# Population Genetics > Autosomal Genetics >  Fine Scale Population Structure in the British Population

## Angela

This is the long awaited study by the POBI (People of the British Isles Project). Leslie et al 2015, Fine Scale Population Structure in the British Population:
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal...ture14230.html

Dienekes opines here at the link below. I've skimmed the paper, and if you don't have time to read the whole paper, Dienekes' review covers all the major points.
http://www.dienekes.blogspot.com/201...t-al-2015.html

My major take away is how little structure there actually is in the British population: "the average of the pairwise FST estimates between each of the 30 sample collection districts is 0.0007, with a maximum of 0.003 (Supplementary Table 1)"

Here are some other highlights as pointed out by Dienekes:

-One cluster, covering most of central and southern England accounts for almost half the people in the study. That cluster seems to be heavily influenced by the Saxon migration.

-However, " *Two separate analyses (ancestry profiles and GLOBETROTTER) show clear evidence in modern England of the Saxon migration, but each limits the proportion of Saxon ancestry, clearly excluding the possibility of long-term Saxon replacement. We estimate the proportion of Saxon ancestry in Cent./S England as very likely to be under 50%, and most likely in the range of 10–40%."

-"**In particular, we see no clear genetic evidence of the Danish Viking occupation and control of a large part of England, either in separate UK clusters in that region, or in estimated ancestry profiles, suggesting a relatively limited input of DNA from the Danish Vikings and subsequent mixing with nearby regions, and clear evidence for only a minority Norse contribution (about 25%) to the current Orkney population."

-"**We saw no evidence of a general ‘Celtic’ population in non-Saxon parts of the UK. Instead there were many distinct genetic clusters in these regions, some amongst the most different in our study, in the sense of being most separated in the hierarchical clustering tree in Fig. 1."

*
From a personal point of view I find it interesting that N.Wales shows a connection not only to France, but to the border area between France and Italy in Piemonte, and in Liguria and down toward Lucca as well. This isn't the first time such a link has appeared; it showed up in the recent autosomal study of European populations by Hellenthal et al 2014:
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/343/6172/747

The Dienekes analysis of that paper:
http://dienekes.blogspot.com/2014/02...n-history.html

Interesting to consider whether it might have something to do with the "Isles type" R1b that shows up in Liguria in Boattini et al.

From 23andme, I know that people of British Isles descent have many devoted geneaologists among them. I'm sorry for their sake that the data won't be available to the public.*
-*

----------


## Greying Wanderer

The data thing (edit: keeping it private i mean) has spoiled this to an extent.

I've always thought that many of the various waves into Britain followed a repeating pattern of people being pushed to the west so i was looking forward to North Wales dna possibly being a repository of these waves showing them like the sediment layers in rocks.

Very annoying. Oh well.

The distinct Celtic clusters are no surprise as it's visibly noticeable if you've ever spent a lot of time in the remoter mountainous parts of north and west Britain and again (imo) speaks to the different invasions over time and their different source directions.

At least the Iberian/Ligurian connection to North Wales shows up - one of the earliest layers imo originally connected to Atlantic Megalith maybe.

----------


## Aberdeen

A very interesting paper, although I won't get a chance to read it in detail for a day or two. The stuff about Wales is quite interesting.

----------


## sparkey

My first impression based on the summary is that this is about as expected based on the bits and pieces they've been throwing out there for the past few years, and I'm glad that they've come to very sensible conclusions based on the data. I was wondering what they would make of their rather clear results that the pre-Anglo-Saxon population was not homogenous. Placing the Anglo-Saxons as more genetically homogenous than the Romano-Britons in light of the data makes sense to me. An alternative explanation for certain affinities, like Cornwall's greater affinity to the big red Southeastern English cluster than northern England, could be explained by saying that Cornwall is more Anglo-Saxon than northern England. It seems that they're instead suggesting that a better explanation is a differences in the substrata.

----------


## Maleth

Its on bbc news too....be patient, of course you NEED to watch the amazing ad before, THANK HEAVENS WE HAVE THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE, HALLELUJAH.

http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-31905764

----------


## Greying Wanderer

Annoyance over data aside looking at the list of components h/t http://dienekes.blogspot.co.uk/2015/...t-al-2015.html

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/---rAR5GpVQ...talSources.jpg

and assuming for the sake of argument that the refuge zone follows the physical geography so North Wales (and probably parts of western Scotland) is the last refuge and so assume that components which are at a higher frequency in North Wales than England derive from earlier population layers being pushed to the west (it could also be the route taken but for now i'll assume they represent earlier waves just to see what comes out) we get

more in north wales than england
--------------------------------------
FRA12 (only scotland and wales)
SFS21 (med. coastal connection?)
FRA14 (all over, more in wales and scotland)
GER6 (all over, more in wales and scotland)

(nb gap between wales/scotland frequency and england frequency seems slightly bigger for FRA14 over GER6 which according to the refuge premise might imply FRA14 was earlier)

more in england than north wales
--------------------------------------
BEL11 (everywhere but less in wales)
DEN18 (less in wales and west scotland)

little or none in wales
-------------------------
GER3 (mostly missing in wales and scotland)
FRA17 (missing in wales but not scotland)

sweden/norway
------------------
hard to say just by looking but to me the sum total of the various components looks about the same - will ignore that for now

then thinking of the different migrations/invasions

1. Doggerland
2. Atlantic Megalith
3. BB / pre-celtic / early celtic (?)
4. La Tene / Belgae (?)
5. Romans
6. Saxon/Viking/Norman
7. later?

1. Doggerland: would either be a very widespread base component or be the most refuge-like. i'm gonna guess the latter so maybe FRA12
2. Atlantic Megalith: second most refuge-like and with a connection to the Mediterranean - SFS21

5/6/7. jumping ahead to those with little or none in north wales so assumed to be later we have
DEN18 (everywhere but less in wales and west scotland)
GER3 (mostly missing in scotland and wales)
FRA17 (mostly missing in wales but not scotland)
maybe saxon/viking/norman? or FRA17 is later but seems too massive in England for Huguenots, earlier? Romans?

(maybe Germany used to be more French-like and everything shifted anti-clockwise i.e. the "Germanic" expansion involved French-like Germans being pushed into France by more German-like Germans?)

anyway too confusing for now

.

the main aim of this was to try and see if you could pin down components from earlier and later to see how many possible population slices there were left over for the confusing "Celtic" era in the middle:
FRA14
GER6
BEL11

.

Anyway, I doubt any of this is actually correct (except maybe the Atlantic Megalith slice) but the intention is to show that maybe the data can be squeezed to show a sequence, especially if any of the data can be used to indicate time depth, or at least a partial sequence if at least the earliest and latest can be identified.

----------


## Angela

I think that all this talk of the differences between the "clusters" obscures the fact that all the people of the British Isles are incredibly homogenous. Those are amazingly small Fst differences. 

That said, it's still interesting.  :Smile: 

Another publication has covered it, understandably. There are some quotes from the authors.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...#ixzz3UmozzND9

In explaining the lack of traceable Dane Viking, "Roman", and Norman ancestry, they have this to say: 
"Sir Walter Bodmer, from Oxford University, said the lack of Viking DNA may have largely been to do with numbers.

He said: 'It's important to emphasise that when you get that mixture it's very much a question of the ratio of the people who come in and the indigenous population."


