Where did the Anatolian branch of Indo-European originate?

[Alan]

Not autochthonous, but most likely from the Caucasus. If they were authochthonous then they wouldn't have been subjugating the Hattic people there before them and using all their place names for the area. The paper mentions the problems with this that I'm sure everyone else is thinking about

"We cannot at this point reject a scenario in which the introduction of the Anatolian IE languages into Anatolia was coupled with the CHG-derived admixture prior to 3700 BCE, but note that this is contrary to the standard view that PIE arose in the steppe north of the Caucasus (4) and that CHG ancestry is also associated with several non-IE-speaking groups, historical and current. Indeed, our data are also consistent with the first speakers of Anatolian IE coming to the region by way of commercial contacts and small-scale movement during the Bronze Age."

"Among comparative linguists, a Balkan route for the introduction of Anatolian IE is generally considered more likely than a passage through the Caucasus, due, for example, to greater Anatolian IE presence and language diversity in the west"

I do agree though, it would probably be more constructive to get DNA from Luwian speakers further west from before the Hittite empire.

What I dislike is that they talk about there being non-IE-speaking populations associated with CHG as if All EHG is associated with is IE. Finno_Ugrics?

 

[Alan]

Again, I hope next time they use the samples of old anthro research.

Johen the earliest inhabitants of Anatolia were Early_Anatolian Farmers/EEF. Hittites seems to be a mix of CHG and Ana_Neo.

 

[Alan]

All Indo-European migrants eventually admixed to some degree with the "locals". Still, the way that arrival is tracked is by the presence of "steppe" in the autosome, whether it's Europe or Central Asia or India. Isn't that what all the analysis is about? What do you think we've all been tracking for the last couple of years?

Only with Anatolia we don't need to find any trace of steppe? This takes special pleading and biased reasoning to a whole new level.

Even finding a little EHG admixture in the region is not a strong argument imo. It's like we could guarante that EHG admixture never reached the South before the Indo Europeans. As we can read from the paper. They seem to have found some EHG even in Maykop. What if there is some in Leyla Tepe too?

But there being a lack of EHG in Hittite samples is indeed a very strong argument against Steppes being their homeland. Indeed I have heard many times that Hittite is so different from the other Indo European groups that it could even be considered it's own branch. Almost like a sister language to Indo European.

 

[holderlin]

Well, I'd bet Khvalynsk and later Repin weren't simply autochthonous developments without any foreign influence, and they were far enough from the Balkans and close enough to the Caucasus to allow us to believe that the "rapid" Neolithization of the entire region from Ukraine to the Caspian wasn't exclusively Balkan-influenced. Also, the first characteristic kurgans do not seem to have appeared in the steppes, but in Transcaucasia. But of course I'm not sure. I'll just say that the Mesolithic and early Neolithic samples from Ukraine have a different autosomal makeup with much much less CHG/Iran_Neo related ancestry. I doubt that came from a generally more technologically advanced region without any cultural impact at all, even if the language of the natives didn't necessarily change.

That's the funny thing. Those Khvalynsk graves are very rich for the context, and ALL of the copper was from the Balkans.

 

[Promenade]

What I dislike is that they talk about there being non IE populations associated with CHG as if All EHG is associated with is IE. Finno_Ugrics?

Read it again and you'll see they're actually very cautious about this. Did you see the EHG in Namazga Chalcolithic? Before they jumped to conclusions they noted the apparent absence of CHG and decided they cannot connect it with Indo-European infiltration. And I'd say they're right, Namazga used Bactrian Camels and Oxen for transportation... what kind of Indo European arrives without his horse? We know EHG was capable of moving around on its own as well seeing a movement into the baltics.

I wonder what culture these migrants came from though, perhaps they were steppe hunter gatherers pushed out by the new Indo European EHG/CHG hybrids? It's curious they made it as far as southern Turkmenistan and that while they settled in Namazga the EHG component is absent in other BMAC settlements for another 1000 years until the WSHGs arrive.

 

[Leandros]

Isnt it more natural the origins of Neolithic farmers to be the Caucasus area? They were just another migratory wave from the same source, they just moved to another direction towards Europe.

