# Population Genetics > Y-DNA Haplogroups >  Where do the white kablye of north africa come from

## Fire Haired

I have been looking at genetics of Berbers( the biggest and oldest ethnicisty in north Africa about 6,000-10,000 years old) and i have heard and read about the _Kabyle in the Atlas mountains. Who are known for blonde hair and blue eyes and also surprisingly red hair. Some sub groups of Kablye have 18% blonde hair_ that is more than Spain, Italy, southern France, Greece, and southern Yugoslaviens. These are all the Europeans who live in the Mediterranean they may have inter married with, central and northern Yugoslavians have about 20-30% blonde hair but that is not enough for these Berbers to get 18% from inter marriage they would have to be nearly 100% Yugoslavien.

Greece and Yugoslaiva over 4,000 years ago would have had alot more blonde hair just inter marriage with dark haired near easterns has lowered the percentage. Same with French the ancient Gauls of France where very well known for blonde hair the only area of France with less than 20% blonde hair also has very high amounts of middle eastern Y DNA haplogroups which most likely came from Rome. 

I have known about these people for a few months. I thought they where very rare and there was not enough DNA tests on them to know where they came from but what made me want to make this thread. 

At church i heard a missionary who went to Moorco( far northwest Africa mainly in the Atlas mountains) tell about the different ethnic groups he saw. _He said that the Moorconas thought he was apart of a ethnic group that lived in the mountains because he had light skin and blue eyes. He went up to he went up to these mounatins the Mooracns said the pale skinned people lived. The Missonary said there are millions of these people and they looked surprisingly European many had light skin and sometimes blue eyed or blonde hair and red hair._

He said these people where actulley seen as a _very ancient ethnic group and have been isolated from inter marriage with other berbers for a very long time because they are isolated in the mountains_. And lived there before Arab Muslim invasion and that they used to be powerful and are very traditional berbers. also that Most are palish skinned with dark hair and eyed but some did have blonde hair or red hair.

The people the Missonary talked about remained me of the Kabyle i wondered if they where who he was talking about. _So i researched the Kablye every thing the MIssonary said was perfectly accurate and matched the Kabyle. They are the Largest speaking Berber ethnic group in Algeria and second biggest in all of Africa there are 5-7 million of them. Kabyle live mainly in the Atlas mountains and far northern Algeria. They are very proud Berbers and fought for more recognition of the Berber language in 1980. The mountains serve as a refuge from outside influences. The Kablye fought against being culturally influenced by ancient Romans over 2,000 years ago, Arab Muslims (over 1,300 years ago), and French colonist in the 1800's._

I know at some point they had of inter married with a very light haired light eyed sometimes red haired group of Europeans before Ancient Rome because the Romans mentioned them and their language is over 4,000 years old. The Pale skin, blonde hair, and red hair of Kabyle is so spread out and they are one of the biggest ethnic groups of north Africa it had to be thousands and thousands of years ago when a group of Europeans inter married with them

. It makes alot of sense they live right at the border of north Africa and Spain but it could not have been Spaniards. Maybe over 8,000 years ago people in spain had alot of blonde hair and red hair i dont know.

Here are some examples of typical Kablye people

_Iberian Migration after the last Ice age 15,000 years ago
_
_This is my theory for the light skinned sometimes blonde haired or red haired Kablye people._ In the Last Glacial Maximum i will just call it last ice age from 26,500-19,000 years ago most of central and northern Europe was covered in ice and was uninhabitble. Most Humans in Europe took refuge in southern Europe. There have been mtDNA traces of people who took refuge in Iberia then helped resettle Europe after the glaciers retreated. They spread mtDNA H1, H3, V, and U5b1*(1).
*
I have explianed the reasons why this last ice age resstlment of Europe really did happen so many times on this website and it takes a very long time and most people dont read so i am going to try to guve a short explination or just read my resourse _(1)._

The mtDNA haplogroups_ H1, H3, V, and U5b1 which are from the migrations out of Iberia 15,000ybp after the last ice age are about 15-30% in most Europeans and north west Africans, 30-50% in Iberians, and 30-40% and in Scandinavians. But these haplogroups are very rare in the middle east and non north west Africa.
_ 
The mtDNA of the Kablye people is H=32.3%, U=29.03%(U6= 17.74%), L=8.07%(L3a=4.84%, L1=3.23%), V=4.84%, T=3.23%, J=3.23%, M1=3.23%, R=3.23%, N=1.61%)*(2)*. It did not say how much H1 and H3 they had just 32.3% H. H1, and H3 are the main haplogroups that spread from Iberia 15,000ybp. They are actulley very common in northwest Africa The Turag in Libya have 61% H1_(3)_. H1 and H3 are just as popular in North west Africa as in most of Europe while H1 and H3 are much less popular in the middle east and the rest of north Africa. There have been DNA studies of H1 in north Africa and they concluded that it did not come from recent Iberian inter rmarraige and that it came from Iberia at least 8,000-9,000 years ago_(3).
_
two 12,000 year old _mtDNA V_ samples came from the _Atlas mountains in Morocco which pretty much proves these migration happened(4)_. The only four that where able to find a fir sure haplogroup all had H they possibly had H1 or H3. Also Berbers have their own subclade of mtDNA U5b1 which is a European haplogroup. U5 originated in Europe over 50,000-60,000 years ago.

The sami of far northern Scandinavia have about 50% V(which came from Iberian refuge), and 40-50% U5b1( which came form Iberian refuge). The Sami U5b1 is most related to the Berber _U5b1 their common ancestor is estimated to have lived 8,000ybp in Iberia_. I think those ages are off probably right after the glacier in Europe retreated 15,000-19,000 years ago. They gave a date to 8,000-9,000 years ago when H1 arrived in North Africa from Iberia this means it came in the same migration as U5b1, But like i said before the dating are probably off.

We dont know if these Iberians would have been dark haired and eyed like modern Iberians. _austomnal DNA( basically it tells ur full ancestry) from a 7,000 year old hunter gather in northern Spain his closest modern relatives are Finnish and Sami people in Scandinavia(6). This is because Sami and Finnish ancestors have been separated from other Europeans for at least 10,000 years_. 

So, they have not inter married mainly with near eastern farmers who came in the Neolithic age (6,000-10,000ybp) and have kept many austome genes the rest of Europe lost. It is true that the Iberians that migrated to North Africa 12,000-15,000ybp would be most related to modern Sami and Finnish that does not exactly mean they had light hair and eyes like Sami and Finnish. 

The original European aust. DNA group according to the globe13 test is called north European because it is most popular in northern Europe but is popular in all of Europe. modern Iberians have 30-40% north European, and 50-60% Mediterranean most western Europeans have 30-40% meditreaen and 50-60% north European_(8)_. 

In aust, DNA from farmers in Europe in the Neolithic age had over 59% Mediterranean,_ the Med component in Europe came with farmers from the middle east_.Since alot of Iberians ancestry is from those farmers who where dark haired and eyed maybe the light hair, light eyes, and red hair in Iberia disappeared. Sami and Finnish people most likely come mainly from those Iberians in the last ice age 15,000ybp and they have mainly light hair and eyes so there is a good chance these Iberians that went to north Africa 12,000-15,000ybp did too. 

A very important note to take is Kablye have red hair. Red hair today almost only exists in western Europe with the borders of Indo European Y DNA R1b L11's subclades. except for the Udmurts in volga Russia who have 15% red hair_(7)_. Also the ancinet Indo Iranien Indo Europeans who migrated out of the steppes to cetral asia about 5,000ybp also had high amounts of red hair. Red hair is sometimes still found today in indo Iranian speaking areas today like Kurds in Iraq, Kalash in Pakistan, Pashuten in Afghanistan. 

_All red hair in the world comes from Indo Europeans who where from many differnt ethnic groups in central Russia and the caucus who mixed 6,000-8,000ybp. Except Udmurt in volga Russia but the Udmurts live in the area where the Indo European languages spread from_ so they get red hair from the same source as Indo Europeans did. 

8,000-10,000 years ago red hair would have only existed in people around central Russia and Ukriane and it would have been extremely popular. Then if the Kablye have red hair and did not get it from Indo European migrations where the heck did it come from. This might mean red hair existed in Paleolithic Spain.

The Kablye do have 15% R1b M269_(2)_ it did not say if they had the western European type R1b l11 but they defintley do and they most likley got it from Spainish. It is true that some ethnic groups in northern Spain like Basque have 1-3% red hair but the Kablye would have gotten R1b from southern Spanish. So i dont think that is a explanation for their red hair. the _Kabyle are evidence red hair originated in Spain in the last glacial Maximum 26,600-19,000 years ago._

I know this seems long and many people have complained i write way to much, but i actulley tried to keep this short and cut it down alot. _I cant make it too short and easy to read because i would be leaving out important information._

I think there needs to be more DNA study of the Kabyle people. They should intentionally study the blonde haired ones or very european looking ones, Sine they will have more blood from what ever European group they got those features from. For now i think it was Iberians who migrated there about 15,000 years ago.

If anyone has other ideas please post it. here is a link to the DNA we have so far of Kablye people it is just mtDNA and Y DNA haplogroups http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabyle_people#cite_note-15

_Resources_ _(1)_http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22560092
*(2)*http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabyle_people#cite_note-15
_(3)_http://www.plosone.org/article/info:...l.pone.0013378
_(4)_http://www.buildinghistory.org/dista...ricaadna.shtml
_(5)_http://www.eupedia.com/europe/neolit...rope_map.shtml
_(6)_http://fennoscandia.blogspot.com/201...saamis-ii.html
_(7)_http://www.eupedia.com/genetics/orig...red_hair.shtml
_(8)_https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/...tUE9kaUE#gid=2

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## adamo

because theyre high in mtdna H and U as you pointed out, from iberia

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## Fire Haired

> because theyre high in mtdna H and U as you pointed out, from iberia


i agree they get it from Iberia but the fact they have mtdna U and H does not prove it. H and U are not European they are Caucasian. Which includes north Africans and mid easterns. 17% of the 29% U in Kabyle is north African U6 it is almost only in north africa and is 40,000-50,000 years old. the most popular H sublade in north africa is H1 and H3 which did migrate their from Iberia 15,000ybp.

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## adamo

exactly, the have low % R1b and quite some H1,H3 as well crossing gibraltar into morocco / algeria = some look white albeit not the majority

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## Fire Haired

i totally agree but the Kabyle have 15% r1b highest in north Africa but that is not enough to affect the entire population many do look white i dont know about most.

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## ElHorsto

It is possible that there is a minor north-euro admixture, but red-hair does not come from north europeans per se, imho. Or do the Saami, Finns and Balts have more red-haired than european average?
An alternative theory for red hair:
Red hair is often hidden by pigmentation in dark brown haired individuals. North-south mixed people (like Irish, Swiss and possibly Mordvins and Udmurts, but also more southern like Jews and some Italians) have highest chances to be red-haired, because low-pigment genes can let the reddishness shine through. That's why red-haired people also have very pale rosy skin.

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## Fire Haired

> It is possible that there is a minor north-euro admixture, but red-hair does not come from north europeans per se, imho. Or do the Saami, Finns and Balts have more red-haired than european average?


here is a map of red hair next to a map of y dna r1b in europe



R1b l11 subclades come from those Indo Europeans that came to western Europe 5,000ybp. the R1b in the rest of europe is not from them which is probably why there is no red hair. The sami and finnish have at most 1% red hair and it is probably from Germanic inter marriage. So Finnish and Sami orignalley probably had no red hair so far the only people are random ethnic groups who lived in central russia and Ukraine 8,000-10,000ybp who also became some of thye early indo Europeans 6,000ybp and spread to Europe and asia 5,000ybp and udmurt people who live in volga russia which is near to where those indo Europeans lived. so it seems red hair is a Russian trait at least it used to be it may have devloped in Russia and only existed in Russia till 5,000 years ago. So if the red hair in kabyle is not of indo european or russia origin they are the only in the world and would mean red hair probably started in spain 15,000ybp. it does seem that kablye have inter married with a light haired group of people. red hair right now does not group with very light haired people since red hair is a light hair color people group with red hair is also have light hair but just because finnish have 60% light hair does not mean they have alot of red hair. So i think who ever the kabyle inter married with it was a very blonde haired group of people who also had some red hair which could only be southern Scandinavians not gauls or celts. or maybe there is a extinct group of people like this who lived in spain 15,000 years ago but that would be extremely hard to prove 




> An alternative theory for red hair:
> Red hair is often hidden by pigmentation in dark brown haired individuals. North-south mixed people (like Irish, Swiss and possibly Mordvins and Udmurts, but also more southern like Jews and some Italians) have highest chances to be red-haired, because low-pigment genes can let the reddishness shine through. That's why red-haired people also have very pale rosy skin.


i did not think of that irish have about 12-15% red hair and only about 10% blonde hair and almost 80% brown hair. Udurt have even less blonde hair and more red and brown hair. i dont know about southern jews i have not seen any studies on jewish hair color. i think u need more evidence on the relationship with people who have more brown hair and more blonde hair and how it effects red hair percentages. red hair is a light hair color like blonde hair i dont know though if the genes for red hair and blonde hair are related i dont think they are. with kablye people it seems they inter married with a very blonde haired people with red hair and the only modern people that could have inter married with them are southern Scandinavians.