I think it's important to keep this in mind whenever people are talking about migrations of conquering male elites; they can change the culture and the language, but their genetic heritage can disappear from the autosomes, if not the yDna, no matter how many wives they took. You need large numbers of men and women, a "folk migration" to make lasting change. The only exception might be if they brought diseases with them, diseases which wiped out large numbers of the indigenous inhabitants. That's why I'm always very skeptical in studies of my own country about claims that the Normans left an autosomal impact on western Sicily, or some quartering of troops around a "Lombard" castle in the south changed the genetic make-up to some large degree. 


I found this intriguing, by the way:
"But even within Wales there are two distinct tribes, with those in the north and south of the principality less similar genetically than the Scots are to the inhabitants of Kent."

What could explain this? Religion is the same, yes? Topography? Language? The same applies to the differences between Cornwall and Devon, although there you have a river as a dividing line. Did both areas retain the use of "Celtic" languages for a longer period?

----------


## bicicleur

IMO the Britons were Celtic tribes R1b-L21 which are still the majority (60%) in Wales, Cornwall, Scotland, Ireland and Bretagne.
So once these tribes had settled, and absorbed the local indogenous people they must have remained sedentary and rather isolated without many intermarriages?
Or is there another explanation?

----------


## Sile

as I have been saying for a long time,,,,,there is no celtic ethnicity

from link P#5

*A DNA study of Britons has shown that genetically there is not a unique Celtic group of people in the UK.
*
*According to the data, those of Celtic ancestry in Scotland and Cornwall are more similar to the English than they are to other Celtic groups.* 
*The study also describes distinct genetic differences across the UK, which reflect regional identities.*

----------


## sparkey

> What could explain this? Religion is the same, yes? Topography? Language? The same applies to the differences between Cornwall and Devon, although there you have a river as a dividing line. Did both areas retain the use of "Celtic" languages for a longer period?


In Wales, there has really always been a North/South divide in history, so perhaps it is also an ancient divide. All of the old kingdoms were divided North vs. South. Between the Roman period and annexation to England, unification of Wales happened for a grand total of 7 years under Gruffydd ap Llywelyn, the rest of the time there was a dominant northern kingdom (usually Gwynedd) and a dominant southern kingdom or two (usually Deheubarth and sometimes Morgannwg or Gwent). A similar division seems to have existed prior to Roman arrival, with the Ordovices and Deceangli in the North, and the Demetae and Silures in the South.

One surprise to me is how the Welsh Marches cluster is nowhere near the South Wales cluster, I thought that they would be similar. Instead, the Welsh Marches cluster shows some Anglo-Saxon affinity (although less than most of England) and a shared substratum with Cornwall+Devon+Southeast England.

As for Cornwall vs. Devon: In additional to a likely ancient divide, there is a large gap in time when they were absorbed into England and when they started speaking English. Devon was completely absorbed into Wessex in 710, when King Ine of Wessex defeated King Geraint of Dyvnon (that is, Dumnonia, or Cornwall and Devon combined). Devon began speaking English very soon after. The Cornish, meanwhile, maintained their independence after their victory at Hehil in 722, and we don't find evidence of the Cornish submitting to the English until over a century later, and we don't find it being considered a part of England until about a century after that. That allows the Cornish to maintain some cultural distinctiveness through the years of Anglo-Saxon cultural conquest, and they continued to speak Cornish until about 1700 (depending on which part of Cornwall we're talking about). So western Cornwall spoke a Celtic language for literally a millennium longer than Devon.

----------


## Sile

> In Wales, there has really always been a North/South divide in history, so perhaps it is also an ancient divide. All of the old kingdoms were divided North vs. South. Between the Roman period and annexation to England, unification of Wales happened for a grand total of 7 years under Gruffydd ap Llywelyn, the rest of the time there was a dominant northern kingdom (usually Gwynedd) and a dominant southern kingdom or two (usually Deheubarth and sometimes Morgannwg or Gwent). A similar division seems to have existed prior to Roman arrival, with the Ordovices and Deceangli in the North, and the Demetae and Silures in the South.
> 
> One surprise to me is how the Welsh Marches cluster is nowhere near the South Wales cluster, I thought that they would be similar. Instead, the Welsh Marches cluster shows some Anglo-Saxon affinity (although less than most of England) and a shared substratum with Cornwall+Devon+Southeast England.
> 
> As for Cornwall vs. Devon: In additional to a likely ancient divide, there is a large gap in time when they were absorbed into England and when they started speaking English. Devon was completely absorbed into Wessex in 710, when King Ine of Wessex defeated King Geraint of Dyvnon (that is, Dumnonia, or Cornwall and Devon combined). Devon began speaking English very soon after. The Cornish, meanwhile, maintained their independence after their victory at Hehil in 722, and we don't find evidence of the Cornish submitting to the English until over a century later, and we don't find it being considered a part of England until about a century after that. That allows the Cornish to maintain some cultural distinctiveness through the years of Anglo-Saxon cultural conquest, and they continued to speak Cornish until about 1700 (depending on which part of Cornwall we're talking about). So western Cornwall spoke a Celtic language for literally a millennium longer than Devon.


the

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

was basically the start of the end of these "non-angleized" devon and cornish people

----------


## Greying Wanderer

> ...
> 
> I found this intriguing, by the way:
> "But even within Wales there are two distinct tribes, with those in the north and south of the principality less similar genetically than the Scots are to the inhabitants of Kent."
> 
> What could explain this? Religion is the same, yes? Topography? Language? The same applies to the differences between Cornwall and Devon, although there you have a river as a dividing line. Did both areas retain the use of "Celtic" languages for a longer period?


What I wonder is if you have a backdrop of a mostly very homogenous population which contains a small but highly divergent component within it e.g. a component with an African element, whether the genetic sorting software might cause that component to show disproportionately. If so then even very small traces of that component might be trackable.

I think Atlantic Megalith might be trackable this way because of their connection with North Africa.

----------


## Aberdeen

Still thinking about the paper, but I do believe, based on things I've read about the history of Wales, that the divide between north and south is very ancient and may be pre-Celtic. I know that the Y DNA of Wales is 74% R1b and 16% I (I1, I2, I2a and I1b) and a bit of R1a so very little Neolithic and possibly Neolithic. It would be interesting to so how that breaks down locally. Although I suppose more detailed subclade information would be needed to get an idea of how long the various bits of R1b and I had been there, since some of the I could have been brought into the area in the post-Roman period by various invaders. But some of the I could be really old and I wonder if there's more of it in the north, or more of one kind of I in the north compared to the south. However, it really does seem as if the Y DNA profile may not correspond very well to the autosomal makeup.

I'm dubious about the supposed lack of Danish DNA in the area that was the Danelaw. Is this conclusion based on an assumption that the DNA of Scandinavia during the Viking period was the same as it is today? I haven't had time to really read carefully yet.

----------


## Greying Wanderer

> Still thinking about the paper, but I do believe, based on things I've read about the history of Wales, that the divide between north and south is very ancient and may be pre-Celtic. I know that the Y DNA of Wales is 74% R1b and 16% I (I1, I2, I2a and I1b) and a bit of R1a so very little Neolithic and possibly Neolithic. It would be interesting to so how that breaks down locally. Although I suppose more detailed subclade information would be needed to get an idea of how long the various bits of R1b and I had been there, since some of the I could have been brought into the area in the post-Roman period by various invaders. But some of the I could be really old and I wonder if there's more of it in the north, or more of one kind of I in the north compared to the south. However, it really does seem as if the Y DNA profile may not correspond very well to the autosomal makeup.
> 
> I'm dubious about the supposed lack of Danish DNA in the area that was the Danelaw. Is this conclusion based on an assumption that the DNA of Scandinavia during the Viking period was the same as it is today? I haven't had time to really read carefully yet.


