Mediterranean migration layers in Sicily and southern Italy

Angela

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Sarno, Boattini et al (interestingly, also Pagani and Spencer Wells)


Ancient and recent admixture layers in Sicily and Southern Italy trace multiple migration routes along the Mediterranean


See:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-01802-4

Enough with the modern dna. Why don't they get hold of some of the teeth in all those ancient samples in Italy and partner with the Reich Lab or someone of equal stature?

Are they talking about Greek? Do Pagani and Wells know something about the Mycenaeans? It would be extraordinary if the warrior PIE culture par excellence turned out to be mostly Anatolian CHG!

This was obviously written before the Mathiesen et al paper on S. E. Europe. There was clearly CHG already in the Balkans in the LN/Chalcolithic and therefore perhaps in Italy as well, as I've always maintained. This is the problem with using modern instead of ancient dna.

I'll have to read the whole paper carefully at some point, including the citations and the source of the samples, to see if they read that Greek paper and used the same Peloponnesus samples.

"The Mediterranean shores stretching between Sicily, Southern Italy and the Southern Balkans witnessed a long series of migration processes and cultural exchanges. Accordingly, present-day population diversity is composed by multiple genetic layers, which make the deciphering of different ancestral and historical contributes particularly challenging. We address this issue by genotyping 511 samples from 23 populations of Sicily, Southern Italy, Greece and Albania with the Illumina GenoChip Array, also including new samples from Albanian- and Greek-speaking ethno-linguistic minorities of Southern Italy. Our results reveal a shared Mediterranean genetic continuity, extending from Sicily to Cyprus, where Southern Italian populations appear genetically closer to Greek-speaking islands than to continental Greece. Besides a predominant Neolithic background, we identify traces of Post-Neolithic Levantine- and Caucasus-related ancestries, compatible with maritime Bronze-Age migrations. We argue that these results may have important implications in the cultural history of Europe, such as in the diffusion of some Indo-European languages. Instead, recent historical expansions from North-Eastern Europe account for the observed differentiation of present-day continental Southern Balkan groups. Patterns of IBD-sharing directly reconnect Albanian-speaking Arbereshe with a recent Balkan-source origin, while Greek-speaking communities of Southern Italy cluster with their Italian-speaking neighbours suggesting a long-term history of presence in Southern Italy."
 
I read bits and pieces, looking forward to reading more later. This looks very interesting
 
As I suspected they didn't get a chance to read Mathiesen et al which shows CHG already in the Balkans in the Late Neolithic/Chal, and they didn't read the paper on the genetics of the Peloponnesus by George Stamatoyannopoulos.(no citations)

http://biorxiv.org/content/biorxiv/early/2017/05/09/135616.full.pdf

http://www.nature.com/ejhg/journal/v25/n5/full/ejhg201718a.html

They do have Peloponnesus samples which they collected themselves, but they're all from one spot in Achaea, somewhere called Tripotama. With all the diversity we saw in the other paper, how is that helpful?

Oh well, I'll read it thoroughly when I get a chance, but I'm not expecting much.
 
Greek speaking Southern Pugliesi are genetically almost identical with locals non Greek speaking. Grecanici of Calabria are a bit different from local Calabresi. Arbereshe are quite different instead. I wanna see results of Gallo-romance speaking of Sicily and Basilicata...
 
So we know the locations:

Calabrian Greek:

Area+del+grecanico+in+Calabria.jpg


Griko of the Salento
puglia.gif


They're apparently saying they're indistinguishable from the surrounding people,so not descended from Byzantine Greeks.

2000px-Magna_Graecia_ancient_colonies_and_dialects-en.svg.png


Bova:
palizzi_panorama.jpg


I wonder if that's where Raoul Bova's Calabrian half came from? :)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-01802-4/figures/1
 
"We will refer to the former as Salentino Greeks
(GRI_SAL) and to the latter as Calabrian Greeks (GRI_BOV and GRI_CAL). In particular (see also
Fig. 1), since the sampling of Calabrian Greeks has involved two different areas of the Bovesia, we
will use the acronym GRI_BOV to refer to those individuals specifically collected in the
municipality of Bova (including Bova Marina), while GRI_CAL encompasses individuals sampled
from the other Greek-speaking villages laying in the Aspromonte mountainous area of Bovesia (i.e.
Roghudi, Gallician?, Roccaforte del Greco and Condofuri)."
 
