Genetic study Genomes from 82 Etruscans and Southern Italians.(800 BCE – 1,000 CE).

Admixture in Etruscans and Latins:
F2.large.jpg



Admixture in Nuragics:
F5.large.jpg
 
Now this is very interesting to me. ETR001 clusters with C6, and is closest to the so-called Latin-outlier R437 from the Iron Age.

She was a Mediterranean, not an eastern Mediterranean.

Distance to:ETR001
3.08917465C6_Iron_Age_Mediterranean:R437_(Latin_Prenestini_Tribe)_Palestrina_Selicata
3.12755496C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R52_Villa_Magna
4.03565360C6_Imperial_Mediterranean:R131_Via_Paisiello_Necropolis
4.13444071C6_Imperial_Mediterranean:R113_Via_Paisiello_Necropolis
4.93768164C6_Late_Antiquity_Mediterranean:R117_S_Ercolano_Necropolis_Ostia
5.00859262C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R56_Villa_Magna
5.05356310C6_Late_Antiquity_Mediterranean:R118_S_Ercolano_Necropolis_Ostia
5.56285898C5_Late_Antiquity_Eastern_Mediterranean:R122_S_Ercolano_Necropolis_Ostia
6.02139519C6_Imperial_Mediterranean:R836_Civitanova_Marche
6.29034975C6_Imperial_Mediterranean:R47_Centocelle_Necropolis
6.51112126C6_Imperial_Mediterranean:R49_Centocelle_Necropolis
6.52214689C6_Imperial_Mediterranean:R835_Civitanova_Marche
6.66137373C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R1290_Villa_Magna
6.98725983C6_Late_Antiquity_Mediterranean:R35_Celio
7.02551777C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R973_Tivoli_Palazzo_Cianti
7.25305453C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R65_Villa_Magna
7.88702098C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R64_Villa_Magna
7.93834366C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R969_Tivoli_Palazzo_Cianti
8.01208462C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R54_Villa_Magna
8.17496789C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R1283_Cancelleria
8.30575704C6_Late_Antiquity_Mediterranean:R120_S_Ercolano_Necropolis_Ostia
8.45656550C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R57_Villa_Magna
8.47171765C6_Imperial_Mediterranean:R111_Via_Paisiello_Necropolis
8.53086748C6_Medieval_Mediterranean:R59_Villa_Magna
8.58506261C6_Imperial_Mediterranean:R137_Marcellino_&_Pietro

Imperial_Chiusi:ETR001

CT6iIsC.png
 
Admixture in Etruscans and Latins:
F2.large.jpg



Admixture in Nuragics:
F5.large.jpg

Exactly what I was looking for. Very informative.

Trying to make sense of the components, a bit dissapointed no legend was included.
So I went ahead and read this: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-09209-7 .... And to some extent made sense of the red component (Iron Gates).

" One assumes a secondary gene flow from Southeastern Europe to Anatolia after the initial formation of the Near-Eastern gene pool as a mixture of the Basal Eurasian and the Villabruna-related gene pools. The other assumes that Iron Gates HG are indeed the most closely related group among European hunter-gatherers to the Villabruna-related ancestry in ancient Near Easterners. Further sampling in Anatolia and Southeastern Europe is needed to specify the spatiotemporal extent of the genetic interactions that we observe."


"Most of the Later European HGs belong to a largely homogeneous gene pool referred to as the “Villabruna cluster,”8 named after its oldest available member from an E***ravettian site in northern Italy. Our results suggest that the non-Basal Eurasian ancestry of ancient Anatolians and Levantines derived from a gene pool related to the Villabruna cluster prior to its expansion within Europe observed after 14,000BP."

"In turn, the Iron Gates HG could be modeled without any Basal Eurasian ancestry or with a non-significant proportion of 1.6 ± 2.8% when forced to have it as a third source (Fig. 3b and Supplementary Table 10). In contrast to the above direct estimate, the three-way admixture model of WHG + EHG + AHG predicts α = 6.4 ± 1.9% for Iron Gates, calculated as (% AHG in Iron Gates HG) × (α in AHG), suggesting that unidirectional gene flow from the Near East to Europe alone may not be sufficient to explain the excess affinity between the Iron Gates HG and the Near-Eastern hunter-gatherers. "

What I understood from this complicated paragraphs, is that the red component in Sardinia, could be a result of Villabruna peoples, and not necessarily from AHG. But what do I know. Could be wrong.