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## ElHorsto

> i did not think of that irish have about 12-15% red hair and only about 10% blonde hair and almost 80% brown hair. Udurt have even less blonde hair and more red and brown hair. i dont know about southern jews i have not seen any studies on jewish hair color. i think u need more evidence on the relationship with people who have more brown hair and more blonde hair and how it effects red hair percentages. red hair is a light hair color like blonde hair i dont know though if the genes for red hair and blonde hair are related i dont think they are. with kablye people it seems they inter married with a very blonde haired people with red hair and the only modern people that could have inter married with them are southern Scandinavians.


Red hair gene is certainly not related to blondness. Near-easterners can be red haired but almost never blond.
Regarding jews I have no evidence except common clichés and stereotypes. And this Wikipedia article: 

"Red hair is also fairly common amongst the Ashkenazi Jewish populations, possibly because of the influx of European DNA over a period of centuries."

But I doubt that the red-hair gene itself necessarily came from European DNA. Probably the european admixture just helped to make the reddishness visible.

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## Fire Haired

> Red hair gene is certainly not related to blondness. Near-easterners can be red haired but almost never blond.
> Regarding jews I have no evidence except common clichés and stereotypes. And this Wikipedia article:
> 
> "Red hair is also fairly common amongst the Ashkenazi Jewish populations, possibly because of the influx of European DNA over a period of centuries."


both red hair and blonde hair orignated in Europe. both redheads and blonde almost always have blue eyes then sometimes green eyes. i think both evolved seperatley for similar reason but are unrelated to each other. the Ancient Jews where dark brown haired it even mentions hair color in the bible it said young men have black hair old men had grey hair. in teh bible it says abrahman came from mespotamia 4,000ybp in modern iraq. abrham was a nomad he was called by God to go to isreal or it was cannon then the whole thing about jews being in egypt then going back to Isreal, teh jews would have inter married with the native people in isreal and that area so genetically ancient jews where not Mesopotamian they where southwest asian. modern jews austomnal dna(which tells full ancestry) if u take away teh european part it perfectly matches modern Syrians, Palestinians and other people around isreal. jews where southwest asians not europeans the reason modern ones in europe look white is because they inter married with europeans so the ancient jews had no red hair unless they inter married with cimmerians or sythiens who had migrated in that area from 3,000-2,500ybp. 

i live in a area with mainly middle eastern and south asian people. there is a assyrian from iran the same area many kurdish live he said that he does not know if there are any redheads in Iraq and Iran but he has heard of some but he said he as seen blondes.

the red hair in the mid east today almost only exists in indo Iranian speaking ethnic groups(kurdish, Kaslash, Pashuten, Pamiri) who have high levals of european ancestry in austomnal DNA and y dna. i really doubt red hair is also native to the middle east. the genes we know of so far that create pale skin and also the genes that create blue eyes in Europeans did originate in the middle east about 50,000-60,000ybp and became more popular in mainly Europeans, but also kind of in northern mid easterns, Anatolian, and caucus peoples ancestors. but red hair is almost defintley a european trait and it probably only existed in central Russia from 15,000-6,000ybp then spread it could have been as high as 30% in some central russians. 

wikpedia like to be politcalley correct and say that red hair is not only european but it is. those so called redh haired chinese live in the same province of china where they found 4,000 years old indo iranien white redheads. also where teh ancient indo Iranian speaking tocherians lived who from what Chinese say where tall had high noses, red hair, blue eyes, and big beards a perfect description of a red haired european plus we have paintngs of tocherians and that is exactley what they looked like. also indo Iranian speaking geneticalley European people and east asians in western china have inter married for about 4,500 years so they are very mixed in western china so some chinese looking people with blue eyes and red hair.




> But I doubt that the red-hair gene itself necessarily came from European DNA. Probably the european admixture just helped to make the reddishness visible.


i dont know how to respond because i odnt know that much about the genes that create red hair. i think it is european here are my reasons

1. redheads have the palish natural kin in the world. teh genes that create pale skin in europeans did orignate in teh mid east 60,000ybp but became dominate in Europeans ancestors and also people in the caucus and Anatolia's ancestors but more in Europeans. redheads had to have been born in a white people group not brown sometimes white middle easterns. who ever the first people to have red hair where they already would have had alot of blue eyes sure blue eyes began in the mid east 60,000ybp but they became popular in only Europeans ancestors. red hair most likely evolved for a similar reason as blonde hair maybe survival in the last ice age of Europe over 20,000 years ago. the only natural redheads so far discovered are either european or get it from european ancestry.

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## Johannes

The so-called "white" Berbers or Kabyles are descendants of Moors who were expelled from Spain. Most of the DNA was from European women who married Berbers. Many Berbers who migrated to the Iberian peninsula after the conquest -- especially during the 1-13th centuries were men who fought in the Muslim's Army. They married European women and then left Spain after they were ethnically cleansed by the Castilians. The Berbers are about 80% E1b1 and 10% I and R1b. The other 10% is Arab DNA J. The Kybales just happen to have more European DNA on average because they lived in isolation since the Middle Ages

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## Drac II

> The so-called "white" Berbers or Kabyles are descendants of Moors who were expelled from Spain. Most of the DNA was from European women who married Berbers. Many Berbers who migrated to the Iberian peninsula after the conquest -- especially during the 1-13th centuries were men who fought in the Muslim's Army. They married European women and then left Spain after they were ethnically cleansed by the Castilians. The Berbers are about 80% E1b1 and 10% I and R1b. The other 10% is Arab DNA J. The Kybales just happen to have more European DNA on average because they lived in isolation since the Middle Ages


The flaw with this theory is that we know from as far back as Pharaonic times that some areas of North Africa, particularly Libya, seem to have had a lot of people with blondish or rufous features, so the presence of these fairer types among North Africans predates Islamic times by thousands of years. Ancient Egyptian tomb and temple portrayals of Libyans usually stereotyped them as having pale complexion, blond, light brown or red hair and light eyes. In those same paintings the Egyptians stereotyped themselves as having darker complexion, hair and eyes than the Libyans, and more like what today we usually think of as typically North African pigmentation. So thanks to ancient Egyptian art we have evidence that North Africa since at least Pharaonic times has been populated by both "dark" and "fair" Caucasian types.

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## Johannes

> The flaw with this theory is that we know from as far back as Pharaonic times that some areas of North Africa, particularly Libya, seem to have had a lot of people with blondish or rufous features, so the presence of these fairer types among North Africans predates Islamic times by thousands of years. Ancient Egyptian tomb and temple portrayals of Libyans usually stereotyped them as having pale complexion, blond, light brown or red hair and light eyes. In those same paintings the Egyptians stereotyped themselves as having darker complexion, hair and eyes than the Libyans, and more like what today we usually think of as typically North African pigmentation. So thanks to ancient Egyptian art we have evidence that North Africa since at least Pharaonic times has been populated by both "dark" and "fair" Caucasian types.


The figures in Egyptian art are very symbolic and have nothing to do with the phenotypes of real people's. The only representatives that reflect reality are the blacks. the rest are pure symbols to differentiate from others. For example, the colors of the Semites and Libyans are the same and I am sure they were not as white as they are represented. Maybe in Libya there were some fair types but Morocco and Algeria is very far to the west. You seem to forget that millions of Muslims fled the Iberian peninsula during the 12-14 centuries of Christian Reconquista. Thus a lot of European DNA (most Andalusi Muslims were Europeans) was transferred to the Berbers. Thus it explains why some are fair. In fact I read a National Geographic special on Andalusian towns in Morocco that exist alonf the northern part of the country.

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## Drac II

> The figures in Egyptian art are very symbolic and have nothing to do with the phenotypes of real people's. The only representatives that reflect reality are the blacks. the rest are pure symbols to differentiate from others. For example, the colors of the Semites and Libyans are the same and I am sure they were not as white as they are represented. Maybe in Libya there were some fair types but Morocco and Algeria is very far to the west. You seem to forget that millions of Muslims fled the Iberian peninsula during the 12-14 centuries of Christian Reconquista. Thus a lot of European DNA (most Andalusi Muslims were Europeans) was transferred to the Berbers. Thus it explains why some are fair. In fact I read a National Geographic special on Andalusian towns in Morocco that exist alonf the northern part of the country.




That is hardly the case. The physical characterizations in those old paintings are quite clear. There is no reason why the Egyptians should have been accurate in their depiction of black Africans and for some mysterious reason they would not apply the same parameters to themselves and Syro-Palestinians and Libyans. We can tell very well that each of these groups were generally stereotyped as follows in Egyptian art (from darkest to lightest):

1- Nubians/Africans from below Egypt: very dark skin, very curly hair, dark eyes, Negroid facial features

2- Egyptians: lighter skinned than sub-Saharan Africans, straight or wavy dark hair when not braided, dark eyes, Caucasoid facial features 

3- Syro-Palestinians: lighter skinned than the Egyptians but often with a yellowish "tinge", straight or wavy dark hair, dark eyes, Caucasoid facial features

4- Libyans: the palest skinned types in Egyptian art, straight or wavy hair when not braided and usually lighter in color, often with light eyes too, Caucasoid facial features




The fact that Iberian Muslims fled to North Africa does not change the fact that lighter pigmented types already inhabited the area thousands of years before. Their presence among modern North Africans can't simply be attributed to a historical source like that of Muslim times. The presence of these types in North Africa predates historical record.

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## Johannes

> That is hardly the case. The physical characterizations in those old paintings are quite clear. There is no reason why the Egyptians should have been accurate in their depiction of black Africans and for some mysterious reason they would not apply the same parameters to themselves and Syro-Palestinians and Libyans. We can tell very well that each of these groups were generally stereotyped as follows in Egyptian art (from darkest to lightest):
> 
> 1- Nubians/Africans from below Egypt: very dark skin, very curly hair, dark eyes, Negroid facial features
> 
> 2- Egyptians: lighter skinned than sub-Saharan Africans, straight or wavy dark hair when not braided, dark eyes, Caucasoid facial features 
> 
> 3- Syro-Palestinians: lighter skinned than the Egyptians but often with a yellowish "tinge", straight or wavy dark hair, dark eyes, Caucasoid facial features
> 
> 4- Libyans: the palest skinned types in Egyptian art, straight or wavy hair when not braided and usually lighter in color, often with light eyes too, Caucasoid facial features
> ...


Do you honestly believe that Libyans and Semites looked that white-skinned as in the portraits? You yourself just said they are "stereotypes." That is exactly what I meant. The only accurate descriptions are of the Egyptians because they were black to brown in complexion. The only candidates for that description are Germanic or Celtic peoples of the north sans the braided and wooly hair.

Do you know were the the term "Maurus" comes from? It means black or very dark. This was the description of the North Africans by Greeks and Romans. NO greek or roman ever mentioned white skinned Libyans or North Africans for that matter.

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## Angela

I wonder why it's so important to make the Libyans "whiter" than the Syrians? 

Regardless, I don't see any difference, and nor do Egyptologists who I'm sure have actually seen the painting. 

See: The Meaning of Skin Color in Eighteenth Dynasty Egypt:
https://www.academia.edu/353602/The_..._Dynasty_Egypt

If this is a veiled discussion of "race", I think it strains the bonds of credulity to think that North Africans did not contain an SSA before the modern era. I would agree that it may not have been as large as it is today for most North Africans, but that is another matter.

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## Johannes

> I wonder why it's so important to make the Libyans "whiter" than the Syrians? 
> 
> Regardless, I don't see any difference, and nor do Egyptologists who I'm sure have actually seen the painting. 
> 
> See: The Meaning of Skin Color in Eighteenth Dynasty Egypt:
> https://www.academia.edu/353602/The_..._Dynasty_Egypt
> 
> If this is a veiled discussion of "race", I think it strains the bonds of credulity to think that North Africans did not contain an SSA before the modern era. I would agree that it may not have been as large as it is today for most North Africans, but that is another matter.


The colors were used to categorize the large amounts of peoples the Egyptians encountered. This did not reflect reality. The contrast was made to make a clear distinction between races or peoples. The Libyans and Berbers were probably similar to Semites but perhaps a shade darker. "Maurus" means black in Greek.