Some parts of North Wales are up to 30% E1b.

http://dienekes.blogspot.co.uk/2011/...marker-in.html

Which is what makes me wonder if they're the remnant of Atlantic Megalith - so maybe neolithic but not the standard neolithic.

----------


## Expredel

> I'm dubious about the supposed lack of Danish DNA in the area that was the Danelaw. Is this conclusion based on an assumption that the DNA of Scandinavia during the Viking period was the same as it is today? I haven't had time to really read carefully yet.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...rthern_Ireland

Danes were cleared from the English region in 1002, some more cleansing in 1070. Later conflicts in Scotland may have been genocidal as well. Populations have a tendency to vanish mysteriously.

----------


## Aberdeen

> Some parts of North Wales are up to 30% E1b.
> 
> http://dienekes.blogspot.co.uk/2011/...marker-in.html
> 
> Which is what makes me wonder if they're the remnant of Atlantic Megalith - so maybe neolithic but not the standard neolithic.


Someone found a spot or two where there were high levels of E1b1b, but that haplotype makes up only 4% of the total Welsh Y DNA. I wonder how much of that 4% is found in northern Wales.

----------


## Aberdeen

> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...rthern_Ireland
> 
> Danes were cleared from the English region in 1002, some more cleansing in 1070. Later conflicts in Scotland may have been genocidal as well. Populations have a tendency to vanish mysteriously.


Massacres seldom result in a total clearing of populations. I suspect Danish DNA was similar enough to Anglo-Saxon DNA that it's difficult to tell the two apart.

----------


## sparkey

The thing about Danish DNA is that there _is_ a clear British Isles group with a lot of affinity to Scandinavia: Orcadians. And the Orcadians, as a result, are the greatest outlier among British populations. Unfortunately, I'm not seeing that they used Danes as a reference population, only Norwegians and Swedes, but nonetheless, it seems that they're drawing their conclusions about the effects of the Danelaw based on reference population affinity.

Naturally, drawing specific conclusions about much of anything based on modern reference populations is highly problematic. There's no real temporal aspect in doing so, so there may be other explanations for why Orcadians are much closer to Scandinavians than the rest of the British. But at least this study can count as evidence.

----------


## Greying Wanderer

> Someone found a spot or two where there were high levels of E1b1b, but that haplotype makes up only 4% of the total Welsh Y DNA. I wonder how much of that 4% is found in northern Wales.


Thing is there are two small components: SFS31 and FRA12 which show the clearest links to Iberia and the Mediterranean. It would have been interesting to see if the E1b was connected to one or both of those.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/---rAR5GpVQ...talSources.jpg (h/t dionekes)

----------


## MOESAN

> Massacres seldom result in a total clearing of populations. I suspect Danish DNA was similar enough to Anglo-Saxon DNA that it's difficult to tell the two apart.


good remark:
1- today Danes are maybe not exactly the same ones as the historic ones, even if the difference would be light -
2- even today (say 1930/1950!), Denmark is/was not completely homogenous by regions, neiher for pigmentation, nor stature nor cephalic index - the Western Jutland shew strong trend towards 'borreby', as do Western Norway (what Y-DNA? what autosomes component according to what poolings?)
3- the Angles/Engles occupied Southern Denmark-Schlesvig so were as 'danish' than 'anglo-saxon' and surely enough were of the same stock than the Anglo-Saxons roughly said - the Jutes remnants examined shew same whole tendancies for crania (I think it is not too precise) but already shew broader mandibules (inf. jaw) than the common means in Northmen of the germanic periods: I see here, without to much doubt (because it is always present among today genuine Danes on whom we can observe physical traits) a 'cromagnon' imput - nevertheless I think all these ancient Danes passed to Britain were not the westernmost typical 'borreby' of West Jutland (pre-I-Ean/pre-Neolithic remnants of fishers by ascendance, at these times maybe not completely germanized nor celticized?) so the comparisons with modern Danes autosomes in not fully accurate???

----------


## giuseppe rossi

> Thing is there are two small components: SFS31 and FRA12 which show the clearest links to Iberia and the Mediterranean. It would have been interesting to see if the E1b was connected to one or both of those.
> 
> http://1.bp.blogspot.com/---rAR5GpVQ...talSources.jpg (h/t dionekes)


The Iberian link is only with Catalans and Basques who are not proper Iberians per se.

----------


## MOESAN

> Thing is there are two small components: SFS31 and FRA12 which show the clearest links to Iberia and the Mediterranean. It would have been interesting to see if the E1b was connected to one or both of those.
> 
> http://1.bp.blogspot.com/---rAR5GpVQ...talSources.jpg (h/t dionekes)



your hypothesis for Y-E1b is very possible but FRA12 ? I'm not sure I understand well the map but this "component" doesn't seem 'mediterranean' by force? could you explain in a deeper way?

----------


## Vallicanus

> your hypothesis for Y-E1b is very possible but FRA12 ? I'm not sure I understand well the map but this "component" doesn't seem 'mediterranean' by force? could you explain in a deeper way?


Indeed component FRA12 might be called "Core French" or "Core Gallic" as it is found in many parts of France with an overspill into NW Italy down to NW Tuscany.

----------


## Aberdeen

> The thing about Danish DNA is that there _is_ a clear British Isles group with a lot of affinity to Scandinavia: Orcadians. And the Orcadians, as a result, are the greatest outlier among British populations. Unfortunately, I'm not seeing that they used Danes as a reference population, only Norwegians and Swedes, but nonetheless, it seems that they're drawing their conclusions about the effects of the Danelaw based on reference population affinity.
> 
> Naturally, drawing specific conclusions about much of anything based on modern reference populations is highly problematic. There's no real temporal aspect in doing so, so there may be other explanations for why Orcadians are much closer to Scandinavians than the rest of the British. But at least this study can count as evidence.


It was the Norwegians, not the Danes, who settled in Orcadia. It was the Danes who settled in the English Danelaw, and I suspect that their DNA was closer to that of the Anglo-Saxons than the Norwegians prior to the medieval political union between Denmark and Norway. If you look at the map, the red dots that supposedly represent Anglo-Saxons match very closely a combination of the Anglo-Saxon heartland and the Danelaw (which did overlap to some extent). There just doesn't seem to be any separation between the two and I suppose one could assume, as the authors seem to, that the Danes just disappeared, presumably after King Canute's last descendent was replaced by an Anglo-Saxon type in 1042. But, when one considers such things as the continuing influence of Old Danish on the accents of people in modern northeastern England, it seems possible that Danish DNA was more like Anglo-Saxon DNA than Norse 1000 years ago, especially given that the Angles appear to have come in part from what is now southern Denmark.

----------


## Angela

I'm having some trouble deciphering the below graphic. FRA17 has blue bars, but the arrow is pointing to teal colored circles. Or am I color blind?

Leslie et al-British ancestry.JPG

It's the teal colored circles which appear in Piemonte, Liguria and down the coast into Toscana. So is it FRA 17 which is in Italy or FRA12?

The teal circles also appear in what looks like Provence, the coastal Loire?, Orleans? and southern Poitou?
Is there something which ties those regions together, particularly?

This is what they have to say about these clusters in the Supplement:
The pattern in North Wales, North Pembrokeshire, South Pembrokeshire: "Absence of GER3 and FRA17, presence of FRA12, and relatively higher proportions of GER6 and FRA14."

