# Population Genetics > Autosomal Genetics >  Genetic borders in Europe

## Tomenable

Here is my PCA with regional averages, probably the biggest genetic border that showed up, is this between Slovenia and North-Eastern Italy. Any ideas why, how and when did this genetic border emerge? Geographically, Veneto-Friuli and Slovenia are neighbours, but in terms of DNA there is a big distance between them:

https://i.imgur.com/Z3NrUkn.png

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## Angela

^^The migration history is totally different. Slovenia was heavily impacted by the invasions of the early Medieval period; Italy not so much. 

They also have a totally different political history. Slovenia part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Venice maintained it's sovereignty until unification. Political borders acted as barriers to genetic flow to some degree. That's part of the reason for the differentiation between northern and southern Italy.

Some of the placement of the Italian regions seems "off" to me, but whatever.

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## berun

rainfall. no, it's not a joke. rainfall is decisive in agricultural or pastoralist economies, being so determinant for cultures attached to a given economy or way of life. also demography is affected as cows can't mantain so many herders as wheat can mantain farmers.

per example the expansive Cardial culture with its agricultural techniques anf crops is not sustainable in wet Slovenia.

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## Cato

There is also a big linguistic gap (Slavic VS Romance) ...they are two ethnicities that live side by side since centuries without much interbreeding 

Maybe Illyrians were more similar to ancient Veneti considering the shared Castellieri heritage

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## Angela

> rainfall. no, it's not a joke. rainfall is decisive in agricultural or pastoralist economies, being so determinant for cultures attached to a given economy or way of life. also demography is affected as cows can't mantain so many herders as wheat can mantain farmers.
> per example the expansive Cardial culture with its agricultural techniques anf crops is not sustainable in wet Slovenia.




Neolithic farmers eventually spread over all of Europe, including Slovenia, except for the far northeast. The people who used to live there were different from the people who live there now. The difference is the Early Medieval Era migrations, which did not have the same impact on Italy or Spain as they did in parts of the northern Balkans and Central Europe.

Language and politics were also barriers to gene flow.

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## Pax Augusta

> Any ideas why, how and when did this genetic border emerge?


To begin with Slovenians are 2 milion, 1/30 of the Italians, basically a small Italian region, and Slovenia does show more NE components than other former Jugoslavia regions.

It's obviously due to the early Medieval Slavic migrations to Slovenia. Slavs in the Balkans are a late arrival, while the north-east Italians had already for many centuries their strong Romance and Rhaeto-Romance identities.

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## Wonomyro

The border lands of the Avar Khaganat were empty:




> The Pannonian Basin was the centre of the Avar power-base. *The Avars re-settled captives from the peripheries of their empire to more central regions*.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pannon...ibal_structure

During the Frankish reign these lands were populated by Slavs.

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## berun

@Angela, I'm not denying historical migrations shaping the autosomal profiles, but i remark that ecosystem-economy-demography is the factor providing explanations for known and unknown human settlements. Even in the map attached Slovenia is under white colour. When it was successfully colonized and by who?... ecosystem also would justify the frontier among Veneti and Carnitian Celts, and now among Venetians and Slavs. Friulians have another history.

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## Pax Augusta

> @Angela, I'm not denying historical migrations shaping the autosomal profiles, but i remark that ecosystem-economy-demography is the factor providing explanations for known and unknown human settlements. Even in the map attached Slovenia is under white colour. When it was successfully colonized and by who?... ecosystem also would justify the frontier among Veneti and Carnitian Celts, and now among Venetians and Slavs. Friulians have another history.


Furlans aren't exactly another history and they assimilated the Carni Celts.

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## Angela

> @Angela, I'm not denying historical migrations shaping the autosomal profiles, but i remark that ecosystem-economy-demography is the factor providing explanations for known and unknown human settlements. Even in the map attached Slovenia is under white colour. When it was successfully colonized and by who?... ecosystem also would justify the frontier among Veneti and Carnitian Celts, and now among Venetians and Slavs. Friulians have another history.


That's a map of the Early Neolithic, Berun. People fanned out from there. By the Middle to Late Neolithic the people of Europe, other than those in the most northern reaches of Europe or far to the east were 75% Anatolia Neolithic genetically, even if the men carried I2a of some sort. 

I'm not saying farming didn't get there later than to some other areas, because for a long time the agricultural package wasn't adapted to grasslands, but by the early 3rd millennium BC my recollection is that there were Middle to Late Neolithic people there. Yes, Indo-European speaking people migrated there after that, people perhaps more adapted to grasslands, but they migrated to Italy too. That's why "Italians" of the Classical Era spoke either Ligurian or Italic, or other Indo-European languages. The Celtic migrations certainly affected the people there, but they also affected all of Northern Italy down into Tuscany.