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## Angela

> The colors were used to categorize the large amounts of peoples the Egyptians encountered. This did not reflect reality. The contrast was made to make a clear distinction between races or peoples. The Libyans and Berbers were probably similar to Semites but perhaps a shade darker. "Maurus" means black in Greek.


Perhaps you should read the paper in the provided link again. The Egyptologist, who, as I pointed out above, has undoubtedly seen the paintings in person, sees no such difference in skin pigmentation. The Egyptians had a limited range of pigment. Anything you perceive as a difference is either in your imagination or the result of differential weathering. 

In addition, you seem to be unaware that fair haired and light eyed people do exist in both the Near East and North Africa, although they are indeed in the minority. I have a feeling you might be someone who has an interest in the work of the traditional physical anthropologists. Look up the plates.

Also, you might investigate things like the cave art from Tassili (3,000 BC).

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## Drac II

> I wonder why it's so important to make the Libyans "whiter" than the Syrians?


Ask the ancient Egyptians, who themselves were North Africans BTW, since it is them who portrayed them that way. Maybe it is because these lighter types were more abundant among them than among Syrians. Just look at the "pockets" of people that have such lighter pigmentation that still survive in modern times among the more isolated communities of Berbers.




> Regardless, I don't see any difference, and nor do Egyptologists who I'm sure have actually seen the painting. 
> 
> See: The Meaning of Skin Color in Eighteenth Dynasty Egypt:
> https://www.academia.edu/353602/The_..._Dynasty_Egypt


I beg to differ. Many scholars have indeed noticed that the Libyans were more prone to be stereotyped by the Egyptians as having lighter features than the other peoples they portrayed:

http://www.digital.library.upenn.edu...haraohs-3.html

"Now, the typical Libyans of ancient Egyptian art were a fair-skinned, red-haired, and blue-eyed race, whose descendants survive to this day eastward of Algeria."

https://books.google.com/books?id=JU...ans%22&f=false

"In the west their neighbors were the light-skinned, blue-eyed Libyans. In the east there were tall people with yellowish-tan skin, prominent noses, and thick facial hair, including short beards, typical of Western Asia."

https://books.google.com/books?id=6p...=0CC4Q6AEwAzgK

"...the dynastic Egyptians usually represented the Libyans as fair-skinned and blue-eyed"

https://books.google.com/books?id=lz...ns.%22&f=false

"Along the Mediterranean, at all events, there has always been a habitable region, partly pastureland and partly arable, the home of the white-skinned, red-haired, and blue-eyed people whom, following the example of the Greeks, we have come to know as Libyans."

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## Drac II

> The colors were used to categorize the large amounts of peoples the Egyptians encountered. This did not reflect reality. The contrast was made to make a clear distinction between races or peoples. The Libyans and Berbers were probably similar to Semites but perhaps a shade darker. "Maurus" means black in Greek.


Wrong, and besides the different pigmentation of hair, eyes and skin given to these different peoples we can also see that the Egyptians portrayed themselves and the Libyans as having different facial traits than the "Semites", who are given more "aquiline" features. Berbers are not "Semitic".

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## Angela

> Ask the ancient Egyptians, who themselves were North Africans BTW, since it is them who portrayed them that way. Maybe it is because these lighter types were more abundant among them than among Syrians. Just look at the "pockets" of people that have such lighter pigmentation that still survive in modern times among the more isolated communities of Berbers.
> 
> 
> 
> I beg to differ. Many scholars have indeed noticed that the Libyans were more prone to be stereotyped by the Egyptians as having lighter features than the other peoples they portrayed:
> 
> http://www.digital.library.upenn.edu...haraohs-3.html
> 
> "Now, the typical Libyans of ancient Egyptian art were a fair-skinned, red-haired, and blue-eyed race, whose descendants survive to this day eastward of Algeria."
> ...


Yes, Drac, we know: the Iberians are exemplars of "pure", "white", Europeans, and they also have significant amounts of North African dna, and therefore the "Libyans" of antiquity had to all have been blonde, redhaired, and blue eyed people. It's so obvious that one wonders why you need to repeat it over and over again. Do you perhaps think people are unpersuaded?

There do indeed appear to have been fair haired Libyans. I just posted to that effect. There were also darker Libyans. Does it appear to you that the "Libyan" in the original frieze is fair haired? If, by the prior, you are trying to imply that there was no SSA in the Libyans of that period, then I think that is highly unlikely. It's not like a minority SSA component is a stain that always shows through, you know. 

Have you seen the film "The Human Stain" by the way? It's based on a true story. You might find it informative. 

Sorry for the digression.

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## Drac II

> Do you honestly believe that Libyans and Semites looked that white-skinned as in the portraits? You yourself just said they are "stereotypes." That is exactly what I meant. The only accurate descriptions are of the Egyptians because they were black to brown in complexion. The only candidates for that description are Germanic or Celtic peoples of the north sans the braided and wooly hair.
> 
> Do you know were the the term "Maurus" comes from? It means black or very dark. This was the description of the North Africans by Greeks and Romans. NO greek or roman ever mentioned white skinned Libyans or North Africans for that matter.


Stereotypes are exaggerations based on actual facts. Obviously the Egyptians came to stereotype the Libyans as having such fair features for an actual reason. These fair types must have been pretty common among them for the Egyptians to have branded them with the stereotype, sort of like modern day Scandinavians are also stereotyped as being blonde and blue eyed, yet we can also plainly see that by no means all of them fit the bill. 

The Egyptians consistently painted themselves as not black, this is very clear as well. Darker than the Syrians and Libyans, but definitely not black. Also, their facial features are like those of the Libyans, not Negroid like that of the sub-Saharan Africans they portrayed.


The word "Maurus" just means "dark" and the Greeks themselves used it as a proper name. Do you think this implies anything? Besides, in a North African context it was only applied to the Mauretanians, who were a specific tribe. You might have been reading too many Afrocentric sources.

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## Drac II

> Yes, Drac, we know: the Iberians are exemplars of "pure", "white", Europeans, and they also have significant amounts of North African dna, and therefore the "Libyans" of antiquity had to all have been blonde, redhaired, and blue eyed people. It's so obvious that one wonders why you need to repeat it over and over again. Do you perhaps think people are unpersuaded?
> 
> There do indeed appear to have been fair haired Libyans. I just posted to that effect. There were also darker Libyans. Does it appear to you that the "Libyan" in the original frieze is fair haired? If, by the prior, you are trying to imply that there was no SSA in the Libyans of that period, then I think that is highly unlikely. It's not like a minority SSA component is a stain that always shows through, you know. 
> 
> Have you seen the film "The Human Stain" by the way? It's based on a true story. You might find it informative. 
> 
> Sorry for the digression.


Look who is talking. Perhaps you think that we don't notice that you want the Syrians to be lighter and more like Europeans because you are afraid that it will imply that Italians are also not "pure", "white" Europeans since Italians have significant amounts of Middle Eastern DNA (not to mention they also have North African, which apparently you don't want to recognize)? Sorry about your strange accusations, but I am merely stating what the Egyptians did, and has been observed by a bunch of people. If you don't like it, take it with them, not me.

PS: and I never said that all Libyans looked that way, let alone all North Africans (which includes the Egyptians themselves), only that they must have been common enough among them for the Egyptians to have stereotyped them as such.

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## Angela

> Look who is talking. Perhaps you think that we don't notice that you want the Syrians to be lighter and more like Europeans because you are afraid that it will imply that Italians are also not "pure", "white" Europeans since Italians have significant amounts of Middle Eastern DNA (not to mention they also have North African, which apparently you don't want to recognize)? Sorry about your strange accusations, but I am merely stating what the Egyptians did, and has been observed by a bunch of people. If you don't like it, take it with them, not me.
> 
> PS: and I never said that all Libyans looked that way, let alone all North Africans (which includes the Egyptians themselves), only that they must have been common enough among them for the Egyptians to have stereotyped them as such.


Do not, and I mean *DO NOT* ever attribute racist attitudes and agendas to me again. I don't give a damn about pigmentation or direction of gene flow into Europe and any idiotic supposed superiority based on it. That's anthrofora filth to which I don't give head room, and anyone who has ever honestly read any of my posts would know that.

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## Johannes

> Wrong, and besides the different pigmentation of hair, eyes and skin given to these different peoples we can also see that the Egyptians portrayed themselves and the Libyans as having different facial traits than the "Semites", who are given more "aquiline" features. Berbers are not "Semitic".


I never said Berbers were Semites. All I said is that they were similar in skin pigmentation. Don't split hairs!

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## Johannes

> Stereotypes are exaggerations based on actual facts. Obviously the Egyptians came to stereotype the Libyans as having such fair features for an actual reason. These fair types must have been pretty common among them for the Egyptians to have branded them with the stereotype, sort of like modern day Scandinavians are also stereotyped as being blonde and blue eyed, yet we can also plainly see that by no means all of them fit the bill. 
> 
> The Egyptians consistently painted themselves as not black, this is very clear as well. Darker than the Syrians and Libyans, but definitely not black. Also, their facial features are like those of the Libyans, not Negroid like that of the sub-Saharan Africans they portrayed.
> 
> 
> The word "Maurus" just means "dark" and the Greeks themselves used it as a proper name. Do you think this implies anything? Besides, in a North African context it was only applied to the Mauretanians, who were a specific tribe. You might have been reading too many Afrocentric sources.


You make no sense or you seem confused. How can you believe that Libyans must have had large numbers of lily-white and blue-eyed numbers for the Egyptians to have "stereotyped?" How can a fair-skinned people living in scorching heat of the Sahara be lily-white and be represented as lily-white??? You made me laugh again. If you believe they were that way then we are entering the realm of fantasy. I am sure there were some red haired Berbers and Semites with fair skin, but the vast majority were dark skinned. The same for Libyans. Yes the word "Maurus" means dark but what does dark mean to you? Are you trying to make dark into light? What does Morocco mean to you?

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## Johannes

> Stereotypes are exaggerations based on actual facts. Obviously the Egyptians came to stereotype the Libyans as having such fair features for an actual reason. These fair types must have been pretty common among them for the Egyptians to have branded them with the stereotype, sort of like modern day Scandinavians are also stereotyped as being blonde and blue eyed, yet we can also plainly see that by no means all of them fit the bill. 
> 
> The Egyptians consistently painted themselves as not black, this is very clear as well. Darker than the Syrians and Libyans, but definitely not black. Also, their facial features are like those of the Libyans, not Negroid like that of the sub-Saharan Africans they portrayed.
> 
> 
> The word "Maurus" just means "dark" and the Greeks themselves used it as a proper name. Do you think this implies anything? Besides, in a North African context it was only applied to the Mauretanians, who were a specific tribe. You might have been reading too many Afrocentric sources.


Here are some examples of what I was talking about**: pictures of ancient are simply representations of categories for simple folk to understand. Most people were illiterate. Thus they needed thus: 

Greeks are depicted as black. Does that make them black???


How about this one? Is one black and other white? Is this reality?

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## Johannes

> Perhaps you should read the paper in the provided link again. The Egyptologist, who, as I pointed out above, has undoubtedly seen the paintings in person, sees no such difference in skin pigmentation. The Egyptians had a limited range of pigment. Anything you perceive as a difference is either in your imagination or the result of differential weathering. 
> 
> In addition, you seem to be unaware that fair haired and light eyed people do exist in both the Near East and North Africa, although they are indeed in the minority. I have a feeling you might be someone who has an interest in the work of the traditional physical anthropologists. Look up the plates.
> 
> Also, you might investigate things like the cave art from Tassili (3,000 BC).


Please give me the link again. I cannot find it. I agree totally what you said. But dont you think that the use of color would make it easier to categorize so that simple people would understand? I mean this is for the bureaucracy in Egypt! -- the same for the Greeks!

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## Angela

> I never said Berbers were Semites. All I said is that they were similar in skin pigmentation. Don't split hairs!





> I never said Berbers were Semites. All I said is that they were similar in skin pigmentation. Don't split hairs!


What on earth are both of you talking about? Semitic is _a language._ Berber is _a language._ Both of them are languages in the Afro-Asiatic group of languages.

Regardless, do you think there is no large genetic similarity between the "Berbers" of today, even the ones who aren't Arabic speaking, as many North Africans are, and the people of the Levant? Who do you think populated North Africa? Yes, perhaps there is some minor component from the paleolithic and some more from the Mesolithic. Some recent mathematical modeling shows that they possess some percentage of ancestry from WHG hunter-gatherers. However, much of their ancestry is Neolithic from the Levant*, part of the gene flow from there that spread north, east, west and south. That's the same ancestry that created the "Semites" in case you don't know it or have forgotten it. The only major difference would indeed be some minority WHG in the western part of North Africa and the ANE which flowed into the Levant after the Neolithic but which is at low levels in North Africa.