A second general pattern is shared by a number of other UK clusters(from north to south: Northumbria; Cumbria; W Yorkshire, Cent./S England; Welsh Borders; Devon; Cornwall): Significant presence of GER3, absence of FRA12, relatively higher contributions from groups FRA17 and DEN18, and relatively lower contributions from FRA14. 

As to FRA17, they have this to say:
"presence/absence pattern (notably its absence from Wales) strongly suggests that it results from a migration or migrations later than those of the earliest migrations which contributed DNA to the modern UK population (GER6, BEK11, FRA14: internal migration has spread the DNA from these early immigrants across the UK, so that if the migrations represented gy FRA17 were earlier than or contemporaneous with these, then the same migrations should also have spread the resulting(FRA17 like)DNA through out the UK, including Wales. We also argue that the FRA17 contribution is unlikely to reflect any of the known movements in histori(i.e.since the Roman invasion of Britain)


Their main argument for the last statement is that none of those invasions were large enough to effect such a wide spread of alleles.

This leads me to think FRA17 is not the one in Italy. FRA14 is, according to the authors, mostly found in northwest France (although it appears in other places on the French map.) Therefore, does it seem more likely that it is FRA12 which is present in Italy?

_If_ that is correct, it's interesting that it is basically only present in Wales. I hesitate to ascribe it to Roman legionnaires (many of whom came from northern Italy and Gaul) as per the thread on E-V13. If they impacted the genetics of Wales, why not that of the area around Hadrian's Wall, or on the Saxon Shore? The authors maintain that the most widespread components are oldest. I'm not so sure that would always be the case. Couldn't the oldest component have been pushed into Wales by subsequent invasions?

As to the presence in Italy there are numerous explanations, from shared Neolithic ancestry to the documented Gallic migrations in the first millennium BC into Piemonte and Liguria specifically from the west.

----------


## MOESAN

> I think that all this talk of the differences between the "clusters" obscures the fact that all the people of the British Isles are incredibly homogenous. Those are amazingly small Fst differences. 
> 
> That said, it's still interesting. 
> 
> 
> 
> I think it's important to keep this in mind whenever people are talking about migrations of conquering male elites; they can change the culture and the language, but their genetic heritage can disappear from the autosomes, if not the yDna, no matter how many wives they took. You need large numbers of men and women, a "folk migration" to make lasting change. The only exception might be if they brought diseases with them, diseases which wiped out large numbers of the indigenous inhabitants. That's why I'm always very skeptical in studies of my own country about claims that the Normans left an autosomal impact on western Sicily, or some quartering of troops around a "Lombard" castle in the south changed the genetic make-up to some large degree.


Angela, male elites colonizations without any female are very seldom - perhaps the maritime ones (as Vikings) were roughly of this sort but NOT ALWAYS after first conquest, females could come to colonize too - scientists shew the Vikings colonizations had different ratio of ethnic males/females different origins ratio, the differences are clear when comparing Hebrides/Western Isles, Caithness, Orkney , Shetland, Iceland, Faroe - (for Ireland I don't read anything) - 
I think as you a male elite conquest leads to desequilibrium between the ratio of different Y-DNA haplos and the ratio of autosomes in a population but let's keep in mind all the way that _when a male passes a 100% Y not recombining heritages to his sons (the girls are not serious, they don't keep the Y haplo of Papa !!! (LOL) he passes also a 50% set of autosomes to them AND to their daughters -_ so in this theorical only males conquest even if the males autosomes tend to be "washed", a, say, hand full of new males excluding autochtonous males of the mating and taking 100 autochtonous females can passe 50% of the autosomes of the new generation and if they keep the strong side in this figure the subsequent generations will roughly keep this 50% ratios - only drift/mutations can changes it in this example - so, taken in account that some "colon" females accompanied the colonizators and that the males conquerors kept some advantages upon local males, the loss of original conquerors autosomes is not always so quick we can aspect: a first brutal loss at first crossing generation, but low evolution in following generations - 
that said, all that is theory: not always all the autochtonous males were discarded of reproduction... you' re right when you write elite males can loose some part of their autosomes but we cannot be sure of the loss speed - surely you were aware of all that, but the way you wrote could give way to misunderstanding to someones
and Sicilia is not so uniform concerning DNA at fine scale I think (even if roughly homogenous compared to other greater regions -
buona sera -

----------


## MOESAN

en vrac

Recall of theoriccolonization of the region - I hope I don't forget the principalones - 
before Neolithic :unknown for the most 
Neolithic : thefirst ones not well known + the Long Barrows period : Atlanticmegalithers with some elements maybe coming from far EastMerditerranea (partially « Sumerianlike » for Coon, maybeS-Caucasus people not far from Black Sea at some stage ? See dolmens in Abkhazia region NW-Caucasus about the 3000 BC? - alreadyY-R1b ? To be checked)
Chalcolithic-Eneolithic :Bell Beakers from the Rhine mouth and maybe Westphaly
Bronze Age : ?maybe some continental Celts ? 
Urnfields period: ?seemingly some people (Celts) seemingly from EasternFrance/Switzerland
Iron Age  :Embarrassment: ther Celts ( ?), Picts ? and Belgae / then : Romans
450-650 :Angles, Saxons, Jutes, Frisons colonization
later :Norwegian and Dane Vikings with different places of settlements
1066 : Williamthe Bastard and « Normans » plus W-Armoric Bretons andFlemings (Preceltic-Celtic-Germanics mix)
later : nocolonization but infiltration of Western French nobility


the clusteringsystem is a problem to me : I suppose it searches close andpeculiar frequencies of genes among individuals leading to thepossibility to create some geographical groupings : it impliessome arbitrary statement ? Where are the true limits ? Themost precise and fine scaled the cluster is, the most exposed torecent drift it is, unrelated to ancient historical events - 
Not the samedepth (number of typical sets of genes leading to the separationfrom others clusters)?
Theses clusters arenot compared to distributions of known pooled componants, ancient orcurrent -
here I would haveprefered a global genetic distance table for all the regions of theIsles ti this clustering system- 
2 small branches ofa same population, sharing the same ancestors, and colonizing 2different small regions and isolated for some reason, can haveglobally the same % of genes of every ancient component butpresent a kind of « complementary » (opposed)distribution of some of these genes ; this plus subsequent driftcan create 2 well defined distinct clusters was could not beproduced by greater populations (greater mating circle) – globallythese 2 « distinct » populations shows nevertheless greatressemblance so short distance when the whole genome isconsidered – (it's the problem I evocated concerning metricsvariations among Amerindians in compartimented mountains of Peru).


ancient regionalfacts :
BBs more in Southernand Eastern England, a bit in Eastern Scotland, modified by other« BBs » =
the Food Vesselpeople from Ireland, with a common element but lack of the otherselements of British BBs, these last ones picked in Preceltic oralready Celtic Germany (it is not so evident) – according tosomeones, BBs pushed back the precedent Long Barrows people wherethey take foot - 
+ possibly peoplefrom East-France-Switzerland in Urnfields period, in Kent and maybeEastern Scotland : 'alpine » regions
Belgae settled forthe most in South-East and East England, very few elsewhere but itdoesn't esclude a shift towards West fleeing the Germanics - 
Romans settled intowns or on boundaries, with them foreign legions from everywhere inthe Empire, Celts among them : surely few remnants after the450... LOOK DATES
the Anglo-Saxons andFrisons/Jutes settled at first the eastern coastal region of todayEngland : possibility : they absorbed the Brittons/Belgaepeople (or only their females) OR they pushed back the most of themtoward West, principally Wessex (look at some S-W english dialects?S/Z-F/V phenomenon , known in celtic Cornish and some Breton dialectstoday, not without some tendancy among Germanics of West : thisphenomenon generalized by the late progression of german, doesn'tseem genuine in North nor East : Frisons, Englishmen,Scandinaviasn ignore it as seemingly all ancient germanic languages :here a study of old germanic dialects phonetics is needed, I'm notsure, only speculation for east-german history)
Norse settlements :Ireland, Hebrides islands, Orkney/Shetland, Western Scotland shoresand Isle of Man, West Lancashire, some traces in South-Pembroke andSomerset 