 

[Ygorcs]

I knew that this will come as an answer. How about looking at the Hittite samples then, do they show to have steppes related ancestry? No, end of the story, there was no migration nor invasion of Steppes people from the Balkan to Anatolia, in your mentioned examples always admixture spread with themselves, how not in this case? Anyway, if the steppes make you sleep then so it should be.

If the next Hittite samples have steppes ancestry, then I will withdraw my claim, but for now I am confirmed by these 3 new Hittite samples.

Man, everyone will be able to take you a bit more seriously if you sound a bit less hysterical, arrogant and angry, okay? Be more respectful, am I clear? The funny thing is that, despite all of your hysteria, I also lean towards the same way you understand about the origins of Hittites and their Anatolian ancestors. So it seems you're fighting your imaginary demons.

That said, I won't simply agree with a weak and factually wrong statement of yours just because we both believe that it is perfectly plausible and even likely that the Anatolian branch of IE diverged from the non-Anatolian IE branch very early on and probably not in the Pontic-Caspian steppe. Those are two completely different matters. We can't accept some weak and false statements just because they would favor our own conclusions, that's not intellectually honest. Anatolian IE may have come as an independent offshoot from a Early PIE population, but that was not because they were more "civilized" or "creative" than the steppe tribes or other such nonsense as if Hittites had appeared out of the blue in Hattic-speaking lands - among many other reasons, obviously, for the simple fact that Anatolian vs. The Rest linguistic split would've happened very early on, in the Neolithic, when not even Sumer was a full fledged civilization.

What you cannot do is just claim - and think people will accept this uncritically - that one of the good reasons to state that is that Hittite culture was so much more advanced than that of steppe IE tribes. That proves nothing at all, especially if you are comparing late Bronze Age Hittites from around 1500-1300 BCE with Yamnaya or Corded Ware people from more than 1000 years earlier. It's just nonsense, this argument is countered by dozens of historically attested "acculturations" of barbarian tribes who became highly civilized in a matter of a few centuries. Sorry.


Now, if you want to base your arguments entirely on the genetic and archaeological evidences, that's fine for me, especially because we agree on the most plausible explanation for these BA Anatolian results.

 

[Sile]

2015 BBC documentary on the hittites
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cVfIJikiMI

.
or
.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTbGD1m7IE8

 

[Maciamo]

If you compare the Anatolian Indo-European cultures with those in the steppes, then you can call the steppe cultures primitive. My point is: how should those "creatives" of the steppes lead to such an "organized" (advanced) culture in Anatolia? And do not start with "elite dominance" and what not.

I wanted to edit the word virus because I knew that someone will misunderstand it. What I wanted to say is that many steppes-hypothesis supporters want the hypothesis to be true because it fulfills their phantasms of "great" IE people spreading their language ("virus", not meant literally, so do not think I am using that term in a judging way) to all parts of the world, including the Near East.

Yes, you say it I am R1(b-V1635). R1b evolved in the Near East and is present there since at least the Epipaleolithic. Especially in my case, I belong to a very old branch of R1b (according to yfull formed 15600 ybp) and this clade is pre-M269 (all European/Steppes and even most Near Eastern R1b branches belong to a subbranch of M269). When then a British R1b person tells me without any clue that my branch "is "an early split from the Steppes to the Near East", I really wonder what phantasms he is living in his head. Also my clade of V1636 has nothing in common with Kura-Araxes V1636, I wanted to say this too, that Kura-Araxes V1636 clade is extinct.

Below "creativity" (as IronSide called it) of the Yamnaya-Steppe pastoralists:

And compared to the Indo-European Hittite culture of Anatolia:

I am not arguing who was greater and such stuff. The point is how should a culture as above (Steppes) lead to a culture like below (Hittites). Even the idea of Steppe pastoralists passing from the Balkans to Anatolia is absurd, which now is proved to be wrong. All IE cultures/languages (namely the Anatolian and steppe branches) derive from a Proto culture south of the Caucasus and developed completely independent from each other.

Ygorcs already mentioned it, but what's the point of comparing the cultural advancement of the Yamna culture (3500-2500 BCE) to the late Hittites (1500-1200 BCE), when they are separated by 1000 to 2300 years? It would be like comparing ancient Gaul with modern Britain and saying the British culture is amazingly more advanced than the French one. etrified: That's the height of intellectual dishonesty. If you look at other Steppe-derived cultures contemporary to the Hittites, what you find are the Celts, the Mycenaean Greeks, the Indo-Aryans of the Rig Veda... They are all much closer to the Hittites than to Yamna.