Again, please acquaint or re-acquaint yourselves with some of the basics of the genetics, history, archaeology, and linguistics of he region before presuming to make pronouncements on these matters.

ED. *and pre-Neolithic from the Levant

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## Alan

> I wonder why it's so important to make the Libyans "whiter" than the Syrians? 
> 
> Regardless, I don't see any difference, and nor do Egyptologists who I'm sure have actually seen the painting. 
> 
> See: The Meaning of Skin Color in Eighteenth Dynasty Egypt:
> https://www.academia.edu/353602/The_..._Dynasty_Egypt
> 
> If this is a veiled discussion of "race", I think it strains the bonds of credulity to think that North Africans did not contain an SSA before the modern era. I would agree that it may not have been as large as it is today for most North Africans, but that is another matter.


Agreed

We had to discuss this a few times already. Egytpians were most likely just like Egyptians nowadays of course with some admixture nowadays both from Arabia and Sub Saharan Africa.

Ancient Egyptian language is part of the Afro_Asiatic family. Inside this family it's closest cousins are in this order 1. Semitic 2. Berber 3. Cushitic/Chadic

And therefore it is save to say that the seperation went this way. Afro Asiatic => Cushitic, Proto Semito-Egyptic-Berber
Semito-Egyptic-Berber=> Semito-Egyptic, Berber
Semito-Egyptic=> Semitic, Egyptic.

Egypt was in the middle between Semites, Berbers and Ethiopic people.

Therefore it is save to assume that they would have looked like a mix of mostly Semites and Berbers with some Ethiopic characteristic. 

The drawings are good indiciation how they looked like based on pigmentation however I wouldn't take the pigmenation for comparison as 100%. We need to see these depictions as a simple description in a extaggerated way of how these people differed. Libyan and Syro_Palestians as "light" in probably olive skinned with obvious Caucasian features. The Nubians simply as East African , Sub Saharan Blacks. And Egyptians as a brown people with Caucasoid facial features. 
I honestly doubt that Libyans or Berbers in general would have looked light haired. 

Overall the Libyan and Syro_Palestinian depiction are almost identical. Only the hair coloring on the Libyan is slightly odd and probably a individual observation of some "Egyptian artist".

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## Alan

> The colors were used to categorize the large amounts of peoples the Egyptians encountered.* This did not reflect reality. The contrast was made to make a clear distinction between races or peoples. The Libyans and Berbers were probably similar to Semites but perhaps a shade darker. "Maurus" means black in Greek.*


^This. It is just to make the differences more clear.

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## Alan

> Stereotypes are exaggerations based on actual facts.


Stereotypes are an exaggerations of Attributes which are more prevelant among one population compared to others.

If it is an attribute you know in general only in low frequency, It could be just 5% more occurance of a specific attribute compared to other populations and people would start to stereotype this people that specific way. 

I doubt that you can take the depictions too literal. They were probably meant to exaggerate , to make the differences more clear.

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## Angela

> Please give me the link again. I cannot find it. I agree totally what you said. But dont you think that the use of color would make it easier to categorize so that simple people would understand? I mean this is for the bureaucracy in Egypt! -- the same for the Greeks!


Here is the link:
See: The Meaning of Skin Color in Eighteenth Dynasty Egypt:
https://www.academia.edu/353602/The_..._Dynasty_Egypt
*Description* One of the most obvious stylistic features of Athenian black-figure vase painting is the use of color to differentiate women from men. By comparing ancient art in Egypt and Greece, Tan Men/Pale Women uncovers the complex history behind the use of color to distinguish between genders, without focusing on race. Author Mary Ann Eaverly considers the significance of this overlooked aspect of ancient art as an indicator of underlying societal ideals about the role and status of women. Such a commonplace method of gender differentiation proved to be a complex and multivalent method for expressing ideas about the relationship between men and women, a method flexible enough to encompass differing worldviews of Pharaonic Egypt and Archaic Greece. Does the standard indoor/outdoor explanation—women are light because they stay indoors—hold true everywhere, or even, in fact, in Greece? How “natural” is color-based gender differentiation, and, more critically, what relationship does color-based gender differentiation have to views about women and the construction of gender identity in the ancient societies that use it?
The depiction of dark men and light women can, as in Egypt, symbolize reconcilable opposites and, as in Greece, seemingly irreconcilable opposites where women are regarded as a distinct species from men. Eaverly challenges traditional ideas about color and gender in ancient Greek painting, reveals an important strategy used by Egyptian artists to support pharaonic ideology and the role of women as complementary opposites to men, and demonstrates that rather than representing an actual difference, skin color marks a society’s ideological view of the varied roles of male and femal

- See more at: http://www.press.umich.edu/3080238#sthash.D1NS4JUd.dpufhttps://www.academia.edu/353602/The_..._Dynasty_Egypt


The way that people are portrayed in ancient art is not about making stereotypes for simple people, or at least not in the way that you mean if I understand you. Their art reflects their world view, the symbolic meaning of certain colors or forms, their aesthetic sense, or what they considered beautiful, their social and gender class structure, the value given to certain techniques etc. 

So, for example, when looking at ancient art people have to be aware that certain conventions were followed whereby women were almost always portrayed as having lighter skin than men, and the wealthy were portrayed as lighter than field workers, for example. As I've pointed out before, ancient people weren't stupid. They could see that work in the fields made people get tan. Ergo, tan skin equals lower status...well, unless the man was a warrior, who would be expected to be hardened by the elements. Today, it's reversed. A tan indicates you're wealthy enough to get away from cold and grey skies in winter and go broil in the sun on a Caribbean Beach. Many things change, but the hunger of the human animal for status symbols never changes, even when the symbol is baked into his own skin.

See: http://www.press.umich.edu/3080238
Tan Men/Pale Women

Then, one also has to consider that certain finishes were very prized because of the difficulty in achieving them. For both the Greeks and the Etruscans, the so called "black figure" pottery was a stylistic and aesthetic _choice_ partly based on the fact that this method was extremely difficult and sophisticated.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black-figure_pottery

Within that style, they observed certain conventions:
http://www.ancient.eu/Black_Figure_Pottery/
"Certain colour conventions were adopted such as white for female flesh, black for male. Other conventions were an almond shape for women’s eyes, circular for males, children are as adults but on a smaller scale, young men are beardless, old men have white hair and sometimes stoop, and older women are fuller-figured. Some gestures also became conventional such as the hand to the head to represent grief. Another striking feature of the style is the lack of literal naturalism. Figures are often depicted with a profile face and frontal body, and runners are in the impossible position of both left (or right) arms and legs moving forward. There was, however, some attempt at achieving perspective, frontal views of horses and chariots being especially popular."

So, it's a mistake to look at Greek vases and think that Greek men were black and Greek women were white. Likewise, Egyptian portrayals of other ancient people has to be cautiously interpreted, although it's clear that they wanted to indicate a difference between Sub-Saharan Africans, themselves, and people like the Libyans and Syrians. We also have written documents, as Drac pointed out, to the effect that there were some fairer "Libyans". 

The bottom line is that I think you can get some clues about the phenotypes of ancient peoples from their art, but it has to be done cautiously and with an understanding of their art and culture, including all the issues discussed above.

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## Hauteville

These Europid phenotypes among some Berbers are just the remnants of ancient North African stock IMO.

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## Angela

> These Europid phenotypes among some Berbers are just the remnants of ancient North African stock IMO.


I'm not sure what you mean by "Europid" features. The North Africans are classified as "Caucasoids" even in old anthropological formulations, regardless of their "SSA" component, which may indeed be larger now than it was in the days when they were being depicted in ancient Egyptian art. 

Regardless, other than blue eyes, possibly, those among them who possessed pale skin or fair hair probably didn't get it from the WHG, among whom we've yet to find any of the European specific de-pigmentation genes. The best bet is some minority component among the Neolithic peoples if we're talking about the Libyans depicted by the Egyptians, or perhaps some remnant of the "Sea Peoples" who diffused into the area, and if we're talking about the North Africans of today in isolated pockets like the Rif mountains, for example, I suppose one could add in the European slaves sold in huge slave centers such as Tangiers. In this particular case women were specifically targeted and stolen for sexual purposes, and their offspring were certainly not killed. 
http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/whtslav.htm

This of course doesn't even cover the much earlier Saracen slave trade. My coast is dotted by "Saracen" towers where look outs could sound the alarm when Saracen ships were sighted. In my husband's regions the coastal areas were virtually abandoned and towns moved inland to better defended promontories.

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## Vukodav

This legend of White North Africans is the biggest joke of the Universe. Ancient Romans depicted all North Africans as extremely swarthy. The modern ones are the same with additional massive Arab and Sub Sahara admixture. I would even say that North Africans overlal more with Caraibbean mulattos than with Europeans.

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## Angela

> This legend of White North Africans is the biggest joke of the Universe. Ancient Romans depicted all North Africans as extremely swarthy. The modern ones are the same with additional massive Arab and Sub Sahara admixture. I would even say that North Africans overlal more with Caraibbean mulattos than with Europeans.


Hardly...

The accepted definition of mulatto is 50% SSA. The average for most modern North Africans seems to be around 20%. 

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets...t?pli=1#gid=24

There are, however, isolated communities in the north who have quite a bit less, going by results from 23andme, among other sources.


We don't know what the percentages were during the Bronze Age.

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## Alan

> This legend of White North Africans is the biggest joke of the Universe. Ancient Romans depicted all North Africans as extremely swarthy. The modern ones are the same with additional massive Arab and Sub Sahara admixture. I would even say that North Africans overlal more with Caraibbean mulattos than with Europeans.


A Mulatto is 50/50 mix. North Africans are at max 20% SSA. This peaks in Morocco and gets less when you reach towards Northeast. 

But than this 20% of SSA admixture is melted part of the overall Caucasian genetic ancestry of North Africans and therefore it has created a stable Caucasian look with sometimes showing SSA characteristics.

You can see a similar case with North Indians. North Indians are even a slightly more extreme example of this. They are ~30% Southeast Eurasian people yet physically look Caucasoid.

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## Vukodav

I see Moroccans on daily basis and more than a third of them look clearly SSA influenced like Dominicans or darker Puerto Ricans...

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## Drac II

> Do not, and I mean *DO NOT* ever attribute racist attitudes and agendas to me again. I don't give a damn about pigmentation or direction of gene flow into Europe and any idiotic supposed superiority based on it. That's anthrofora filth to which I don't give head room, and anyone who has ever honestly read any of my posts would know that.


Then I suggest you do likewise and do not try to project those attitudes on other forum members.

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## Drac II

> You make no sense or you seem confused. How can you believe that Libyans must have had large numbers of lily-white and blue-eyed numbers for the Egyptians to have "stereotyped?" How can a fair-skinned people living in scorching heat of the Sahara be lily-white and be represented as lily-white??? You made me laugh again. If you believe they were that way then we are entering the realm of fantasy. I am sure there were some red haired Berbers and Semites with fair skin, but the vast majority were dark skinned. The same for Libyans. Yes the word "Maurus" means dark but what does dark mean to you? Are you trying to make dark into light? What does Morocco mean to you?


The "contradiction" is purely imaginary on your part. In fact, if anything you are the one who is entering into contradictions. You seem to have no problem accepting that many Near Easterners can be light skinned, enough so for the Egyptians to have stereotyped them as being lighter than them, yet you have problems accepting the same for North Africans who also lived in similar climates. Skin pigmentation is not an exact science and does not follow strict geographical patterns, only generalized ones. You can find "swarthy" types among the natives of countries of even such climates as that of the British Isles and Norway, just like you can find fair types in such climates as that of the Middle East and North Africa.

And we are talking about how the Egyptians perceived these peoples who were their neighbors. To them the Libyans seemed like a fairer people, very likely because they had more of these fair types among them than the Egyptians had. If we look at where the majority of fair North African types are still found (Kabyles, Riffians) today we can see that it is indeed in lands west of Egypt.

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## Drac II

> Here are some examples of what I was talking about**: pictures of ancient are simply representations of categories for simple folk to understand. Most people were illiterate. Thus they needed thus: 
> 
> Greeks are depicted as black. Does that make them black???
> 
> 
> How about this one? Is one black and other white? Is this reality?


You are comparing apples with oranges. Ancient Egypt was not the same as ancient Greece. And Greek art could also be very realistic and accurate. Greek vessel portraying a Negroid face and a Caucasoid face:

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## Hauteville

> This legend of White North Africans is the biggest joke of the Universe. Ancient Romans depicted all North Africans as extremely swarthy. The modern ones are the same with additional massive Arab and Sub Sahara admixture. I would even say that North Africans overlal more with Caraibbean mulattos than with Europeans.