Middle Ages Vikingssettlements in Wirral-W-Lancashire shew some big drift concerningY-DNA by instance : their Y-DNA is absorbed for the most now ( alesson!) - it is the problem of colonizations by small groups,humans as animals – and here we have too the question ofpre-Anglo-Saxon regional clusters : the most of the regionsconsidered as more Celtic are refuge areas with small density sincelong time ago and so more exposure to drift– so it's hard tomeasure the DNA they shared between them some centuries ago – whatdoes not push me to think it's only recent drift that explainthe today differences in these refuges – the Neolithic people camesurely in more than a wave and from diverse places even if LongBarrows people seem having had an heavy rôle – the Celts came fromdifferent places (maybe since the « British » BBs?) atdifferent times. 
And we know Celtswere for the most pushed back into refuges of Preceltic people (anold law of History)- the Bretons and Belgae living in Central Englandand East or North England before the Saxons were surely not exactlythe same ones as the today Neo-Celts of the Occident shores - 
the differencesbetween these refuge zones are maybe due not to the differencebetween Celts only but due more to the differences between Precelticstettlers. So small distances but clear restricted clusters ? 
The clusterS-Central England seems to me very too largely and uniformly spred to be « sincere » - he doesn't reflect what anthropologynor Y-Haplos shew us – it ressemble an « average » or« mean » english citizen type (completely unrelated tovariations in Y-DNA haplos) where is smelt Anglo-Saxons + Celts +some Precelts : a cities new populations ? Or genuine localtypes, but with erased differences by the clustering system appliedto big populations or not isolated small populations (famouscontinuum concept ???)
as you know thereare some studies about the different systems to appreciatedifferences in distributions of traits in population(s) and theclustering : not so simple... THE method can give THE result ?I 'll try to learn but maths explanations with maths « ogams »or « runes » are a punition to me...


So Angela is rightwhen she speak about global short distances between British people,even if it is true too for all the Euroasians – except that thespotting of individuals in some tables show a span from Irishmen toNorth Frenches, Normands or Bretons, to N-W Germans (so :Belgians and Dutch people) until Norwegians !
By the way the« french » elements present in the Isles is for a partsince Middle Ages, but I think a lot is representative of more than aCeltic/Celtized people wave. I tried ti buy the paper but I had somedifficulty, I 'll try again : maybe I 'll change my thoughts ?


A conclusion ?Perhaps a TOO FINE scale for clustering is not accurate to show realdistances between human groups and to illustrate History? Butdifferent adjustments of the magnifying glass can help to devinedifferent depths of History too so...

----------


## Angela

> Angela, male elites colonizations without any female are very seldom - perhaps the maritime ones (as Vikings) were roughly of this sort but NOT ALWAYS after first conquest, females could come to colonize too - scientists shew the Vikings colonizations had different ratio of ethnic males/females different origins ratio, the differences are clear when comparing Hebrides/Western Isles, Caithness, Orkney , Shetland, Iceland, Faroe - (for Ireland I don't read anything) - 
> I think as you a male elite conquest leads to desequilibrium between the ratio of different Y-DNA haplos and the ratio of autosomes in a population but let's keep in mind all the way that _when a male passes a 100% Y not recombining heritages to his sons (the girls are not serious, they don't keep the Y haplo of Papa !!! (LOL) he passes also a 50% set of autosomes to them AND to their daughters -_ so in this theorical only males conquest even if the males autosomes tend to be "washed", a, say, hand full of new males excluding autochtonous males of the mating and taking 100 autochtonous females can passe 50% of the autosomes of the new generation and if they keep the strong side in this figure the subsequent generations will roughly keep this 50% ratios - only drift/mutations can changes it in this example - so, taken in account that some "colon" females accompanied the colonizators and that the males conquerors kept some advantages upon local males, the loss of original conquerors autosomes is not always so quick we can aspect: a first brutal loss at first crossing generation, but low evolution in following generations - 
> that said, all that is theory: not always all the autochtonous males were discarded of reproduction... you' re right when you write elite males can loose some part of their autosomes but we cannot be sure of the loss speed - surely you were aware of all that, but the way you wrote could give way to misunderstanding to someones
> and Sicilia is not so uniform concerning DNA at fine scale I think (even if roughly homogenous compared to other greater regions -
> buona sera -


I don't disagree with much of what you have posted. 

My comment was in response to the following quote from the paper (which appeared in my post).
"He said: 'It's important to emphasise that when you get that mixture it's very much a question of the ratio of the people who come in and the indigenous population."

If, as in the scenario they were describing, which involved, to my recollection, Roman administrators, soldiers, merchants etc., these men were admixing into a population of over two million people, their yDna might remain, through chance, but the autosomal contribution could disappear. Simulations in various genetics papers indicate it could disappear in six generations.

The supposed "Indo-European" migration into India is a perfect example of an elite male migration. There is minimal if any sign of a movement of steppe related or eastern European related mtDna into India. There is a lot of R1a of the Z93 variety. If the R1a Z93 was indeed brought from the steppe, the number of men must have been small in relation to the indigenous population, and continual marriage into that indigenous population wiped out the autosomal component, because the amount of "Northern European" even in Northwest Indians is miniscule.

Even if there is a folk migration of sorts, the impact autosomally depends on that ratio. The Lombard invasion of Italy involved less than 100,000 people, although they came as families. However, if we try to measure their impact by yDna and we look at lineages like U-106 and I1, their impact was minimal. That's because they were migrating into a country whose population numbered in the millions. Their strongest impact is, in so far as I can tell, in the north east and center north of Italy. We have a lot of Lombard castles in my particular area, but the amount of I1 is small. I would speculate that these castles were garrisoned by men who didn't necessarily bring their own women with them. Of course, we really need autosomal analysis using ancient genomes to get a clearer picture, but what has been done so far in regard to the Lombards is underwhelming to say the least.

----------


## Angela

> It was the Norwegians, not the Danes, who settled in Orcadia. It was the Danes who settled in the English Danelaw, and I suspect that their DNA was closer to that of the Anglo-Saxons than the Norwegians prior to the medieval political union between Denmark and Norway. If you look at the map, the red dots that supposedly represent Anglo-Saxons match very closely a combination of the Anglo-Saxon heartland and the Danelaw (which did overlap to some extent). There just doesn't seem to be any separation between the two and I suppose one could assume, as the authors seem to, that the Danes just disappeared, presumably after King Canute's last descendent was replaced by an Anglo-Saxon type in 1042. But, when one considers such things as the continuing influence of Old Danish on the accents of people in modern northeastern England, it seems possible that Danish DNA was more like Anglo-Saxon DNA than Norse 1000 years ago, especially given that the Angles appear to have come in part from what is now southern Denmark.



