To burn or not to burn: LBA/EIA Balkan case

[Jovialis]

But i still think Y-DNA E is to be associated with ANA (Ancient North Africans) which is classified as separate component from both Eurasians and Sub-Saharans but it looks like influenced both Basal Eurasian and Sub-Saharan autosomal to a degree.

If the pre-print is correct, I think that's plausible.

 

[Riverman]

Note how they started to remove their front teeth. They started collecting specific food, and were having tooth decay. Or it was a ritual thing IDK, during Capsian time this practice stopped. Nevertheless he is good to be stamped in a Pirate flag or to be weared as Halloween mask.

That's a cultural practise widespread in (rather Subsaharan) Africans up to recent times.

As for E, E-M35 and the direct predecessor of E-V13, all three need to be treated separately. The safest assumption is that E-L618 came with Natufian -> Pre Pottery Neolithic to Levantine/Anatolian Neolithics, from which Impresso-Cardial settlers came to Europe.

 

[Aspurg]

Well I managed to find clear Byzantine affinity for 12 out of 20 V13 (including 3 "L618" which ofc won't stay there most likely). Archeological Byzantine links + autosomal DNA etc.

But what I find it interesting is that of those almost all are Z5018+, while of those V13 samples that by auDNA and their location seem locals Z5016+ dominates.. This might indicate Dacians (maybe also earlier Pannonian Scythians) were heavy on Z5016, and indeed there is plenty of diversity of that clade around there.

Some of those very Southern people were not likely to have been locals anyway especially counting in subsequent Germanic etc migrations. For one of these (Z5016) I deeply looked at it is clear he is a Gepid of earlier Daco-Carpian extraction. As on the same Avar site there were Gepid finds and also earlier Daco-Carpian finds, and some authors even mentioned such a mixed Daco-Germanic-Celtic population existing there. By auDNA he was rather Germanic like it seems and he was found together with the two I1.

 

[Aspurg]

Its not Slavic. Perhaps he meant to say that if some of the E-V13 in these Avars(who also had Slavic admixture) is related to some E-V13 in the Balkans, then, perhaps at least recently some(and not all) E-V13 may have a more recent Avaro-Slavic extraction and spread. In which case some E-V13 in the Balkans could habe arrived with Avars and not been native there. I think perhaps this could be more true for some South Slavic E-V13 as I recall someone mentioning these Avar V13 samples have no recent matches with Albanian V13 until at least the Iron Age.

Avars proper had little to no Slavic admixture. And Avars had 0 I2a Din. 0. few Slavic R1a's too. That some V13 could have arrived with the Avars is definitely an option. But definitely not Slavs. Especially considering high diversity and presence in the area of Komani-Kruja culture which had also Avar admixture.

Ofc that great part of those Avar V13's seem Byzantine is another matter..

But clearly Avars did not mix with the Slavs at all. They mixed with the local Gepids, other remnants and ofc these Romanoi that came there either forcefully (I guess more likely) or willingly (opportunists).

 

[Riverman]

Well I managed to find clear Byzantine affinity for 12 out of 20 V13 (including 3 "L618" which ofc won't stay there most likely). Archeological Byzantine links + autosomal DNA etc.

But what I find it interesting is that of those almost all are Z5018+, while of those V13 samples that by auDNA and their location seem locals Z5016+ dominates.. This might indicate Dacians (maybe also earlier Pannonian Scythians) were heavy on Z5016, and indeed there is plenty of diversity of that clade around there.

Some of those very Southern people were not likely to have been locals anyway especially counting in subsequent Germanic etc migrations. For one of these (Z5016) I deeply looked at it is clear he is a Gepid of earlier Daco-Carpian extraction. As on the same Avar site there were Gepid finds and also earlier Daco-Carpian finds, and some authors even mentioned such a mixed Daco-Germanic-Celtic population existing there. By auDNA he was rather Germanic like it seems and he was found together with the two I1.