The green is Steppe?
Purple has to be WHG right?
And the Blue? Can't figure that one out.

Would appreciate a link to the study.

Also, If I am interpreting that PCA right, adding Steppe and the Blue component to Sardinian Nuragic would bring you in the PCA close to Tuscans? Or am I missing something?
 
Greek_Lemnos is quite distant from ETR001 and very distant from Etruscans and Latins. The Imperial-era Roman ETR001 is very similar to Iron Age Latin R437.


bHLMuYY.png


5zn7Xao.png
Pretty close to Apulia and Abruzzo though :grin:. My note was that Greek_Lemnos was the closest of all the Greek Areas to ETR001 not that it was especially close to it.
 
Exactly what I was looking for. Very informative.

Trying to make sense of the components, a bit dissapointed no legend was included.
So I went ahead and read this: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-09209-7 .... And to some extent made sense of the red component (Iron Gates).

" One assumes a secondary gene flow from Southeastern Europe to Anatolia after the initial formation of the Near-Eastern gene pool as a mixture of the Basal Eurasian and the Villabruna-related gene pools. The other assumes that Iron Gates HG are indeed the most closely related group among European hunter-gatherers to the Villabruna-related ancestry in ancient Near Easterners. Further sampling in Anatolia and Southeastern Europe is needed to specify the spatiotemporal extent of the genetic interactions that we observe."


"Most of the Later European HGs belong to a largely homogeneous gene pool referred to as the “Villabruna cluster,”8 named after its oldest available member from an E***ravettian site in northern Italy. Our results suggest that the non-Basal Eurasian ancestry of ancient Anatolians and Levantines derived from a gene pool related to the Villabruna cluster prior to its expansion within Europe observed after 14,000BP."

"In turn, the Iron Gates HG could be modeled without any Basal Eurasian ancestry or with a non-significant proportion of 1.6 ± 2.8% when forced to have it as a third source (Fig. 3b and Supplementary Table 10). In contrast to the above direct estimate, the three-way admixture model of WHG + EHG + AHG predicts α = 6.4 ± 1.9% for Iron Gates, calculated as (% AHG in Iron Gates HG) × (α in AHG), suggesting that unidirectional gene flow from the Near East to Europe alone may not be sufficient to explain the excess affinity between the Iron Gates HG and the Near-Eastern hunter-gatherers. "

What I understood from this complicated paragraphs, is that the red component in Sardinia, could be a result of Villabruna peoples, and not necessarily from AHG. But what do I know. Could be wrong.


The green is Steppe?
Purple has to be WHG right?
And the Blue? Can't figure that one out.

Would appreciate a link to the study.

Also, If I am interpreting that PCA right, adding Steppe and the Blue component to Sardinian Nuragic would bring you in the PCA close to Tuscans? Or am I missing something?

I assume you recognize the often posted graphic from Antonio et al, so I further assume you mean the graphic from the paper on Sardinian genetics. I should have provided a link.

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/583104v1.full

As to the "legend", there wasn't any that I saw. I guess they assumed there were enough clues in the graphic itself, i.e. Iron Gates HG is all red; Steppe EMBA is almost all green; Early Neolithic is almost all purple and therefore that's the EEF "farmer" component; Iran Copper Age is almost all blue etc.

Sardinians are shifted quite far west of the Tuscans, doubtless because they have so much WHG relatively speaking, as well as the effects of drift, of course.

Anyone familiar with the Mediterranean knows that reaching Sardinia by sea was quite difficult for much of early history. Most of their ancestry probably arrived from the mainland and then down through Corsica. Only along the edges and only in the Iron Age did people arrive relatively easily by sea. It has to do with water and wind currents in the Mediterranean.
 
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Are Nuragic people in any way related, archeologically/linguistically/genetically with the Etruscans? I know there was some connections genetically at least based on the Nuragic L283/Etruscan L283. But that Etruscan L283 was single in number, hence until these new samples come out, it could have been an outlier as far as YDNA is concerned.
Pax you are the likeliest person to know the answer to this, given how read you are in Etruscology. Could you share your two cents?