There was Germanic gene flow in both areas too. The Lombards settled the Veneto pretty heavily. I think it's the Italian area that actually has the most "Lombard" ancestry. 

The difference in terms of all these migrations might be because parts of Italy having been colonized so early, it was more heavily populated than areas like Slovenia, and "Indo-European" tribes might have been more adapted to grasslands. 

However, the major migration wave that really impacted the two areas differently was the migration of the Slavic speaking peoples. That doesn't mean that the Slavs came into an empty landscape, no matter what some Croatians, Slovene? would like to think. There was admixture.

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## Angela

> That's a map of the Early Neolithic, Berun. People fanned out from there. By the Middle to Late Neolithic the people of Europe, other than those in the most northern reaches of Europe or far to the east were 75% Anatolia Neolithic genetically, even if the men carried I2a of some sort. 
> 
> I'm not saying farming didn't get there later than to some other areas, because for a long time the agricultural package wasn't adapted to grasslands, but by the early 3rd millennium BC my recollection is that there were Middle to Late Neolithic people there. Yes, Indo-European speaking people migrated there after that, people perhaps more adapted to grasslands, but they migrated to Italy too. That's why "Italians" of the Classical Era spoke either Ligurian or Italic, or other Indo-European languages. The Celtic migrations certainly affected the people there, but they also affected all of Northern Italy down into Tuscany.
> 
> There was Germanic gene flow in both areas too. The Lombards settled the Veneto pretty heavily. I think it's the Italian area that actually has the most "Lombard" ancestry. 
> 
> The difference in terms of all these migrations might be because parts of Italy having been colonized so early, it was more heavily populated than areas like Slovenia, and "Indo-European" tribes might have been more adapted to grasslands. 
> 
> However, the major migration wave that really impacted the two areas differently was the migration of the Slavic speaking peoples. That doesn't mean that the Slavs came into an empty landscape, no matter what some Croatians, Slovene? would like to think. There was admixture.


This is from later in the Neolithic. Slovenia, or at least most of it was part of Cardial Impressa from what I can see.






Late Bronze Age Europe:


Of course, this is all speculation. The only way to know is to look at ancient genomes. Does anyone know if there are any ancient sample from the area around Slovenia?

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## berun

> Furlans aren't exactly another history and they assimilated the Carni Celts.


Friulan is a dialect related to Rumansch (Rome) in Switzerland and Ladin (Latino) in the Dolomites, such patchy extension must mean a migration like that of Germans settling in south Alps: Walderer in Valle d'Aosta or Tyrolean in South Tyrol. Another case of herders traveling to poor productive regions are the Vlach in Greece, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Romanua, Serbia, etc, of course they are not the remnants of the Latin speaking population but migrations from Albania.

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## berun

@Angela, a Paint map is not the best, betterto rely on scientific papers...
https://goo.gl/images/oh3QD4
as can be seen the Alpine ecosystem stopped the Anatolian farming as the Steppe ecosystem (the first by execessive raining, the later by lack of enough raining to sustain crops).

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## Sile

> Furlans aren't exactly another history and they assimilated the Carni Celts.


Strabo and Livy claim the Carni tribe as Illyrian ............that is, always linked with the Illyrians. More recent scholars state this has changed, with a link to the Adriatic Veneti being preferred, similar to the Catali tribe to the east of the Carni. 
Pliny mentions two other towns, Ocra and Segeste, as belonging to the Carni, ......."este" ending towns are 100% Illyrian

Strabo - *From Tergeste, a village of the Carni, there is a pass across and through the Ocra to a marsh called Lugeum. A river, the Corcoras, flows near Nauportus, and conveys the merchandise from that place*

Tergeste = Trieste .......a Illyrian town , another "este " ending name

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## Angela

> @Angela, a Paint map is not the best, betterto rely on scientific papers...
> https://goo.gl/images/oh3QD4
> as can be seen the Alpine ecosystem stopped the Anatolian farming as the Steppe ecosystem (the first by execessive raining, the later by lack of enough raining to sustain crops).


Those maps are based on SETTLEMENTS, you know, like PEOPLE, not on terrain. Slovenia is mostly grassland, by the way, and people would have taken a nice walk up from Istria, which was ALWAYS Cardial/Impressa. Or they would have come up from the Balkans. 

I guess you only like the maps of the Neolithic if they're from the very early periods. The farmers even got up to Gotland for goodness sakes. 

If Otzi, a man genetically almost indistinguishable from the EEF could live and thrive on the top of the Alps, you think people couldn't live in the grasslands of Slovenia? 

Why do you think there is so much Ydna E-V13 in the Austrian Tyrol and in southwestern Germany? 

You know what, never mind. Slovenia was empty. 

This is EARLY Neolithic. You think it stayed like that? It spread all over Spain, for example. Why do you think your EEF levels are sky-high? It got to Gotland, as I said. You think it didn't spread to all of France? Yes, there was a pause before the spread of the Neolithic into Central Europe, because their agricultural package wasn't adapted to it. It lasted almost a thousand years, but they did eventually get there.