I think the individuals with "Byzantine" affinity were simply Roman provincials, so Romanised locals which got an extra bit of "Imperial Roman" admixture from the East Mediterranean, just like some of the Viminacium samples might have. Its typical, archaeologically, for the Roman pockets like Keszthely, that they being more Eastern oriented, since that was, at that time and for the region, their religious and cultural centre. You can even see that they copied Eastern Roman style. So I would describe them mostly as Daco-Romans or Pannonian-Roman provincials.
The more Northern shifted individuals you are talking about might have been from the neighbouring, non-Roman settled areas, like in the Danube bent and up the Carpathians, being ethnically derived from Sarmatians with Dacian influences, like the Iazyges, or Dacian people directly, like the Costobocci and Carpi among others, as well as the mixed Celtic-Dacian people like the Cotini and Bastarnae.

The Romance communities were strong in the South West and South too, but most samples being clearly concentrated to the South East, like close to the Tisza river, like around Szeged. And they are still stronger in Eastern Hungary, than in Southern and Western Hungary. Its really a peculiar region, which was once the centre of Belegis II-G?va and later Bosut-Basarabi, its especially the Banat and the Eastern side of the Tisza basin.

Counties of Hungary, you can click on the map:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counties_of_Hungary

Most of the samples being concentrated in in the komitats (counties):

Csongr?d-Csan?d (South Eastern Hungary)
Kiskundorozsma-Kettőshat?r I (3)
Sz?kkutas-K?polnadűlő (2)
Pitvaros-V?zt?roz? (1)
Szeged-Kundomb (1)
Szegv?r-Oromdűlő (1)

J?sz-Nagykun-Szolnok (Central Eastern Hungary):
Alatty?n-Tul?t (2)

B?k?s ([South] Eastern Hungary)
Orosh?za-B?num T?glagy?r (2)

Hajd?-Bihar (Eastern Hungary)
P?sp?klad?ny-Eperjesv?lgy (1)
S?rr?tudvari-H?z?f?ld (1)

B?cs-Kiskun (Eastern-Central South of Hungary):
S?k?sd-S?god (1)

Heves (Central North Eastern Hungary):
Tiszan?na-Cseh tanya (1)

J?sz-Nagykun-Szolnok (Central Eastern Hungary):
Tiszaf?red-Majoros-halom (1)

So the main commonality is: All are in Eastern Hungary, a lot being concentrated along the Tisza and there is an even higher concentration in Csongr?d-Csan?d, which is the area which connects directly with the Romanian and Serbian Banat. This is the area which was an absolute centre of Belegis II-G?va and later Bosut-Basarabi. Szeged and Belegi? being directly connected by the Tisza river. As are most of the other sites and provinces mentioned. Note especially that West of Csongr?d-Csan?d there is almost nothing! There are more samples from the Northern East than from the very South, which had strong Roman communities too.

The question is how old it is, and how much dates to the old G?va from the Upper Tisza vs. the Basarabi expansion from the South Banat. A good portion of this area was not constantly and late Roman controlled, because of the Danube bent:

Before the big migration period, in later Roman times, when the Dacian power was broken, this area was mostly inhabited by Sarmatians, like the Iazyges:

Note the whole macro-region North of the Roman borders were controlled by Sarmatians and Daco-Thracians, like the Costobocci, Carpi and possibly mixed people more Celtic influenced, like the Cotini. Considering how the earlier Thraco-Cimmerians and Vekerzug Scythians score, I guess the Iazyges and other Sarmatian tribes too got their fair share of Dacian-related ancestry.
The question is how the Costobocci and Carpi would look like, but like so often with Daco-Thracians, a lot of them kept the tradition of burning their dead, which makes the whole quest even more difficult.

We definitely need a lot more samples from Romania in particular. Talking about E-V13 prehistory, Romania is key, together with Eastern Hungary, Eastern Slovakia, Transcarpathian Ukraine and adjacet Polish areas, as well as Romania as a whole, which will be important, regardless of a Northern (G?va = Upper Tisza) or more Southern (Belegis II-G?va and Bosut-Basarabi = Tisza-Danube area, Banat and East) ultimate main source region for the Bronze-Iron Age founder effects.

