Genetic and Cultural Differences between Jews and Greeks

[Leopoldo Leone]

I think Ygorcs here might have a point: if we talk about the "historical Philistines", we are referring to a population that spoke a given language, had a given culture and also associated with some genetic profile ( which seems to be an overwhelmingly Levantine and a very much diluted Greek one ). It would akin to say that the Italic people, all south of Tuscany, were not "italic" because they were not the same as the "proto-italic". What is important is not to confound the "original" migrants (south east european, genetically speaking) with the "new Philistines (accultured levantines, genetically speaking). Also as long as the Philistines are not used a a way to explain the overblown Levantine_N that only G25 gives with an implausible backmigration, I don't see how they are relevant about this discussion about Greeks and Italians ( and likely a good chunk of the balkans )

 

[Salento]

@Duarte, Hannah Moots told me that she thinks the R850 sample is indeed crete-like.

... just a story
if you believe Herodotus:

probably around 3.300 BC (I think) a huge fleet of Cretans left to lay siege on Camico (Sicily) for 5 years, ... they totally failed,

... on their way back to Crete they got caught in a violent storm, ... they were shipwrecked along a rocky coastline of Iapigia (Puglia).

Their ships got damaged beyond repair and their only option was to remain, they founded Ira and mixed with the locals, eventually they became an Integrated part of the population and by default they too contributed to the genetic makeup of the Messapi.

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Herodotus/7C*.html

https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messapi

 

[Palermo Trapani]

... just a story
if you believe Herodotus:

probably around 3.300 BC (I think) a huge fleet of Cretans left to lay siege on Camico (Sicily) for 5 years, ... they totally failed,

... on their way back to Crete they got caught in a violent storm, ... they were shipwrecked along a rocky coastline of Iapigia (Puglia).

Their ships got damaged beyond repair and their only option was to remain, they founded Ira and mixed with the locals, eventually they became an Integrated part of the population and by default they too contributed to the genetic makeup of the Messapi.

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Herodotus/7C*.html

https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messapi

Very interesting story.

 

[Duarte]

I think that the Italic, Roman and Italian citizenship must be returned to R851, lol.
Both R851 and R850 are legitimately Italian brothers. Today there are Italians just like them both in the north, and in the South and in the center of modern Italy. Cheers dear friends.

 

[Jovialis]

Are there any good threads about Southern Italian/Sicilian population genetics and also in relation to ancient Roman samples? I personally have no interest in Jewish genetics.

Here is one where you can compare to Roman samples:

https://www.eupedia.com/forum/threads/39706-Ancient-Rome-Test-(Various-Calculators)

 

[Ailchu]

How exactly do you measure culture by numbers and facts?

if you can't give them you will not be able to have an argument. and you were talking about "ethno-culture" not just about culture remember? you constantly change the focus from culture to ethnicity and then back.

There is also a correlation to these events and a rise in antisemitism, which is a common sentiment in Islamic populations.

seems like it's not really uncommon in parts of europe either.

What makes you think culture and ethnicity aren’t related?

what makes you think it is? if that is the casem are the different attitudes towards migrants or the economic situations in european countries also because of genetics? or are they just caused by or also part of the environment? you are just speculating. say what exact differences between let's say lebanese and german culture are caused by genetic differences?

Would you argue that if “Europeaness” doesn’t exist, does Western Civilization or the West as a concept exist?

that's a cultural concept. and no THE west does not exist.

Is there not a closer relationship between the peoples of say Germany and Italy or France and Italy, than say Lebanon and Italy?

culturally yes i guess but i don't know lebanese culture well enough, if you mean genetically then i don't think you can say that.

To conclude I am actually not sure if I’m in disagreement with you or not. I am not sure what the main point of your argument is. It would be somewhat more helpful if we could state our original disagreements with one another.

it would also be helpful if you could try to answer at least some of the question i asked you. can a hungarian become ethno cultural brit just to name one of them. or why are for example georgians not european anymore?