I see North Africans everyday and most of them look SSA influenced and the rest look like gulf Arabs (especially the Tunisians and the Egyptians).
The few like Zidane are a rarity.

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## Drac II

> Agreed
> 
> We had to discuss this a few times already. Egytpians were most likely just like Egyptians nowadays of course with some admixture nowadays both from Arabia and Sub Saharan Africa.
> 
> Ancient Egyptian language is part of the Afro_Asiatic family. Inside this family it's closest cousins are in this order 1. Semitic 2. Berber 3. Cushitic/Chadic
> 
> And therefore it is save to say that the seperation went this way. Afro Asiatic => Cushitic, Proto Semito-Egyptic-Berber
> Semito-Egyptic-Berber=> Semito-Egyptic, Berber
> Semito-Egyptic=> Semitic, Egyptic.
> ...


What you are agreeing with is actually with what I have said. Except that you did not notice that it is not just one depiction of Libyans that stereotypes them as such, but many. Read the quotes I provided summarizing the observations of scholars who have taken a look at many of these paintings of Libyans in Egyptian art. They have noticed this regular portrayal of them with lighter features. Obviously this recurring stereotype must have a foundation on actual facts. No one seems to question the Egyptians' portrayals of sub-Saharan Africans, Near Easterners and themselves, yet for some odd reason some want to vehemently deny their depictions of Libyans. The only logical conclusion one can derive from it is that the Libyans must have had a larger proportion of people with these features, enough so that the Egyptians noticed it and branded them with the stereotype, much like what many modern people still do with many nationalities (ex: Germans are tall, blonde, blue eyed "Aryans"), even though a more objective look reveals that they are exaggerations.

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## Drac II

> I see North Africans everyday and most of them look SSA influenced and the rest look like gulf Arabs (especially the Tunisians and the Egyptians).
> The few like Zidane are a rarity.


One has to consider the sub-Saharan slave trade in the area, in Egypt in particular going as far back as Pharaonic times. You can also point out similar things in the Middle East and other areas of North Africa during Islamic times. With the gradual expansion of this religion into sub-Saharan Africa increasingly more and more slaves and also free converted natives found their way into these areas. Anyone interested in the subject should read the comments about black Africa and its inhabitants (usually called "Zanj") by Arab and Berber historians and travelers from the Middle Ages, like Ibn Battuta and Ibn Khaldun. Warning: some of these comments sound extremely racist to our modern ears. They are only useful in the sense that they give us an idea of the gradually increasing contact between the Arabs and Berbers of Islamic times and the "pagan" Africans from below the Sahara as Islam made incursions into these lands.

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## Hauteville

Black slaves in North Africans are the Gnawa, of course some mixing with them and the Tuareg has influenced modern Maghrebi population but Maghreb was also colonized by Arab tribes of Banu Hilal and replaced the original Berbers in many parts of the Maghreb.
So, who knows how the original Berbers looked?maybe these Kabyles are the purest descendent of them?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banu_Hilal

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnawa

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## Vukodav

> That is hardly the case. The physical characterizations in those old paintings are quite clear. There is no reason why the Egyptians should have been accurate in their depiction of black Africans and for some mysterious reason they would not apply the same parameters to themselves and Syro-Palestinians and Libyans. We can tell very well that each of these groups were generally stereotyped as follows in Egyptian art (from darkest to lightest):
> 
> 1- Nubians/Africans from below Egypt: very dark skin, very curly hair, dark eyes, Negroid facial features
> 
> 2- Egyptians: lighter skinned than sub-Saharan Africans, straight or wavy dark hair when not braided, dark eyes, Caucasoid facial features 
> 
> 3- Syro-Palestinians: lighter skinned than the Egyptians but often with a yellowish "tinge", straight or wavy dark hair, dark eyes, Caucasoid facial features
> 
> 4- Libyans: the palest skinned types in Egyptian art, straight or wavy hair when not braided and usually lighter in color, often with light eyes too, Caucasoid facial features
> ...


That image is an artistic rendering, based on a mural from the tomb of Seti I, not a real image.

There is not a single written evidence that ancient Egyptians viewed Lybians and Arabs as light skinned.

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## Hauteville

> I see Moroccans on daily basis and more than a third of them look clearly SSA influenced like Dominicans or darker Puerto Ricans...


I agree.
I have been in Tunisia and among them there were a significant minority of pure black population who live in the cities, i dunno if they are recent immigrants of descendent of the slaves though.

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## Alan

> I see North Africans everyday and most of them look SSA influenced and the rest look like gulf Arabs (especially the Tunisians and the Egyptians).
> The few like Zidane are a rarity.


I have also seen allot of them. Moroccons looked either fully Caucasian or im some cases SSA admixed. Tunesians looked entirely Caucasian, some like Levantines and Iraqis and some like Yemenites. Well among the Egyptians I haven't seen any SSA admixed looking ones. Yet I know they exist. 

Take in mind the guys in the image have a strong tan. The guys in the image look Caucasian similar to Yemenites. And as Angela said SSA admixture in North Africa exists since very ancient times and earlier. Not so strong as nowadays but still there.

----------


## Hauteville

North African average is around 20% SSA admixed autosomally and in places like southern Morocco the average is higher, so they are SSA influenced.
The guys in the photo above are the average Maghrebi you can see everywhere in Italy.

----------


## Vukodav

North Africans score 20% of SSA admixture, without outliers. Otherwise it's much higher than that.

There is one Mozabite Berber from Behar et al. who scores 60% of SSA admixture.

----------


## Johannes

> You are comparing apples with oranges. Ancient Egypt was not the same as ancient Greece. And Greek art could also be very realistic and accurate. Greek vessel portraying a Negroid face and a Caucasoid face:


You did not understanding what I was saying. All I tried to show you is that the Greeks did not use color to determine a phenotype. The vase I showed you is a clear indication of that. For some strange reason the Greeks used black to portray Greek males. Of course they were not black but they are represented in black color. This explains the Egyptian depictions as not representing reality. I am beginning to think you are stubborn and you like to split hairs. Aristotle once stated that the Greeks were between the northern barbarians (who have white skin) and the Ethiopians (who have black skin). This clearly indicates that the ancient Greeks were either brown or light brown in complexion and this is likewise the same for the Semites and Berbers -- I will even go so far as to say the Romans as well! -- even the Iberians.

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## Johannes

> ^This. It is just to make the differences more clear.


That is what I meant and was telling Drac but he continues to claim they were white blah blah blah. The Egyptians were very dark and they exaggerated to make a clear distinctions between the races they saw.

----------


## Johannes

> Here is the link:
> See: The Meaning of Skin Color in Eighteenth Dynasty Egypt:
> https://www.academia.edu/353602/The_..._Dynasty_Egypt
> *Description*
> 
> One of the most obvious stylistic features of Athenian black-figure vase painting is the use of color to differentiate women from men. By comparing ancient art in Egypt and Greece, Tan Men/Pale Women uncovers the complex history behind the use of color to distinguish between genders, without focusing on race. Author Mary Ann Eaverly considers the significance of this overlooked aspect of ancient art as an indicator of underlying societal ideals about the role and status of women. Such a commonplace method of gender differentiation proved to be a complex and multivalent method for expressing ideas about the relationship between men and women, a method flexible enough to encompass differing worldviews of Pharaonic Egypt and Archaic Greece. Does the standard indoor/outdoor explanation—women are light because they stay indoors—hold true everywhere, or even, in fact, in Greece? How “natural” is color-based gender differentiation, and, more critically, what relationship does color-based gender differentiation have to views about women and the construction of gender identity in the ancient societies that use it?
> The depiction of dark men and light women can, as in Egypt, symbolize reconcilable opposites and, as in Greece, seemingly irreconcilable opposites where women are regarded as a distinct species from men. Eaverly challenges traditional ideas about color and gender in ancient Greek painting, reveals an important strategy used by Egyptian artists to support pharaonic ideology and the role of women as complementary opposites to men, and demonstrates that rather than representing an actual difference, skin color marks a society’s ideological view of the varied roles of male and femal
> 
> - See more at: http://www.press.umich.edu/3080238#sthash.D1NS4JUd.dpufhttps://www.academia.edu/353602/The_..._Dynasty_Egypt
> ...



Thank you for the information. You misunderstood: I did not mean to say that Greek men were black. What I was trying to show Drac was that colors were symbolic and did not reflect reality -- I mean exact reality. You basically agree with what I was saying (to be honest Angela, all this information is not new) and agree with what I have been saying, its just that you add more information. All I was trying to tell Drac was that portraits of people in ancient art was basically symbolic and made -- like you said -- for the purpose of distinguishing peoples and sexes.

----------


## Johannes

> I'm not sure what you mean by "Europid" features. The North Africans are classified as "Caucasoids" even in old anthropological formulations, regardless of their "SSA" component, which may indeed be larger now than it was in the days when they were being depicted in ancient Egyptian art. 
> 
> Regardless, other than blue eyes, possibly, those among them who possessed pale skin or fair hair probably didn't get it from the WHG, among whom we've yet to find any of the European specific de-pigmentation genes. The best bet is some minority component among the Neolithic peoples if we're talking about the Libyans depicted by the Egyptians, or perhaps some remnant of the "Sea Peoples" who diffused into the area, and if we're talking about the North Africans of today in isolated pockets like the Rif mountains, for example, I suppose one could add in the European slaves sold in huge slave centers such as Tangiers. In this particular case women were specifically targeted and stolen for sexual purposes, and their offspring were certainly not killed. 
> http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/whtslav.htm
> 
> This of course doesn't even cover the much earlier Saracen slave trade. My coast is dotted by "Saracen" towers where look outs could sound the alarm when Saracen ships were sighted. In my husband's regions the coastal areas were virtually abandoned and towns moved inland to better defended promontories.


Angela you forget that millions of Iberian Muslims fled Europe during the 12-13th centuries. I dont understand why people do not know about the ethnic cleansing of Andalusia.

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## Johannes

> The "contradiction" is purely imaginary on your part. In fact, if anything you are the one who is entering into contradictions. You seem to have no problem accepting that many Near Easterners can be light skinned, enough so for the Egyptians to have stereotyped them as being lighter than them, yet you have problems accepting the same for North Africans who also lived in similar climates. Skin pigmentation is not an exact science and does not follow strict geographical patterns, only generalized ones. You can find "swarthy" types among the natives of countries of even such climates as that of the British Isles and Norway, just like you can find fair types in such climates as that of the Middle East and North Africa.
> 
> And we are talking about how the Egyptians perceived these peoples who were their neighbors. To them the Libyans seemed like a fairer people, very likely because they had more of these fair types among them than the Egyptians had. If we look at where the majority of fair North African types are still found (Kabyles, Riffians) today we can see that it is indeed in lands west of Egypt.


Stereotypes usually involve the majority of phenotypes not their minority. You are saying that a few light-skinned Libyans represented the majority in Egypt. I am willing to agree with you if Egyptians only saw the light skinned types. But since ancient Egyptians were of Libyan stock and they lived next to Libya, I doubt they would have chosen a minority to represent the race. The same with the Semites. The fair-skinned Berbers are a result of Iberian Muslims who fled the Christians and the 1 million other European slaves captured. Read history.

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## Hauteville

Vandals and Romans too at this point.

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## Hauteville

> Angela you forget that millions of Iberian Muslims fled Europe during the 12-13th centuries. I dont understand why people do not know about the ethnic cleansing of Andalusia.


Here the numbers of Moriscos expelled by regions.

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expulsi...#Consecuencias

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## Angela

> Angela you forget that millions of Iberian Muslims fled Europe during the 12-13th centuries. I dont understand why people do not know about the ethnic cleansing of Andalusia.



Where on earth do you get the idea that anyone on this Board is denying that there was an expulsion of the Moriscos from Spain? Please refrain from making blanket generalizations or accusations when it's clear that you haven't bothered to read any of the numerous threads on this subject which have been published here, and so have absolutely no basis for your comments.

On the matter of the expulsion of the Moriscos from Spain, and the Sephardics, for that matter, no reputable academic researcher denies that it happened. However, academics are indeed divided as to whether all of them were expelled or some minority remained. 

See: Rhetoric and Reality in Early Modern Spain, edited by Richard Pym
One of the relevant sections begins on page 22.
https://books.google.com/books?hl=en...Behind&f=false

To pretend that there is total agreement on the matter in the academic community is dishonest. As to the skew in geographic distribution, it is documented that after the revolt of the Valencian Moriscos they were resettled in northern and eastern parts of the country. Certain scholars maintain that indeed Valencia was one of the regions where the expulsion was most effective. That may or may not be the case.

