How could ANFs (G2a) be close to Natufians (E)? It is generally understood that the ANFs emerged from the AHGs whose point of origin must have been in East Anatolia or the Caucasus, far away from where you'd expect the Natufians or their predecessors. It is where AHGs split from the ancestors of WHGs and CHGs at various points in time. In fact, the AHGs are believed to be the earliest split from a core West Eurasian population and are even equated with Dzudzuana. The Natufians have Dzudzuana, too, so that's the only connection. Now fast forward to the neolithic, the ANFs are pretty much the AHGs genetically but there was a minor gene flow from the Levant and the Caucasus but it was limited to the border regions. For some reason, and I suspect it's due to a population explosion, the ANFs expanded in all directions, including the Levant. That's why the Natufian-derived Pre-Pottery Neolithic B has a lot of ANF admixture and not the other way round. Whatever shared ancestry there was between the ANFs and Natufians, it was mediated through Dzudzuana, a core West Eurasian component. But it doesn't make any sense to claim that ANFs were closer to Natufians than WHGs or even CHGs, considering the fact that their principal male haplogroup G2a comes from the macro-group GHIJK, whereas the Natufians belonged to E, itself derived from DE with its closest sibling being the East Asian/Eurasian haplogroup D. Bear also in mind that the Old European language spoken by the Basque, the people most closely related to EEFs/ANFs, seems to be a remnant of the latter. The Natufians are thought to be the progenitors of Afro-Asiatic. Where is the relation?
It doesn't matter what I think. Nobody relates the ANFs to Natufians as was once the case. Today everybody recognises that the ANFs are a separate group (although heterogeneous), completely unrelated to the Natufians and Levantines because they were basically farming AHGs who adopted agriculture on their own. They kept expanding throughout the calcolithic and the Bronze Age, of course, which is why Levantines have so much of their ancestry as opposed to the populations of the Arabian peninsula where the Natufian component is the highest.
Here I think you see what you want see.
Let's read again the survey of Lazaridis and Cy about the region since Paleo to Neolithic.
"...
These analyses show that ESHG share more alleles with Dzudzuana than with PGNE populations,
except Neolithic Anatolians who form a clade with Dzudzuana to the exclusion of ESHG
(Extended Data Fig. 5a)."...
It says: on the gradian between European Siberian HG's and NAF Near Eastern pop's, stay Dzudzuana and Anat-Neol- pop's, both of this last ones very closer
one to another than
to the two extreme pop's. Like that it says nothing about relative proximity of Dzu & NE with one of these extremes.
...
Furthermore, Dzudzuana shares more alleles with Villabruna-cluster groups than with other
ESHG (Extended Data Fig. 5b), suggesting that this European affinity was specifically
related to the Villabruna cluster, and indicating that the Villabruna affinity of PGNE
populations from Anatolia and the Levant is not the result of a migration into the Near East
from Europe. ...
It says that among HG ancestor of Europe it's the Villabruna cluster which is close to Dzudzuana and also that Villabruna had
some ties with the Levant (via Dzu-) and that these ties are not the result of newcomers from Western Europe, and I conclude that it's could be ancient enough.
...
Neolithic Anatolians, while forming a clade with Dzudzuana with respect to ESHG (Extended Data Fig. 5a), share more alleles with all other PGNE (Extended Data Fig. 5d), suggesting that PGNE share at least partially common descent to the exclusion of the much older samples from Dzudzuana. ...
How could ANFs (G2a) be close to Natufians (E)? It is generally understood that the ANFs emerged from the AHGs whose point of origin must have been in East Anatolia or the Caucasus, far away from where you'd expect the Natufians or their predecessors. It is where AHGs split from the ancestors of WHGs and CHGs at various points in time. In fact, the AHGs are believed to be the earliest split from a core West Eurasian population and are even equated with Dzudzuana. The Natufians have Dzudzuana, too, so that's the only connection. Now fast forward to the neolithic, the ANFs are pretty much the AHGs genetically but there was a minor gene flow from the Levant and the Caucasus but it was limited to the border regions. For some reason, and I suspect it's due to a population explosion, the ANFs expanded in all directions, including the Levant. That's why the Natufian-derived Pre-Pottery Neolithic B has a lot of ANF admixture and not the other way round. Whatever shared ancestry there was between the ANFs and Natufians, it was mediated through Dzudzuana, a core West Eurasian component. But it doesn't make any sense to claim that ANFs were closer to Natufians than WHGs or even CHGs, considering the fact that their principal male haplogroup G2a comes from the macro-group GHIJK, whereas the Natufians belonged to E, itself derived from DE with its closest sibling being the East Asian/Eurasian haplogroup D. Bear also in mind that the Old European language spoken by the Basque, the people most closely related to EEFs/ANFs, seems to be a remnant of the latter. The Natufians are thought to be the progenitors of Afro-Asiatic. Where is the relation?
It doesn't matter what I think. Nobody relates the ANFs to Natufians as was once the case. Today everybody recognises that the ANFs are a separate group (although heterogeneous), completely unrelated to the Natufians and Levantines because they were basically farming AHGs who adopted agriculture on their own. They kept expanding throughout the calcolithic and the Bronze Age, of course, which is why Levantines have so much of their ancestry as opposed to the populations of the Arabian peninsula where the Natufian component is the highest.
have another reading!