The presence of J2b2-L283 among both Nuragics and Etruscans is interesting, but they are also different clades, aren't they? Both Etruscology and prehistoric studies of Italy and Sardinia do not take into account the idea that Sardinians are related to the origin of Etruscans. It is recognized that there were very intense relations both from prehistoric times between the Sardinians and the areas that were then known as Etruria in historical times, and it is fairly well known that there were intense trade exchanges between the late Bronze Age and the early Iron Age, also with the Sardinians who had settled in Etruria and with the Etruscans who frequented Sardinia in the Villanovan period (recently Villanovan ceramics has been found on the island of Tavolara), and it may be that the Sardinians acted as intermediaries between the Punics and the Etruscans. But the Etruscans have not only relationships with the Sardinians. The Etruscans have also relationships with many others. Not to mention that the material culture at the end of the bronze in Sardinia and Etruria is completely different.

I'm interested to see this paper, also I wonder what part of Southern Italy they are referring to. I assume it was the area that was colonized by Etruscans, since that is the topic of the paper. The influx of "Eastern Mediterranean" makes sense by the Imperial era, because it would probably have meant the incorporation of the Greek colonies which were right next door. I am also assuming the Etruscans will probably look like they did, genetically, in Antonio et al. 2019.

They could be the areas of Campania where, coming from Lazio, groups of Etruscans had settled from the Villanovan period. Etruscan Campania is described by Etruscologists as an area in which the Etruscans coexisted and mixed from the beginning with Greeks and the indigenous peoples of Campania, and then to be completely assimilated around 500 BC by Oscans and Samnites and lose the Etruscan identity.

Not surprisingly, this study is also coming out.

"Exploring the Genetic Diversity of Magna Graecia - The Case of Campania."

And this one

"Genomic and anthropological analysis on the human skeletal remains recovered in the House with Garden in Pompeii, Italy".
 
The Roman imperial period changed the genetic profile of all of Italy, as all of Italy was part of the Roman Empire. It is too early to draw conclusions, though. This study clarifies the origins of the Etruscans once and for all, but studies on the rest of Italy are still lacking.



The writing from Plutarch seems to support your assertion that foreigners were effecting all of Italy not just Rome: Life of Tiberius Gracchus, passages 8-9 (Events second century BC).

Of the territory which the Romans won in war from their neighbours, apart they sold, and a part they made common land, and assigned it for occupation to the poor and indigent among the citizens, on payment of a small rent into the public treasury. And when the rich began to offer larger rents and drove out the poor, a law was enacted forbidding the holding by one person of more than five hundred acres of land. For a short time this enactment gave a check to the rapacity of the rich, and was of assistance to the poor, who remained in their places on the land which they had rented and occupied the allotment which each had held from the outset. But later on the neighbouring rich men, by means of fictitious personages, transferred these rentals to themselves, and finally held most of the land openly in their own names. Then the poor, who had been ejected from their land, no longer showed themselves eager for military service, and neglected the bringing up of children, so that soon all Italy was conscious of a dearth of freemen, and was filled with gangs of foreign slaves, by whose aid the rich cultivated their estates, from which they had driven away the free citizens."
 
jNEVFQb.jpg


I'm interested to see this paper, also I wonder what part of Southern Italy they are referring to. I assume it was the area that was colonized by Etruscans, since that is the topic of the paper. The influx of "Eastern Mediterranean" makes sense by the Imperial era, because it would probably have meant the incorporation of the Greek colonies which were right next door. I am also assuming the Etruscans will probably look like they did, genetically, in Antonio et al. 2019.
Roman samples in late antiquity who are Southern Italian-like have around 10-15% J1, while modern South Italians have around 2% to 5% J1. This makes it clear that Southern Italians were different from Estrucans in antiquity.

The reason why Late Antiquity Romans plot with Southern Italians is probably coincidence.
 
Agreed. Very annoying. I wonder how long will it take.

I think in a couple of months the fully paper will be published. It would be great if in the meantime other long- awaited papers would be published too.
 