 

[Ygorcs]

You would never know they came from Greek origins, unless you look at the samples individually. That's how it is determined they came from Crete. So I have to disagree.


Why is it so imperative to try to find precisely how much levantine are in populations? Yet, with other instances, completely divergent samples should be lumped together. Seems kind of odd to me.

Because it matters to History particularly when people on the other side are claiming that that signal either does not exist at all or is so insignificant that it is negligible and doesn't have any relevance at all as an evidence in genetic history and historical population movements? Maybe that's why. I am really striving to avoid saying it all again, but since you keep asking with some innuendo, I have to repeat again that normally one would expect that there's no problem at all in trying to find if there was some foreign gene flow thousands and thousands of years ago in some region of the world. Intriguingly, people are totally willing to accept even very minor evidences of migrations from Northeastern Europe down to South India, and from Mongolia all the way to Western Anatolia - but, hey, it's totally unrealistic that Levantine affinities that are observed repeatedly by multiple people (including professionals) involved actual significant number of people who crossed some hundreds of kilometers from the East Mediterranean coast to South Italy. Okay. It's sooooooo absurd, right?

Those who are completely denying that a certain admixture that is hinted at by multiple evidences really exists, is not simply negligible "noise" and must have some interesting and relevant meaning in ancient demographics and genetic history should be the ones asking themselves why that bothers them so much. Everyone may have unconscious biases particularly when the topic being discussed has a direct link to your own ethnic or national identity.

 

[Ygorcs]

Even if I hold that Ygorcs is spectacularly wrong, I don't think it is honest to insinuate that to him finding Levantine ancestry in Italians matters: he believes he is finding something new, an event that happened in the ethnogenesis of the gene pool of south Italians but that till now has not been properly adressed. To pursue such a discovery ( or "suggestion") it matters a lot to quantify exactly the Levantine admixture in Italians.

Exactly. As I said before there are 3 possible implications that do have a lot of historical relevance:
1) South Italy/Sicily was peopled by Pelopponese_N-type people with a bit more Levantine and CHG/Iran_N affintiies, unlike the vast majority of Europe, mainly inhabited by Barcin_N-type people;
2) Sicily_MN, Sicily_EBA and Sicily_MBA are not just minorities or outliers and in fact South Italy as a whole was more "typical" EEF initially, more Barcin_N-like (with minor WHG of course), and a major genetic/ethnic change towards a more Aegean-like EEF happened after the Neolithic;
3) between the MLBA and the IA a minor but notable change happened due to influx of people enriched in Levant_N and, less so (because this kind of ancestry was already expanding there since the Neolithic), CHG/Iran_N-related people.

How does that not matter at all, particularly when other people are not simply saying "I think the actual genetic contribution was lower than that", but that it is totally negligible and the whole matter is not just irrelevant but perhaps even annoying (I really wonder why)? All the 3 possibilities would have significant historical implications.
If researching possible population movements and admixture events doesn't matter at all, we could just as well keep the outdated myths like the Paleolithic Continuity theory or something like that... but now only revamping it to become the Neolithic Continuity theory.

 

[Jovialis]

Here's an idea, how about using genetic components that make sense? Rather than ones that are artificially constructed by non-professionals to facilitate their pet theories.

I have to say, at least this thread has been very illuminating as to exactly why G25 is a horrendous calculator.

I don't even blame you, Ygorc, but rather Davidski, for using his popularity, to spread disinformation.

Who btw, must create these components, because he is a paranoid, conspricy theorist, that has anti-intellectual procliviities, in his analysis.

 

[Ygorcs]

Here is ASH068 vs other ancient samples found here: http://vahaduo.genetics.ovh/dodecad-k12b-ANCIENT-vahaduo.htm

He doesn't even come close to the other ASH samples.