For Medieval Hungary, the lack of sampling from around Lake Balaton hurts, like I said before, but its quite telling that they had one sample taking from the crucial period and it was J2b. I doubt the E-V13 will be higher in South Western Romance Hungary than in the East, because while Channelled Ware people and Basarabi had their strong impact there too, it was not as strong as along the Tisza.

 

[Riverman]

By the way, VPBper167 Conq. elite 10. (2nd half) sample belongs to J-Y17946 which is the same as the Bronze Age Kyjatice BR2 sample, which was from Heves county by the way and fully Eastern Central European autosomally:
https://www.yfull.com/tree/J-Y17946/

This might be the first direct evidence for Channelled Ware continuity in Pannonia! Good catch.

He is a conqueror elite, at a time most of the older structure might have been already lost, yet not fully so, from V?rs-Papkert-B, county of Somogy, directly at the Lake Balaton and within reach of Keszthely, so from an area known to have had strong Romance continuity, among the longest in the whole Pannonian region!

The area was probably dominated by Pannonian Illyrians, but got heavily influenced by Channelled Ware/Kyjatice-G?va in the transitional period:

At
the same time the high number of characteristics in shape
and motifs typical of the Kyjatice and G?va cultures indi-
cates that the population living in the Danube River Bend
Gorge region during the Ha B period maintained intensive
relations principally with communities inhabiting the Hun-
garian Northern Mountain Hills and the Great Hungarian
Plain.45
The material evidence of cultural interactions shows that
the intensity of communicaton increaeses during the HaB1
period at such a rate that it becomes visible in the deposition
of goods in burials.46 The warrior elite evolving on the Great
Hungarian Plain had an intense impact on the material cul-
ture of the neighbouring areas, which can be observed not
only in funerals but also in the composition of the hoards of
the Hajd?b?sz?rm?ny horizon and its customs of deposi-
tion.47 The influence of the warrior elite living in the Great
Hungarian Plain increases in the regions along the Danube
in Transdanubia during the Ha B3 and Ha C periods.

https://www.austriaca.at/0xc1aa5576_0x003ace22.pdf

I would assume the Iron Age, pre-Celtic population of the area should have been J-L283 dominated, with Bell Beaker R1b and a minority from Channelled Ware. This individual, if really being in the same clade, could be a direct descendant of the earlier Channelled Ware expansion from Kyjatice-G?va. Interestingly, he looks more Northern, possibly Sarmatian or Slavic or Germanic influenced, but keep in mind, the Kyjatice sample BR2 was similar!

From the paper:

VPB-167 V?rs-Papkert-B Conq. elite EU_cline 89% EU_Core5 11% EU_Core1

Since that's no super common lineage, that's quite exciting and shows once more how important main and subclades are, in a best case scenario down to a terminal SNP. Quite exciting and it just shows that Channelled Ware people might indeed have influenced the whole Pannonian region and survived there up to the Hungarian conqueror period at least!

 

[Hawk]

We already have La Tene results from Western Hungary who should be pre-Celtic, and from those small samples E-V13 is there, even moreso than J2b2-L283 in Pannonia.

 

[Riverman]

We already have La Tene results from Western Hungary who should be pre-Celtic, and from those small samples E-V13 is there, even moreso than J2b2-L283 in Pannonia.

The problem with E-V13 is that its a major European haplogroup, so by just stating E-V13 was there, we don't prove continuity, because it could have been a branch from every cardinal point. We don't know. This lineage from Kyjatice however is kind of more specific. For E-V13 we really come to the point, like I repeatedly stressed, where we don't just need to know it was E-V13, but the exact subclades!

Its good this paper has some, which is absolutely key for putting things into context, but the British paper wasn't as successful unfortunately.

 

[MOESAN]

But i still think Y-DNA E is to be associated with ANA (Ancient North Africans) which is classified as separate component from both Eurasians and Sub-Saharans but it looks like influenced both Basal Eurasian and Sub-Saharan autosomal to a degree.