The presence of J2b2-L283 among both Nuragics and Etruscans is interesting, but they are also different clades, aren't they? Both Etruscology and prehistoric studies of Italy and Sardinia do not take into account the idea that Sardinians are related to the origin of Etruscans. It is recognized that there were very intense relations both from prehistoric times between the Sardinians and the areas that were then known as Etruria in historical times, and it is fairly well known that there were intense trade exchanges between the late Bronze Age and the early Iron Age, also with the Sardinians who had settled in Etruria and with the Etruscans who frequented Sardinia in the Villanovan period (recently Villanovan ceramics has been found on the island of Tavolara), and it may be that the Sardinians acted as intermediaries between the Punics and the Etruscans. But the Etruscans have not only relationships with the Sardinians. The Etruscans have also relationships with many others. Not to mention that the material culture at the end of the bronze in Sardinia and Etruria is completely different.

Very informative as always Pax.

Indeed everything you said makes sense and feels on point.

I brought the question up mainly due to my confusion regarding the Nurgaics. The L283 in Sardinia is very peculiar for a couple of reasons. 1) Their autosomal lacks steppe. 2) Their clades are very far up the tree, some downstream of L283 basal (L283* - this one likely a mistake due to low coverage, according to some admins I have talked to; J-Z600; J-YP157).

Which for me is hard to comprehend, given the rest of the evidence we have regarding L283.

You are also right. The Etruscan L283 (2700kya/J-Y45181) is downstream of the Dalmatian L283 (3.3kya/J-Z38240) and indeed has steppe in its autosomal.

Meanwhile the 3 Nuragic samples are all quite upstream from both these samples. Yet there doesn't seem to be an ancestral relation (?).

So yeah, the biggest puzzle so far for me regarding my clade is how it got to Sardinia. My current hypothesis is from the North via sea. And that it was there for quite some generations for its steppe to be fully diluted. But since we are talking about at least MBA/LBA, and as you said during BA getting to Sardinia was not trivial, you see why its so interesting.

But either way, no one knows, I have spoken to various L283 admins, and they share my puzzlement.

Thanks for the clarifications regarding cultural ties between Nuragics and Etruscans.

Edit: Since I do not want to flood this thread with unrelated discussions. @Torzio, yeah I am quite familiar with my own Haplogroup, the graphic you just shared I have myself posted quite often in this forum, and updated version of it in a new thread I opened couple of weeks ago regarding L283 and Yamnaya/CHG.
 
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Very informative as always Pax.

Indeed everything you said makes sense and feels on point.

I brought the question up mainly due to my confusion regarding the Nurgaics. The L283 in Sardinia is very peculiar for a couple of reasons. 1) Their autosomal lacks steppe. 2) Their clades are very far up the tree, some downstream of L283 basal (L283* - this one likely a mistake due to low coverage, according to some admins I have talked to; J-Z600; J-YP157).

Which for me is hard to comprehend, given the rest of the evidence we have regarding L283.

You are also right. The Etruscan L283 (2700kya/J-Y45181) is downstream of the Dalmatian L283 (3.3kya/J-Z38240) and indeed has steppe in its autosomal.

Meanwhile the 3 Nuragic samples are all quite upstream from both these samples. Yet there doesn't seem to be an ancestral relation (?).

So yeah, the biggest puzzle so far for me regarding my clade is how it got to Sardinia. My current hypothesis is from the North via sea. And that it was there for quite some generations for its steppe to be fully diluted. But since we are talking about at least MBA/LBA, and as you said during BA getting to Sardinia was not trivial, you see why its so interesting.

But either way, no one knows, I have spoken to various L283 admins, and they share my puzzlement.

Thanks for the clarifications regarding cultural ties between Nuragics and Etruscans.


origins of L283 is in the north Caucasus

 
Roman samples in late antiquity who are Southern Italian-like have around 10-15% J1, while modern South Italians have around 2% to 5% J1. This makes it clear that Southern Italians were different from Estrucans in antiquity.

The reason why Late Antiquity Romans plot with Southern Italians is probably coincidence.

It is possibly a coincidence, but I don't think it is probably a coincidence. I don't think anyone can determine probability.

Modern Italians, including southerners certainly are connected to the middle ages, I don't see why a mere era earlier is out of the question.
 
