6° Post :
- the brachycephalizing element in Andronovo pops is not clearly identified : the famous massive proto-siberian type of Ienissei/Novossibirsk regions or kind of ‘borreby’ of N-E Europe ??? (puzzling because we don’t know if the proto-siberian peculiar type, already so’europoid’-like was not already a component in ‘borreby’ types…) ( I personally think that the ANE autosomal component was very high among these proto-south-siberians) - or some elements from Tadjikistan mountains ??? (less secure!) -
some opinions resumed here under : some abstracts have been red by us in other threads more or less associated -
Metrics, non-metrics and the Steppes people of the Metals Ages
Lozintsev :
… According to a view shared by most specialists, archaeologists and physical anthropologists alike, the Afanasyev culture was closely related to the Pit Grave (Yamnaya) culture, and its appearance in Gorny Altai and on the Middle Yenisei was caused by a migration from the Eastern European steppes. The possible role of Poltavka and Catacomb culture elements, too, has been discussed (Tsyb, 1981, 1984). The idea is supported by new radiocarbon dates indicating the coexistence of Catacomb culture with Pit Grave culture over most of the 3rd millennium BC (Chernykh, 2008). On the other hand, very early dates of the earliest Afanasyev sites in Gorny Altai (mid-4th millennium BC) suggest that the predecessors of the Pit Grave people, specifically those associated with the Khvalynsk and Sredni Stog cultures, as well as the proto-Pit Grave (Repino) tribes, might have taken part in Afanasyev origins. This suggestion was already made by physical anthropologists (Shevchenko, 1986; Solodovnikov, 2003). …
…
With regard to the post-Afanasyev Bronze Age cultures, the traditional idea that the Okunev culture is autochthonous has given place to theories stating that the Pit Grave and Catacomb traditions (Lazaretov, 1997), or those of Afanasyev culture, which were also introduced from Europe, were critical in Okunev origins (Sher, 2006). In terms of physical anthropology however, the presumed European ancestry of the Okunev people of the Minusinsk Basin, according to A.V. Gromov (1997b), pointing to affinities with the Pit Grave and Catacomb people of Kalmykia, is rather indistinct and traceable mostly at the individual level if at all. The analysis of data concerning two independent trait batteries – craniometric and cranial nonmetric – suggests that the affinities of the Okunev people of the Yenisei are mostly Siberian (Gromov, 1997a, b), and the integration of these data demonstrates that the unusual trait combination observed in Okunev crania is rather archaic (plesiomorphic) and may be more ancient than both the Caucasoid and Mongoloid trait combinations (Kozintsev, 2004). According to Gromov (1997b), the Okunev people resembled the Neolithic population of the Krasnoyarsk–Kansk region. …
… The Karakol culture of Gorny Altai is similar to Okunev culture, and craniometric parallels between people associated with these cultures were also noted. However, Karakol crania are believed to exhibit a “Mediterranean” tendency (Chikisheva, 2000; Tur, Solodovnikov, 2005). The Okunev crania from Tuva and the Yelunino crania from the Upper Ob, especially the former, are much more Caucasoid…( £ : link with the « blond Mindin’s » ? not sure at all, spite the Chinese trads saying they were high narrow faced, anthropo’ seems telling they were broad faced-)
… This agrees with archaeological facts indicating the affinities of cultures such as Yelunino and Okunev of Tuva with Early Bronze Age cultures of Central and even Western Europe (Kovalev, 2007). The possible Caucasoid ties of other pre-Andronov tribes of Southern Siberia such as Krotovo (Dremov, 1997) and Samus (Solodovnikov, 2005, 2006) have been discussed by craniologists. K.N. Solodovnikov (Ibid.) believes that in all the above pre-Andronov groups, except the Okunev group of the Yenisei, these ties are Southern Caucasoid or Mediterranean which, in his view, is especially evident in the male series. …
… The origin of the Andronov community is one of the pivotal points in Indo-European history. The predominantly Indo-Iranian or Iranian attribution of this community is beyond doubt (Kuzmina, 2007a, b; 2008). The relationship between its two constituents, specifically the Alakul (western) and Fedorov, which spread in an eastern direction up to the Yenisei, is less clear. The Alakul variety apparently originated earlier, in the 3rd millennium BC (Chernykh, 2008) and the cultures which contributed to its origin were Poltavka, Catacomb, and Abashevo. The origin of the Fedorov variety, which originated later and coexisted with Alakul over most of the 2nd millennium BC, remains obscure (Tkacheva, Tkachev, 2008). …