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## Pax Augusta

> Friulan is a dialect related to Rumansch (Rome) in Switzerland and Ladin (Latino) in the Dolomites, such patchy extension must mean a migration like that of Germans settling in south Alps: Walderer in Valle d'Aosta or Tyrolean in South Tyrol. .


No, it's the opposite. It does not mean a migration, Rhaeto-Romance languages are the remnants of Romance languages spoken in the Alps in a broader area before the Germanization and Slavicization of the Alps. Vlachs are a complete different case. While Walser are indeed a migration of a Germanic-speaking population into North Italy now mostly assimilated and have nothing to do with Rhaeto-Romance people and Vlachs (and also these two are not related).

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## Tomenable

> The farmers even got up to Gotland for goodness sakes.


Have you seen the new paper about this?:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science...231?via%3Dihub

https://ac.els-cdn.com/S2352409X1730...ffa9091ec34a8c

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## Angela

> Have you seen the new paper about this?:
> 
> http://www.sciencedirect.com/science...231?via%3Dihub
> 
> https://ac.els-cdn.com/S2352409X1730...ffa9091ec34a8c


Yes, I read them. How does this impact the discussion?

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## berun

Angela, you are messing a good chunk, I was pointing out that ecosystem was the main reason for the divide, I'm not deniying the impact of historical migrations but by sure the ecosystem had the last answer as invaders finding more or less peopled areas and/or zones fitting better their way of life can thrive more or less. I was giving as example the lack of Cardial in Slovenia, but you come with a Paint map, Otzi Iceman (Copper Age right?), and promenades by Istrians, but even with no data about Cardial examples in Slovenia. I realy would like to have scientific debate but you are not for it today.

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## berun

@Pax Augusta, one or two Rhaeto-Romance languages are survivals but not all, Ladin and Friulan are south of Alps but Rumansh is in the north, difficult so to imagine an ancient extended unity... broken by Venetian.

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## Angela

> Angela, you are messing a good chunk, I was pointing out that ecosystem was the main reason for the divide, I'm not deniying the impact of historical migrations but by sure the ecosystem had the last answer as invaders finding more or less peopled areas and/or zones fitting better their way of life can thrive more or less. I was giving as example the lack of Cardial in Slovenia, but you come with a Paint map, Otzi Iceman (Copper Age right?), and promenades by Istrians, but even with no data about Cardial examples in Slovenia. I realy would like to have scientific debate but you are not for it today.


You are talking generalities. I am talking about the specifics of the migrations, genetics, and cultures of Europe (except some far northern locations) after the arrival of the farmers from the Near East. I have already said that the early Neolithic farmers at first preferred certain soils, loess, to be precise, and that they were stalled in southern Europe until they adapted their agricultural package. That doesn't mean that the "farmers" in Italy versus the farmers in Slovenia in the Middle Neolithic were substantially different from one another. There is no substantial difference between the Cardial farmers and the Balkan farmers, at least not that any academics have yet found. If you don't have specific data to show otherwise, that's where it stands.

The point I was trying to make with the Otzi reference is that if genetically EEF people could live in the high Alps in Italy, why wouldn't they live in Slovenia.

And there were Neolithic farmers in Slovenia. Did you think it was empty? What evidence do you have that they were any different from the Neolithic farmers in the rest of the Balkans, or in Austria or southern Germany? 

See: The Neolithic of Northeastern Slovenia seems to be an offshoot of Lengyel.
https://www.academia.edu/10013524/Th...stern_Slovenia

Late Neolithic pile dwelling community, similar to the ones in Italy, btw, at the time of Otzi:
https://www.academia.edu/7835239/Pla..._Alpine_Iceman

Again, unless you can provide data showing that Neolithic people in Slovenia were substantially different than Neolithic people in northeastern Italy, I won't be responding. It's all just speculation.

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## berun

https://goo.gl/images/QFnqDT
you may detect some interesting frontier there?
you are who might deliver DNA or archaeological proofs about continuity between the coast + Italy and the core center or between the core and the Pannonian plains, not the contrary, argumenti ad ignorantiam are not accepted.

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## Pax Augusta

> @Pax Augusta, one or two Rhaeto-Romance languages are survivals but not all, Ladin and Friulan are south of Alps but Rumansh is in the north, difficult so to imagine an ancient extended unity... broken by Venetian.


_Rumantsch_ speakers live close to the Italian border, not north of the Alps.