Then, as Ygorcs said, the Hittites absorbed a lot of their culture from the Hattians or other pre-IE Indo-European populations.

 

[Maciamo]

what does lazardis mean when he says that no steppe in anatolian populations falsifies the steppe theory? isn't he actually playing with the thought that the anatolian branch was spread by people who were missing EHG?

I don't know but that comes from a guy who maintained for many years that IE languages spread with Neolithic farmers from Anatolia and who was sure that modern humans didn't have Neanderthal admixture - until ancient DNA proved him wrong.

 

[berun]

@holderlin, the steppe signal in BA Anatolian is dubious, in fact it's a Euro HG signal, and disappears in other Admixture Ks.

By the way to find right autosomes and Y-DNA in Hittites will be so difficult as to find it in ancient India as both practiced cremation, and if I remember well under kurgans in Anatolia. Just practicing apartheid as in India with the caste system would not ease the research.

 

[holderlin]

@holderlin, the steppe signal in BA Anatolian is dubious, in fact it's a Euro HG signal, and disappears in other Admixture Ks.

By the way to find right autosomes and Y-DNA in Hittites will be so difficult as to find it in ancient India as both practiced cremation, and if I remember well under kurgans in Anatolia. Just practicing apartheid as in India with the caste system would not ease the research.

Yes, dubious, but it is in a sample listed as during the time of "Old Hittite", which of course doesn't mean that it's a Hittite person, but the fact that it's not in the earlier "Assyrian" samples is showing a pull towards Europe (if not the steppe) at the very least as we move towards the Iron Age when we see the increased Euro HG in the Hellenistic samples.

 

[halfalp]

But Hittite were in history in 1600 BC, CHG in the pontic steppe happenned 6000-5000 BC. So how do we explain IE languages with both EHG or CHG ?

 

[Olympus Mons]

I don't know but that comes from a guy who maintained for many years that IE languages spread with Neolithic farmers from Anatolia ...

And IE did spread with Neolithic farmer from Anatolia. I mean at least VIA Anatolia.
That is becoming the elephant in the room: Assuming Krause is right, Now Reich is right and so many others (as me and you)… then it needs to be assumed, it follows, that populations we see moving via Anatolia and arriving to Balkans at 4500bc, such as Kum6 (4600bc), loaded with CHG and different farmers ancestry from Anatolia_N (8000bc) and having heavy shared ancestry with Greece Neolithic, such as Klei10, and Pal7 in Greece, a thousand years later (3500bc) and with even Otzi the Iceman (3300bc) …. They ALL SPOKE PIE/IE!

So, best put, Otzi could very well be a IE speaking person and have never even have met a Steppe person! – Lets start wrapping our minds around it!

I challenge anyone to truly fault this reasoning.

 

[Promenade]

And IE did spread with Neolithic farmer from Anatolia. I mean at least VIA Anatolia.
That is becoming the elephant in the room: Assuming Krause is right, Now Reich is right and so many others (as me and you)… then it needs to be assumed, it follows, that populations we see moving via Anatolia and arriving to Balkans at 4500bc, such as Kum6 (4600bc), loaded with CHG and different farmers ancestry from Anatolia_N (8000bc) and having heavy shared ancestry with Greece Neolithic, such as Klei10, and Pal7 in Greece, a thousand years later (3500bc) and with even Otzi the Iceman (3300bc) …. They ALL SPOKE PIE/IE!

So, best put, Otzi could very well be a IE speaking person and have never even have met a Steppe person! – Lets start wrapping our minds around it!

I challenge anyone to truly fault this reasoning.

What happened to Shulaveri-Shomu, did one paper change your mind so quickly?

You should elaborate though, do you believe an Anatolian derived IE spread with EEF or later with the CHG intrusion into southern Europe? The obvious fault with this reasoning is all pre-IE languages in Europe are not IE related, Basque, Etruscan, Lemnian etc. and we don't see the archaic Anatolian influence on modern IE languages.