If anyone were interested in my personal opinion on the matter I would say that much of the "North African" uniparental and autosomal presence in Iberia is probably pre-historic, with a lot of it coming in the Neolithic. I also think it's unlikely, however, that every last Morisco was rooted out. There is the also the fact that there was intermarriage into the "Old Christian" community and that would have had an impact as well.

Some more clarity could be achieved if an analysis was done of lineages like E-M81 to determine subclades of it and their age, as was done for mtDna U6. Some ancient dna from that period would be nice too. Without well done genetic studies that drill into the details it's difficult to come to any conclusions. Well, it's difficult if you're trying to be objective

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## Hauteville

Anyway muslims and moriscos were expelled also from Sicily, Malta and surely from Crete as well.

http://www.stupormundi.it/bianchi.htm

This link talk about ethnic cleansing.

http://www.stupormundi.it/ceramiche.htm

Both are italians, I can translate if you want.

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## Alan

> . Aristotle once stated that the Greeks were between the northern barbarians (who have white skin) and the Ethiopians (who have black skin). This clearly indicates that the ancient Greeks were either brown or light brown in complexion and this is likewise the same for the Semites and Berbers -- I will even go so far as to say the Romans as well! -- even the Iberians.


^this. It will be against some peoples world view but I imagine the majority of ancient Greeks and Romans to have been slightly more "Mediterranean" looking as modern once who have been the target of dozen migrations from North (Germanic, Slavic, Celtic and North Iranic tribes). Heck Xenephon even mentions once, when he and his 100000 men army travel towards Media to assist the Persians against the Medes, that the Iranic groups of that region where lighter skinned than the Greek soldiers who were probably slightly tanned in the sun. Therefore it is save to assume that the Greeks were overall olive skinned people.

I have seen some ancient portraits of Romans and man those looked like how North Europeans "stereotype" the typical Mditerraneans. light Olive/light brown skin color with mostly dark hair. Of course it is out of doubt that just like nowadays a significant number of lighter featured people existed. But they were probably in smaller number as compared to today.

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## Alan

> That is what I meant and was telling Drac but he continues to claim they were white blah blah blah. The Egyptians were very dark and they exaggerated to make a clear distinctions between the races they saw.



I agree with you but certanly they weren't "very dark". More of a brown tone, how we see it in North India. Some Greek historians even compares the Egyptians to Indians (Known India back than was Pakistan and North India) based on pigmentation.


I imagine the ancient Egyptians this way.

http://abcnews.go.com/images/Interna...0425_wblog.jpg
http://www.cairorush.com/wp-content/...5/04/asser.jpg
http://www.whilemusic.com/Content/Album/Album_9059.jpg
http://travelblog.portfoliocollectio...mages/mido.png
http://nilesports.com/wp-content/upl...ty-striker.jpg

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## Alan

> But since ancient Egyptians were of Libyan stock and they lived next to Libya,


Nah, not true. Egyptian was closer to Semitic than Berber.Therefore Egyptians wouldb be more of a similar stock to Semites, which is genetically also the case, Egyptians have FAR less WHG and less SSA admixture than other North Africans and at the same time 4% ANE and slightly more ENF.

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## Vukodav

> Stereotypes usually involve the majority of phenotypes not their minority. You are saying that a few light-skinned Libyans represented the majority in Egypt. I am willing to agree with you if Egyptians only saw the light skinned types. But since ancient Egyptians were of Libyan stock and they lived next to Libya, I doubt they would have chosen a minority to represent the race. The same with the Semites. The fair-skinned Berbers are a result of Iberian Muslims who fled the Christians and the 1 million other European slaves captured. Read history.


This is another legend. North West Africans lack the ANE component, so they obviously don't have recent Iberian admixture.

Light types exist among all Caucasoids. For example North Caucasians are about 10% light eyed and 2% blonde.

----------


## Vukodav

> North African average is around 20% SSA admixed autosomally and in places like southern Morocco the average is higher, so they are SSA influenced.
> The guys in the photo above are the average Maghrebi you can see everywhere in Italy.


Indeed. Notice how Yemeni Arabs have more SSA than the Egyptians. Some Yemeni outliers look almost like they have 40% SSA. Overall all Afro Asiatic speakers, including the Lebanese and the Syrians score between 5% and 10% of SSA.

In Henn et al 2012, Qataris from the Persian Gulf have also a significant amount of SSA. About half of them are on par with Moroccans or Algerians.

----------


## Hauteville

> This is another legend. North West Africans lack the ANE component, so they obviously don't have recent Iberian admixture.
> 
> Light types exist among all Caucasoids. For example North Caucasians are about 10% light eyed and 2% blonde.


True.



By the way, Sant'Agostino d'Ippona was a Berber saint in the Roman era.
Imo these "white" looking minority derived from the ancient Berber stock (Mechta Afalou was somewhat depigmented right?), but they are a really small percentage in north Africa nowadays.

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## Drac II

> That image is an artistic rendering, based on a mural from the tomb of Seti I, not a real image.
> 
> There is not a single written evidence that ancient Egyptians viewed Lybians and Arabs as light skinned.


Those are representations of how the Egyptians perceived themselves and the people of the nations that surrounded them. The pigments chosen to represent each nation are about as indicative of their perception of them as are the generally accurate facial features they chose to portray them with. They are based on real things, these are not representations of imaginary gods, but real people whom the Egyptians were well acquainted with.

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## Drac II

> You did not understanding what I was saying. All I tried to show you is that the Greeks did not use color to determine a phenotype. The vase I showed you is a clear indication of that. For some strange reason the Greeks used black to portray Greek males. Of course they were not black but they are represented in black color. This explains the Egyptian depictions as not representing reality. I am beginning to think you are stubborn and you like to split hairs. Aristotle once stated that the Greeks were between the northern barbarians (who have white skin) and the Ethiopians (who have black skin). This clearly indicates that the ancient Greeks were either brown or light brown in complexion and this is likewise the same for the Semites and Berbers -- I will even go so far as to say the Romans as well! -- even the Iberians.


Whatever the cultural trait is that made the Greeks sometimes use black pigment for non-black people, it is not part of the Egyptian culture. Again, comparing apples with oranges. The depictions of the different nations known to the Egyptians are pretty clear and consistent, they are not some strange "coincidence" or some mysterious reason that would make them totally ignore reality only when it comes to pigmentation but not when it comes to other traits like facial features.

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## Drac II

> That is what I meant and was telling Drac but he continues to claim they were white blah blah blah. The Egyptians were very dark and they exaggerated to make a clear distinctions between the races they saw.


Darker when compared to the Libyans and Syrians, but not really so when compared to the sub-Saharan Africans, as their paintings indicate. And you are not telling me anything that I haven't already told you. These are obviously stereotypes and generalizations, but based on actual facts.

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## Drac II

> Stereotypes usually involve the majority of phenotypes not their minority. You are saying that a few light-skinned Libyans represented the majority in Egypt. I am willing to agree with you if Egyptians only saw the light skinned types. But since ancient Egyptians were of Libyan stock and they lived next to Libya, I doubt they would have chosen a minority to represent the race. The same with the Semites. The fair-skinned Berbers are a result of Iberian Muslims who fled the Christians and the 1 million other European slaves captured. Read history.


Not necessarily, a stereotype can be based on just a frequent trait, but not necessarily the majority. Do you think most Germans really fit the "blonde blue-eyed Aryan" bill? Anyone who has seen many of them will obviously disagree. Yet look how common it is. All it would take is for the Libyans to have had quite more of these fairer types among them for the Egyptians to have noticed it and then stereotype them.

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## Alan

> 



Thats the second time I see that chart thrown into the room, As far as I know this chart is not scientific but made by one User based on his *opinion*.
The chart is completely out of sense. He obviously went the Anthroboard stereotype.

Giving ther frequency of hair and eye color by exact percentage is ridicilous to begin with because not even scientist can know exactly the percentage but this guy thinks he knows that Poland has exactly 1% more blonde hair than Switzerland? A scientifc paper would use an interval (from-to percentage).

Use at least actual semi academic data.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eqhQhrOT-C...neral--lig.png
https://westernparadigm.files.wordpr....jpg%3Fw%3D500
http://www.google.de/url?source=imgr...Sg-zd4Y01sRhWA
http://www.google.de/url?source=imgr...DdBvpAM11OuFvw

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...ration_map.png
http://www.mappery.com/maps/Europe-B...ediumthumb.jpg

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## Vukodav

North Africans are primarly descended from Semitic people. That's evident by looking at their Y-dna lineages. The main Semitic lineage, namely the J-P58, is extremely common in all North Africa.

Most North Africans were not tested for J-P58, but the ones who were tested had plenty of it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_J-M267#Africa

Frequency of J-P58.

Egypt: 19.7%
Tunisia (Sousse): 25.9%
Tunisia (Tunis): 31.1%
Tunisia (Sened Berbers): 31.4%
Tunisia (Andalusian Zaghouan): 43.8%
Tunisia (Cosmopolitan Tunis): 24.2%

Now for Middle Eastern Semites:

Qatar: 56.9%
UAE: 34.8%
Yemen: 67.7%
Oman: 37.2%
Ashkenazi Jews (Cohanim): 46.0%
Bedouin Negev: 64.3%
Syria (Sunni from Hama): 44.4%

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## Drac II

> Thats the second time I see that chart thrown into the room, As far as I know this chart is not scientific but made by one User based on his *opinion*.
> The chart is completely out of sense. He obviously went the Anthroboard stereotype.
> 
> Giving ther frequency of hair and eye color by exact percentage is ridicilous to begin with because not even scientist can know exactly the percentage but this guy thinks he knows that Poland has exactly 1% more blonde hair than Switzerland? A scientifc paper would use an interval (from-to percentage).


Perhaps the author of the chart compiled the results out of pigmentation surveys for all these countries? The percentages would not be meant as absolute fixed values but averages based on the results of the samples. Example: if you take a sample of 1000 random Swedes and find that 500 of them are blond/blondish and light eyed that gives you an estimate of about 50% of them having those traits. These figures are based on statistics and are meant as approximations, not as absolute constant values that never change. 

Does anyone around here know the actual origin of the figures shown in the chart?

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## Alan

> North Africans are primarly descended from Semitic people. That's evident by looking at their Y-dna lineages. The main Semitic lineage, namely the J-P58, is extremely common in all North Africa.
> 
> Most North Africans were not tested for J-P58, but the ones who were tested had plenty of it.
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_J-M267#Africa
> 
> Frequency of J-P58.
> 
> Egypt: 19.7%
> ...


J1-P58 is not the proto_Semitic lineage. E1b1b* is. The lineage which distinguishes Semites from the other Afro_Astiatic speakers is the fusion with J1-P58.

The further you went to the supposed homeland of Afro-Asiatic speakers the more equal E1b1b and P58 get. When a branch of Afro_Asiatic speakers reached modern day Jordan, they merged with the local J1-P58 and became the Proto_Semites.

North Africans are for most what they were back than. Still 70-80% of North Africans are E1b1b*. North Africas was already in ancient times the target of Semiet people such as the Phoenicians. At least half of the J1-p58 can be contributed to them. 
As mentioned above Egyptians is the closest cousin to Semite and bordering Levant it is very save to assume that they had a good chunk of J1-P58 since the beginning too. The Arabian expansion into North Africa change the genetic landscape at ~10%

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## Alan

> Perhaps the author of the chart compiled the results out of pigmentation surveys for all these countries? The percentages would not be meant as absolute fixed values but averages based on the results of the samples. Example: if you take a sample of 1000 random Swedes and find that 500 of them are blond/blondish and light eyed that gives you an estimate of about 50% of them having those traits. These figures are based on statistics and are meant as approximations, not as absolute constant values that never change. 
> *
> Does anyone around here know the actual origin of the figures shown in the chart?*


 I have seen the Thread this chart was published the guy said it is based on "images he saw on the World Wide Web and his own estimation from it". So it is not worth the space.

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## Vukodav

> J1-P58 is not the proto_Semitic lineage. E1b1b* is. The lineage which distinguishes Semites from the other Afro_Astiatic speakers is the fusion with J1-P58.
> 
> The further you went to the supposed homeland of Afro-Asiatic speakers the more equal E1b1b and P58 get. When a branch of Afro_Asiatic speakers reached modern day Jordan, they merged with the local J1-P58 and became the Proto_Semites.
> 
> North Africans are for most what they were back than. Still 70-80% of North Africans are E1b1b*. North Africas was already in ancient times the target of Semiet people such as the Phoenicians. At least half of the J1-p58 can be contributed to them. 
> As mentioned above Egyptians is the closest cousin to Semite and bordering Levant it is very save to assume that they had a good chunk of J1-P58 since the beginning too. The Arabian expansion into North Africa change the genetic landscape at ~10%


J-P58 may not be the original proto Semitic haplotype, but its diffusion in Africa correlates with the spread of Semitic languages from the Southern Levant, Arabia and Gulf countries.