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## alexfritz

judging by the PCA of mathieson et al (balkan_ba) and amorim et al (ema_pannonians) plotting with modern north/central italians i think the slovenians are a signal of an entire new people of that region as the tyroleans seem to intermixed more with the pre-existing people; the neolithic zones of northern italy greatly changed in the 5thmil in VBQ with transalpine-trade (rivoli/isola) and a more hunting red-deer based economy (mezzocorona/molino casarotto) than kilinc et al explaining that ötzi/remedello share more alleles with CHG than other EEFs and derives them from a kumtepe[<tepecik] type 4thmil add wave/migration which also coincides with an emerging copper industry/network in tuscany (to which ötzi/remedello belong) and in sardinia; but i dont think the rift between slovenians and north italians is all neolithic based given the balkan_ba/hungary_ba and ema_pannonian samples;

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## Angela

> judging by the PCA of mathieson et al (balkan_ba) and amorim et al (ema_pannonians) plotting with modern north/central italians i think the slovenians are a signal of an entire new people of that region as the tyroleans seem to intermixed more with the pre-existing people; the neolithic zones of northern italy greatly changed in the 5thmil in VBQ with transalpine-trade (rivoli/isola) and a more hunting red-deer based economy (mezzocorona/molino casarotto) than kilinc et al explaining that ötzi/remedello share more alleles with CHG than other EEFs and derives them from a kumtepe[<tepecik] type 4thmil add wave/migration which also coincides with an emerging copper industry/network in tuscany (to which ötzi/remedello belong) and in sardinia; but i dont think the rift between slovenians and north italians is all neolithic based given the balkan_ba/hungary_ba and ema_pannonian samples;


I absolutely don't deny that there may have been a movement of more CHG like people up through Italy after the Early Neolithic. I've been beating that drum for five years on this site. However, I would maintain that this was a Copper Age movement that also affected the Balkans.

Your iteration of this idea vastly overstates the differences, however. Remedello and Otzi still plot very near the EEF samples, even if they are less WHG than Copper Age samples of the same time period (approximately 3400 BC) in parts of Central Europe. 

Regardless, we weren't discussing the Copper and Bronze Age, where there were differences. We were talking about the Neolithic, and the difference between Neolithic peoples in Slovenia versus neighboring people right across the modern border in northeastern Italy, not between those Neolithic Slovenians and Neolithic Tuscans or Remedello. 

Bottom line, could some of the differences stem from the Neolithic? Perhaps, but I doubt it was major. Were the two areas differently impacted by subsequent migrations? Perhaps, but until we get Bronze Age Italian genomes and genomes from Slovenia, I wouldn't be so sure it's a major difference. I think the major differences probably came with the period from, perhaps. 400 BC to the Slavic migrations.

Hopefully, with time we'll get more and more samples and the details will become more clear.

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## Yetos

> Strabo and Livy claim the Carni tribe as Illyrian ............that is, always linked with the Illyrians. More recent scholars state this has changed, with a link to the Adriatic Veneti being preferred, similar to the Catali tribe to the east of the Carni. 
> Pliny mentions two other towns, Ocra and Segeste, as belonging to the Carni, ......."este" ending towns are 100% Illyrian
> 
> Strabo - *From Tergeste, a village of the Carni, there is a pass across and through the Ocra to a marsh called Lugeum. A river, the Corcoras, flows near Nauportus, and conveys the merchandise from that place*
> 
> Tergeste = Trieste .......a Illyrian town , another "este " ending name



let me doupt,

there hundrends of toponyms in East Balkans eith ending -esti

the ending - este -esti means -nest -εστια and is found very much Thracian areas

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## davef

> This is from later in the Neolithic. Slovenia, or at least most of it was part of Cardial Impressa from what I can see.
> 
> 
> Late Bronze Age Europe:
> 
> Of course, this is all speculation. The only way to know is to look at ancient genomes. Does anyone know if there are any ancient sample from the area around Slovenia?


The topmost map answers every question, i wonder what could be wrong with it?

Question is for those who are doubting it.

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## alexfritz

> I absolutely don't deny that there may have been a movement of more CHG like people up through Italy after the Early Neolithic. I've been beating that drum for five years on this site. However, I would maintain that this was a Copper Age movement that also affected the Balkans.
> 
> Your iteration of this idea vastly overstates the differences, however. Remedello and Otzi still plot very near the EEF samples, even if they are less WHG than Copper Age samples of the same time period (approximately 3400 BC) in parts of Central Europe. 
> 
> Regardless, we weren't discussing the Copper and Bronze Age, where there were differences. We were talking about the Neolithic, and the difference between Neolithic peoples in Slovenia versus neighboring people right across the modern border in northeastern Italy, not between those Neolithic Slovenians and Neolithic Tuscans or Remedello. 
> 
> Bottom line, could some of the differences stem from the Neolithic? Perhaps, but I doubt it was major. Were the two areas differently impacted by subsequent migrations? Perhaps, but until we get Bronze Age Italian genomes and genomes from Slovenia, I wouldn't be so sure it's a major difference. I think the major differences probably came with the period from, perhaps. 400 BC to the Slavic migrations.
> 
> Hopefully, with time we'll get more and more samples and the details will become more clear.