I think you still didn't understand what I meant. What I meant is that the people who were ethnically (ethnicity is more about culture and politics, it's an identity and as such it may change socially with or without genetic change) Philistines were probably a mixture of Greeks with Levantines. The fact 1 one of the sample is heavily mixed also shows that. So, in that cultural community and ethnic group you wouldn't have simply a "pure" South Levantine culture living alongside a "pure" Greek culture transplanted to the South Levant just as it was. Philistine people probably had a genetic structure from 100% Greek-like to 100% Levant-like, and a lot of mixed people in between. What you're saying is a bit like claiming only the Eastern Bell Beakers packed with a lot of Steppe admixture are "truly EBB", all the others are not "really" EBB even if directly belonging to the same culture and place, so they should be ignored when we try to establish what the average BB individual was like genetically. By that token, in fact, many if not even most Anatolian Greeks would not be considered Greeks at all.

It's different from what we see in Imperial Rome, which was a multiethnic or perhaps even supraethnic state like few others, a thenreasonably recent kind of burocratic state with a civic identity instead of a strong and unified ethnic identity. Philistines probably had originally a Greek elite, but it's unlikely all the Philistine population would be identified genetically and even culturally as entirely Greek, especially if we consider the biblical sources, which do seem to indicate a pretty "Canaanite-influenced" culture.

 

[Leopoldo Leone]

Exactly. As I said before there are 3 possible implications that do have a lot of historical relevance:
1) South Italy/Sicily was peopled by Pelopponese_N-type people with a bit more Levantine and CHG/Iran_N affintiies, unlike the vast majority of Europe, mainly inhabited by Barcin_N-type people;
2) Sicily_MN, Sicily_EBA and Sicily_MBA are not just minorities or outliers and in fact South Italy as a whole was more "typical" EEF initially, more Barcin_N-like (with minor WHG of course), and a major genetic/ethnic change towards a more Aegean-like EEF happened after the Neolithic;
3) between the MLBA and the IA a minor but notable change happened due to influx of people enriched in Levant_N and, less so (because this kind of ancestry was already expanding there since the Neolithic), CHG/Iran_N-related people.

How does that not matter at all, particularly when other people are not simply saying "I think the actual genetic contribution was lower than that", but that it is totally negligible and the whole matter is not just irrelevant but perhaps even annoying (I really wonder why)? All the 3 possibilities would have significant historical implications.
If researching possible population movements and admixture events doesn't matter at all, we could just as well keep the outdated myths like the Paleolithic Continuity theory or something like that... but now only revamping it to become the Neolithic Continuity theory.

Is the aegean ancestry minoan-like? Because if so according to Lazaridis they had either zero or very low additional Levant_N, and I again I wouldn't call "G25 models ( which have many problems adressed in this thread, and also the uniparental paper you posted doesn't either point to your model or even goes against it)" multiple evidence. Given that that we happened to have been talking much more about south Italians, even if your theory has to do with central Italians and south east Europeans too, I think that if there were such "many hints", genetists would have already talked about it and even modeled it, given that they have been studying the genetic history of Anatolia, the Levant and of Europe for a decent amount of time.
Do you agree with Lazaridis's results that Myceneans had 0% additional Levant_N?

 

[Ygorcs]

Here's an idea, how about using genetic components that make sense? Rather than ones that are artificially constructed by non-professionals to facilitate their pet theories.

I have to say, at least this thread has been very illuminating as to exactly why G25 is a horrendous calculator.

I don't even blame you, Ygorc, but rather Davidski, for using his popularity, to spread disinformation.

Who btw, must create these components, because his is a paranoid, conspricy theorist, that has anti-intellectual procliviities, in his analysis.

I don't see the problems you're seeing, simply because, unlike most of you, as I see so far, I make my models using individual samples and summing them up if many individuals are picked up by the ancestry software. I don't use averages as if they were solid homogeneous components. So, no, there is no "Davidski's cunning disinformation" in them.

What exactly are you really disagreeing with now? If it's the use of Philistine Ashkelon individuals (which were compounded individually, not as a population average in my model), then you should of course notice that if I take it out what will happen is simply that some of its proportion will go to Greek-like samples and some other part of it will go to Levant-like samples. The signal is there either way. The software simply looks for where it and other ancestral signals are best found together among the samples available. The core "message" of the models won't change - and the fact that, as RegioX has been finding out, G25 doesn't seem to b really overestimating Natufian or Levant_N by a very wide margin also corroborates other evidences already presented here, including models provided in professional and published studies.

