000 years ago, which is the TMRCA for the Basque R1b-M153. In all likelihood the Neolithic ancestors of the Basques belonged primarily to I2a1a (M26) and G2a and perhaps to a minority of E1b1b, J1, J2 and R1b-V88. Since this paper analysed samples dating from 3500 BCE to 1500 BCE, the more recent samples could already include R1b-M269, as PIE Bronze Age people had already reached France by 2500 BCE, Britain by 2200 BCE and and even central Iberia by 1800 BCE.

I just have a feeling the 3,500yo individuals will be of pure Neolithic decent and lack R1b. I'm not basing it on much it is just a hunch. We've already seen in Italy 3,900 years ago that was the case.

[Brennos]

I just have a feeling the 3,500yo individuals will be of pure Neolithic decent and lack R1b. I'm not basing it on much it is just a hunch. We've already seen in Italy 3,900 years ago that was the case.

If you believe in bad luck, then R-M269 will pop up in early samples!

[Brennos]

...so they are I2a like Motala?

No.Motala I2a is Mesolithic and not M26.

Sorry, I did a mistake.

So we haven't got any Y-DNA from Neolithic Scandinavia?

[Angela]

Journalists almost always get it wrong to some extent. It's one thing to say that the Basques are the closest population to the El Portalon farmers, which should be no surprise by this point, and another thing to say there's no difference between the two. I'd be very surprised if there's been absolutely no gene flow into the Basques in all this time.

Also, a sample from even 3500 BC is not early Neolithic. So, that doesn't tell us what the farmers were like when they first arrived, yes? If the pattern is the same as for central Europe, there was very little admixture with HGs in the beginning, and then some admixture in the transition to the Middle Neolithic.

It will be interesting, of course, to see how the genomes might have changed from 3500 BC to 1500 BC. We do have an El Portalon genome from 2000 BC. See:
http://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get...FULLTEXT01.pdf
Also see our discussion here about it.
http://www.eupedia.com/forum/threads...ortalon+farmer

It will be important to see if the two sets of researchers agree about the samples from that particular period.

Getting back to this paper, I see that Genetiker is claiming one of the samples, ATP3 is M269. The dating is very important. If this is a sample from 3500 BC it's a game changer. If it's from 2000 BC or 1500 BC, it could validate the steppe theory.

That comment about the 10-25% difference from other Iberians and it coming from the "east and North Africa" is interesting too if it actually appears in the paper. I don't know what they mean by "east". Do they mean steppe ancestry? Or do they mean Phoenician. I've always doubted there was a huge impact from Phoenicians, but there was, apparently, some migration from the east that can be seen in the

That comment about increased flow from North Africa is also interesting. I have been operating under the assumption that the North African percentages in Iberians was at least partly from the Neolithic, but this might show that's incorrect, and it's post Neolithic. However, perhaps it was once regionally substructured, and if and when we get genomes from Neolithic sites to the west, we'll find some.

Another interesting statement is the one that says the HG component is "local", and that the HG in the Neolithic farmers in Scandinavia is also "local" (SHG)* Isn't that directly contrary to the findings of the recent paper which said that the HG in their Iberian sample was closer to KO1 from central Europe than to La Brana?

Parenthetically, I floated the idea years ago that SHG might have spread westward and even southward, and might have been partly responsible for the increased HG in the transition from mid-to-late Neolithic Europe, and might also have been part of the reason for the increased ANE in Scots etc. because of the Scandinavian gene flow into them. That was met with great opposition. It will be interesting to see if it did happen.

*I got that wrong. The authors seem to feel that the SHG didn't contribute to anyone. Didn't Lazaridis and Haak say something similar? If I'm getting it right they're seeing Ajvide as contributing to the Scandinavian farmers.

[bicicleur]

here you go :

https://genetiker.wordpress.com/2015...nze-age-spain/

3500-1500 BC, no specific date per sample

surprise, no I2a1a-M26 but I2a2a-M223

similar to what was found at Els Trock >5000 BC ?

[Angela]

Well, it will be more interesting if the early samples are R1b M269. :)

Years ago, when we were still dealing with just modern YDna, I suggested that perhaps R1b moved west ahead of the main "Yamnaya" type steppe migrations. I had speculated that maybe R1b was a male mediated elite group that had moved into the Balkans and/or the Aegean very early, and that then the collapse of the late Neolithic civilizations forced some of these people westward.