there is a cryptic passage about contemporary Chl CO1[baden] in kilinc et al but she is not incl into the overall shared drift conclusion, given the burial rite of remedello in contrast to rinaldone there could be an earlier tiszapolgar/carpathian link involved maybe indicated by the clear shift in VBQ; it could be kilinc et al sample pop was not extensive enough maybe the lipson et al data can shed more light into the CHG drift and a carpatho/balkan<anatolia route alternative is the direct anatolian material/copper driven migration; if there was a direct border exchange friul/slovenia i do not know but the early site of sammardenchia indicates a crossroads of mediterranean and carpathian with both types of obsidian found;

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## berun

> _Rumantsch_ speakers live close to the Italian border, not north of the Alps.


they occupy the higher Rhin valley... so in the north side of the Alps

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## bicicleur

> Neolithic farmers eventually spread over all of Europe, including Slovenia, except for the far northeast. The people who used to live there were different from the people who live there now. The difference is the Early Medieval Era migrations, which did not have the same impact on Italy or Spain as they did in parts of the northern Balkans and Central Europe.
> 
> Language and politics were also barriers to gene flow.


this is not about the early neolithic, it has to do with later
I don't know, what was the subsistence of the Slavs when they arrived in Slovenia? And of the Veneto-Friuli Italians in the same era?

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## bicicleur

there may be other reasons, but I don't know the specific history
why did the Slavs stop in Slovenia and not enter the Veneto-Friuli?
were the Veneto-Friuli succesfull in resisting the Slavs, while the Slovenes were not?

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## berun

Very roughly Slovenia now is profiting land by climatological conditions for timber, cows and corn (the last from America). Only cows were profited by sure in prehistory there, so the maximum population possible would be much less than the farming population of Veneto-Friul, where as I cam remember climatology is milder as to have vineyards.

It's like putting side by side the Toscana and the Altai Autonomous Republic.

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## Angela

> this is not about the early neolithic, it has to do with later
> I don't know, what was the subsistence of the Slavs when they arrived in Slovenia? And of the Veneto-Friuli Italians in the same era?


That's precisely my point, Bicicleur. The major differences occurred later, not in the Neolithic, as some are trying to argue, and I would maintain that most of it dates to the Slavic migrations, but whatever the ancient dna shows, it shows. I have no horse in this race. Why would it matter to me?

"In the Iron Age, present-day Slovenia was inhabited by Illyrian and Celtic tribes until the 1st century BC, when the Romansconquered the region establishing the provinces of Pannonia and Noricum. What is now western Slovenia was included directly under Roman Italia as part of the X region _Venetia et Histria_. Important Roman towns located in present-day Slovenia included Emona, Celeia and Poetovio. Other important settlements were Nauportus, Neviodunum, Haliaetum, Atrans, and Stridon."



"During the migration period, the region suffered invasions of many barbarian armies, due to its strategic position as* the main passage from the Pannonian plain to the Italian peninsula.* Rome finally abandoned the region at the end of the 4th century. Most cities were destroyed, while the remaining local population moved to the highland areas, establishing fortified towns. In the 5th century, the region was part of the Ostrogothic kingdom, and was later contested between the Ostrogoths, the Byzantine Empire and the Lombards."

As we learned just recently from the Lombard paper,there was still a very "southern" type population in the Pannonian plain when the Lombards went through there. 

"The Slavic ancestors of present-day Slovenes settled in the East Alpine area at the end of the 6th century. Coming from two directions, North (via today's East Austria and Czech Republic), settling in the area of today's Carinthia and west Styria and South (via today's Slavonia), settling in the area of today's central Slovenia."

In the sixth century the Gothic War between the Goths and the Byzantines was raging in Italy. By 568 the Lombards were in control. 

As the quotes indicate, Slovenia is the pathway into Italy from the east and northeast. It's a much easier route than the one through Liguria or the Alps for that matter. 

As for climate, topography, land use, there isn't a sharp break at the Italian border, at least not that I've seen. 

Slovenia:
"Humid subtropical climate on the coast, continental climate with mild to hot summers and cold winters in the plateaus and in the valleys to the east. Precipitation is high away from the coast, with the spring being particularly prone to rainfall. Slovenia's Alps have frequent snowfalls during the winter.[5]

A short coastal strip on the Adriatic Sea, an alpine mountain region adjacent to Italy and Austria, mixed mountain and valleys with numerous rivers to the east."








Thanks to my first cousin marrying a Venetian (whose last name ended in ich, btw), I already knew about the above. I've also extensively driven the area.

I'm getting extremely tired of people having decided opinions about Italian pre-history, but especially history, when they know nothing about it. This doesn't apply to you, of course, Bicicleur. Your posts are always thoughtful and informative. 