Even the Iberomaurusian cranium which was noted by anthropologists hinted at quite separate group of people. Likewise the more deep in time, the more pure ANA and less Dzudzuana the more robust the crania like this Paleolithic Egyptian hunter gatherer whom i bet he was Y-DNA E-M35

Is not the above skull the Taforalt one, rather than the one yu placed under? BTW this first skull you posted shows strong similarities with 'combe-capelle' one.

 

[mount123]

Avars proper had little to no Slavic admixture. And Avars had 0 I2a Din. 0. few Slavic R1a's too. That some V13 could have arrived with the Avars is definitely an option. But definitely not Slavs. Especially considering high diversity and presence in the area of Komani-Kruja culture which had also Avar admixture.

Ofc that great part of those Avar V13's seem Byzantine is another matter..

But clearly Avars did not mix with the Slavs at all. They mixed with the local Gepids, other remnants and ofc these Romanoi that came there either forcefully (I guess more likely) or willingly (opportunists).

*I2a Slav nothing "Dinaric" about it, it is not native to the area so that's an obsolete term.

 

[Hawk]

Is not the above skull the Taforalt one, rather than the one yu placed under? BTW this first skull you posted shows strong similarities with 'combe-capelle' one.

No, he is from Paleolithic Egypt, i forgot the site name. I think he is dated archeologically 22k-20k B.C. Similarities with European Paleolithic is probably due to convergent evolution. I guess they were quite different.

 

[kingjohn]

Yes basically a branch of e-z830 entered the levant
In mesolithic ( probably also e-m78 joined him)
Than in late neolithic -chl
j haplogroup came from the north and began
To reduce our numbers

 

[Hawk]

Yes basically a branch of e-z830 entered the levant
In mesolithic ( probably also e-m78 joined him)
Than in late neolithic -chl
j haplogroup came from the north and began
To reduce our numbers

The rise in number of Y-DNA J1 likely post-date their initial arrival, because they speak Semitic language a spinoff of Afro-Asiatic languages clearly linked with E-M35 lineage. Otherwise Middle East would have spoken a different language family today.

 

[kingjohn]

The rise in number of Y-DNA J1 likely post-date their initial arrival, because they speak Semitic language a spinoff of Afro-Asiatic languages clearly linked with E-M35 lineage. Otherwise Middle East would have spoken a different language family today.

they might have adopted the language from the E
but unfortuntley later there was some selection against E
because our number been reduced ....
we see it also in chl peki'in cave ( huge % of T in that case and only 1 E)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peki'in


p.s
at least E (in the form of e-v13) was a big hit in the balkan

 

[Hawk]

they might have adopted the language from the E
but unfortuntley later there was some selection against E
because our number been reduced ....
we see it also in chl peki'in cave ( huge % of T in that case and only 1 E)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peki'in


p.s
at least E (in the form of e-v13) was a big hit in the balkan

Yeah, that looks like it. Maybe some climate even initially? Because some of them also back-migrated into North/East Africa as well.

 

[Angela]

Yes basically a branch of e-z830 entered the levant
In mesolithic ( probably also e-m78 joined him)
Than in late neolithic -chl
j haplogroup came from the north and began
To reduce our numbers

Well, according to the recent Reich Lab paper (Patterson) for which I just started a thread, Iran Neo arrived in Anatolia pre-agriculture. That's not to say more didn't come with time, of course.

 

[MOESAN]

No, he is from Paleolithic Egypt, i forgot the site name. I think he is dated archeologically 22k-20k B.C. Similarities with European Paleolithic is probably due to convergent evolution. I guess they were quite different.

I asked because I saw more than a time a skull pic posted with a false identification.
Combe-capelle and your Egyptians have more chances to share ancient links than convergent evolution, IMO. But yes it's uneasy to prove...
The skull you posted under the name of 'taforalt' surprised me, based upon what I read about Taforalt proportions. But it's true I never saw its skull. What I had read evocated a high long face, not this one, so...
ATW if you have other old well identified skulls like those to share, don't fear doing it, perhaps in the "collection ofskulls" thread, if you don"t mind. Thanks beforehand.