...Craniologists have discovered that the Andronov community was markedly heterogeneous. People buried in graves with Alakul or mixed Alakul-Fedorov (Kozhumberdy) ceramics in western Kazakhstan displayed a trait combination which V.V. Ginzburg (1962) described as Mediterranean, and V.P. Alekseyev (1964) as leptomorphic. Ginzburg believed that this combination evidences the affinities of western Alakul people with both the Timber Grave (Srubnaya) populations of the Volga steppes and those of Southwestern Central Asia (the AmuDarya/Syr-Darya interfluve) {= Oxus region}. The second idea was refuted by Alekseyev, who claimed that archaeological data point solely to western (Timber Grave) affinities. Ginzburg ignored the critique and repeated his conclusion in the summarizing monograph (Ginzburg, Trofimova, 1972). In this case, neither he nor Alekseyev used statistical methods and relied on typological assessments. …
… The results challenge the traditional idea that the sole and direct ancestors of the Afanasyev people were those of Pit Grave culture. Pit Grave affinities rank first only in the cases of Saldyar I and Karasuk III. Catacomb parallels are no fewer than those with Pit Grave, and in most instances they are the most pronounced. Every Afanasyev group has close ties with Catacomb groups. By contrast, not all Afanasyev series show close Pit Grave connections: these are absent in two groups of the Altai (Ursul and Kurota II) and in the pooled Altai sample. In half of the Altai series, ties with the Catacomb people of the Don are the most distinct, and the same is true of the pooled Altai group. Afanasyeva Gora and the pooled Minusinsk series are closest to the late Catacomb of the Lower Dnieper, whereas the series from Kurota II in the Altai, is closest to Poltavka. These results are matched by archaeological facts which, according to S.V. Tsyb (1981, 1984), evidence the importance of Poltavka and Catacomb cultures in Afanasyev origins. …
… Strangely, similarities with Timber Grave people are no less numerous. In fact, for the pooled Minusinsk group they are more distinct than those with Catacomb and Pit Grave. …
… The results can hardly be attributed to a slightly uneven representation of the three Eastern European cultures in the database, where the Pit Grave is represented by 15 series, the Catacomb by 18, and the Timber Grave by 16. More likely, these results testify to the considerable stability and relative homogeneity of the physical type of the Eastern European steppe populations over the Bronze Age despite the succession of cultures and apparently despite microevolutionary trends such as gracilization. …
… . On the one hand, the Pit Grave people of the Lower Dnieper (Kakhovka and Kherson areas), the Catacomb people of the same region (Verkhne-Tarasovka, early group) and those of Kalmykia are similar to the Chalcolithic Khvalynsk population (5th–4th millennia BC). Another Chalcolithic series which represents the Sredni Stog culture is more isolated, the least removed from it being various Afanasyev groups of the Altai and the Catacomb people of the Don. All these facts may point to the deep Eastern European roots of the Pit Grave, Catacomb, and partly Afanasyev communities. …
… The analysis of a larger number of groups using the reduced trait battery reveals numerous early (4th millennium BC and earlier) Central and Western European parallels for groups such as the Pit Grave from the Ingulets and early Catacomb from the Molochnaya. These ties are especially evident in four gracile early Catacomb groups of the Ukraine, which show 14 close ties with Central and Western European populations and eight with those of Transcaucasia and Southwestern Central Asia. This apparently attests to migration, since the late Catacomb people are more robust, contrary to the normal diachronic trend (Kruts, 1990) and show no such ties. 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. …
… Gromov (Ibid.) suggests that the Okunev community resulted from an admixture of Eastern and Western populations, and that this admixture is evident at both the within-group and between-group level. Leaving the former aside because of a lesser reliability of individual diagnostics, it can be noted that at the between-group level, the Okunev physical type is quite peculiar, and this peculiarity is not seen in either of the supposed ancestral groups (Caucasoid or Mongoloid). Therefore the observed pattern could hardly have resulted from admixture. This is evidenced by both craniometrics (Ibid.) and cranial nonmetrics (Gromov, Moiseyev, 2004), and by the results of their integration (Kozintsev, Gromov, Moiseyev, 1999, 2003; Kozintsev, 2004). In addition, if the Catacomb people actually participated in Okunev origins, we would have to admit that they were ancestral also to the Neolithic population of Krasnoyarsk–Kansk area, which is craniometrically quite close to the Okunev group. As nothing indicates this, it is more reasonable to assume that the Okunev people were autochthonous, and that European elements of their culture are borrowings. …