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## Vukodav

> I have also seen allot of them. Moroccons looked either fully Caucasian or im some cases SSA admixed. Tunesians looked entirely Caucasian, some like Levantines and Iraqis and some like Yemenites. Well among the Egyptians I haven't seen any SSA admixed looking ones. Yet I know they exist. 
> 
> Take in mind the guys in the image have a strong tan. The guys in the image look Caucasian similar to Yemenites. And as Angela said SSA admixture in North Africa exists since very ancient times and earlier. Not so strong as nowadays but still there.


Wrong, Sub-Saharan ancestry in North Africa appeared after the fall of the Roman Empire.




> Mitochondrial DNA Research in the Dakhleh Oasis, Egypt
> Alison M. Graver, Ryan L. Parr, Sandra Walters, Renée C. Praymak, Jennifer M. Maki and J.El Molto
> 
> Molecular genetic research is being conducted as part of the Dakhleh Oasis Project (DOP), an international and multi-disciplinary research initiative in the western desert of Egypt. Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is being analyzed from both ancient human skeletal remains associated with the Roman period town of Kellis (100 to 450 AD) and contemporary inhabitants of the Dakhleh Oasis. The primary objectives of this research are to derive paleogenetic information about the inhabitants of ancient Kellis, and to develop a picture of change over time within this desert oasis. *Preliminary mtDNA restriction site data and control region sequence variability suggest significant genetic differences exist between the ancient and modern oasis populations*
> 
> To obtain the frequencies of these mtDNA types, ampliﬁcation of the HVRI region and three RFLP markers was conducted. The authors succeeded in analysing RFLP markers in 34 samples and HVRI sequences in 18 of the samples. Both populations, ancient and contemporary, ﬁt the north-south clinal distribution of “southern” and “northern” mtDNA types (Graver et al. 2001). However, signiﬁcant differences were found between these populations. Based on an increased frequency of HpaI 3592 (+) haplotypes in the contemporary Dakhlehian population, *the authors suggested that, since Roman times, gene ﬂow from the Sub-Saharan region has affected gene frequencies of individuals from the oasis.*

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## Johannes

> You are comparing apples with oranges. Ancient Egypt was not the same as ancient Greece. And Greek art could also be very realistic and accurate.


Greek vessel portraying a Negroid face and a Caucasoid face:
The Greek figures depicted above are just shown as a contrast to the light background and thus are depicted dark. This is only symbolism. BUT the "Caucasoid face" does not look European. It looks typically Middle Eastern and brown and definitely not "European."

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## Angela

> Greek vessel portraying a Negroid face and a Caucasoid face:
> The Greek figures depicted above are just shown as a contrast to the light background and thus are depicted dark. This is only symbolism. BUT the "Caucasoid face" does not look European. It looks typically Middle Eastern and brown and definitely not "European."


"Caucasian" comes from the Caucasus. The kind of old school physical anthropologists who came up with these classifications had "Georgians" in mind. Ever seen any Georgians? The majority of them don't look like Swedes. 
http://orcasissues.com/wp-content/up...e-Ensemble.jpg


The face on the right is most probably modeled from a Greek. It's very similar to the the classic Attic Greek face. Last time I checked they were both European and Caucasian.
http://greeklandscapes.com/image-sli...ulpture-03.jpg

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## Johannes

> Here the numbers of Moriscos expelled by regions.
> 
> http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expulsi...#Consecuencias


What are you talking about??? I told you the ethnic cleansing of Muslims was severe and it happened during the 12-13th centuries and you give me information about the 17th century??? Why are people in this post so ignorant? After the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa 1212 the Christians killed thousands of Muslim warriors and all of Andalusia was liberated (except little Granada). According to the chronicles all Muslims were expelled from Sevilla and Cordova. And all the Muslims from Cadiz, Huelva, Jerez, fled into either Granada or Morocco.

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## Fire Haired14

I'd say West Eurasian is the best term to use. Then East Asian is another very real genetic-signal.

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## Angela

> I'd say West Eurasian is the best term to use. Then East Asian is another very real genetic-signal.


Exactly, Fire-Haired.

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## Angela

> What are you talking about??? I told you the ethnic cleansing of Muslims was severe and it happened during the 12-13th centuries and you give me information about the 17th century??? Why are people in this post so ignorant? After the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa 1212 the Christians killed thousands of Muslim warriors and all of Andalusia was liberated (except little Granada). According to the chronicles all Muslims were expelled from Sevilla and Cordova. And all the Muslims from Cadiz, Huelva, Jerez, fled into either Granada or Morocco.


I don't see the difficulty here. Why would the fact that Muslims were expelled in the 12th-13th century mean that there weren't plenty of them still around to be expelled in the 17th century? Also, why were there revolts of the Moriscos in the later centuries in Valencia if they had all already been exiled to Granada?

I would recommend the following book for a thorough analysis of the difficult and protracted process involved in expelling the Moriscos from Spain.
https://books.google.com/books?hl=en...Behind&f=false

----------


## Drac II

> Greek vessel portraying a Negroid face and a Caucasoid face:
> The Greek figures depicted above are just shown as a contrast to the light background and thus are depicted dark. This is only symbolism. BUT the "Caucasoid face" does not look European. It looks typically Middle Eastern and brown and definitely not "European."


"Symbolism" based obviously on direct observation of actual people. Once again, we are not talking about depictions of things that nobody has seen, like mythological beings, but representations of human types.

Caucasoid peoples have a wide range of phenotypical variation, which includes skin pigmentation, which is in fact ultimately what this thread is about. You are apparently under the mistaken impression that Europe has only been inhabited by Caucasoids who should be pale as ghosts. Also, the Caucasoid man in the Greek vase has a typically "European" facial profile. If you look at the Egyptian representations of Near Easterners, you will see that those ones do in fact have more of the stereotypical profile of "Middle Easterners". But then again you seem to think that all these ancient people were blind or stupid and were not capable of discerning such differences and portraying them except mysteriously when it came to the case of Negroid people, since you keep insisting that these portraits are just some sort of abstract symbolism.

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## Drac II

It should be pointed out here that the large majority of the much talked about "Moriscos" were descendants of the Iberian converts to Islam, not Arab or Berber foreigners. 16th-17th century paintings and illustrations by both Spaniards and foreigners in Spain who witnessed the expulsions of these "Moriscos" show that phenotypically most of them were hardly any different from the Spanish Christians persecuting them, the only way to tell most of them apart from one another is in fact by the clothes they wear and not by their physical appearance:

http://www.arauco.org/SAPEREAUDE/ter...0Morisques.jpg

http://www.arauco.org/SAPEREAUDE/ter...t%20Mestre.jpg

http://admin.religionenlibertad.com/...delosmoris.jpg

http://lamarinaplaza.com/wp-content/...r-Mercader.jpg

http://loffit.abc.es/wp-content/uplo...za-Morisca.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...ch_105-106.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...ch_103-104.jpg

https://ernesto51.files.wordpress.co...isca.jpg?w=655

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-trA8SDk18a...0/Moriscos.jpg

https://c4.staticflickr.com/8/7308/1...5df90375_b.jpg

Thus this "ethnic cleansing" was really of a religious nature, similar to what happens in the Balkans even today between Christians and Muslims, the majority of whom are in fact descended from the native inhabitants not from Turkish foreigners.

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## Johannes

> It should be pointed out here that the large majority of the much talked about "Moriscos" were descendants of the Iberian converts to Islam, not Arab or Berber foreigners. 16th-17th century paintings and illustrations by both Spaniards and foreigners in Spain who witnessed the expulsions of these "Moriscos" show that phenotypically most of them were hardly any different from the Spanish Christians persecuting them, the only way to tell most of them apart from one another is in fact by the clothes they wear and not by their physical appearance:
> 
> http://www.arauco.org/SAPEREAUDE/ter...0Morisques.jpg
> 
> http://www.arauco.org/SAPEREAUDE/ter...t%20Mestre.jpg
> 
> http://admin.religionenlibertad.com/...delosmoris.jpg
> 
> http://lamarinaplaza.com/wp-content/...r-Mercader.jpg
> ...


Yes but not before my friend. You are absolutely right about the Moriscos. However, I was talking before about the ethnic cleansing of the Moors during the 13th century after the battle of Las Navas de Tolosa 1212. After the battle the vast majority of the Muslim population was either forced to flee or were massacred. I dont recall all the details as it has been 20 years since I read all the journals on Medieval History of the Iberian Peninsula. All I remember is that the numbers of Muslims that were removed were very large. For example, the cities of Ubeda and Baeza were completely empty when the Christians took them (I believe all the inhabitants of Ubeda fled and the the ones on Beaza were massacred -- including children and all the animals). I also remember that ALL the Muslims from Seville and Cordova were expelled and not allowed to return. Jaen, Jerez, and Cadiz also lost a large amount of Muslims. Muslims fled because they were terrified of the Christians and they could not accept being ruled by infidels. Therefore, the majority (probably millions) of the Muslim population was reduced by massacres and voluntary and forced expulsions. Most fled to Granada and Morocco. This was done by Castilians. The Aragonese, on the other hand, were not as ruthless and allowed many to stay. Many Muslims accepted being ruled by Aragonese in Valencia but were eventually were expelled during the 17th century. The Castillians under Alfonso VIII and his grandson Ferdinand III could have easily conquered Granada. But the wars had depleted the king's treasury and the expulsions of the Muslims dramatically reduced tax revenues. The kings of Castile needed money. They even begged the Christians of the North (even the French and some say the German peasants) to come and settle on cheap land in Andalusia. But the idiots refused. If they would have accepted the lots of land being sold by the kings of Castile many Christians would have become wealthy, and would have created a new middle class, which would have changed the history of Spain and Europe. Thus, vast tracts of land were sold to the Church, the Military Orders, and the nobility at cut rate prices. But this took time and the kings needed cash. Thus the Kingdom of Granada was allowed to exist because it became the cash cow of the Kings of Castile. I should add that the Black Plague saved the Muslims well). The Muslims that were left in Spain numbered no more than 250,000 by the 17th century. So if we make some calculations: during the Middle Ages there were some 2 millions of Muslims (if we take 4 millions as a total population in the peninsula). So A LOT of Muslims were removed from Europe.

It was not just the Muslims who were ethnically cleansed. The Almoravides expelled all the Christians and Jews from Andalusia, Valencia, and Saragossa. The Almoravides were Muslim fundamentalists who wanted to create and apartheid state between Muslims and non Muslims. Thus they could not tolerate infidels anymore. This was idiotic because 1/4 to 1/3 of the southern population shifted to the north and added to the coffers of the kings and provided much needed manpower to crush the Muslims.

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## Drac II

> Yes but not before my friend. You are absolutely right about the Moriscos. However, I was talking before about the ethnic cleansing of the Moors during the 13th century after the battle of Las Navas de Tolosa 1212. After the battle the vast majority of the Muslim population was either forced to flee or were massacred. I dont recall all the details as it has been 20 years since I read all the journals on Medieval History of the Iberian Peninsula. All I remember is that the numbers of Muslims that were removed were very large. For example, the cities of Ubeda and Baeza were completely empty when the Christians took them (I believe all the inhabitants of Ubeda fled and the the ones on Beaza were massacred -- including children and all the animals). I also remember that ALL the Muslims from Seville and Cordova were expelled and not allowed to return. Jaen, Jerez, and Cadiz also lost a large amount of Muslims. Muslims fled because they were terrified of the Christians and they could not accept being ruled by infidels. Therefore, the majority (probably millions) of the Muslim population was reduced by massacres and voluntary and forced expulsions. Most fled to Granada and Morocco. This was done by Castilians. The Aragonese, on the other hand, were not as ruthless and allowed many to stay. Many Muslims accepted being ruled by Aragonese in Valencia but were eventually were expelled during the 17th century. The Castillians under Alfonso VIII and his grandson Ferdinand III could have easily conquered Granada. But the wars had depleted the king's treasury and the expulsions of the Muslims dramatically reduced tax revenues. The kings of Castile needed money. They even begged the Christians of the North (even the French and some say the German peasants) to come and settle on cheap land in Andalusia. But the idiots refused. If they would have accepted the lots of land being sold by the kings of Castile many Christians would have become wealthy, and would have created a new middle class, which would have changed the history of Spain and Europe. Thus, vast tracts of land were sold to the Church, the Military Orders, and the nobility at cut rate prices. But this took time and the kings needed cash. Thus the Kingdom of Granada was allowed to exist because it became the cash cow of the Kings of Castile. I should add that the Black Plague saved the Muslims well). The Muslims that were left in Spain numbered no more than 250,000 by the 17th century. So if we make some calculations: during the Middle Ages there were some 2 millions of Muslims (if we take 4 millions as a total population in the peninsula). So A LOT of Muslims were removed from Europe.
> 
> It was not just the Muslims who were ethnically cleansed. The Almoravides expelled all the Christians and Jews from Andalusia, Valencia, and Saragossa. The Almoravides were Muslim fundamentalists who wanted to create and apartheid state between Muslims and non Muslims. Thus they could not tolerate infidels anymore. This was idiotic because 1/4 to 1/3 of the southern population shifted to the north and added to the coffers of the kings and provided much needed manpower to crush the Muslims.


