Sicilians pre-Greek colonization

I was named after my great-grandfather, a first generation Sicilian-American (his parents were from Palazzo Adriano), and am proud of my Sicilian heritage, a drop of olive oil in my otherwise glass of milk DNA, but I do not match many Greco-Roman samples, I'm afraid; the addition of Mediterranean DNA into the 60% majority British Isles DNA merely makes me plot closer to my West German ancestors than to my English or Irish forbears. Most of my samples at MTA are Franks or Celts, and many French people today are descended from Romanized Franks and Celts, so there's that. I frequent Anthrogenica but my area of interest is the haplogroups, and most of the guys there are fellow Americans interested in their roots and not interested in racialist theory, although I can't speak of everyone.
 
I was named after my great-grandfather, a first generation Sicilian-American (his parents were from Palazzo Adriano), and am proud of my Sicilian heritage, a drop of olive oil in my otherwise glass of milk DNA, but I do not match many Greco-Roman samples, I'm afraid; the addition of Mediterranean DNA into the 60% majority British Isles DNA merely makes me plot closer to my West German ancestors than to my English or Irish forbears. Most of my samples at MTA are Franks or Celts, and many French people today are descended from Romanized Franks and Celts, so there's that. I frequent Anthrogenica but my area of interest is the haplogroups, and most of the guys there are fellow Americans interested in their roots and not interested in racialist theory, although I can't speak of everyone.

Palazzo Adriano is a neat place, it sits about 3,000 feet in the mountains. In the piazza there is a water fountain on on the left side looking directly at the fountain, is the Church of SS Marie Del Lume (Roman/Latin Catholic) and on the right is Church of SS Marie Assunte (Byzantine Catholic). There is a museum right next to the Municipal office that documents the making of the movie Cinema Paradiso. I visited the town last summer and found my Mother's Father (My Grandfather's birth record) and his Father's Wedding document. Her Father's family were all in the Roman Catholic tradition. I had already found my Mother's Mother's Father's birth record through ancestry (he was baptized in the Byzantine Catholic Church. Beautiful town to visit.
 
Torzio: I don't dispute Mycenaean's setting up trade with Sicily in 1400 BC in fact they were trading with the Southern Mainland at that time (modern Puglia) and had set up trade with Iberia as well. But Greek colonization in Sicily did not happen till 750 BC but at that same time, Greek's were founding colonies in Puglia, Calabria and Campania, Naples being a city they founded. So why is it that Sicily seems to be the "brunt of your interest"?

With respect to the article you linked regarding Iron Age Elymians, in light of the trade with the Myceneans, it is not surprising that when the Greek colonization took place in 750 BC, the Elymians and Sicani easily adjusted to the Greek civilization as they had been engaging in commerce with the Greeks long before. Pheonicians set up trade centers on the coast yes, but did not colonize maybe due to several reasons, but one would be they for the most part were not interested in colonization but were Sea Peoples for the most part. There territories largely consisted of Coastal towns with sea ports. The Elymian towns of Segesta and Entellina (what is ancient Entellina) are in the area of 20-25 miles inland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenicia

... ‘cause you mentioned Puglia and National Geographic, ...and “Grecìa Salentina” is in Salento :)

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MTA’s Ancient Ancestry Map matches NatGeo’s results:

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Salento: I appreciate the explanation why you put your NAT Geno in but no need to, you can post to me anytime. If I saw something goofy, which I try to avoid, fraternal correction is welcomed. I get the same 2 reference populations you get at NAT Geno and my MTA map is similar to yours. I think the MTA Timeline I posted above confirms that.

Cheers.
 
Salento: I appreciate the explanation why you put your NAT Geno in but no need to, you can post to me anytime. If I saw something goofy, which I try to avoid, fraternal correction is welcomed. I get the same 2 reference populations you get at NAT Geno and my MTA map is similar to yours. I think the MTA Timeline I posted above confirms that.

Cheers.

... it’s not about you,
a lot of people don't know who we really are, but they like to write a lot ... about us, your Region, mine and others ...

Many of the “experts “ who write endlessly about our Regions and Ancestry, are not motivated by a genuine academic interest or curiosity, each of them has their reasons ... (God bless their heart) ... :)

They think they know a lot about us, but they don't ...
 
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... it’s not about you,
a lot of people don't know who we really are, but they like to write a lot ... about us, your Region, mine and others ...

Many of the “experts “ who write endlessly about our Regions and Ancestry, are not motivated by a genuine academic interest or curiosity, each of them has their reasons ... (God bless their heart) ... :)

They think they know a lot about us, but they don't ...

Thanks and I agree with what you said. Very well stated. I will go even further, I think there has always been the notion by many a different group of peoples to want the ancient Greeks and Romans to look like Nordics and have their genetics and sound like BBC Commentators. Sort of like some of the fundamentalist types I grew up around with that thought Saint Peter and Saint Paul "used the King James Bible" Totally different subject but the mentality was always the same.