 

[Azzurro]

And IE did spread with Neolithic farmer from Anatolia. I mean at least VIA Anatolia.
That is becoming the elephant in the room: Assuming Krause is right, Now Reich is right and so many others (as me and you)… then it needs to be assumed, it follows, that populations we see moving via Anatolia and arriving to Balkans at 4500bc, such as Kum6 (4600bc), loaded with CHG and different farmers ancestry from Anatolia_N (8000bc) and having heavy shared ancestry with Greece Neolithic, such as Klei10, and Pal7 in Greece, a thousand years later (3500bc) and with even Otzi the Iceman (3300bc) …. They ALL SPOKE PIE/IE!

So, best put, Otzi could very well be a IE speaking person and have never even have met a Steppe person! – Lets start wrapping our minds around it!

I challenge anyone to truly fault this reasoning.

Mr Snow, I am still waiting for your response at Anthrogenica, it seems as if your having a difficult time, no rush.

 

[Angela]

Steppe people weren't primitive, they were a very creative culture.

R1 nomads spreading their virus ? dude, you're an R1.

Steppe peoples ORIGINALLY were indeed very primitive. They were hunter-gatherers living in yurts. How can you possibly compare them to the more civilized cultures of their day, such as the people of "Old Europe", or contemporaneous cultures of the Near East?

That's not a put down of any kind. It's just the facts.

They borrowed agriculture from other peoples, metallurgy from other peoples, it seems they may even have gotten kurgans, burial rites, and the wheel from other peoples.

Even Andronovo/Sintashta from the perspective of culture owes little to the steppe groups to the west. There is no trail of metallurgy to them from the Pontic-Caspian steppe for example, which was still more "primitive" in terms of metallurgy. Many of their advancements may have come to them from the south, by way of the Inner Asian Corridor.

What they were was excellent borrowers and adapters. That's an admirable trait in its own way. They weren't so rigid that they refused to adopt more sophisticated technology.

As for your comment about R1 nomads spreading the plague, that's also a fact, just as Genovese trade ships spread it after picking it up from steppe people in the Crimea during the Middle Ages.

Are you seriously suggesting that because men carry an R1 ydna haplogroup they should attempt to distort the historical record so their ancestors "look better" from the standpoint of history?

If you are, I'm sorry to say this is an example of everything that's wrong with the amateur population genetics community.

 

[Angela]

Even finding a little EHG admixture in the region is not a strong argument imo. It's like we could guarante that EHG admixture never reached the South before the Indo Europeans. As we can read from the paper. They seem to have found some EHG even in Maykop. What if there is some in Leyla Tepe too?

But there being a lack of EHG in Hittite samples is indeed a very strong argument against Steppes being their homeland. Indeed I have heard many times that Hittite is so different from the other Indo European groups that it could even be considered it's own branch. Almost like a sister language to Indo European.

That's indeed one of the linguistic theories about Hittite.

As I've said repeatedly, I'm content to see what information comes from the Royal Hittite graves.

The way things stand now, however, all the top three population genetics groups in the world, people who know more about statistics and these programs (indeed they created them) than anyone in the population genetics amateur community, consider it a possibility: the Harvard group under David Reich and Nick Patterson, the Willerslev group, including Allentoft, and the Max Planck institute. Even Mr. Eurogenes has conceded it is possible.

None of them know what they're talking about? They're all biased Near Easterners? I don't think so.

Just follow the evidence, people, and apply the same logic to every situation.

Even if it turns out to be true that the first form of the language moved from south of the Caucasus to the steppe along with the genes, what does it matter, for goodness' sakes? The rest of the theory is more or less intact, even if far more nuanced than the pop gen amateur community would have had it.

 

[IronSide]

@Angela

What are you saying ? I'm an expert on population genetics.

The gods themselves stand in awe to my wisdom.

And raspberry was just making nonsense and hating on the steppe folk. They have feelings too you know .. we have to defend the weak.

 

[Olympus Mons]

Mr Snow, I am still waiting for your response at Anthrogenica, it seems as if your having a difficult time, no rush.

I can guarantee and swear I am not SNOW.
I would really like to engage him, but I am banned from Anthro.
Can you ask me, what was the question? Maybe I can help.