The medieval expulsions and retreats would also have included the native Muslim population (usually called "muladies"), since they formed the bulk of it. So if I did not misunderstand your original argument, you believe that fair North Africans are due to these expulsions of Muslims from Iberia, the majority of whom ended up in North Africa. So you must be acknowledging the fact that these Muslims being expelled from Iberia were for the most part actually Europeans, otherwise your argument would not be very logical. If they were mostly "Moors" and Arabs then your argument would not have much of a point. This takes us back to my counterargument: without denying the contribution that the Iberian expulsions had in this regard, the fact still remains that it is simply impossible to attribute the presence of fairer types among North Africans to historical events like those, because we have evidence going as far back as Pharaonic times that these types already existed among North Africans, and were even common enough in some parts for the Egyptians to have noticed and stereotyped a group of people (Libyans) with those traits.

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## Johannes

> The medieval expulsions and retreats would also have included the native Muslim population (usually called "muladies"), since they formed the bulk of it. So if I did not misunderstand your original argument, you believe that fair North Africans are due to these expulsions of Muslims from Iberia, the majority of whom ended up in North Africa. So you must be acknowledging the fact that these Muslims being expelled from Iberia were for the most part actually Europeans, otherwise your argument would not be very logical. If they were mostly "Moors" and Arabs then your argument would not have much of a point. This takes us back to my counterargument: without denying the contribution that the Iberian expulsions had in this regard, the fact still remains that it is simply impossible to attribute the presence of fairer types among North Africans to historical events like those, because we have evidence going as far back as Pharaonic times that these types already existed among North Africans, and were even common enough in some parts for the Egyptians to have noticed and stereotyped a group of people (Libyans) with those traits.


The number of Berbers in Iberia during the Middle Ages numbered no more than 20% of the total Muslim population. So it was roughly ~ 400,000 and they lived away from the European Muslims (southern Portugal, Extremadura, and Granada areas). The Arabs dont count at all as they were too few and by the 13th century had mixed with the Europeans. The Berbers would have been the first to go because they had families right across the Strait and would have had it easy. The European Muslims had a terrible time because they were natives and going to Africa would have terrified them. Many converted but many also went into Granada and some to Morocco and Algeria. These probably numbered some thousands. And this I believe created the "white" Berbers. There are some Andalusi villages in the Rif area of northern Morocco. They said that they look exactly like the villages of Anadalusia. So there is physical proof there.

If you remember I agreed with you that there must have been red heads and light skinned Berbers in ancients times (the Jews had red-headed people too). But hey were very few. All I am saying id the Iberians who fled to Africa added to the "whiteness' of the Berbers.

here is what the Moors of the African variety probably looked like:

Juan de Pareja -- oops. next slide.

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## Johannes

Juan de Pareja

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## Johannes

> I don't see the difficulty here. Why would the fact that Muslims were expelled in the 12th-13th century mean that there weren't plenty of them still around to be expelled in the 17th century? Also, why were there revolts of the Moriscos in the later centuries in Valencia if they had all already been exiled to Granada?
> 
> I would recommend the following book for a thorough analysis of the difficult and protracted process involved in expelling the Moriscos from Spain.
> https://books.google.com/books?hl=en...Behind&f=false


See the posts at the bottom. Valencian Muslims never lived in Granada or were expelled to Granada. they were the property of the Kings of Aragon. Thats why they survived. The Muslims of Granada became vassals of the Kings of Castile. Why did many Muslims die and were expelled? Because Castilians had been the main enemies of the Muslims and had lost thousands of soldiers. The Aragonese concentrated their energies in stealing the land of the Italians in Naples and Sicily. They did conquer Valencia during the 13th century but they were more tolerant compared to the Castilians.

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## Johannes

> Juan de Pareja


 Another Morisco: Pablo the Jester of Valladolid

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## Johannes

> I agree with you but certanly they weren't "very dark". More of a brown tone, how we see it in North India. Some Greek historians even compares the Egyptians to Indians (Known India back than was Pakistan and North India) based on pigmentation.
> 
> 
> I imagine the ancient Egyptians this way.
> 
> http://abcnews.go.com/images/Interna...0425_wblog.jpg
> http://www.cairorush.com/wp-content/...5/04/asser.jpg
> http://www.whilemusic.com/Content/Album/Album_9059.jpg
> http://travelblog.portfoliocollectio...mages/mido.png
> http://nilesports.com/wp-content/upl...ty-striker.jpg


Herodotus clearly stated (when he visited Egypt in the 5th century BCE) that Egyptians were black or if not brown. He is the only reliable source for information about Africans.

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## Drac II

> Juan de Pareja


Pareja was a descendant of sub-Saharan African slaves, neither a "Moor" nor a "Morisco" in the proper "old world" sense.

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## Drac II

> The number of Berbers in Iberia during the Middle Ages numbered no more than 20% of the total Muslim population. So it was roughly ~ 400,000 and they lived away from the European Muslims (southern Portugal, Extremadura, and Granada areas). The Arabs dont count at all as they were too few and by the 13th century had mixed with the Europeans. The Berbers would have been the first to go because they had families right across the Strait and would have had it easy. The European Muslims had a terrible time because they were natives and going to Africa would have terrified them. Many converted but many also went into Granada and some to Morocco and Algeria. These probably numbered some thousands. And this I believe created the "white" Berbers. There are some Andalusi villages in the Rif area of northern Morocco. They said that they look exactly like the villages of Anadalusia. So there is physical proof there.


Anthropologists, like Carleton Coon, are well aware of these "Andalusian Moors" in North Africa and have noted them. In fact, Coon even implied that the "Moors" were influenced by the Andalusians more than the other way around. However, what you consider as "white Berbers" already existed long before that.




> here is what the Moors of the African variety probably looked like:




We have plenty of Roman coins and busts depicting North Africans, they certainly did not look like Pareja, who was a descendant of sub-Saharan slaves. Just look at the busts and coins of Macrinus or Aemilianus.

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## Johannes

> North Africans are primarly descended from Semitic people. That's evident by looking at their Y-dna lineages. The main Semitic lineage, namely the J-P58, is extremely common in all North Africa.
> 
> Most North Africans were not tested for J-P58, but the ones who were tested had plenty of it.
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_J-M267#Africa
> 
> Frequency of J-P58.
> 
> Egypt: 19.7%
> ...


This does not show anything from Morocco or Algeria. These are the only places where "true" Berbers live. Tunisia and everything east is heavily mixed with Arabs and other Semites.

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## Johannes

> Anthropologists, like Carleton Coon, are well aware of these "Andalusian Moors" in North Africa and have noted them. In fact, Coon even implied that the "Moors" were influenced by the Andalusians more than the other way around. However, what you consider as "white Berbers" already existed long before that.
> 
> We have plenty of Roman coins and busts depicting North Africans, they certainly did not look like Pareja, who was a descendant of sub-Saharan slaves. Just look at the busts and coins of Macrinus or Aemilianus.


 I used Pareja only to show the negroid side of the Moors. I probably did not mentioned it. Of course the vast majority of the "Moors" were in fact European. I am also in agreement that there were some "white" Moors in antiquity. But they were small in number. The European Muslims added more to the DNA. I believe 10-15% of Moroccan DNA is European.

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## Johannes

> Anthropologists, like Carleton Coon, are well aware of these "Andalusian Moors" in North Africa and have noted them. In fact, Coon even implied that the "Moors" were influenced by the Andalusians more than the other way around. However, what you consider as "white Berbers" already existed long before that.


Not only influenced but created the whole Muslim culture in Iberia. The Berbers were backwards country pumpkins and the Arabs were slightly more advanced. They learned everything from Europeans, especially Greeks and Romans. Very little was actually "Arabian or Berber."

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## Johannes

> I see North Africans everyday and most of them look SSA influenced and the rest look like gulf Arabs (especially the Tunisians and the Egyptians).
> The few like Zidane are a rarity.


Are these truly Berbers or Arab? They look like Egytians to me. Berbers are not as dark as these. They look to me like Arabs from Yemen.

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## Drac II

> Not only influenced but created the whole Muslim culture in Iberia. The Berbers were backwards country pumpkins and the Arabs were slightly more advanced. They learned everything from Europeans, especially Greeks and Romans. Very little was actually "Arabian or Berber."


This was true at first, during the early years of Islam, but later on the Muslims (including Arabs, Persians, Berbers and Europeans) made their own contributions and improvements. For example, the ancient Greeks thought that vision was because the eyes emitted "visual rays", while the medieval Muslims more correctly explained that it was the objects being seen that emitted the light that hits the eyes:

http://www.visionlearning.com/en/lib...s-on-light/170

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## Drac II

> I used Pareja only to show the negroid side of the Moors. I probably did not mentioned it. Of course the vast majority of the "Moors" were in fact European. I am also in agreement that there were some "white" Moors in antiquity. But they were small in number. The European Muslims added more to the DNA. I believe 10-15% of Moroccan DNA is European.


I have looked at dozens upon dozens of examples of depictions of "Moors" and other North Africans from Roman and medieval times, and it is extremely safe to conclude that the Negroid elements among them were minimal at best. On top of that we also have the written statements by the medieval "Moors" themselves, who obviously did not see themselves as "blacks" and clearly distinguished themselves from sub-Saharan Africans. The whole "Moors were black" claim is an Afrocentric fairy tale, same as the claims that Egyptians, Arabs and even the Olmecs and early Chinese were supposedly "black" too.

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## Johannes

> This was true at first, during the early years of Islam, but later on the Muslims (including Arabs, Persians, Berbers and Europeans) made their own contributions and improvements. For example, the ancient Greeks thought that vision was because the eyes emitted "visual rays", while the medieval Muslims more correctly explained that it was the objects being seen that emitted the light that hits the eyes:
> 
> http://www.visionlearning.com/en/lib...s-on-light/170


True but since the overwhelming majority of southern Iberians converted to Islam (80%) it was hard to tell who was from who after the 10th century. By then the Arabs and Persians had disappeared as a phenotype. Only the Berbers and Europeans remained. So any "hot shot" scientist who made a contribution just said he was an "Arab." In the beginning "Arab" was an ethnic definition but it then changed an became cultural. For example, today many Berbers who live in the cities call themselves "Arabs" but they have little or no Arab DNA. However, the Berbers who live in small towns and villages call themselves "Amazagin." The same is true throughout the whole of North Africa. In Muslim Spain a man who is called "al-Gudiyya" simply means son of Goth. A man who called himself "al mardinesh" is simply son of Martin or Martinez. So all these so-called "great" contributions by Arabs were actually made by Iberians or hybrids, although there were some who were real Semites and Persians.

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## Johannes

> I have looked at dozens upon dozens of examples of depictions of "Moors" and other North Africans from Roman and medieval times, and it is extremely safe to conclude that the Negroid elements among them were minimal at best. On top of that we also have the written statements by the medieval "Moors" themselves, who obviously did not see themselves as "blacks" and clearly distinguished themselves from sub-Saharan Africans. The whole "Moors were black" claim is an Afrocentric fairy tale, same as the claims that Egyptians, Arabs and even the Olmecs and early Chinese were supposedly "black" too.


This whole BS about Moors being black began during the 11-13th centuries during the Crusades. The Almoravides had already conquered the sub-Saharan region around Mauritania and Senegal and had brought back many Black slaves to fight in their armies. So when they arrived in Andalusia they met a lot of fighters from northern Europe, especially French, German and English (they came in order to kill Jews and Muslims). So naturally when they saw Blacks and Berbers they thought they were ALL Blacks (the vast majority of Muslim soldiers under the Almoravides and Almohads were dark skinned Berbers and Blacks). So after they left and went back to their countries they took the myth that ALL Moors were Black. And as you can see Shakespeare did it not to long after. Whats amazing is that many ignorant English professors up until the 20th century still thought they were Black!

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