 

[Hawk]

I asked because I saw more than a time a skull pic posted with a false identification.
Combe-capelle and your Egyptians have more chances to share ancient links than convergent evolution, IMO. But yes it's uneasy to prove...
The skull you posted under the name of 'taforalt' surprised me, based upon what I read about Taforalt proportions. But it's true I never saw its skull. What I had read evocated a high long face, not this one, so...
ATW if you have other old well identified skulls like those to share, don't fear doing it, perhaps in the "collection ofskulls" thread, if you don"t mind. Thanks beforehand.

Hmm, in all sources i have read a parallel is thrown between Taforalt/Iberomaurusian and European Paleolithic/Mesolithic but they always indicate that Taforalt/Iberomaurusian has more robusticity than their European contemporary.

But, yes, i am sure those two skulls under Taforalt/Iberomaurusian are skulls from those. And the first skull Paleolithic Egyptian hunter gatherer resides actually in one of the Cairo museums as i have been told.

 

[Riverman]

I was reading in this book: Perspectives on Balkan Archaeology 1, Spheres of Interaction, 2020.
https://www.oeaw.ac.at/oeai/publikationen/reihen/perspectives-on-balkan-archaeology

From the chapter: Similarities and Differences between Material Culture of the Belegis-Gava Group from the Southern Pannonian Plain and the Morava River Basin, Aleksandar Kapuran, Aleksandar Bulatovic (p. 37 ff)

It confirms, just like the Albanian papers on the issue, two things:
First, Belegis II-G?va has some characteristics of its own, which point to influences in Southern Pannonian-Banat areas changing it from classical G?va. I think this is merely a substrate and branching effect, but this is debatable.
Secondly, it also proves that even core elements and groups of Belegis II-G?va penetrated much deeper into the South than some authors and comments seem to have suggested before.

Especially the Pre?evo valley which connects Southern Serbia and the Kosovo was a stronghold of Channelled Ware people (p. 43):

Recent research conducted by M. Stojic and A. Bulatovic in the basins of Leskovac, Vranje-Bujanovac and Presevo led to discoveries of new sites with Belegis II-Gava cultural characteristics. Excavations of the largest extent were conducted at the hillfort site of Hisar in Leskovac. The site was divided in two sectors: the upper plateau with dwelling structures of a dugaout type, which mostly belonged to Brnjica I horizon (Sector II), and a sector comprising the plateau and the southeastern slope of the hill with dwelling structures, which contained channelled pottery decorated in the Gava manner (Sector I).

[...]

A. Bulatovic has suggested that the channelled vessel belongs to the period between the 11th and the 10th cenutry BCE, which would represent a terminus ante quem for the emergence of the settlement in this sector. Numerous finds of channelled pottery here also confirm their prominence over the earlier Brnjica pottery culture, which clearly was in an intrusive deposit because of the erosion from the upper plateau. Comparable rectangular houses are rare during the Belegis II-Gava period both in the Pannonian-Danubian region and in the central Balkans. The surveys and test excavations in the surroundings of Hisar brought to light one lowland settlement at the site of Sastanci in the village Bobiste near Leskovac and hillfort Kale in Grdelica at the very entrance to the Gredelica Gorge. The pottery found in both sites corresponds to the Belegis II-Gava cultural complex.

On the local pre-Channelled Ware (pre-G?va/Belegis II/Mediana II) population (p. 44):

...although certain Brnjica-like forms have been noticed, thus indicating that indigenous populations were still present, though not as an own ethno-cultural group but rather as an assimilated minority.

The spread happened in some areas with a destruction horizon:

The most important results have been achieved at the hillfort of Gradiste in Konculj, positioned at strategically important place at the entrance to the Konculj gorge. the hillfort is enclosed by a rampart. In the layer above the destroyed and burnt Brnjica-period settlement, pottery of poorer quality appears together with channelled ware that can be attributed to Ha A1 to Ha A2 or to time of 12th and 11th century BCE.