But you as I do get closest ancient populations Ancient Greek and Ancient Rome and you as I do get closest modern population Italian and Greek. So if that does not suggest genetic continuity overall with some regional variations in admixture here and there, I don't know what does.
 
From my perspective, the ancestry that arrived from the east either directly or through the Greeks is just mainly the same old, same old. The new arrivals carried Anatolia Neolithic, which had been in Europe for 7,000 years already. It carried more Iran Neo/CHG, but some of that was part of the genesis of the Anatolia Neolithic in the first place, and more had been dribbling in since the Bronze Age. It was just the arrival of some long separated distant cousins. It's not like the Han Chinese suddenly migrated in, for heaven's sake.

Some people want to obfuscate this fact and label these newcomers as "alien", somehow, not people very similar to whose who make up 40-50% of their own ancestry, but now alien "Middle Easterners" who would pollute their blood. Is it the additional Iran Neo which is so objectionable? Yet that makes no sense to me because it was extremely similar to the ancestry which formed 40-50% of the ancestry of the steppe people whom they so want to share ancestry with...

Maybe all the fuss is because of some minor amount of "Levant" Bronze Age ancestry which slipped in. Is antisemitism really still so virulent in some of these people, that and hatred of Middle Eastern refugees, that they'll distort history and population genetics to find it only in people in Europe they can label the "other". Just think what would happen if these kinds of people came into power again, and what a tool genetic testing would be for them.

I find it bizarre but not really surprising.

There was population mixing throughout human history: Neanderthals and Denisovans with each other and with modern humans (and who knows how many other hominids), Levant Neolithic with Anatolia Neolithic, both with Iran Neolithic, Anatolia Neolithic with WHG, EHG with Iran Neo/CHG, steppe people with Middle Neolithic people, etc. all mixtures of far more different people from one another than any incoming Aegean like people with local inhabitants of the Italic peninsula and Sicily. That 's more akin to somebody saying the Danes were a brand new population from the Angles and Saxons, or even the Saxons from the Britons. These are just shades of difference.



Far more important to me than these minor genetic differences are what incoming people brought with them. Did they bring new crops, new innovation, architecture, art, literacy, or rape, rapine, the mass destruction of infrastructure, death and disease?

it's very easy, it is not hatred of refugees its hatred of near east in general. those people, not just at anthrogenica but rather all "eurocentrics", don't want to believe the deep genetic connection that europeans have with modern near eastern people. so to seperate what can't be seperated they have to cut their own flesh and distort population genetics.
even if there were hordes of phoenicians in sicily nothing really new would have been added. they were all distant cousins as you said so well. and all further developed than most of europe. same with carthaginians.
 
it's very easy, it is not hatred of refugees its hatred of near east in general. those people, not just at anthrogenica but rather all "eurocentrics", don't want to believe the deep genetic connection that europeans have with modern near eastern people. so to seperate what can't be seperated they have to cut their own flesh and distort population genetics.
even if there were hordes of phoenicians in sicily nothing really new would have been added. they were all distant cousins as you said so well. and all further developed than most of europe. same with carthaginians.


You are mixing and confusing 2 different things,

I think it is obvious that in your mind you created an idea of 'hatred'
and chew it as chewing gum everywhere.
 
You are mixing and confusing 2 different things,

I think it is obvious that in your mind you created an idea of 'hatred'
and chew it as chewing gum everywhere.

can you elaborate on what those 2 different things are? you really believe that people who think any additional near eastern ancestry is pollution or making people less european hate on refugees just because of their culture or religion? i think you don't know what we are dealing with here.
 
Ailchu: I think I remember you and me discussing migrant and EU policies in another forum. While I am not a moderator (Jovialis and Angela do a good job with that in these Italian related genetics forums), don't you think the migrant issue is a separate issue for most people and should be discussed in the political forum. However, I do recognize there is a segment where the migrant issue and Asia minor ancestry from the Arabia, Levant or Iran Neolithic, etc are interrelated.

I don't want to speak for the OP for this thread (ihype02) or anyone else but at least based on what the OP wrote, the thread seems to me was about Genetics per se independent of modern Political issues in the EU due to migrants and illegal immigration. There are people, me included, who agree with the anti-illegal immigration policies of political parties in my case, the USA, and agree with politicians in Europe who believe the same thing. That does not mean I (they) all hate people from different parts of the world than where one's ancestors happen to be from or are against any and all immigrants. I am the grandson/great grandson of immigrants, but I will say clearly "legal immigrants" who came to the USA through "legal ports of entry" with documentation as to who they are and where they were from. My particular case as with all Italian immigrants during the period 1885 to 1920 as well as Polish, Greeks and SE Europeans and Eastern European Jews during that period were "legal immigrants".