@Berun,

Don't you ever get tired of insisting on opinions about matters of which you clearly know very little? If you don't know very much about a subject did it ever occur to you to research it before you opine?

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## Pax Augusta

> they occupy the higher Rhin valley... so in the north side of the Alps


How should this prove they are late newcomers? They are only a few kilometers above the Rhine still in the middle of the Alps not north of the Alps, and the great majority of Romansh people are south of the Rhine. 

Anyway the river Rhine rises in the Romansh speaking area of the Chantun Grischun (the only trilingual Swiss Canton: German, Italian, Romansh), few kilometers from the other Swiss Italian-speaking Canton, and not very distant from the Italian border either. The river Rhine has two sources: the Rein Anteriur (Lai da Tuma) and Rein Posteriur. What else can it be? Romansh is a descendant of the spoken Latin language of the Alps that replaced (and likely assimilated) the Celtic (Lepontic) and Raetic languages previously spoken in the area.

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## berun

Angela, again, I'm not denying the impact of historical migrations. My opinions are based on how ecosystem shape population density, economy, and language borders, there are hundreds of cases to learn from. Instead you said Slovenia was EFF but no proof about it (please attach this to ecosystems and not to actual borders).

Pax Augusta, again, the Grisons are in the north of the Alps, in the northern side of the Alps, you can't change it, but you can try to know the region, do you know the investment of effort to cross the Alps? ask to Hannibal... do you know what means to have passes cut by snow half year? do you think that the languages in your last map were united once but cutted by Germans or Venetians? do you think that French is original in Val d'Aosta? do you think that Provenzal is original of the Piemontese valleys? do you think that German is original in South Tyrol?

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## berun

behold, Rumansch people name the Rhine with its German name?....

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## Angela

> Angela, again, I'm not denying the impact of historical migrations. My opinions are based on how ecosystem shape population density, economy, and language borders, there are hundreds of cases to learn from. Instead you said Slovenia was EFF but no proof about it (please attach this to ecosystems and not to actual borders).
> 
> Pax Augusta, again, the Grisons are in the north of the Alps, in the northern side of the Alps, you can't change it, but you can try to know the region, do you know the investment of effort to cross the Alps? ask to Hannibal... do you know what means to have passes cut by snow half year? do you think that the languages in your last map were united once but cutted by Germans or Venetians? do you think that French is original in Val d'Aosta? do you think that Provenzal is original of the Piemontese valleys? do you think that German is original in South Tyrol?


I'm going to say this one last time and then I'm done:

There is no BREAK in the ecosystem at the Italo-Slovenian border.

There were NO non-EEF type people anywhere in Iberia, or the Balkans, or Central Europe, for that matter, in the NEOLITHIC. There would only be people with slightly differing proportions of WHG or perhaps CHG. EVERY SINGLE European genome from the Middle to Late Neolithic shows the same thing. SLOVENIA IS NOT GOING TO BE ANY DIFFERENT. The only reservoirs of WHG types seems to have been in the far north, and there was EHG in the far eastern areas.

Read the papers. 

Look at the PCAS. This one is from Kilinc et al. Although different papers might show it a bit differently (in this case the samples are shown further apart), the story is the same. Note the placement of even the two Copper Age samples: Otzi and Baden.

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## bicicleur

> I'm going to say this one last time and then I'm done:
> 
> THERE IS NO BREAK IN THE ECOSYSTEM AT THE ITALY SLOVENIAN BORDER.


so either the local population was replaced by the Slavic newcomers or ..

Angela, was the plague also raging in Slovenia prior to the arrival of the Slavs?

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## Pax Augusta

> Pax Augusta, again, the Grisons are in the north of the Alps, in the northern side of the Alps, you can't change it, but you can try to know the region, do you know the investment of effort to cross the Alps? ask to Hannibal... do you know what means to have passes cut by snow half year? do you think that the languages in your last map were united once but cutted by Germans or Venetians? do you think that French is original in Val d'Aosta? do you think that Provenzal is original of the Piemontese valleys? do you think that German is original in South Tyrol?


You're mixing things that have nothing to do with each other, just for the sake of provoking. 

I give you one last chance. What are the sources that assume that Romansh are descended from a migration? And from where?





> behold, Rumansch people name the Rhine with its German name?....


Rhine is in any language a hydronym of Celtic origin (Gaulish *Rēnos; Proto-Celtic *Rein-os; Latin Rhenus, from Proto-Indo-European *rey- (“to flow”). In Sursilvan is Rein and sursilvan is the Romansh language spoken in the area of the Rhine river. The homonymous river Reno of Emilia-Romagna in Northern Italian languages is Rén.