Have you taken a look at page 11 of the Supplement?
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal...re14230-s1.pdf

----------


## Greying Wanderer

> your hypothesis for Y-E1b is very possible but FRA12 ? I'm not sure I understand well the map but this "component" doesn't seem 'mediterranean' by force? could you explain in a deeper way?


It's only that FRA12 extends more into the France/Italy/Liguria region than the rest of the components - so not much of a reason.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/---rAR5GpVQ...talSources.jpg

(h/t dionekes)

My thinking was
- Romans said Wales had darker people
- Wales has more ydna E1b
- SFS31 and FRA12 are the two components furthest towards the mediterranean

so not exactly watertight :)

As FRA12 only appears in low amounts and only in Wales and SW Scotland I think that points at it being an old layer pushed back to the primary refuge zones but maybe before Atlantic Megalith?

Thinking about it more my guess is the Iberian (or coastal Iberian for those who prefer) SFS31 seems like the most likely candidate for E1b.

----------


## Greying Wanderer

> I'm having some trouble deciphering the below graphic. FRA17 has blue bars, but the arrow is pointing to teal colored circles. Or am I color blind?
> 
> Attachment 7153
> 
> It's the teal colored circles which appear in Piemonte, Liguria and down the coast into Toscana. So is it FRA 17 which is in Italy or FRA12?
> 
> The teal circles also appear in what looks like Provence, the coastal Loire?, Orleans? and southern Poitou?
> Is there something which ties those regions together, particularly?
> 
> ...


Yes I think it is FRA12 extending into Italy. FRA17 is pointing at the wrong color.

Also the more I squint the more widespread a lot of the colors are.

----------


## Greying Wanderer

@Moesan




> The clusterS-Central England seems to me very too largely and uniformly spred to be « sincere »


I wonder if that might relate to the hajnal line marriage system and low levels of cousin marriage?

----------


## Angela

> Yes I think it is FRA12 extending into Italy. FRA17 is pointing at the wrong color.
> 
> Also the more I squint the more widespread a lot of the colors are.


The FRA12 being the group present in northwestern Italy as well as in France, and being present in Wales but not other parts of Britain sort of supports the Hellenthal et al results finding a link between northern Italy/Tuscany and Wales, yes? However, what's the time period? What group could have fed into Wales from northwest Italy, or, conversely, what group could have fed into both areas?

----------


## Vallicanus

> The FRA12 being the group present in northwestern Italy as well as in France, and being present in Wales but not other parts of Britain sort of supports the Hellenthal et al results finding a link between northern Italy/Tuscany and Wales, yes? However, what's the time period? What group could have fed into Wales from northwest Italy, or, conversely, what group could have fed into both areas?


It is significant that FRA12 is found in Wales and in both Northern Ireland and Scotland categories and in Orkney1. We may have traces of an ancient substratum of people from prehistoric Gaul here.

----------


## giuseppe rossi

> It's only that FRA12 extends more into the France/Italy/Liguria region than the rest of the components - so not much of a reason.
> 
> http://1.bp.blogspot.com/---rAR5GpVQ...talSources.jpg
> 
> (h/t dionekes)
> 
> My thinking was
> - Romans said Wales had darker people
> - Wales has more ydna E1b
> ...


No only the Silures were said to be swarthy, not the whole Wales.

The Iberian connection is only with Basques and Catalans and is like 1% at max.

----------


## Aberdeen

> Have you taken a look at page 11 of the Supplement?
> http://www.nature.com/nature/journal...re14230-s1.pdf


I guess I don't know enough about that kind of thing to interpret the map very well. I was going mainly by what Dienekes said about the paper, and the way he illustrated one of the maps from it. But mostly I'm looking at the wording of the paper. After admitting that the Jutes and some of the Angles actually came from what is now Denmark and stating "Definitively separating Saxon and Danish Viking inputs is impossible", they try to do just that, apparently by making the questionable assumption that Danish DNA of 1000 years ago more closely resembled modern Norse DNA than modern German DNA. And they greatly understate the size of the Danelaw and don't even mention that the whole of England was ruled by Danes for a few decades. In fact, there are a number of what I think are questionable assumptions they make throughout the paper in order to arrive at the conclusion that there is more old DNA in England than had been assumed.

----------


## Aberdeen

> No only the Silures were said to be swarthy, not the whole Wales.
> 
> The Iberian connection is only with Basques and Catalans and is like 1% at max.


Actually, Julius Caesar said that the Britons were smaller and darker, on average, than the Romans, although he also said that the Celts who ruled Britain were quite tall and strongly built, with light coloured hair (at least partly because of the use of hair dye). So Caesar seems to have distinguished the Celtic ruling class from the majority of Brits.

----------


## giuseppe rossi

???

No I don't think so. I've read his whole book.

----------


## MOESAN

> Actually, Julius Caesar said that the Britons were smaller and darker, on average, than the Romans, although he also said that the Celts who ruled Britain were quite tall and strongly built, with light coloured hair (at least partly because of the use of hair dye). So Caesar seems to have distinguished the Celtic ruling class from the majority of Brits.


 I lost the Caesar 's book (translated in french) long time ago and can no more check details - I've no remembrance of Britons smaller than Romans (these ones 1m62 as mean, for I red in Coon but ?) even when speaking about the curly black haired Siluri(ans) - 
what I remember for others authors is Britons (not Belgae ones) as a whole were described as slightly higher but a bit slender than Gauls, and a bit darker for head hairs, but with as light skins - Gauls were a bit lighter haired (same remark concerning bleaching) and a bit more stocky - 
at Iron times, I red 1m70 for Gaels, and 1m67 as a mean for Gauls (no precision for British Celts, except the famous descriptions of "red haired" and high and long bodied Caledonians - surely all Britons were not pure Celts and some regional places shew different types and Caesar was not anthropologist, nor were the other Ancients - 
but perhaps, Abderdeen, have you the passage where Caesar spoke of these anatomic details concerning different Britons? ( I can have passed over there long time ago)

----------


## elghund

I can see three hotspots in France for FRA 17. Could the arrow be pointing at the teal blob because the teal blob is setting in the middle zone of the three FRA 17 spots?

----------


## Greying Wanderer

Caesar

http://www.mytimemachine.co.uk/caesar.htm




> The interior portion of Britain is inhabited by those of whom they say that it is handed down by tradition that they were born in the island itself: the maritime portion by those who had passed over from the country of the Belgae for the purpose of plunder and making war; almost all of whom are called by the names of those states from which being sprung they went thither, and having waged war, continued there and began to cultivate the lands.



Tacitus

http://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/tac/ag01010.htm




> Who were the original inhabitants of Britain, whether they were indigenous or foreign, is, as usual among barbarians, little known. Their physical characteristics are various, and from these conclusions may be drawn. The red hair and large limbs of the inhabitants of Caledonia point clearly to a German origin. The dark complexion of the Silures, their usually curly hair, and the fact that Spain is the opposite shore to them, are an evidence that Iberians of a former date crossed over and occupied these parts. Those who are nearest to the Gauls are also like them, either from the permanent influence of original descent, or, because in countries which run out so far to meet each other, climate has produced similar physical qualities. But a general survey inclines me to believe that the Gauls established themselves in an island so near to them.



also interesting separately




> The most civilized of all these nations are they who inhabit Kent, which is entirely a maritime district, nor do they differ much from the Gallic customs. Most of the inland inhabitants do not sow corn, *but live on milk and flesh*, and are clad with skins.