I'd really like to understand why that all sounds so bad and unacceptable to you. Or is it just my impression?

 

[Ygorcs]

Is the aegean ancestry minoan-like? Because if so according to Lazaridis they had either zero or very low additional Levant_N, and I again I wouldn't call "G25 models ( which have many problems adressed in this thread, and also the uniparental paper you posted doesn't either point to your model or even goes against it)" multiple evidence. Given that that we happened to have been talking much more about south Italians, even if your theory has to do with central Italians and south east Europeans too, I think that if there were such "many hints", genetists would have already talked about it and even modeled it, given that they have been studying the genetic history of Anatolia, the Levant and of Europe for a decent amount of time.
Do you agree with Lazaridis's results that Myceneans had 0% additional Levant_N?

No, Anatolia_BA, which Lazaridis modelled as having 9.5% Natufian and 17% Levant_BA in feasible models added to Anatolia_Chl and Minoan_Lassithi. Have you missed that post in this thread? And we all also know Levant_N itself was not any higher than 60% Natufian. So, yes, higher Levantine affinity is there in Anatolia_BA. I know, that must sound awful and tragic to some, but I'm sure it's not so bad. In either case, look, there is a great consolation: it's never any more than ~10% in average, so it's all perfectly manageable.

Well, contrary to what you say, geneticists have already point out the similarities between South Sicily/Sicily and Anatolia_BA. They don't need to be spoon-feeding every detail of what that means.

 

[Jovialis]

I think you still didn't understand what I meant. What I meant is that the people who were ethnically (ethnicity is more about culture and politics, it's an identity and as such it may change socially with or without genetic change) Philistines were probably a mixture of Greeks with Levantines. The fact 1 one of the sample is heavily mixed also shows that. So, in that cultural community and ethnic group you wouldn't have simply a "pure" South Levantine culture living alongside a "pure" Greek culture transplanted to the South Levant just as it was. Philistine people probably had a genetic structure from 100% Greek-like to 100% Levant-like, and a lot of mixed people in between. What you're saying is a bit like claiming only the Eastern Bell Beakers packed with a lot of Steppe admixture are "truly EBB", all the others are not "really" EBB even if directly belonging to the same culture and place, so they should be ignored when we try to establish what the average BB individual was like genetically. By that token, in fact, many if not even most Anatolian Greeks would not be considered Greeks at all.

It's different from what we see in Imperial Rome, which was a multiethnic or perhaps even supraethnic state like few others, a thenreasonably recent kind of burocratic state with a civic identity instead of a strong and unified ethnic identity. Philistines probably had originally a Greek elite, but it's unlikely all the Philistine population would be identified genetically and even culturally as entirely Greek, especially if we consider the biblical sources, which do seem to indicate a pretty "Canaanite-influenced" culture.

The point is, ASH_Levant_Iron_Age1 is not a real construct, because we know the dynamics of that society. As you said, they were originally Greek/-like that eventually mixed with Levantines, ultimately just becoming Levantines once again down the line. Regardless of the trajectory of that population, how on earth is it appropriate to use it as a component of a totally unrelated population. Especially, when by the conclusion of that particular study, they (the original Greek Philistines) were mixed out of existence?

Apparently, our disagreement runs deeper than just figures alone, but rather philosophical? Sorry, I am not on board with this kind of analysis. It has nothing to do with my ethnicity, btw, I have given you plenty of examples regarding other populations. I can turn around, and say; perhaps you have an attraction to this, because you yourself are of strongly divergently-mixed ancestry.

