Ancient DNA and deep population structure in sub-Saharan African foragers

[Palermo Trapani]

I know, but they are anatomically not closer to later IBM than let's say Paleolithic Europeans, not at all.

And we know from genetics that the IBM were much closer to West Eurasians and had significant West Eurasian direct ancestry.

Yes, I don't dispute the Ibermarusians were genetically close to West Eurasians. I cited 2 papers that clearly documented that fact and I am not disputing that fact.

And yes, you are correct, the Aterians are intermediate between Jebel Irhoud an, Iberomaurusians and Upper Paleolithic Europeans (latter 2 cluster together Morphologically) From the paper " Aterian remains have been described as less archaic than the earliest currently known H. sapiens from Jebel Irhoud, but not as modern as Iberomaurusian or European Upper Paleolithic groups." Although they do resemble them as the authors put it and are in terms of morphology, part of the link from Jebel Irhoud to Natufians, Iberomarusians, Upper Paleolithic Europeans, etc.

 

[Riverman]

Yes, I don't dispute the Ibermarusians were genetically close to West Eurasians. I cited 2 papers that clearly documented that fact and I am not disputing that fact.

And yes, you are correct, the Aterians are intermediate between Jebel Irhoud an, Iberomaurusians and Upper Paleolithic Europeans (latter 2 cluster together Morphologically) From the paper " Aterian remains have been described as less archaic than the earliest currently known H. sapiens from Jebel Irhoud, but not as modern as Iberomaurusian or European Upper Paleolithic groups." Although they do resemble them as the authors put it and are in terms of morphology, part of the link from Jebel Irhoud to Natufians, Iberomarusians, Upper Paleolithic Europeans, etc.

They have no intermediate position, but are just somewhat closer to Paleolithic Europeans. However, that doesn't mean they were the link, or there were no more modern, closer to UP Europeans and IBM, human beings around at the time of the Ateriens. Rather it just means they are somewhere close to some sort of transitional group which existed at some point in time. It doesn't prove they are the actual link. To prove that, there would be no other options - but there are, from the Near East for example, and we would need genetic evidence of some sort - even if its just a general ancient protein similarity.

 

[Palermo Trapani]

They have no intermediate position, but are just somewhat closer to Paleolithic Europeans. However, that doesn't mean they were the link, or there were no more modern, closer to UP Europeans and IBM, human beings around at the time of the Ateriens. Rather it just means they are somewhere close to some sort of transitional group which existed at some point in time. It doesn't prove they are the actual link. To prove that, there would be no other options - but there are, from the Near East for example, and we would need genetic evidence of some sort - even if its just a general ancient protein similarity.

Riverman: Maybe I am not being clear, the link being talked about in the paper is a morphological link. That is the one the authors are stating based on their analysis of the fossils. I agree, to establish a clear genetic link, there would have to be DNA from Jebel Irhoud to the Aterian fossils (Early to late ones), along with the Levant early Homo Sapiens (i.e. Qafzeh from 100K years ago) and then compare them to the Iberomarusians and Natufians.

Still I think the paper is making some interesting conclusions and again, I am going by what the authors are stating.

"Even though we have no proof of an in-situ population succession, Aterian morphology fts the human fossil gap between Jebel Figure 7. Superimpositions in Procrustes space of the original Irhoud 11 (pink), Tomas I Gh10717 (white), Dar-es-Soltane II 5 (green), El Harhoura (violet), Taforalt XVIII (turquoise), and a reconstructed version of Irhoud 11 (pink transparent). Irhoud 11 and Iberomaurusians, suggesting a greater time depth for regional continuity in Northern Africa than previously established"

 

[LIONFARM]

I sent a message to a geneticist about if E1B1* MOTA was actually NOT African BUT LEVANTINE !

This is his response highlight as follows...
2:33:00 (we spoke directly to him)
On Sun, May 22, 2022, 11:21 PM Peter Revesz wrote:
Hello Lion,

"You're RIGHT that it is NOT TRULY AFRICAN. However, not including it would have looked like we deliberately try to avoid any link with Africa. Therefore, our approach was to include as many samples as possible from all Old World cultures and worry about them more only if necessary, that is, they show a significant connection to the Minoans. If they do not, then nothing more needs to be said about them."

Best,
Peter Revesz