----------


## Greying Wanderer

@Angela, Vallicanus

Indeed, an interesting little mystery.

----------


## JS Bach

That’s cool that the (South and Central) English form such a clear homogeneous cluster – even at 24 clusters. I wouldn’t have thought that before, but I can see reasons for it now. I guess out-breeding within the bounds of a nation can contribute to such an effect. It seems like it would be easy to identify if someone belongs to that cluster. I hope 23andMe utilizes those results in their ancestral composition calculator. Some of my ancestry traces back to those Northern England clusters as well, so I hope I can someday get my ancestral breakdowns for that too.

----------


## Arame

> *9600 BC* Last Ice Age ends and land is colonised by hunter-gatherers
> 
> *2500 BC Influx of settlers from east and western coastal routes*
> 
> *54 BC* Julius Caesar invades Britain and defeats the British tribal chief Cassivellaunus
> *410 AD* Collapse of Roman rule in Britain, which descends into the chaos of a failed state
> *400-500 AD* Large influx of Angles and Saxons
> *600-700 AD* Anglo-Saxon rule throughout much of Britain – Welsh kingdoms successfully resist
> *865 AD* Large-scale invasion by Danish Vikings
> *1066 AD* Norman invasion


A brief timeline of settlements in Britain from here

What are Your opinions. Who are the people at 2500 BC?
Are there the R1b people? 
Are there pre-IE or this is the IE influx?
In my opinion it is little bit too early for IE. 
Whoever there are I think it is quite probable that they are the builders of Stonehenge complex.

----------


## Aberdeen

> A brief timeline of settlements in Britain from here
> 
> What are Your opinions. Who are the people at 2500 BC?
> Are there the R1b people? 
> Are there pre-IE or this is the IE influx?
> In my opinion it is little bit too early for IE. 
> Whoever there are I think it is quite probable that they are the builders of Stonehenge complex.


My own personal view is that the people who arrived in Britain from the sea about 4500 years ago were the Bell Beaker R1b folk. However, here at the Europe Forum, such a point of view is considered to be heretical by most of the people who regularly post here.

----------


## JS Bach

> My own personal view is that the people who arrived in Britain from the sea about 4500 years ago were the Bell Beaker R1b folk.


That's probably close to my view as well now. I've been doing linear regression analyses of the Ancient DNA samples of the Bell Beakers, Corded Ware, and Hinxton Celts and Anglo-Saxons, using the Eurogenes 15 populations spreadsheet, and without including the Corded Ware samples got the following results:


R-Squared
Hinxton Anglo-Saxons
Hinxton Celts
Bell Beakers
Intercept

Southeast_English
0.992643
0.09091
0.586855
0.32388
-0.01117

Southwest_English
0.987226
0.291528
0.172233
0.548788
-0.0828

West_Scottish
0.997614
0.035514
0.883953
0.092273
-0.077

Danish
0.995665
0.57223
-0.02596
0.452749
0.006023

North_Dutch
0.995606
0.672777
-0.1185
0.450742
-0.03299



I then added the Corded Ware average, and got negative coefficients for the Corded Ware attribute in the British Samples:


R-Squared
Corded Ware Average
Bell Beaker Average
Hinxton 2, 3 and 5 Average
Hinxton 1 and 4 Average
Intercept

Southeast_English
0.99727
-0.1809
0.534825
0.173386
0.451567
0.140614

Southwest_English
0.997056
-0.26069
0.852778
0.410384
-0.02273
0.135932

West_Scottish
0.998428
-0.07898
0.184374
0.071524
0.824885
-0.01073

North_Dutch
0.995713
0.027794
0.418332
0.660106
-0.09772
-0.05631



The Corded Ware did make a reasonably good showing in the Norwegian and Swedish samples:


R-Squared
Corded Ware Average
Bell Beaker Average
Hinxton 2, 3 and 5 Average
Intercept

Norwegian
0.983373
0.200697
0.032122
0.762082
0.034933

Norwegian
std err :
0.104949
0.22862
0.171303
0.574305

Swedish
0.972284
0.271106
0.027215
0.702293
-0.00382

Swedish
std err :
0.134317
0.292596
0.219239
0.735015



And to a lesser extent in the North Germans:


R-Squared
Corded Ware Average
Bell Beaker Average
Hinxton 1 and 4 Average
Intercept

North German
0.993364
0.100407
0.490937
0.403744
0.032947

North German
std err :
0.060915
0.181092
0.147057
0.341062



The North Dutch, however, came out as about a 40-60 split of the Bell Beakers and Hinxton Anglo-Saxons:


R-Squared
Bell Beaker Average
Hinxton 2, 3 and 5 Average
Intercept

North_Dutch
0.995576
0.405466
0.596296
-0.01119

North_Dutch
std err :
0.102244
0.083744
0.276286



I realize this analysis method is far from perfect, but I guess it's something with what we have for estimating those proportions.

It may well also be the case that the Bell Beakers in question had some Yamna influence, as noted particularly by their West Asian proportions in Eurogenes 15.

----------


## Greying Wanderer

> A brief timeline of settlements in Britain from here
> 
> What are Your opinions. Who are the people at 2500 BC?
> Are there the R1b people? 
> Are there pre-IE or this is the IE influx?
> In my opinion it is little bit too early for IE. 
> Whoever there are I think it is quite probable that they are the builders of Stonehenge complex.


I think the sequence was

1) Doggerland HGs
2) Atlantic Megalith from southern Portugal (megalithic structures start with them)
3) Bell Beakers spreading as a minority artisan/trading population along the various trade routes including the Atlantic Megalith ones
4) megalithic structures reach their peak - Stonehenge plus others
5) one or more "Celtic" waves - Belgae last (IE?)
6) Romans
etc

so from the timing I'd guess Stonehenge (and various other peak megaliths in Ireland, Brittany etc) were the result of the high point of Atlantic Megalith.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megalit...pean_megaliths

However given the timing the next question would be how important were the Bell Beakers in creating that high point?

Imma gonna guess very important and probably something to do with copper.

http://www.greatormemines.info/

So (just my opinion) the most likely option is BB originally started some place early copper working developed and then spread as an artisan/trading group along the trade networks in various directions and when they found a region that had copper those regions got an economic / cultural boost from mining / crafting copper that lead to things like Stonehenge (and possibly to dudes with axes coming to take their stuff).

So to answer your question
- I think the base of the people who built Stonehenge were already there before 2500BC i.e. Atlantic Megalith (my guess mostly ydna E and maybe some J) possibly mixed with doggerland HGs (ydna C or I)
- combined with copper working BB people (my guess R1b or at least one branch of it and not necessarily the most common ones now).

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

edit: the next question would be if BB spread as minority artisans then you can see how they might still have a large cultural or economic impact but how could they have become a big deal demographically in some regions but not others?

----------


## Arame

Well I agree that it was Bell Beaker folk who enter at 4500 BP.
Where they R1b? Now I start to think that yes there were R1b. Because there is no any other major genetic event in this timeline. If not R1b who else?
In my opinion R1b appearance was not accompanied by mass killing of males. They just had a better farming technic, better axes to cut the forest and open a space for farming. Better axes also means boats. Boats means also fishing. All this combined means more food, more R1b population. 
Is this map corect that shows spread of Beaker from Germany?