 

[Ygorcs]

I think Ygorcs here might have a point: if we talk about the "historical Philistines", we are referring to a population that spoke a given language, had a given culture and also associated with some genetic profile ( which seems to be an overwhelmingly Levantine and a very much diluted Greek one ). It would akin to say that the Italic people, all south of Tuscany, were not "italic" because they were not the same as the "proto-italic". What is important is not to confound the "original" migrants (south east european, genetically speaking) with the "new Philistines (accultured levantines, genetically speaking).

Thank you very much, you explained it much better than I myself. That's exactly what I'm saying.

Also as long as the Philistines are not used a a way to explain the overblown Levantine_N that only G25 gives with an implausible backmigration, I don't see how they are relevant about this discussion about Greeks and Italians ( and likely a good chunk of the balkans )

Those models must not be interpreted that literally. If it picks those samples, it's simply saying: something Greek-like but much more enriched in Levant_BA ancestry is found here, too, roughly in this proportion. It's not just in G25. In ANY genetics calculator at all that you may use or see others using, the results must not be interpreted literally as if all picked samples are reeeeeally ancestral to the target sample, instead of just somehow closely related, though it may be through much more indirect and complicated ways (both chronologically and spacially). Even professional geneticists have made mistakes like this due to misinterpretation of what those models are really about.

 

[Jovialis]

No, Anatolia_BA, which Lazaridis modelled as having 9.5% Natufian and 17% Levant_BA in feasible models added to Anatolia_Chl and Minoan_Lassithi. Have you missed that post in this thread? And we all also know Levant_N itself was not any higher than 60% Natufian. So, yes, higher Levantine affinity is there in Anatolia_BA. I know, that must sound awful and tragic to some, but I'm sure it's not so bad. In either case, look, there is a great consolation: it's never any more than ~10% in average, so it's all perfectly manageable.

Well, contrary to what you say, geneticists have already point out the similarities between South Sicily/Sicily and Anatolia_BA. They don't need to be spoon-feeding every detail of what that means.

ABA in southern European modeling, is based on 1 sample I2683, which has very little Levant_N (by your own analysis), are you purposely ignoring that? Because it has been mentioned several times. Or do you have a problem with that?

 

[bigsnake49]

What the samples show is that the Imperial era was multi-ethnic to a degree, though it does not tell us at what magnatude. I think the fact that these people "disappear" does not indicated that they heavily mixed with the natives, but because they were a small minority, that died out, and/or mixed out of existence.

I have said prior, that I think it is possible that the legacy of Greek colonists could have played a role in the re-population of Italy, after the fall of the Roman Empire. Especially in the south, were they were many. The extent of which, has yet to be determined. Though it would probably be difficult to discern, because I think it is possible that the southern Italian natives were already Greek-like prior to colonization, though not necessarily from Greece.

It would be nice to have samples both from the local settlements and the Greek colonies and then contrast and compare.

 

[Ygorcs]

The point is, ASH_Levant_Iron_Age1 is not a real construct, because we know the dynamics of that society. As you said, they were originally Greek/-like that eventually mixed with Levantines. Regardless of the trajectory of that population, how on earth is it appropriate to use it as a component of a totally unrelated population. Especially, when by the conclusion of that particular study, they (the original Greek Philistines) were mixed out of existence?

Apparently, our disagreement runs deeper than just figures alone, but rather philosophical? Sorry, I am not on board with this kind of analysis. It has nothing to do with my ethnicity, btw, I have given you plenty of examples regarding other populations. I can turn around, and say; perhaps you have an attraction to this, because you yourself are of strongly divergent mixed ancestry.

I'm not sure the conclusion of that study is that they were mixed out of existence. Not at all. They simply found no indication that the earlier Greek-like ancestry was still present in Ashkelon in the later part of the IA. Was that genetic dilution, displacement, extermination, large-scale emigration? I'm sure that if the authors are really professionals they won't venture claiming that they know what really happened.

