I wonder wether there realy was a population replacement or a large invoasion for that matter.
It was a very turbulent period with lots of destruction, but few cities were actually abondonned.
Some scholars say it was just a replacement of the power structures.
In Greece the palaces of the people in power were destroyed, but not the cities.
There was no language shift, the classic Greeks basically spoke still the same language as the Mycaeneans, even though the Dorians, Ionians and Aeolians from the Balkans had joined them.
That's indeed what the modern scholarship seems to show. There doesn't seem to be any indication in the archaeology of major population movements in that area with the end of the Bronze Age. Even in terms of language there wasn't an overall shift, and the languages are all Greek. People forget that Doric wasn't spoken all over Greece, and even in areas where there was a transition, the scholarship seems to indicate not even a "replacement" of the elites, but a "blending" of the elites.
There's also numerous books on the subject. However, who knows what the dna will actually show.
I thought I'd mention that there's the recent genetics work from, I think, the Bean Project, the same group that revealed that the mtDna of Greek Mesolithic hunter-gatherers had no mtDna "U". Unfortunately the abstract itself isn't very informative.
"
The origin of the Aegean palatial civilizations from a population genetic perspective
Unterlander etal
Focusing on the Neolithic 6600-3200BCE and the Bronze Age, after 3200BCE
A place of early urbanization, palaces, coastal settlements, an exchange networks. "
"http://meeting.physanth.org/program/2015/session18/papageorgopoulou-2015-the-origins-of-the-aegean-palatial-civilizations-from-a-population-genetic-perspective.html
"The present paper investigates the origins of the Aegean pre-palatial civilizations (5th-3rd millennium BC) by applying cutting-edge methods of molecular biology and population genetics. The term Aegean Civilizations refers to the novel human lifeway (agriculture and craft specialization, redistribution systems, intensive trade) that appeared during the end of the Neolithic and the beginning of the Bronze Age in the Aegean. Although many studies exist on archaeological constructions of ethnic and cultural identity on mainland Greece, the Cyclades and Crete, not enough efforts have been made to explore this direction on a population history basis. We have investigated Late, Final Neolithic and Early Bronze Age human skeletons (n=127) from the Aegean using ancient DNA methods, next generation sequencing (NGS) technology and statistical population genetic inferences to i) gather information on diversity, population size, and origin of the pre-palatial Aegean Cultures, ii) to compare them on a genetic basis, in terms of their cultural division (Helladic, Cycladic, Minoan) and iii) to investigate their ancestral/non-ancestral status to the Early and Middle Neolithic farmers from Greece. In addition to mitochondrial DNA genomes, by applying a capture-NGS approach we collected information on functional traits of the early Aegean communities in southeastern Europe. Considering the International Spirit that overwhelms the Aegean during the 3rdmillennium BC, seen by the wide distribution of artifacts, this palaeogenetic approach provides valuable new insights on population structure of the groups involved in the Neolithic-Bronze Age transition and the spread of specific alleles in this part of Europe."
From articles in the news about the paper that was presented: "
The village residents of the Bronze Age (2500 BC-1850 BC) Xeropigado Valley Kozani were lactose intolerant and therefore could not digest milk. Moreover they had brown eyes and dark skin. The new data is revealed by DNA analysis of skeletal remains found in the Bronze Age cemetery, one of the few of this period investigated systematically in the Macedonian region."
"
An equally important finding for Greece is the recovery of entire genomes of three prehistoric farmers who lived in northern Greece 7500-5500 thousand years ago. These farmers were from Neolithic settlements in Paliampela Kolindrou and Revenia Korinou Pieria and the Kleitos Kozanis."
To my knowledge they've never published any details.
However, didn't one of the guys who posts at Eurogenes contact her, and didn't she say that the biggest change in the genetics was from the early to the mid-late Neolithic? Of course, since this conclusion is apparently only based on mtDna sequences, it's hardly "conclusive" .
Still, in central Europe it was a folk movement of both men and women so I don't know why it would have been different here. Since mid-late Neolithic is when we find E-V13 and J2 showing up in Europe, perhaps it's the same movement. Then, apparently there was some change from late Neolithic to Bronze Age, but still with low FST between them. (I think she dated Bronze Age to 3200 BCE) So, was Drews right all along and the "Indo-European Greeks" entered Greece from the east instead of the north-east from the steppe via the Balkans, thereby having passed through northern Anatolia? Or was it a case of the Mycenaeans only being a small group? I don't know. I thought the Bean project would clear all this up, but they're slow as molasses. Maybe it was sort of like Remedello and the culture changed before any major genetic change.
There's just no way of knowing until we get the ancient dna.
I know that's a little off topic as it doesn't directly relate to the Iron Age transition, but I think it shows that it may be wrong to try to transpose what happened in central and northern Europe to southern Europe. The "Indo-Europeanization process may have been different in the two areas, so you may be looking at slightly different base line "Bronze Age" genetics in the two areas.