Arbereshe speaking areas of Italy:
arberia.jpg



dialetti_italiani.gif
 
I take it back, partly. They do have some ancient samples ; just not any ancient Italian samples, which is what we need.

Anyway, here's their PCA of Southern Italians, Sicilians, Greeks, Albanians, European Jews. Keep in mind all the Peloponnesus samples are from that one spot in Achaia. This is also only a PCA. Click to enlarge.

(see post number 9 for the graphic)

Do the Ashkenazim look the closest to Crete?

Can someone get a clearer graphic?
 
Thank-you. I think it needs to be flipped over to the left, though, doesn't it, so east and west are in the right place?

In addition to the problem with the Peloponnesus Greeks, it seems to me that depending on the Southern Italian group chosen, some are equidistant to Crete and the mainland. Others may be closer to the mainland. Of course, I don't know what some of those circles represent.
 
While CHG and Iran_Neolithic are ultimately related, we knew there is some substructure here from the old Dienekes calculators, but they should not be confused. CHG is north European shifted and based on 13,000 skeletons from the Caucasus. Iran_Neolithic is based on far younger genomes, and within Europe is mostly isolated to Italy(esp South), the Balkans, and to a lesser extent eastern Europe. This late Bronze Age migration brought "Iran_Neolithic" to SEE, whether or not it was Indo European is another matter.

Recall how Italians and Greeks were getting much higher "West Asian" on the old Dienekes calculators? Recall how Iran_Neolithic appeared in the Bronze Age Levant?
 
While CHG and Iran_Neolithic are ultimately related, we knew there is some substructure here from the old Dienekes calculators, but they should not be confused. CHG is north European shifted and based on 13,000 skeletons from the Caucasus. Iran_Neolithic is based on far younger genomes, and within Europe is mostly isolated to Italy(esp South), the Balkans, and to a lesser extent eastern Europe. This late Bronze Age migration brought "Iran_Neolithic" to SEE, whether or not it was Indo European is another matter.

Recall how Italians and Greeks were getting much higher "West Asian" on the old Dienekes calculators? Recall how Iran_Neolithic appeared in the Bronze Age Levant?
Did you perhaps mean to post this in the S. E. Europe thread?

Anyway, I always had respect for Dienekes' work, still do, but calculators based on modern, drifted populations are not the way to go to answer questions about population genetics, although Dienekes' gave some good clues for future research, unlike many others. In fact, I think he created them for that purpose.

I just posted this on the other thread; it's sort of where I am at this point.

"@ LeBrok, Bicicleur,

We were talking about the composition of Yamnaya:


"Iosif Lazaridis (Broad) said...
It's great to see the data already being analyzed and I hope it will be useful in your analyses!

I just wanted to leave a brief comment that the model of Steppe_EMBA as a mixture of EHG+CHG is rejected (Table S7.11), while that of EHG+Iran_ChL is not. Note that in Table S7.11 we are modeling Steppe_EMBA and the references with respect to 13 outgroup populations (the set O9ALNW), not all of which are included in the TreeMix graph.

It is possible for some models to succeed with a particular set of outgroups (both EHG+CHG and EHG+Iran_ChL are feasible with only the O9 set of outgroups; Table S7.10), but for some of them to be rejected when additional outgroups are introduced (Table S7.11). As we mention further down, that doesn't mean there is no CHG-related ancestry in Steppe_EMBA as we can model it as a 3-way mixture involving CHG as one of the sources. What it does mean, however, is that CHG+EHG cannot be the only sources, as this model is rejected (Table S7.11). A further test of our overall model is that when we withhold Iran_ChL as a source, and infer mixture proportions by intersecting the EHG->Steppe_EMBA and Levant_N+Levant_BA clines (p. 134), we get fairly reasonable agreement (mixture proportions).