I sense you're misinterpreting what that model really means. I used alll ancient DNA samples and let Vahaduo pick whatever samples are mored closely related and fit better in combination to model the ancestral makeup of the target sample. You're instead interpreting it literally, which is not the correct way to do it. Also, you're misinterpreting what the legends of the results indicate: ASH_Levant_Iron_AGE1 is - repeating once again - NOT a population average, it's the summed up proportion of all INDIVIDUAL samples that were picked up by the model and had that basic geographical+chronological label.

You're still ignoring that information, but it really matters. Basically, what this means is: the model picked BOTH the Greek-like individual and the Levantine-like individual as well as the mixed Greek-Levantine individual.

Does that mean that South Italians have Philistine ancestry? Of course it doesn't.
The model is simply telling us that people that were genetically closely related to those and the other samples in the final result of the ancestry model contributed ancestry to South Italians. That's all. If you take things about genetic ancestry soooooo specifically, you'll end up interpreting lots of things incorrectly and also unwittingly be unable to get the "signals" that the different models are hinting at.

I can turn around, and say; perhaps you have an attraction to this, because you yourself are of strongly divergent mixed ancestry.

Not the best argument, because, sorry, but you may have forgotten that Anatolia_N and Levant_N and especially Anatolia_BA and Levant_BA are not "strongly divergent" sources of ancestry at all. They'd still be a lot less mixed than me. I could even add: poor guys! :grin: Just kidding.

 

[Leopoldo Leone]

No, Anatolia_BA, which Lazaridis modelled as having 9.5% Natufian and 17% Levant_BA in feasible models added to Anatolia_Chl and Minoan_Lassithi. Have you missed that post in this thread? And we all also know Levant_N itself was not any higher than 60% Natufian. So, yes, higher Levantine affinity is there in Anatolia_BA. I know, that must sound awful and tragic to some, but I'm sure it's not so bad. In either case, look, there is a great consolation: it's never any more than ~10% in average, so it's all perfectly manageable. Well, contrary to what you say, geneticists have already point out the similarities between South Sicily/Sicily and Anatolia_BA. They don't need to be spoon-feeding every detail of what that means.

Actually, as I have kept repeating, I was not (and no one here) said that there are no higher affinities to the Levant in south east Europe, but whether they are the result of migrations between the late bronze age and the iron age or whether they have been there well before. You hypothesise that it was the former case because G25 models do not find Levant_PNP in the Samples from bronze age Sicily, but to be honest I wouldn't trust so much a hobbyist tool. In the end, talking about additional Levant_N ancestry, south Italians are very similar to Myceneans, and to ABA, who had 0% and 4% (the sample used to model south Italians in raveanne 2019) additional Levant_N. First you dismissed the two way model (anatolian plus CHG) by claiming that genetists did not "check for Levant_N", now you assume that the Anatolian who migrated in Europe ( or at least in south east Europe) were Barcin-like and not Tepefic-like, even if Kilinc 2016 suggests it was ( and yes, it could also have been that first Barcin-like anatolians migrated, and were later substituted by a more Tepefic mixed with Caucasus admixture, that could have been the case for the post-neolithic caucasus related geneflow that hit southeast europe). Also according to the latest study on AF, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-09209-7, the one that migrated to Europe were the CAF, that had already a 20% Levant_N admixture ( and visually on the PCA they fall right on top of the EEF cluster).

 

[Ygorcs]

ABA in southern European modeling, is based on 1 sample I2683, which has very little Levant_N (by your own analysis), are you purposely ignoring that? Because it has been mentioned several times. Or do you have a problem with that?

I'm not ignoring that purposefully or unpurposefully. You're the one who seems to be ignoring that in no post of this thread at all has anyone said that Levant_N admixture is large in the ancestry of South Italians. It's always being discussed as something on average between 5% and 12%, which somehow seems "too much" nonetheless (and in my models I2683 appears with 6.8% Levant_N with 11% higher distance and 6.8% 0.25x higher distance, so pretty within that range). The whole controversy is basically simply one: you and other members claim that it is totally negligible and mean virtually NO post-Neolithic movement into South Italy at all. That bold statement is simply not what a whole bunch of evidences (not just my own models) suggests to me and many others.