… Genetic continuity between the Okunev and Karasuk cannot be excluded because the latter display no affinities other than those with the Okunev, apart from ties with the Mongun Taiga people of Tuva who were the contemporaries of the Karasuk. The European group least distant from the Karasuk is the Catacomb of Stavropol. In terms of cranial nonmetrics however, the Karasuk and Okunev are quite dissimilar (Gromov, 1997a). …
… The characteristics of the Okunev people of Tuva, and those of theYelunino and Samus people were discussed in my previous publication (Kozintsev, 2008). In the case of the Okunev of Tuva, the most prominent are the Eastern European steppe parallels (Pit Grave, early Catacomb, Timber Grave), and the analysis based on a reduced trait set additionally reveals an early Central European parallel with a group related to the Funnel Beaker culture of the late 4th millennium BC. The migration therefore was from Europe rather than from Southwestern Central Asia or the Near East as formerly believed. This was hardly the same migration that had brought Afanasyev ancestors to the Altai and to the Yenisei, since the Okunev people of Tuva were less similar to Afanasyev people than to the Eastern and Central European populations. The situation with Yelunino is less clear. This group is craniometrically isolated, being the least distant from the Okunev people of Tuva (Solodovnikov, Tur, 2003). However, in the light of the hypotheses of “Mediterranean” migrations to Southern Siberia, two rather remote Transcaucasian (Kura-Araxes) parallels deserve attention. On the other hand, the analysis based on the reduced trait set reveals only western parallels, including one in Poland. The source of migration therefore cannot be ascertained. In the case of the Samus, the most distinct affinity is with the Poltavka. The same parallel ranks first in the case of an Afanasyev group from the Altai (Kurota II). The role of the Poltavka as a major source of Indo-European dispersals is beyond doubt (see, e.g. (Kuzmina, 2007a)); the question is, with what branch of the Eastern IndoEuropeans was this culture associated? …
… The group from Firsovo XIV on the Upper Ob provides a perfect support for the hypothesis advanced by V.P. Alekseyev (1961) in regard to the Yenisei Fedorov, because the Firsovo series is extremely similar to the Afanasyev group from Saldyar in the Altai. The male Saldyar series admittedly consists of only four crania, but given the territorial proximity of the Upper Ob to Gorny Altai, the relationship is worth considering. Parallels with the Catacomb people of Kalmykia and with the Pit Grave – Poltavka group of the Volga–Ural area too should be taken into account. Neither the Alakul nor Yelunino ties can be revealed by craniometric analysis. The Fedorov people of Rudny Altai are also very close to the Saldyar. …
...The situation with the remaining three Fedorov groups is different. All closest ties of the pooled group from the Upper Ob lead directly to southeastern Europe, in fact to a single region and a single period – the late Pit Grave and Catacomb epoch of the Northern Caucasus and northwestern Caspian (Kalmykia). Sixty years ago, G.F. Debetz (1948) argued with S.V. Kiselev who countered the idea of Andronov migration from Kazakhstan to the Yenisei on the basis of the allegedly sedentary lifestyle of Bronze Age tribes. The route from Southeastern Europe to Southern Siberia was even longer and moreover was hardly straight. The key events in proto-Andronov population history apparently took place in the intermediate territory of the southern Urals – the supposed source area of Aryan dispersals (Kuzmina, 2007a, 2008), but physical anthropology is of little help in elucidating events that occurred at this stage since human remains representing the Sintashta culture are quite scarce. …
