2) R1b people originated in the Near East and could have picked up maternal K lineages in Anatolia and the Caucasus (Georgia has the highest frequency of any country), then again in Southeast Europe before migrating to Western Europe.
K lineages that were already assimilated by R1b tribes before the Bronze Age expansion from the Pontic Steppe would have ended up all over Europe, but also in the Volga-Ural region, the Altai, Mongolia, Xinjiang, and most of Central Asia. Potential candidates for a Proto-Indo-European dispersal include K1a1a, K1a3 and K2a6. Other K subclades, such as K1c1, K1c2 and K2b are better associated with the spread of R1a Indo-Europeans. K1c2 and K2b1 are particularly common in Germanic countries and could be linked to the Germanic branch of R1a or to the Corded Ware culture.