I saw it as mostly a sea borne migration, moving into southern Italy and then onwards, with a major staging area somewhere around the Rhone. I think I based it on papers that came out around that time that showed a lot of R1b diversity from around the Rhone into the Alps.

All of the subsequent papers on ancient dna led me to abandon that theory.

I'd like to know the Ydna and autosomal signature of those people from Los Millares and Zambujal, who suddenly out of nowhere, around 2000 BC show evidence of very eastern Med type fortified cities etc.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castro_of_Zambujal
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Millares

http://www.academia.edu/2923221/Soci...Seville_Spain_

[bicicleur]

I'd like to know the Ydna and autosomal signature of those people from Los Millares and Zambujal, who suddenly out of nowhere, around 2000 BC show evidence of very eastern Med type fortified cities etc.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castro_of_Zambujal
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Millares

http://www.academia.edu/2923221/Soci...Seville_Spain_

if i recall well Los Millares is >3000 BC
it would be interesting, i wouldn't expect either of both R1b-M269

I'd also like to know La Bastida / El Argar culture +/- 2000 BC, first bronze in Iberia

[Fire Haired14]

The R1b1a2 is from 3516–3362 BC. The paper is out, his ID is ATP3. I have to be honest, this doesn't make any sense. Lets wait for more analysis by Genome bloggers.

[arvistro]

The R1b1a2 is from 3516–3362 BC. The paper is out, his ID is ATP3. I have to be honest, this doesn't make any sense. Lets wait for more analysis by Genome bloggers.

Crazy! No ANE Basque R1b 3500 BC...
Now, that is a rumour.

[Sile]

Table 1 has the following ydna
S5.1. ATP2
ATP2 displayed the derived allele for nine Y chromosome markers (Table S5); with all of the
markers providing phylogenetic support for ATP2 belonging to haplogroup H2. These
markers included: L985, L1013 and L1053 (A1); M235, P159 and P187 (F); L279, L281 and
P96 (H2). Previously labeled haplogroup F3, H2 was recently redefined on the basis of an
overlap between the datasets of[64] and[65][63]. It was found that the two haplogroups, H-M69 and F3-M282,
shared a root defined by the marker M3035. While only a few H2
individuals have ever been found, the haplogroup appears to have a west Eurasian
distribution; with a low level Middle Eastern presence in modern-day Iran, Turkey, Bahrain,
Kuwait and Qatar (Family Tree DNA,[66]), as well as minor occurrences in modern-day
England, France, Sardinia, Sweden and the Netherlands (Family Tree DNA,[64,65,67]
). H2also seems to occur at low frequencies in Neolithic samples[68].

So Ydna of H2
and mtdna of U5b3


and other sample

S5.2. ATP12-1420
ATP12-1420 displayed the derived allele for five Y chromosome markers (Table S6); with all
of the markers providing phylogenetic support for ATP12-1420 belonging to haplogroup
I2a2a. These markers included: L1053 (A1); P124 (IJ); L460 (I2a); L34 and P221 (I2a2a).
While the almost European-specific haplogroup I arose approximately 20000 to 25000 years
ago[67,69], haplogroup I2a2a may have diverged as a subclade, around 15000 years ago
[69], possibly during the recolonization of Europe following the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM).
Unlike the more common subclades of I1 and I2a1, haplogroup I2a2a appears at relatively
low frequencies across much of Europe. Its highest levels (10-12%) are found in modern-day
Germany and the Netherlands, with frequencies of around 5%, notably occurring in parts of
modern-day France as well as Mordvin in the Volga region of central Eastern Europe[69].

ydna of I2a2a
mtdna of H3c

[Fire Haired14]

I added the Copper age Spanish to Pre-Historic West Eurasian Phenotype: 374F was still at low frequency, lactose intolerance, 3/3 Brown eyes, One was a carrier of Red hair.

[Sile]

This might be a better paper for some

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/20...df?with-ds=yes

[epoch]

This might be a better paper for some

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/20...df?with-ds=yes

At first sight they do NOT call R1b Y-DNA for ATP3

[Angela]

The earliest date I've seen for Los Millares is about 3200 BC, so that's about a one hundred year difference from the date of this particular sample (latest date of 3362BC). However, the date from the paper is calibrated, I don't know about the general Los Millares date. I'll have to check.

The authors didn't publish a y dna clade for ATP3, probably because it's so low coverage, so all we have is that one call by Genetiker.

In terms of Neolithic people we seem to have found the blue eyed genes in Central Europe so far, yes? Interesting that they have the 24A5 but only a bit of the 42A5 in terms of pigmentation. Oetzi had both. What about Remedello? Do we know?

P.S. The authors do make it clear these are pre-Beaker.

[Fire Haired14]

In terms of Neolithic people we seem to have found the blue eyed genes in Central Europe so far, yes? Interesting that they have the 24A5 but only a bit of the 42A5 in terms of pigmentation. Oetzi had both. What about Remedello? Do we know?

Everyone is low in 42A5 till Corded Ware. I didn't know Oetzi had both. One Remedello had CG(~2900 BC) and one CC(~2000 BC). A rise in 42A5 looks like a Pan-European event that didn't affect West Asia much. It looks like Blue eyes were higher in the Eastern/Northern(Hungary-Sweden) half of the Neolithic world and could be why the same divide exists today.

[Brennos]

The earliest date I've seen for Los Millares is about 3200 BC, so that's about a one hundred year difference from the date of this particular sample (latest date of 3362BC). However, the date from the paper is calibrated, I don't know about the general Los Millares date. I'll have to check.

The authors didn't publish a y dna clade for ATP3, probably because it's so low coverage, so all we have is that one call by Genetiker.

In terms of Neolithic people we seem to have found the blue eyed genes in Central Europe so far, yes? Interesting that they have the 24A5 but only a bit of the 42A5 in terms of pigmentation. Oetzi had both. What about Remedello? Do we know?

P.S. The authors do make it clear these are pre-Beaker.

I see Genetiker link for that presumed R1b individual: he has many calls on multiple haplogroups! How is possible? I see Haplogroup Q, haplogroup E, haplogroup R... Perhaps Gemetiker hopped to hurry conclusions...

The authors give only two Y-DNA results.

[Finalise]

I highly doubt M269/L23 will pop. Proponents of West Asian L23 theory say it was a Chalcolithic farming expansion from Anatolia to the Danube, not Cardial/LBK movements.I think LBK = G with some J2Cardial Ware = EV13, G, J2

[Greying Wanderer]

Well, it will be more interesting if the early samples are R1b M269. :)

Years ago, when we were still dealing with just modern YDna, I suggested that perhaps R1b moved west ahead of the main "Yamnaya" type steppe migrations. I had speculated that maybe R1b was a male mediated elite group that had moved into the Balkans and/or the Aegean very early, and that then the collapse of the late Neolithic civilizations forced some of these people westward.

I saw it as mostly a sea borne migration, moving into southern Italy and then onwards, with a major staging area somewhere around the Rhone. I think I based it on papers that came out around that time that showed a lot of R1b diversity from around the Rhone into the Alps.

All of the subsequent papers on ancient dna led me to abandon that theory.

I'd like to know the Ydna and autosomal signature of those people from Los Millares and Zambujal, who suddenly out of nowhere, around 2000 BC show evidence of very eastern Med type fortified cities etc.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castro_of_Zambujal
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Los_Millares

http://www.academia.edu/2923221/Soci...Seville_Spain_

Copper in places like Cyprus, Corsica, Iberia - seems likely they might have at least some sea contact with each other.

[bicicleur]

The earliest date I've seen for Los Millares is about 3200 BC, so that's about a one hundred year difference from the date of this particular sample (latest date of 3362BC). However, the date from the paper is calibrated, I don't know about the general Los Millares date. I'll have to check.

The authors didn't publish a y dna clade for ATP3, probably because it's so low coverage, so all we have is that one call by Genetiker.

In terms of Neolithic people we seem to have found the blue eyed genes in Central Europe so far, yes? Interesting that they have the 24A5 but only a bit of the 42A5 in terms of pigmentation. Oetzi had both. What about Remedello? Do we know?

P.S. The authors do make it clear these are pre-Beaker.

afaik the walls of Los Millares collapsed and were rebuild 3025 BC
dates for the 1st construction of Los Millares are unknown

probably explorers where at first attracted by alluvial copper which maby natives had allready found
after they would have been looking for copper ores

don't know whether in Atapuerca it was the same situation

[Taranis]

I'd like to say that a Late Neolithic origin for the Basques is very much compatible with the linguistic evidence: Proto-Basque was decisively not the language of Mesolithic hunter-gatherers, and given that its an isolate language, the notion "Basques were recent (Bronze Age) immigrants" decisively doesn't hold up. If the Beaker culture started out as a native, western European phenomenon (that only later got 'hijacked' by Indo-Europeans in Central Europe), as I recall Maciamo asserted a while back, it would also explain why Basque has its own vocabulary for metallurgy. Just saying.