… The same can be said of the Fedorov groups of northeastern Kazakhstan. Here as well, ties with the late Pit Grave of Kalmykia rank fi rst; other affinities are mostly with late Catacomb groups and one parallel is with Potapovka. The Fedorov people of the Yenisei are closest to their tribesmen in northeastern Kazakhstan, which supports Debetz’s theory. However, on the Yenisei too the biological legacy of late Pit Grave and Catacomb ancestorsis quite traceable. A similarity with the Afanasyev people of the Altai is less distinct in this case. Turning to Alakul, its eastern group, that from Yermak IV on the Irtysh, like the Fedorov groups, is closest to the late Pit Grave series of Kalmykia. By contrast, the western Alakul group from western Kazakhstan which was traditionally described as “Mediterranean”, reveals a very different pattern of relationships. While here too, Pit Grave and Catacomb parallels rank first, it is the early and not the late Catacomb ties that are the most prominent. Also, most of them lead not to Kalmykia but to a more remote region, the Ukraine. Ties with Timber Grave people, who were contemporaneous with the Alakul, may evidence both common origin and admixture. In terms of origin, connections between the western Alakul and the earlier Neolithic and Early Bronze Age populations of Central and Western Europe are far more informative. None of the remaining six Andronov groups display these ties. One should not forget of course that the reduced trait set used for comparisons with Central and Western European groups does not include important measures of facial and nasal profile. And yet some conclusions can be made with certainty. First, calling the western Alakul people “Mediterraneans” is unwarranted as they show virtually no connections with the Near East, Transcaucasia or Southwestern Central Asia. The parallel with a Middle and Late Bronze Age group from Turkmenia is singular and may attest to a southward migration of proto-Iranians from the steppes toward Iran. Therefore, in the argument between V.P Alekseyev and V.V. Ginzburg, the former was right but his conclusion that the affi nities of Kazakhstanian Alakul are entirely western rather than southern turns out to have a much broader meaning. …
… help reconstruct the principal stages of migrations which eventually brought Alakul ancestors to western Kazakhstan. These stages are as follows: Western and Central Europe (4th millennium BC and earlier); the Ukraine (3rd millennium); Northern Caucasus and northwestern Caspian*; western Kazakhstan (2nd millennium and possibly the late 3rd millennium BC). The special role of two groups from the Ukraine – Pit Grave from the Ingulets and early Catacomb from the Molochnaya – as possible milestones marking the advance of Indo-Europeans, specifically proto-Aryans from Central Europe to the east has already been noted in my previous publications (Kozintsev, 2007, 2008). The migration of gracile Caucasoids who were ancestors of certain Pit Grave, early Catacomb, and Western Alakul people from Central Europe to the Ukraine and further east, apparently preceded the migrations of more robust ancestors of late the Catacomb and most Fedorov populations from the Northern Caucasus and the northwestern Caspian to the east and west (see (Kruts, 1990) for a discussion of their migration to the Ukraine). This is supported by the earlier emergence of the Alakul variety of Andronov, compared to the Fedorov variety (Chernykh, 2008). Features of certain Afanasyev groups of the Altai such as the Saldyar and the Okunev people of Tuva, the Yelunino and possibly Samus people, demonstrate that gracile Caucasoids began to migrate to Eastern Central Asia before the Andronov era. The western Alakul population attests to a later phase of the eastward advance of various Indo-European groups which may have continued over many centuries of the Bronze Age. The reconstruction of this historical process is impeded by another process, which is biological by nature and is known as gracilization. In some instances, similarity can be erroneously taken for proof of a genetic relationship while actually it only means that the groups are at the same stage of the gracilization process. Theoretically, however it is unlikely that gracilization can result in a convergence of unrelated groups over the entire set of traits. The effect of this factor can probably be reduced if only the closest similarities are considered, as in this study. Robust Cromagnon-like Caucasoids too, apparently migrated to Eastern Central Asia from the west, and there may have been several such migrations. Thus, while the Afanasyev people are craniometrically closest to the Catacomb people of the Don and Ukraine, Fedorov people who were representatives of a later Cromagnon migration wave were apparently descended from the late Pit Grave and Catacomb people of more eastern regions such as the Northern Caucasus and the northwestern Caspian.
[h=2]_______________________________________________________________________________________[/h] [h=2]Other morphology notes from abstracts more centred on archeology, nevertheless :[/h] [h=2]- Kara-Depe group (halfway Atrek river, East the South Caspian, today SW Turkmenistan :[/h] « morphologic ressemblance between the Kara-Depe skulls and the Sialk (Iran) ones » - (I think Coon called them « eurafrican » or « indo-afghan ») - men : 1m710 – women : 1m590 -
- Sarazm tomb (1 woman, 1 youang man and a child) : « europoid, dolichocrane, narrow face well profiled, close to populations of the Middle Asia and Anterior Asia – the female was high enough : 1m63/64 » - the archeology says Sarazm had contact with Mesopotamia, Iran, Baluchistan and Harappa concerning culture, a bit more ties with this last one, if I red well – about the 1750 BC this urban culture died out, and progressively pastoral tribes occupied the territory -some said the type had not been yet studied bit it seemed having received input of the proto-europoid racial type -
- Altyn-Depe, close to Kara-Depe, they say : « The Altyn-Depe population was also of europoid type, veyr similat to the Gheoksiur population. The bones remnants amazed us by their weak dimensions and their slimness. The ressemblance and the physical aspect of the Gheoksiur and Altyn-Depe inhabitants at the Chalcolithic with the Amtyn-Depe ones of the Bronze Age is evident. » All these pops of the Atrek river banks, during Chaclo and Bronze, have been said of « meridional europoid type » or « dolichocephalic leptomorphic europoid (mediterranean) »… men : 1m69,4 – women : 1m57,5 -
- Sapalli-Tepe et Djarkutan, and Boustan on Amu-Darya river (Bactriana) : « The skulls were very narrow and long (dolichocephalic). The face was of mean height, very narrow, strongly profiled on the horizontal plan, with a very prominent (jutting) nose and low orbits. These traits point to a marked europoid type. … it was a meridional europoid ». These skeletons have been found under tumuli with catacomb (according to the text), the « body » laying on the side, with the limbs bent - & : do notice Sapalli-Tepe people were very small and light, apart from the other pops for this criteria : men: 1m630 – women: 1m 550spite very close (according to authors) to higer statured neigbouring pops – the life level could explain the low stature ? Not too evidentfor other authors (same abstract!) who say the life level washigh enough : « Apparently this gracile aspect was a somatic peculiarity of the group. »
- Vakhsh culture : breeders - (Vakhsh close to Djarkul, N-E to Sapalli-Tepe) : skulls of local Neolithic Hissar culture : Tutkaul and Sai Saied ; they show the population there was of meridional mediterranean aspect, but had a sturdy constitution, a rather receding forehead, a relatively low and broad face and low orbits, broader nose which show it was not the oriental gracile mediterranean but probably a proto-mediterranean type not already differenciated. They say this pop was not close to the Andronovo steppic type ; Vakhsh people were also easily distinguishable from the « pure » mediterraneans well known thanks to Altyn-Depe and Sapalli-Tepe people – apparently the descripted pop was the same as the Vakhsh culture about the 2000/1000 transition, but this passage is not too clear in the text…(I wonder if some ‘veddoid’ element in not at play among them but...)
- Rannii-Tulkhar (Tadjikistan, neighbour to Vakhsh) ; Bronze - breeders too – relations with the Steppes civilisations, « but the craniologic material doesn’t allow to confirm it » - europoid with a large face (broad and high), study body, receding forehead, very jutting nose, as a whole mediterranean type, no component from the Steppes (they say) – this type is stayed isolated among the people of the time -
both types are classified « mediterranean » - Tulkhar people could evocate a rough element responsible of the more robusticity of ‘indo-afghan’ type compared to more southern ‘mediter’ types ??? - but I have not the cifers nor the shapes of these people, not even a Ceph-Index so I can mistake 100 % (a pity) – that said I ‘m not sure they did not have in them one of the Steppics elements ? -
- in Badakhstan, Bronze in Pamir and in the Yuzhbok river valley (between the ranges of Alishur and Wakhan) : dolichomorphic europoid tracing back genetically to a population of the Anterior Asia -
[h=2]- Ferghana agricultors of Tchust (high Syr Darya): dolichocephalic, mediterrnean europoid as a dominant type, but, less evident, a « proto-europoid » type typical of the Steppes of the same period : « there is here a fact which demonstrates that a mixing was taking place and a differenciation of the population on the ethnic side » - the Tchust or Tchoost culture seems the transformation of a Steppic culture under the influence of agricultural southern societies - [/h] Some statures : men women
Parkhay (Atrek) 1m695 1m585
Sumbar (Atrek) 1m680 1m565
Altyn Depe (Atrek) 1m694 1m575
Kara Depe Gheoksiur1m715 1m580
Sapalli Tepa (Amu Darya) 1m630 1m550
Djarkutan (Amu Darya) 1m695 1m585
Makonimor (Amu Darya) 1m695 ?
Tigrovaya Balka (Amu Darya) 1m605 ?
HARAPPA 1m760 1m600
two sample with very low statures among others higher seems pointing towards familial endogamic peculiarities or an other southern pop input...
[h=2][/h]