So I am not going to speak for Yetos either but for some people there are 2 different things at play here. One is totally related to using DNA to explain the genetics of modern Greeks and modern Italians are while not static (nothing is 100% static), are in significant continuity with the ancient Greek and Roman civilizations. The findings of that fact are now robust to several different studies. That to the chagrin of the anthrogenica type crowd goes against everything they have been saying before we had DNA. The other issue about migrants and immigration, legal vs. illegal, etc is purely a political and economic issue and relates to ensuring culture stability in host countries. I see those as 2 totally different issues, as I think Most people do. If there are antrogenica types that conflate the two together, well that is a different issue, at least to me.
 
i agree with you that the issue about illegal or legal immigrants is not part of this discussion. i was talking about eurocentric folks at anthrogenica not about simple opponents of illegal immigrants. those are indeed 2 different things. i don't see why you and yetos think it was the same.

do you think they would look for recent near eastern ancestry in sicilians just because they don't like illegal migrants? makes no sense, right? i think they just can't admit to themselves that european ancestry is in large parts related to near east and that phenotypic traits that are overlapping between those two regions can be there because of shared ancestry and not just because of recent mixture.likewise a near easterner with european traits must have recent european ancestry or for example ancestry from yamnas. it was the same with darker looking northern europeans. they must have had recent southern European ancestry, romans maybe, it couldn't be because of shared ancestry in the whole population. that one changed, now they need to somehow exclude near east.
 
i agree with you that the issue about illegal or legal immigrants is not part of this discussion. i was talking about eurocentric folks at anthrogenica not about simple opponents of illegal immigrants. those are indeed 2 different things. i don't see why you and yetos think it was different?
why do you think they look for near eastern ancestry in sicilians? i think they just can't admit to themselves that european ancestry is in large parts related to near east and that phenotypic traits that are overlapping between those two regions can be there because of shared ancestry and not just because of recent mixture. it was the same with darker looking northern europeans. they must have had recent southern European ancestry it couldn't be because of shared ancestry in the whole population. that one changed, now they need to somehow exclude near east.

Ok, well my position on antrogenica is well documented in my earlier post. The reason for aversion to Near East is I guess because of the "Stepper" fetish some in that circle have. They all want to believe that they are 100% Steppe and it was only I guess made up of Eastern European Hunter Gather and Ancient North Eurasian type ancestry, etc. Any thing from the Asia Minor Southern Caucus region, Northern Levant or Iran Neolithic type ancestry just doesn't fit their narrative. For the record, I have no need to be affirmed by the "Stepper's", I actually could care less. My issue is that they do not get to define what is European. Europe is comprised of Northern Europeans, NW Europeans (English, Angles, Scotts, Welsh, Irish, etc) and I guess Northern France, SW Europe (Iberia, Southern France) Southern Europe (Italy and Balkans), Central Europe, Eastern Europe, etc. I am very comfortable in my Southern European space, most countries North of the Alps I have no desire to visit, if you want me to totally honest.

I mean does the fact that George Harrison and Paul McCartney have darker hair and brown eyes make them less English?, I think Lennon had brown eyes, hair reddish brown, only Ringo had lighter eyes, sort of Hazel, but hair was darker rather than lighter.

But like I said I respectfully think the immigration issues are tangential to the thread

Cheers, Respectively, PT
 
What Italian, or at least what Italian knowing anything about Italian archaeology and history would see Sicilians, or Southern Italians, for that matter, as nothing more than Italian speaking Greeks?
Well I never mentioned it's Italians who say so and I said nearly nothing more than Italian-speaking Greeks which was hyperbolic on my part but the exact claim that is that the vast majority of the ancestry of Siclians and Southern Italians comes from Magna Greacians.

IMO, the ancient Greek ancestry in Italy probably peaks in Calabria given that most cities survived the wars and whole coast was controlled by them compared to around 2/3 in Sicily.
 
From what I have heard is that before the Greek colonization ancient Sicilians were much more Western shifted. My hypothesis was that Sicily is a diverse region with many different (ancient) populations (i.e natives, other Italians, Greeks, Phoenicans) but the Greek component was the greatest but not the absolute majority.
While some members in Anthrogenica tend to propose that the vast majority of their ancestry comes from the Hellenes that may be true but I am not convinced so far.
So what's your opinion about this?