383px-Beaker_culture_diffusion.svg.png

----------


## Aberdeen

> Well I agree that it was Bell Beaker folk who enter at 4500 BP.
> Where they R1b? Now I start to think that yes there were R1b. Because there is no any other major genetic event in this timeline. If not R1b who else?
> In my opinion R1b appearance was not accompanied by mass killing of males. They just had a better farming technic, better axes to cut the forest and open a space for farming. Better axes also means boats. Boats means also fishing. All this combined means more food, more R1b population. 
> Is this map corect that shows spread of Beaker from Germany?
> 
> 
> 
> 383px-Beaker_culture_diffusion.svg.png


There are various maps and various theories about who the Bell Beaker folk were and where they came from. If you explore this site, you'll find Maciamo's views on the matter. I believe he sees BB as largely being a cultural phenomenon, whereas some of us think it involved major population movements, perhaps initially mainly by sea. Regardless, the earliest "Maritime" style bell beakers are found on the Iberian peninsula.

----------


## MOESAN

> There are various maps and various theories about who the Bell Beaker folk were and where they came from. If you explore this site, you'll find Maciamo's views on the matter. I believe he sees BB as largely being a cultural phenomenon, whereas some of us think it involved major population movements, perhaps initially mainly by sea. Regardless, the earliest "Maritime" style bell beakers are found on the Iberian peninsula.


_

I'm afraid I 'll repeat myself but we have some clues to estimate BB was a speedy phenomenon at the scale of History, and shew different aspects according to regions, different depths of penetration too, and different physical types, even if 'dinarids' of the old school seem the first ones, everywhere (males for the most, I think) - strontium teeth stories and other non metric researches shew some foreign intruders in some diverse places with some mating with local females (non BB at first then) but apparently the different phases of BBs didn't began nor dead at the same time everywhere. the recent origin of the most of British BBs seem without doubt in the Netherlands-Germany Rhine (anthropology + archeology) and seem having been already the result of a mixture of populations and cultural influences (Corded by instance)- the Germany BBs DNA we have seem confirming a Northern Europe stage too, not very akin to southern Portugal populations of ancient time nor today - Hubert had the impression the BRITISH BBs could have been the ancestors of the celtic Gaels... the BBs of Ireland, physically (#not the supposed Gales here!), shew more ties with Iberia (Coon), scottish ones between Britain and Ireland - Y-R1b? I don't know, yes, but at what stage? very possible if we accept that BB played a booster role - NO HOMOGENEITY WHEN WE GO IN DETAILS. A BROAD NET OF MATERIAL ACCULTURATION BASED ON METALLURGY SKILLS FINALLY TRANSMITTED TO OTHER ELITES
big movements of populations? pretty sure, but not the demic result of first BBs bearers - I think they seriously helped Celtic and proto-Germanic and Italic tribes to do a step or more forwards, and help the Atlantic megalithers too to get closer to these central Europe first I-Eans (final result: celtization of Iberia?)
&: we suppose always Gaels took foot on Ireland just after leaving the Continent. it's very possible they stayed a long enough time in Britain; their supposed passage to ireland at Iron time could be related to Brittonic impulses from the Continent -
_

----------


## MOESAN

concerning Vikings, when speaking of Iceland it seems the Norwegians were the core of the colonizators, and coming FROM DIFFERENT PARTS OF NORWAY, NOT ONLY WEST, and some Swedes and Danes took foot there too - 
In and abstract of the Bodmer paper, it's said that when anlaysing with ADMIXTURE and not his FINESTRUCTURE he found roughly a cluster with all Welshes, Western Scots, some Northern irishmen at first + some other men of Scotland places N-East and South, and here and there some Enlishmen - cluster opposed to the remnant of all England 
it seems confirming some links within "celtic" regions and my analysis about depth of his FINESTRUCTURE (small clusters can reflect old story or recent drift when you have not more details about them)- 

the supposed "franch" components can very easily reflect Neolithic people mixed with Mesolithic ones before Celts, and Celts themselves mixed with the 2 precedent groups (+ some fully Middle Ages introgression? not sure of a great imput here) - the Doggerland hypothesis seems to me a bit overrated on the demic aspect -

----------


## Vukodav

There are four French clusters in this study: FRA12, FRA14, FRA17 and SFS31.

The last one has also some Northern Spanish samples, mostly from Catalonia, while FRA12 has some Italians samples.

----------


## JS Bach

One thing I’m having a hard time reconciling is how the analysis in this study can conclude that Anglo-Saxons are so much more homogeneous than the Celts, yet how Bryan Sykes, Stephen Oppenheimer and others can be so adamant in their conclusions that the English are overwhelmingly Celtic. If you assume that the English are, say, 75% Celtic and 25% Anglo-Saxon, then wouldn’t the Celtic population in England that the Angles and Saxons mixed with have had to be very homogeneous? If that is the case, then how likely is it that the red area of the graph here http://www.dienekes.blogspot.ca/2015...t-al-2015.html covering the large majority of England would have had such a genetically homogeneous population of Celts, compared to the rest of the Island, before the Anglo-Saxons came? If the newer study is more accurate, then it looks more like an invasion than a melting pot to me. (note the red colour depicting the English cluster)


Addendum – This kind of contradicts the linear regression analysis I posted earlier in this thread which had the ancient Hinxton Celts as being the most significant variable, and the Hinxton Anglo-Saxons as the least significant variable for predicting the SouthEast English sample I used - with the Bell Beakers being in the middle in terms of significance. Well, the Hinxton samples were small (2 and 3) ...

----------


## sparkey

> One thing I’m having a hard time reconciling is how the analysis in this study can conclude that Anglo-Saxons are so much more homogeneous than the Celts, yet how Bryan Sykes, Stephen Oppenheimer and others can be so adamant in their conclusions that the English are overwhelmingly Celtic. If you assume that the English are, say, 75% Celtic and 25% Anglo-Saxon, then wouldn’t the Celtic population in England that the Angles and Saxons mixed with have had to be very homogeneous? If that is the case, then how likely is it that the red area of the graph here http://www.dienekes.blogspot.ca/2015...t-al-2015.html covering the large majority of England would have had such a genetically homogeneous population of Celts, compared to the rest of the Island, before the Anglo-Saxons came? If the newer study is more accurate, then it looks more like an invasion than a melting pot to me. (note the red colour depicting the English cluster)


To begin with, Sykes and Oppenheimer are not reliable on the topic. They worked with a much more limited dataset, and jumped to false conclusions. One assumption that they made is that the percentage of haplogroups from a source population corresponds to the percentage of autosomal DNA from the same source population, which is not a good assumption in many cases. They also assumed that maximum haplogroup frequency tends to correspond to point of origin, which it does not. And although I don't recall that they ever used this assumption themselves, I think it would also be incorrect to assume that population diversity corresponds to diversity of haplogroups. The Anglo-Saxons probably brought a mix of R1b, I1, I2-M223, R1a, etc., while the native Celts were more dominantly R1b, but that doesn't imply that the Celts were more homogenous.

One of the more thoroughly addressed points in the PotBI paper is the correspondence of clusters to one another and to continental populations. It's tough to argue that the red cluster is much more than 50% Anglo-Saxon when it matches more closely to certain other British populations than it does to continental populations. Based on this study, it does indeed seem that there was a large group of relatively homogenous Celts in southern Britain, which I don't think should be that surprising, considering that the geography of those parts of southern Britain allows a lot of population movement. So, we see a large, relatively homogenous Celtic substratum spanning the red cluster, as well as the Devon cluster, Cornish cluster, Welsh Marches cluster, etc; the differences between those being partly the amount of Anglo-Saxon influence.

----------