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## berun

Angela... again with modern borders? I'm just attaching the case to ecosystems, I repeat by third time , ECOSYSTEMS. For actual or older Slovenians in PCA... I'm tired... you just don't understand or you even don't try... I'm not deniying the effect of historical migrations ( and its DNA effects). 

Pax Augusta, the same, you only are capable to hear yourselves, where I said that Rumansch is not native? Even so, continuing the provokative discussion... so do you suggest that Rumansch people got the name of the river direct from proto-Celtic? Oh, I know why I"m tired now.

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## Angela

> so either the local population was replaced by the Slavic newcomers or ..
> 
> Angela, was the plague also raging in Slovenia prior to the arrival of the Slavs?


I don't know about replacement, but they had a big impact on Slovenia in contrast to what happened in Italy with the Lombards. I guess it was a race as to which tribes were going to get to which area first, and the Lombards got to Italy first. The interesting part is that the Lombards didn't have the same kind of impact on Italy, not even in the Veneto, Venezia-Giulia, and eastern Lombardia, where their influence was strongest, that the Slavs had on the Balkans, or so I've always assumed based both on the autosomal signature and the yDna distribution. In the Veneto and parts of Lombardia there's definitely I1 and R1b U-106, even in northwestern Sicily, but not like the levels of the "Slavic" I2a and R1a in the Balkans, although the rates differ by country. They also didn't succeed in imposing their language. However, all bets are off now until I see that actual paper on the Lombards. If the incoming Lombards also carried some lineages of U-152, then their contribution may have been greater, but it's been masked because they were such an admixed group. 

I guess larger population sizes in Italy might have been a factor, which leads to your question about the plague. The plague is attested around 542, but I don't know of anything that compares its severity to what was going on in the Balkans.

According to the Lombard chroniclers like Paul the Deacon the Gothic Wars had left Italy devastated, much worse off than after the initial Gothic invasions, with fields lying barren, people scattered and decimated by disease. 

I have grown increasingly skeptical about so called "historical" accounts by ancient historians or generals, for instance in the accounts by Roman generals as to how there were no longer any Celt-Ligurians. Usually, they were just hacks for whichever "royals" or " nobles" paid them well. 

However, I don't doubt that there was devastation. The question is, how much of the "native" population remained in comparison to the number of newcomers? The Lombards in total, even according to their own estimates, numbered only 100,000 people, plus about 20,000 Saxons, women and children and older men included, so you wonder how much of an impact they might have had. Still, in the early years of their rule, they were firmly planted in the Veneto, which may have been enough to keep the Slavic speakers at bay. 

"The first important city to fall was _Forum Iulii_ (Cividale del Friuli) in northeastern Italy, in 569. There, Alboin created the first Lombard duchy, which he entrusted to his nephew Gisulf. Soon Vicenza, Verona and Brescia fell into Germanic hands. In the summer of 569, the Lombards conquered the main Roman centre of northern Italy, Milan. The area was then recovering from the terrible Gothic Wars, and the small Byzantine army left for its defence could do almost nothing. Longinus, the Exarch sent to Italy by Emperor Justin II, could only defend coastal cities that could be supplied by the powerful Byzantine fleet. Pavia fell after a siege of three years, in 572, becoming the first capital city of the new Lombard kingdom of Italy.In the following years, the Lombards penetrated further south, conquering Tuscany and establishing two duchies, Spoleto and Benevento under Zotto, which soon became semi-independent and even outlasted the northern kingdom, surviving well into the 12th century. Wherever they went, they were joined by the Ostrogothic population, who was allowed to live peacefully in Italy with their Rugian allies under Roman sovereignty.[60] The Byzantines managed to retain control of the area of Ravenna and Rome, linked by a thin corridor running through Perugia."

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## Angela

> I don't know about replacement, but they had a big impact on Slovenia in contrast to what happened in Italy with the Lombards. I guess it was a race as to which tribes were going to get to which area first, and the Lombards got to Italy first. The interesting part is that the Lombards didn't have the same kind of impact on Italy, not even in the Veneto, Venezia-Giulia, and eastern Lombardia, where their influence was strongest, that the Slavs had on the Balkans, or so I've always assumed based both on the autosomal signature and the yDna distribution. In the Veneto and parts of Lombardia there's definitely I1 and R1b U-106, even in northwestern Sicily, but not like the levels of the "Slavic" I2a and R1a in the Balkans, although the rates differ by country. They also didn't succeed in imposing their language. However, all bets are off now until I see that actual paper on the Lombards. If the incoming Lombards also carried some lineages of U-152, then their contribution may have been greater, but it's been masked because they were such an admixed group. 
> 
> I guess larger population sizes in Italy might have been a factor, which leads to your question about the plague. The plague is attested around 542, but I don't know of anything that compares its severity to what was going on in the Balkans.
> 
> According to the Lombard chroniclers like Paul the Deacon the Gothic Wars had left Italy devastated, much worse off than after the initial Gothic invasions, with fields lying barren, people scattered and decimated by disease. 
> 
> I have grown increasingly skeptical about so called "historical" accounts by ancient historians or generals, for instance in the accounts by Roman generals as to how there were no longer any Celt-Ligurians. Usually, they were just hacks for whichever "royals" or " nobles" paid them well. 
> 
> However, I don't doubt that there was devastation. The question is, how much of the "native" population remained in comparison to the number of newcomers? The Lombards in total, even according to their own estimates, numbered only 100,000 people, plus about 20,000 Saxons, women and children and older men included, so you wonder how much of an impact they might have had. Still, in the early years of their rule, they were firmly planted in the Veneto, which may have been enough to keep the Slavic speakers at bay. 
> ...