We try to be cautious in our interpretation of the admixture models, because of three factors: (i) we don't know the geographical extent of populations like "CHG" or "Iran_ChL" so admixture from Iran_ChL does not imply admixture from geographical Iran or CHG from the geographical Caucasus, (ii) we do not have samples from many places and it's very likely that slightly different mixtures than the sampled populations existed elsewhere, (iii) it is possible that the actual history of admixture may be more complex than the simplest parsimonious models identified by the analysis.

Overall, our admixture analysis rejects several possible models (such as EHG+CHG) and thus puts constraints on what may have happened, and also proposes some models that are more resilient to rejection (such as EHG+Iran_ChL+CHG). But, by no means should these be regarded as the final word or unique solutions, but rather as one possible way that the data can be modeled."


I don't think they've found the specific population (s), or they hadn't at that time.
In the subject paper Mathiesen uses CHG + Iran Neolithic as the formulation for the group that moved into Anatolia and then into the Balkans in the Chalcolithic and then even more so in the Bronze Age. Now that may be the population only for this migration westward. The Reich Lab formulation for the group that mixed with the EHG to create Yamnaya may still be where Lazaridis left it, may be closer to this Mathiesen formulation, or may have changed based on samples they've discovered but not released. I just don't know.

Ed. Just X out the paragraph above. Mathiesen is saying the combination that went into the Balkans is the same as what went onto the steppe.

"In eastern Europe we document the appearance of CHG/Iranian Neolithic ancestry north of the Black Sea, and its eventual extension as far north as the Baltic. In some ways, this expansion parallels the expansion of Anatolian farmer ancestry into western Europe although it is less dramatic, and several thousand years later. These expansions set up the two, largely separate, populations in western and eastern Europe that would come together in the Final Neolithic and Early Bronze Age to form the ancestry of present-day Europe."

I would think Lazaridis would agree, but we'll have to wait for his new paper. Maybe they've found a new and slightly different Iranian farmer population.
 
Last edited:
While CHG and Iran_Neolithic are ultimately related, we knew there is some substructure here from the old Dienekes calculators, but they should not be confused. CHG is north European shifted and based on 13,000 skeletons from the Caucasus. Iran_Neolithic is based on far younger genomes, and within Europe is mostly isolated to Italy(esp South), the Balkans, and to a lesser extent eastern Europe. This late Bronze Age migration brought "Iran_Neolithic" to SEE, whether or not it was Indo European is another matter.

Recall how Italians and Greeks were getting much higher "West Asian" on the old Dienekes calculators? Recall how Iran_Neolithic appeared in the Bronze Age Levant?

I think the same. Here is how I modeled Modern Italian few month ago. Just don't ask me why NW Italian, lol, I don't remember. To model South Italian obviously we would need more Anatolian/Armenian BA.

0.30.50.2
Remedello AverageF999933BR2, J-M67M536324I1658Modeled ItalianModern NW Italian
Hungary, Ludas-Varjú-dűlő,3.3kyaArmenia EBAComposition
Run timeRun time 15.13 Run time 8.22 Run timeRun time
S-Indian - S-Indian - S-Indian 0.27 S-Indian 0.05 S-Indian -
Baloch - Baloch 3.15 Baloch 25.53 Baloch 6.68 Baloch 6.00
Caucasian 11.03 Caucasian 14.73 Caucasian 56.75 Caucasian 22.02 Caucasian 20.00
NE-Euro 21.25 NE-Euro 46.18 NE-Euro 4.79 NE-Euro 30.42 NE-Euro 33.00
SE-Asian 0.61 SE-Asian 0.20 SE-Asian - SE-Asian 0.28 SE-Asian 0.61
Siberian - Siberian - Siberian - Siberian - Siberian -
NE-Asian - NE-Asian - NE-Asian - NE-Asian - NE-Asian -
Papuan - Papuan 0.18 Papuan - Papuan 0.09 Papuan -
American - American - American - American - American -
Beringian - Beringian - Beringian - Beringian - Beringian -
Mediterranean 60.61 Mediterranean 31.73 Mediterranean 5.88 Mediterranean 35.22 Mediterranean 34.00
SW-Asian 5.50 SW-Asian 3.33 SW-Asian 6.45 SW-Asian 4.60 SW-Asian 6.00
San - San - San - San - San -
E-African - E-African - E-African - E-African - E-African -
Pygmy 0.08 Pygmy - Pygmy - Pygmy 0.03 Pygmy -
W-African 0.92 W-African 0.48 W-African 0.33 W-African 0.58 W-African -


And lets keep in mind that BR2 is already is modeled (by me) as EEF/WHG/and 15% Armenian BA.
 