Illustration for the expansion of Belegis II-G?va:

Figure 2, page 40.

https://ibb.co/VgZn5cZ

The earlier population survived in isolated areas if not being subjugated, or they turned South:

In short, we can assume that Brnjica societies were pushed from north into regions to the southeast of the Juzna Morava, into the Bujanovacko-Presevski Basin, due to the invasion of populations that used channelled pottery. The large number of settlements on the riverbanks of the Juzna Morava with finds of the Belegis II-Gava culture predominating indicates assimilation of earlier population, in contrast to the situation in settlements in mountainous areas an perimeters of these basins.

The situation was therefore very, very similar to later Germanic and especially Slavic tribal migrations into the area: The river basins and lowlands were under full control of Channelled Ware, whereas in the mountainous areas and highlands some local populations survived and kept their independence in part.

Cenotaphs and ritual pits were also found in the Belegis II-Gava context, reaching both Southern Serbia and Western Bulgaria.

in the conclusions (p. 49):

This insufficiently documented and most probably turbulent period seems, according to settlement stratigraphy, to have been characterised by activities of people who used channelled pottery, which, after a longer period of existence in southern Pannonia, started to move into the southern Balkans. The influence of the channelled pottery had started to spread along the Velika Morava River and into the hinterland of the Iron Gates even before this presupposed movement. The lack of cemeteries of the Belegis II-Gava group in the Juzna Morava and the Nisana River basins points to the swift advancement of population groups. Unstratified chance finds of symbolic nature, namely burials with cenotaphs, might support this assumption. There also seems to be an urgent need for weaponry during these aggressive migraitons towards the south, perhaps related to the absence of bronze hoards with deposited metal objects. The advancement from the north into the territory of the Brnjica culture in the Juzna Morava Basin is evidenced by a sudden cessation of habitation at the settlements of Konculj and Vranjski Priboj. These developments and the evidence from the recently excavated cemetery near Mali Dol-Negotino, as well as other burial sites mentioned here, in addition to the settlements in the Vardar River basin, point to certain contacts or movements between the central Balkans and the Vardar River basin. In a certain way, what has been described as the Aegean migration should not be completely ruled out, but which certainly shold not be exclusively linked to the "Sea peoples" thesis.

 

[Johane Derite]

I was reading in this book: Perspectives on Balkan Archaeology 1, Spheres of Interaction, 2020.
https://www.oeaw.ac.at/oeai/publikationen/reihen/perspectives-on-balkan-archaeology

From the chapter: Similarities and Differences between Material Culture of the Belegis-Gava Group from the Southern Pannonian Plain and the Morava River Basin, Aleksandar Kapuran, Aleksandar Bulatovic (p. 37 ff)

It confirms, just like the Albanian papers on the issue, two things:
First, Belegis II-G�va has some characteristics of its own, which point to influences in Southern Pannonian-Banat areas changing it from classical G�va. I think this is merely a substrate and branching effect, but this is debatable.
Secondly, it also proves that even core elements and groups of Belegis II-G�va penetrated much deeper into the South than some authors and comments seem to have suggested before.

Especially the Pre�evo valley which connects Southern Serbia and the Kosovo was a stronghold of Channelled Ware people (p. 43):



On the local pre-Channelled Ware (pre-G�va/Belegis II/Mediana II) population (p. 44):



The spread happened in some areas with a destruction horizon:


Illustration for the expansion of Belegis II-G�va:

Figure 2, page 40.

https://ibb.co/VgZn5cZ

The earlier population survived in isolated areas if not being subjugated, or they turned South:


The situation was therefore very, very similar to later Germanic and especially Slavic tribal migrations into the area: The river basins and lowlands were under full control of Channelled Ware, whereas in the mountainous areas and highlands some local populations survived and kept their independence in part.

Cenotaphs and ritual pits were also found in the Belegis II-Gava context, reaching both Southern Serbia and Western Bulgaria.

in the conclusions (p. 49):

Really interesting post. Especially about some Brnjica populations surviving in the mountainous regions.