Also, to make myself clear, I think it was more complex than that. There were other people living in the area of the south where the Etruscans colonized. I don't think they're a simple two way mixture of Etruscans and "Eastern Mediterranean" (whatever that label even means). Though I do think it is possible they were at least some of their ancestors.

I think the ancestry of Southern Italians is primarily Greeks and random Italics from other tribes. Of course some other people were involved, like Illyrians, etc.
 
Proto-Tyrrhenians could have been atleast partially descended from Gava-Holigrady Culture and might have come from East-Alps/Western-Carpathians in the Late Bronze Age. Villanovans were part of Urnfield cultural complex.

Villanova urns were likely of Gava origin but Gava people were R1a and very Northern autosomaly unlike all V13 finds. E-V13 is totally related to Girla-Mare culture which was non-IE speaking and it may well be this culture held the proto-Etruscan language. Or that simply put Lemnian language was just a survivor of what used to be formerly much more widespread language (instead of them being some recent migrants as some have suggested).

We know all Thracians were E-V13 as the Girla Mare merged with Gava elements to form the entire range of proto-Thracian cultures.
There are clear implicit suggestions E-V13 might have relation to Etruscans:
1. Pšeničevo - all 3 finds are E-V13
2. Pšeničevo derived of Insula Banului
3. Insula Banului = Girla Mare + Gava
4. Gava were R1a so that leaves Girla Mare for E-V13
5. Girla-Mare was non-IE speaking
6. Villanovan urns very close to Gava urns.
7. The only Etruscan Y-DNA J-L283 find is of certain MBA Balkan origin.
 
Villanova urns were likely of Gava origin but Gava people were R1a and very Northern autosomaly unlike all V13 finds. E-V13 is totally related to Girla-Mare culture which was non-IE speaking and it may well be this culture held the proto-Etruscan language. Or that simply put Lemnian language was just a survivor of what used to be formerly much more widespread language (instead of them being some recent migrants as some have suggested).

These are complex topics and cannot be simplified in this way. First of all, these are material cultures, not ethnicities. Villanovan culture is an Iron Age culture exclusively Etruscan. It is true that it shows similarities with various cultures of the Urnfield cultures of Central and Eastern Europe. But before the Villanovan culture there is the Bronze Age Proto-Villanovan culture which is almost supranational in Italy.

Who published the analyses of bone remains from the Gava culture? What studies state that E-V13 is totally related to the Girla-Mare culture which was non-IE speaking?

There is definitely a relationship in the material culture between the Etruscans of the early Iron Age and some Urnfield cultures between the northern Balkans and the Danubian-Carpathian plain but this relationship is very complex. Including the Proto-Tyrrhenian language in the discourse must explain not only the Etruscan language but also the Raetic language. The Raetic people in the second Iron Age are associated with the Fritzens-Sanzeno culture and before that, between the end of Bronze and the first Iron Age, with the Laugen-Melaun culture.

In the early Iron Age, Etruria traded with many different areas of central and northern Europe. This map is now 10-15 years old, more discoveries have been made in recent years.

n9c9zeI.jpg
 
Roman samples in late antiquity who are Southern Italian-like have around 10-15% J1, while modern South Italians have around 2% to 5% J1. This makes it clear that Southern Italians were different from Estrucans in antiquity.
The reason why Late Antiquity Romans plot with Southern Italians is probably coincidence.

Looking at remains from the Roman period and Late Antiquity is not like looking at samples from the Bronze Age, for example, where, after a spurt of migration people stayed in certain areas for long periods of time.

During Late Antiquity, depending on the time periods, you have the Gothic Wars, with the Byzantines bringing in mercenary troops from near and far. The Byzantines also re-established trade routes. I'm not surprised there might have been an upsurge in certain haplogroups, just as in the Langobard burials you see a lot of U-106 (a lot more than is present in Piemonte today, btw.)

I'm also unclear about the precise dating and context of these samples. The first Saracen incursions are around 827. Depending on that dating that could have an impact too in some samples, even if not on the genetics of the mainland.

These kinds of "contacts" can leave some y dna that survives, maybe even some autosomal, but I've seen nothing anywhere or in any time period which would convince me it's enough to significantly change the "profile" of a population.