Greek Islanders are surprisingly distant from South Italians...weird. I've always felt that South Italians and Greek Islanders are pretty much the same.
 
Greek Islanders are surprisingly distant from South Italians...weird. I've always felt that South Italians and Greek Islanders are pretty much the same.
There are of course some differences. We drift more western for more Sardinian-like admix, Greek islanders are more eastern for more Caucasian-like admix.

invia immagini
 
Thank-you. I think it needs to be flipped over to the left, though, doesn't it, so east and west are in the right place?

In addition to the problem with the Peloponnesus Greeks, it seems to me that depending on the Southern Italian group chosen, some are equidistant to Crete and the mainland. Others may be closer to the mainland. Of course, I don't know what some of those circles represent.
Afaik the Peloponnese samples are only from Achaia and other from Geno 2.0. We need the samples of Stamatoyannopoulos and I wanna see samples from Campania (i.e Salerno, Napoli province) and Malta other than Gallo-Italics of Sicily and Basilicata, to have a clear genetic cline of Southern Italy and surroundings areas (Malta was part of Sicily for loads of centuries so I consider them a bunch of people with Southern Italian affinities as you know). Palermitan samples are from the Madonie which is a montainous area, not Palermitan citizens who are descendent of all Sicilians and mainland Italians.

PS: what do you think about the fact that Griko of Puglia (Salento) are a Southern Italian group while Greek-speaking Calabrese are a distinct group even from the local people of Reggio Calabria province?Isolation or what?
 
I'm very disappointed for two reasons:1) The study used Greek samples from GENO 2.0, who are almost all Greek Americans with self reported ancestries. No serious control has been made on those samples. That's extremely unreliable and inaccurate. Only the GRK cluster from Thessaly of Hellenthal et al is reliable. 2) The authors argue that modern South Italians have additional recent Levantine ancestry, assuming that modern Sardinians from the HGDP panel are a good proxy for Neolitich farmers. There is a problem though: Sardinians have quite a lot of additional WHG related ancestry not present in Anatolian farmers, who were much more Basal Eurasian rich and so Levantine like than any EEF. So there is no need to assume any "recent" MENA influence, beside the tiny (~4%) North African admixture present only in Sicily as for Sazzini et al.
 
It seems a Bronze Age introgression, not recent/historic.

Besides a predominant Neolithic background, we identify traces of Post-Neolithic Levantine- and Caucasus-related ancestries, compatible with maritime Bronze-Age migrations.
 
Greek Islanders are surprisingly distant from South Italians...weird. I've always felt that South Italians and Greek Islanders are pretty much the same.

They are not, why should they be pretty much the same? They have never been.
 
I'm very disappointed for two reasons:1) The study used Greek samples from GENO 2.0, who are almost all Greek Americans with self reported ancestries. No serious control has been made on those samples. That's extremely unreliable and inaccurate. Only the GRK cluster from Thessaly of Hellenthal et al is reliable. 2) The authors argue that modern South Italians have additional recent Levantine ancestry, assuming that modern Sardinians from the HGDP panel are a good proxy for Neolitich farmers. There is a problem though: Sardinians have quite a lot of additional WHG related ancestry not present in Anatolian farmers, who were much more Basal Eurasian rich and so Levantine like than any EEF. So there is no need to assume any "recent" MENA influence, beside the tiny (~4%) North African admixture present only in Sicily as for Sazzini et al.

Not to mention that Sardinians from the HGDP panel hardly represent a true modern-day Sardinian average.
 

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