I've also wondered what was Greece like before the Neolithic Expansion? Where's the data on this. Was no one living in what is now called Greece prior to the arrival of ENF?
 
it's very easy, it is not hatred of refugees its hatred of near east in general. those people, not just at anthrogenica but rather all "eurocentrics", don't want to believe the deep genetic connection that europeans have with modern near eastern people. so to seperate what can't be seperated they have to cut their own flesh and distort population genetics.
even if there were hordes of phoenicians in sicily nothing really new would have been added. they were all distant cousins as you said so well. and all further developed than most of europe. same with carthaginians.

what connection has this
it's very easy, it is not hatred of refugees

with this
its hatred of near east in general.

in fact some European nations are very proud for having ANE or simmilar ancestry to their genetic structure
 
I've also wondered what was Greece like before the Neolithic Expansion? Where's the data on this. Was no one living in what is now called Greece prior to the arrival of ENF?

mataworf: I think what you are asking is a fair "research question" that hopefully the legitimate scholars like Krause, Lazaridis, Reich, Mathieseon, etc to adress. I don't know if there are any Mesolithic Ancient Greek samples out there. Eurogenes K13 ancient has 18 Mesolithic European samples, non from Greece (a few from Italy) and Croatia. Dodecad 12b Ancient has 12 but again none from Ancient Greece. MDLP same thing, no ancient Greek Mesolithic samples. Maybe the moderators and advisors here know of some Mesolithic Greek samples that are being studied but the papers haven't been released yet for review.
 
We have no Dna from the Mesolithic period from Greece. We also do not have any or very little DNA from classical Greece.
 
We have no Dna from the Mesolithic period from Greece. We also do not have any or very little DNA from classical Greece.

Those are 2 periods with significant differences in time periods. Classical era, we are only talking about 200 or so years, 6th century to 4th century BC, etc. However, we do have samples Pre Classical Greece (Lazaradis et al 2017) analyzing Minoans and Mycenaeans and Post Classical Greece (Stamatoyannopoulouos et al 2017) analyzing the Medieval Peloponneseans. I think the basic conclusion is that Modern Greeks are in genetic continuity with both the Minoans and Mycenaeans and the Medieval Greeks were not replaced by other populations and thus are also in continuity with Greeks from earlier years, although the medieval Greeks are closer to modern Sicilians and mainland Italians (maybe tied to the Roman empire moving East?).

So I guess do you think that the Classical Greeks will show a genetic discontinuity with pre-Classical era and post-Classical era Greeks? My priors on it are probably not.
 
Those are 2 periods with significant differences in time periods. Classical era, we are only talking about 200 or so years, 6th century to 4th century BC, etc. However, we do have samples Pre Classical Greece (Lazaradis et al 2017) analyzing Minoans and Mycenaeans and Post Classical Greece (Stamatoyannopoulouos et al 2017) analyzing the Medieval Peloponneseans. I think the basic conclusion is that Modern Greeks are in genetic continuity with both the Minoans and Mycenaeans and the Medieval Greeks were not replaced by other populations and thus are also in continuity with Greeks from earlier years, although the medieval Greeks are closer to modern Sicilians and mainland Italians (maybe tied to the Roman empire moving East?).

So I guess do you think that the Classical Greeks will show a genetic discontinuity with pre-Classical era and post-Classical era Greeks? My priors on it are probably not.

I would like DNA from 1200-200 BC to include the collapse of civilization around the 12th century BC to find out what happened to those great civilizations. Was it a pandemic? The sea people? Something else? I would like DNA from the great age of colonization in the 800's and 700BCs. I would like to see if there are differences between the Greek tribes. I would like to see if we could trace each tribe's migration patterns. I would like to see if there is any genetic effect of the Celtic tribes in the Balkan area and particularly in Greece. I would like to see if there are any genetic differences or similarities between all the different Thracian and Illyrian Tribes. I would like to know what happened to all the different people that the Roman emperors, the Byzantine Emperors and the Turkish Sultans moved around through the centuries for whatever reason.
 
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i agree with you that the issue about illegal or legal immigrants is not part of this discussion. i was talking about eurocentric folks at anthrogenica not about simple opponents of illegal immigrants. those are indeed 2 different things. i don't see why you and yetos think it was the same.

do you think they would look for recent near eastern ancestry in sicilians just because they don't like illegal migrants? makes no sense, right? i think they just can't admit to themselves that european ancestry is in large parts related to near east and that phenotypic traits that are overlapping between those two regions can be there because of shared ancestry and not just because of recent mixture.likewise a near easterner with european traits must have recent european ancestry or for example ancestry from yamnas. it was the same with darker looking northern europeans. they must have had recent southern European ancestry, romans maybe, it couldn't be because of shared ancestry in the whole population. that one changed, now they need to somehow exclude near east.

I largely agree with you.

@BigSnake,
Me too.

As for Classical Greeks, my guess would be they're not that different from Mycenaeans, but perhaps with some more "northern" ancestry. I think modern mainland Greeks, except for certain parts of the Peloponnese, have additional "northern" ancestry which arrived after the fall of Rome, in the early Medieval period. That's pure speculation, of course, and I'm not insistent on that interpretation. Time will tell.
 

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