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Human mobility at Tell Atchana (Alalakh), Hatay, Turkey during the 2nd millennium BC: Integration of isotopic and genomic evidence
Tara Ingman ,
Stefanie Eisenmann , Eirini Skourtanioti, Murat Akar, Jana Ilgner, Guido Alberto Gnecchi Ruscone, Petrus le Roux, Rula Shafiq, Gunnar U. Neumann, Marcel Keller, Cäcilia Freund, Sara Marzo, Mary Lucas, Johannes Krause, Patrick Roberts, K. Aslıhan Yener , Philipp W. Stockhammer
PLOS
Published: June 30, 2021
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0241883
Abstract
The Middle and Late Bronze Age, a period roughly spanning the 2nd millennium BC (ca. 2000–1200 BC) in the Near East, is frequently referred to as the first ‘international age’, characterized by intense and far-reaching contacts between different entities from the eastern Mediterranean to the Near East and beyond. In a large-scale tandem study of stable isotopes and ancient DNA of individuals excavated at Tell Atchana (Alalakh, located in Hatay, Turkey), we explored the role of mobility at the capital of a regional kingdom, named Mukish during the Late Bronze Age, which spanned the Amuq Valley and some areas beyond. We generated strontium and oxygen isotope data from dental enamel for 53 individuals and 77 individuals, respectively, and added ancient DNA data of 10 newly sequenced individuals to a dataset of 27 individuals published in 2020. Additionally, we improved the DNA coverage of one individual from this 2020 dataset. The DNA data revealed a very homogeneous gene pool. This picture of an overwhelmingly local ancestry was consistent with the evidence of local upbringing in most of the individuals indicated by the isotopic data, where only five were found to be non-local. High levels of contact, trade, and exchange of ideas and goods in the Middle and Late Bronze Ages, therefore, seem not to have translated into high levels of individual mobility detectable at Tell Atchana.
Human mobility at Tell Atchana (Alalakh), Hatay, Turkey during the 2nd millennium BC: Integration of isotopic and genomic evidence (plos.org)
Tara Ingman ,
Stefanie Eisenmann , Eirini Skourtanioti, Murat Akar, Jana Ilgner, Guido Alberto Gnecchi Ruscone, Petrus le Roux, Rula Shafiq, Gunnar U. Neumann, Marcel Keller, Cäcilia Freund, Sara Marzo, Mary Lucas, Johannes Krause, Patrick Roberts, K. Aslıhan Yener , Philipp W. Stockhammer
PLOS
Published: June 30, 2021
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0241883
Abstract
The Middle and Late Bronze Age, a period roughly spanning the 2nd millennium BC (ca. 2000–1200 BC) in the Near East, is frequently referred to as the first ‘international age’, characterized by intense and far-reaching contacts between different entities from the eastern Mediterranean to the Near East and beyond. In a large-scale tandem study of stable isotopes and ancient DNA of individuals excavated at Tell Atchana (Alalakh, located in Hatay, Turkey), we explored the role of mobility at the capital of a regional kingdom, named Mukish during the Late Bronze Age, which spanned the Amuq Valley and some areas beyond. We generated strontium and oxygen isotope data from dental enamel for 53 individuals and 77 individuals, respectively, and added ancient DNA data of 10 newly sequenced individuals to a dataset of 27 individuals published in 2020. Additionally, we improved the DNA coverage of one individual from this 2020 dataset. The DNA data revealed a very homogeneous gene pool. This picture of an overwhelmingly local ancestry was consistent with the evidence of local upbringing in most of the individuals indicated by the isotopic data, where only five were found to be non-local. High levels of contact, trade, and exchange of ideas and goods in the Middle and Late Bronze Ages, therefore, seem not to have translated into high levels of individual mobility detectable at Tell Atchana.
In addition to the analysis of genetic ancestry between individuals within one site and between populations, aDNA analysis allows the detection of biological relationships amongst individuals. In some cases, pedigrees can be reconstructed from these [70, 157], which, from an archaeological point of view, can shed light on particular pedigree-related dynamics and practices at a site.
The earliest, and to date only, glimpse into the genetic makeup of the inhabitants of the Amuq Valley prior to Alalakh comes from six samples from Tell Kurdu, five of which date to the Early Chalcolithic between 5750–5600 BC and one of which is dated to the Middle Chalcolithic, 5005–4849 cal BC (2σ) [49]. Skourtanioti et al. [49] showed, with three different analyses (PCA, f4-statistics, and qpAdm), that the Chalcolithic samples from Tell Kurdu harbor ancestries related primarily to western Anatolia and secondarily to the Caucasus/Iran and the Southern Levant, suggesting a gradient of ancestries with geographical characteristics already in place during that time in the Amuq Valley [49]. However, the samples from the MBA and LBA from Alalakh draw a genetic picture of the Amuq that is considerably changed: roughly 3000 years after the last individual from Tell Kurdu, the individuals from Alalakh, along with individuals from EBA and MBA Ebla in northwestern Syria, are part of the same PC1-PC2 space with Late Chalcolithic-Bronze Age Anatolians. They are, compared to samples from Barcın in western Anatolia and Tell Kurdu, all shifted upwards on the PC2 towards samples of Caucasus and Zagros/Iranian origin [49]. This shift in ancestry was formally tested with f4-statistics of the format f4(Mbuti, test; Barcın_N/TellKurdu_EC, X), which revealed that all the Late Chalcolithic-LBA populations from Anatolia and the northern Levant (X, i.e. Ebla and Alalakh) are more closely related to Iranian Neolithic individuals and/or Caucasus Hunter Gatherer individuals (test) than are the earlier Tell Kurdu and Barcın individuals [49]. A similar genetic shift towards Iranian/Caucasus-related populations was detected for the contemporary Southern Levant [37–39]. This means that in the period between 5000–2000 BC, gene flow from populations harboring Iranian/Caucasus-like ancestries, which also includes populations that are genetically similar to these but have not yet been sampled, and are thus unknown, affected southern Anatolia and the entire Levant, including the Amuq Valley. It is currently neither possible to pinpoint the exact source population(s) that brought about these changes in the local gene pool nor to propose specific migration events.
Four genetic outlier individuals from Bronze Age Levantine contexts, one of them the so-called Well Lady from Alalakh (ALA019) and three from Megiddo (two of which are siblings), are shifted upwards on the PCA, the former towards individuals from Chalcolithic/Bronze Age Iran and Central Asia [49] and the latter towards the Chalcolithic/Bronze Age Caucasus. Strontium isotope analysis of the two siblings from Megiddo suggests that both grew up locally [37]. These outlier individuals from Megiddo and Alalakh attest that gene flow from the Caucasus/Iran (or genetically similar groups) into the Levant continued throughout the 2nd millennium BC.
Human mobility at Tell Atchana (Alalakh), Hatay, Turkey during the 2nd millennium BC: Integration of isotopic and genomic evidence (plos.org)