We saw the same thing in the Antonio et al Roman samples from the Imperium and Late Antiquity, where some of them were clearly visitors to Italy from Northern Europe. (Of course, that there might have been visitors from the Levant who "didn't" stay and become part of the native population is clearly impossible. Magic erased the "tail" to the Levant. :))

Rome was already a place of pilgrimage. Heck, the Archbishop of Canterbury took the Via Francigena to Rome to see the Pope, passing literally the front step of the house where I was born along the Magra. The description of the trip mentions the death of some of the pilgrims or retainers. Doesn't mean they're my ancestors.
 
These are complex topics and cannot be simplified in this way. First of all, these are material cultures, not ethnicities. Villanovan culture is an Iron Age culture exclusively Etruscan. It is true that it shows similarities with various cultures of the Urnfield cultures of Central and Eastern Europe. But before the Villanovan culture there is the Bronze Age Proto-Villanovan culture which is almost supranational in Italy.

Who published the analyses of bone remains from the Gava culture? What studies state that E-V13 is totally related to the Girla-Mare culture which was non-IE speaking?

There is definitely a relationship in the material culture between the Etruscans of the early Iron Age and some Urnfield cultures between the northern Balkans and the Danubian-Carpathian plain but this relationship is very complex. Including the Proto-Tyrrhenian language in the discourse must explain not only the Etruscan language but also the Raetic language. The Raetic people in the second Iron Age are associated with the Fritzens-Sanzeno culture and before that, between the end of Bronze and the first Iron Age, with the Laugen-Melaun culture.

In the early Iron Age, Etruria traded with many different areas of central and northern Europe. This map is now 10-15 years old, more discoveries have been made in recent years.

n9c9zeI.jpg

A question, when are Italic languages supposed to enter Italian peninsula? Did they enter with Proto-Villanovans (Late Bronze Age), or earlier?
 
Couldn't Proto-Tyrrhenians come from Central Europe, somewhere around the Alps given that they descend from Villanovans, and they stem from common root with Rhaetians?

There's this group of linguists who are studying, together, the ancient languages of Europe. Marchesini, Belfiore, Salomon,
Schumacher, Poccetti, Kluge, Benelli, are those who deal especially with Etruscan and Raetic.

http://aelaw.unizar.es/people

It cannot be ruled out but so far I have never read that anyone, some credible scholar I mean, claimed a provenance of the Proto-Tyrrhenian from Central Europe. In the past, Italian scholars had related the ancestors of the Etruscans to the Terramare culture and the pile-dwellers of the Alps.
 
The presence of J2b2-L283 among both Nuragics and Etruscans is interesting, but they are also different clades, aren't they? Both Etruscology and prehistoric studies of Italy and Sardinia do not take into account the idea that Sardinians are related to the origin of Etruscans. It is recognized that there were very intense relations both from prehistoric times between the Sardinians and the areas that were then known as Etruria in historical times, and it is fairly well known that there were intense trade exchanges between the late Bronze Age and the early Iron Age, also with the Sardinians who had settled in Etruria and with the Etruscans who frequented Sardinia in the Villanovan period (recently Villanovan ceramics has been found on the island of Tavolara), and it may be that the Sardinians acted as intermediaries between the Punics and the Etruscans. But the Etruscans have not only relationships with the Sardinians. The Etruscans have also relationships with many others. Not to mention that the material culture at the end of the bronze in Sardinia and Etruria is completely different.
They could be the areas of Campania where, coming from Lazio, groups of Etruscans had settled from the Villanovan period. Etruscan Campania is described by Etruscologists as an area in which the Etruscans coexisted and mixed from the beginning with Greeks and the indigenous peoples of Campania, and then to be completely assimilated around 500 BC by Oscans and Samnites and lose the Etruscan identity.
Not surprisingly, this study is also coming out.
"Exploring the Genetic Diversity of Magna Graecia - The Case of Campania."
And this one
"Genomic and anthropological analysis on the human skeletal remains recovered in the House with Garden in Pompeii, Italy".
That's great news, these studies are long overdue.

That's what I think too, it is likely these groups in the south mixed together, especially by the Imperial era. By then, their cultural identity would have been "Roman" in that era.
 

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