As for the Slavs, this is what Gimbutas had to say:

"According to Marija Gimbutas, "Neither Bulgars nor Avars colonized the Balkan Peninsula; after storming Thrace, Illyriaand Greece they went back to their territory north of the Danube. It was the Slavs who did the colonizing ... entire families or even whole tribes infiltrated lands. As an agricultural people, they constantly sought an outlet for the population surplus. Suppressed for over a millennium by foreign rule of Scythians, Sarmatians and Goths, they had been restricted to a small territory; now the barriers were down and they poured out".[103] In addition to their growth, the depopulation of eastern Europe (due, in part, to Germanic migration) and the lack of imperial defences encouraged Slavic expansion."

In terms of lifestyle:
"Early Slavic settlements were no larger than 0.5 to 2 hectares (1.2 to 4.9 acres). Settlements were often temporary, perhaps reflecting their itinerant form of agriculture,[124] and were often along rivers. They were characterized by sunken buildings, known as _Grubenhäuser in German or poluzemlianki in Russian. Built over a rectangular pit, they varied from 4 to 20 m2 (43 to 215 sq ft) in area and could accommodate a typical nuclear family. Each house had a stone or clay oven in a corner (a defining feature of Eastern European dwellings), and a settlement had a population of fifty to seventy.[125] Settlements had a central, open area, where communal activities and ceremonies were conducted, and were divided into production and settlement zones.[126]"

_Like the Lombards, they were small scale subsistence farmers who often moved locations. It may be that like the Lombards they didn't fertilize the soil or practice crop rotation, and so when the soil was depleted they tried to move on to new fields. 

The Lombards, at least, weren't very skilled at making a living from their farming, because when they were in Pannonia many of them were suffering from malnutrition, or perhaps everyone around the area also suffered from it because of the unsettled conditions.

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## Cato

How is possible that Aosta is closer to Canarias than Piedmont ?  :Thinking:  ...Also the big distance between Lazio and Abruzzo is somewhat unexpected

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## Ailchu

> I'm going to say this one last time and then I'm done:
> 
> There is no BREAK in the ecosystem at the Italo-Slovenian border.
> 
> There were NO non-EEF type people anywhere in Iberia, or the Balkans, or Central Europe, for that matter, in the NEOLITHIC. There would only be people with slightly differing proportions of WHG or perhaps CHG. EVERY SINGLE European genome from the Middle to Late Neolithic shows the same thing. SLOVENIA IS NOT GOING TO BE ANY DIFFERENT. The only reservoirs of WHG types seems to have been in the far north, and there was EHG in the far eastern areas.
> 
> Read the papers. 
> 
> Look at the PCAS. This one is from Kilinc et al. Although different papers might show it a bit differently (in this case the samples are shown further apart), the story is the same. Note the placement of even the two Copper Age samples: Otzi and Baden.


that may not be a question about the topic of this thread, sorry. until now i have only seen this graphic without the EHG but now where they are included on the map it seems like the impact the yamna had on the genome of north and western europeans was not really big. it rather looks like the influence ot eastern hunter gatherers is way higher?
if we assume that western europe was populated by EEF who then were mixed with incoming indo europeans why doesn't it look like they are pulled towards the yamna? it looks more like they were pulled towards the EHG. 
i mean the lithuanians or even the scots and english do not really look like they were EEF who were pulled towards yamna. especially the lithuanians look more like a mix of EHG and SHG/WHG.

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## Angela

^^It's best to stick to academic papers and pcas produced by academicians, as well, of course, to the formal stats produced by them so you don't get confused.

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## brick

> Here is my PCA with regional averages, probably the biggest genetic border that showed up, is this between Slovenia and North-Eastern Italy. Any ideas why, how and when did this genetic border emerge? Geographically, Veneto-Friuli and Slovenia are neighbours, but in terms of DNA there is a big distance between them:


Veneto-Friuli is closer to southern Germanic people rather than to Slavic people.

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## Angela

By the time the Slavs got this far, the Italian regions were already controlled by Germanic tribes. That's why there was little bleed over. 

There is extremely little Slavic admixture in Italy.

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