« … analyses show that ESHG share more alleles with Dzudzuana than with PGNE populations,
except Neolithic Anatolians who form a clade with Dzudzuana to the exclusion of ESHG
(Extended Data Fig. 5a). Thus, our results prove that the European affinity of Neolithic
Anatolians does not necessarily reflect any admixture into the Near East from Europe, as an
Anatolian Neolithic-like population already existed in parts of the Near East by ~26kya. »/…
IT’s says : on the cline between Europe-Siberia HG’s and NAFr-Near-East extremes of the cline we found Dzu- and Anat-Neol-, both closer to one another than to the extremes – and that Near-East had Dzu-
Not come by force from Western Europe but here since possibly a long enough time./ …
« Furthermore, Dzudzuana shares more alleles with Villabruna-cluster groups than with other
ESHG (Extended Data Fig. 5b), suggesting that this European affinity was specifically
related to the Villabruna cluster, and indicating that the Villabruna affinity of PGNE
populations from Anatolia and the Levant is not the result of a migration into the Near East
from Europe. »/ …
It says : In the Europelike ancestry of Dzudzuana, it’s Villabruna the principal donor and the affinities between Villabruna and Near East is not due to an immigration from Europe. It doesn’t precise the supposed time of Villabruna introgression in Near-East
if even introgression. / ...
…
« Neolithic Anatolians, while forming a clade with Dzudzuana with respect to ESHG
, share more alleles with all other PGNE , suggesting that PGNE share at least partially common descent to the exclusion of the much older samples from Dzudzuana. »/ … / « The Dzudzuana population was not identical to the WHG, as it shared fewer alleles with both an early Upper Paleolithic Siberian (Ust’Ishim) and an early Upper Paleolithic East Asian (Tianyuan), thus, it too—like the PGNE populations—had Basal Eurasian ancestry. The detection
of this type of ancestry, twice as early as previously documented and at the northern edge
of the Near East, lends weight to the hypothesis that it represents a deep Near Eastern lineage
rather than a recent arrival from Africa.
It says : Dzudzuana (Caucasus) had ‘Basal Eurasion (whatever the definition)
as the pop’s of Near-East and even NAF and
it’s ancient enough ,
when for Euro-Siber-HG’s had not this BE ; BE among these southern pop’s is not a recent event. And also that on the above mentioned cline, ANAnat- were already closer to the more southern pop’s (Levant/NAF) than to Euro-Siber-HG when original Dzu- stayed a bit closer to Euro-Siber-HG.
…
We used qpGraph to build an admixture graph model of the relationship between ESHG
and Dzudzuana, also including the earliest PGNE populations from North Africa (Taforalt)
and the Epipaleolithic Levant (Natufians)... According to this model, a common population contributed ancestry to Gravettians (represented by Vestonice16) and to a “Common West Eurasian” population that contributed all the ancestry of Villabruna and most of the ancestry of Dzudzuana which also had 28.4±4.2% Basal Eurasian ancestry. Our co-modeling of Epipaleolithic Natufians and Ibero-Maurusians from Taforalt confirms that the Taforalt population was mixed, but instead of specifying gene flow from the ancestors of Natufians into the ancestors of Taforalt as originally reported, we infer gene flow in the reverse direction (into Natufians). The Neolithic population from Morocco, closely related to Taforalt is also consistent with being descended from the source of this gene flow, and appears to have no admixture from the Levantine Neolithic. If our model is correct, Epipaleolithic Natufians trace part of their ancestry to North Africa, consistent with morphological and archaeological studies that indicate a spread of morphological features and artifacts from North Africa into the Near East.
…
In the Near East, the Dzudzuana-related population admixed with North African-related ancestry in the Levant and with Siberian hunter-gatherer and eastern non-African-related ancestry in Iran and the Caucasus. Thus, the highly differentiated populations at the dawn of the Neolithic were primarily descended from Villabruna Cluster and Dzudzuana-related ancestors, with varying degrees of additional input related to both North Africa and Ancient North/East Eurasia whose proximate sources may be clarified by future sampling of geographically and temporally inter-mediate populations./ …
…
Both Europeans and Near Easterners also share in AG3-related ancestry of up to ~30% in eastern
Europe down to ~0% in parts of North Africa. Europeans are differentiated by an excess of
up to ~20% Villabruna-related ancestry relative to non-European populations and also by a
relative lack of extra ‘Deep’ ancestry compared to the Near East and North Africa, a type of
ancestry that may only partially be explained by the Basal Eurasian ancestry of ancient West
Eurasian populations and must also trace to Africa. ‘Deep’ ancestry,
including Basal Eurasian ancestry, is associated with reduced Neandertal ancestry, confirming that Neandertal ancestry in West Eurasia has been diluted by admixture./ …
It says : Iran/CHG and Near-East/NAF had different respective complementary admixture, what doesn’t exclude the common Dzudzuana,
which contained BE, and had another deep ancestry,
these last ones almost absent in old Europeans.
In a few words : we all share a common basis with some drift and received diverse adstrata themselves results of ancient drifts. To be precise, these groupings of ESHG and PGNE aren’t homogenous, they help to give us a rough sketche.
In another survey they said (same squad ?) Dzudzuana was roughly half way between ESHG and PGNE (NANE),
so ANA (Anat Neol) were a bit closer to PGNE than to ESHG. Plus on every PCA I saw (I know PCA’s are not God’s word)
Anatolian Farmers and close pop’s were close to the middle on the clines between today Europeans and Near-East, but a bit closer to modern Near-East and North Arabs people as a whole, if we leave ancient pre-Neolithic Natufians and current Southern Arabs besides .
When compared to ancient Euro HG’s they were even farther than to modern Euro. History passed there, with in Euope a bit more EHG, and CHG/Iran at diverse proportions, this last component passed through more than a way and decreasing the distances between all. Today South- and South-eastern Europeans are no more the first EEF farmers, - these last ones already a bit drifted from first Anatolian Farmers. So the position of these ancient farmers doesn’t predict the today position of our southerners.
pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov