# Humanities & Anthropology > History & Civilisations >  Early depiction of Jesus

## Angela

This line drawing of the face of Jesus has been discovered in a church in the Negev. It dates anywhere from the 4th to the 6th century. There was no Jewish settlement there. It was Byzantine and "Arabic". 
https://www.haaretz.com/archaeology/...urch-1.6640744




There are differences from the sort of consensus depiction which came to dominate religious art and which also can be found from the 6th century,i.e. no long hair or beard. The line drawing looks to have a rather more "Semitic" nose to me.


I always used to picture him this way.

Of course, it's anybody's guess as to the accuracy or inaccuracy of either version, as there are no contemporaneous portraits of him and his appearance is not described in any surviving writing, canonical or not. 

This is the earliest depiction, from 2nd century Syria, but the face is indistinct, although the hair is short.


I suppose we could say, however, that the odds are that he was NOT blonde, blue eyed, and small nosed.

This is the depiction by Michelangelo using a young Jew from the Rome ghetto as a model. I think he looks like the "eastern" model which dominated for so long, but whether it was the most common "look" among the Jews of Rome, or Michelangelo just looked for a beautiful young Jew who resembled the iconography with which he was familiar, we can't know.

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> This line drawing of the face of Jesus has been discovered in a church in the Negev. It dates anywhere from the 4th to the 6th century. There was no Jewish settlement there. It was Byzantine and "Arabic". 
> https://www.haaretz.com/archaeology/...urch-1.6640744
> 
> 
> 
> 
> There are differences from the sort of consensus depiction which came to dominate religious art and which also can be found from the 6th century,i.e. no long hair or beard. The line drawing looks to have a rather more "Semitic" nose to me.
> 
> 
> ...


Yup, the whole "Aryan Jesus" movement from the 19th and early 20th centuries is quite ridiculous, at least with hindsight. I honestly think, though, that Jesus would have looked more Italian than anything else, as that's roughly what I imagine the original Hebrews as looking like (more so than, say, the Lebanese). Phenotypically, this comes under the "Litorid" type.

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## Angela

Fwiw, anthropologists trying to "reconstruct" ancient skulls from Israel would disagree with you. 

1.Man from the Galilee who lived during the time of Jesus

2.Man from Israel 4,000 BC.

3.Philistine woman

4.Sacrificed child 4,000 BC.

=



First century Judean:

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> Fwiw, anthropologists trying to "reconstruct" ancient skulls from Israel would disagree with you. 
> 
> 1.Man from the Galilee who lived during the time of Jesus
> 
> 2.Man from Israel 4,000 BC.
> 
> 3.Philistine woman
> 
> 4.Sacrificed child 4,000 BC.
> ...


I mean, the proper anthropologists analysing these skulls in the first half of the 20th century (people like Coon) didn't come to the conclusion that Jews used to look like this:



I genuinely think there were big political motivations for that famous reconstruction - he was almost certainly cherry-picked and exaggerated to achieve those features. The Hebrews were an East Mediterranean population, and appropriately were pred. Mediterranid with some Dinaro-Armenid influences from further North.

That reconstruction, terrible as it is, was probably based on someone with the Assyroid phenotype (http://humanphenotypes.net/Assyroid.html). Jews would never have been even close to that dark originally for starters (Samaritans would be somewhat darker than the original Jews, and are probably on par at least with non-Northern Italians), but also as mentioned Jews were and still are mainly of the Mediterranean race, unlike these hobgoblins. The Harvey Weinstein types are and were not even close to as common as the Natalie Portmans, though of course they're a decent chunk.

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> We already have solid representatives of the Ancient Levant in modern Druze, Samaritans, and Palestinians. Not one passes as Italians.


You can keep believing they're accurate representations :) Did that Chalcolithic Israel study hurt your feelings? People in Israel haven't looked like Palestinians since the dawn of time - phenotype can change in a region, you know. Antinous was a natural blonde Anatolian Greek, good luck finding that today. King David was described as a redhead, as were Jews for basically the longest period of time during the second exodus - this is still true to some extent, to the point where in Eastern Europe red hair was and sometimes still is seen as a sign of Jewish ancestry (not to mention medieval Spain and Italy - in fact, only in NW Europe are people more red-headed). Now, tell me, did Ashkenazim gain this red hair from admixture with Southern Europeans?

By the way, in my posts I have gone a bit nuts about red hair before lol, but I am not a red head - it is just a very interesting (in my opinion originally Epigravettian, but that is way back) phenotypical marker of ancestry.

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## gyms

The National Police in Italy have reportedly created a digital image of what they believe Jesus Christ looked like as a young child.

https://abcnews.go.com/International...ry?id=30823820

Real Face of Jesus from the Shroud of Turin 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOSa_09i9oM

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## Angela

> I mean, the proper anthropologists analysing these skulls in the first half of the 20th century (people like Coon) didn't come to the conclusion that Jews used to look like this:
> 
> 
> 
> I genuinely think there were big political motivations for that famous reconstruction - he was almost certainly cherry-picked and exaggerated to achieve those features. The Hebrews were an East Mediterranean population, and appropriately were pred. Mediterranid with some Dinaro-Armenid influences from further North.
> 
> That reconstruction, terrible as it is, was probably based on someone with the Assyroid phenotype (http://humanphenotypes.net/Assyroid.html). Jews would never have been even close to that dark originally for starters (Samaritans would be somewhat darker than the original Jews, and are probably on par at least with non-Northern Italians), but also as mentioned Jews were and still are mainly of the Mediterranean race, unlike these hobgoblins. The Harvey Weinstein types are and were not even close to as common as the Natalie Portmans, though of course they're a decent chunk.


Not one comment you made is supported by anything vaguely factual. Just for starters you didn't provide links to the comments by Coon, or which skulls he was using, for that matter. They certainly wouldn't have been these skulls. The rest is total nonsense. How on earth would you know that Samaritans are darker? Based on what evidence? People have to stop assuming modern Ashkenazim look exactly like Judeans of the first century. Their admixture, for one thing, puts that seriously in doubt.

As for Samaritans, I do indeed see some similarities with the that last posted reconstruction. 






@Gyms,
Leaving aside the question of who is represented on the Shroud of Turin, I will say that the reconstruction doesn't really look like the shroud picture to me. It looks more likely to be "Semitic" than does the image on the Shroud.

It also rather looks like the reconstruction in my first post of the man from Galilee, and also somewhat resembles this old picture of a Samaritan priest. It may have been a minority "look" among the Samaritans which has now almost disappeared.

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> Not one comment you made is supported by anything vaguely factual. Just for starters you didn't provide links to the comments by Coon, or which skulls he was using, for that matter. They certainly wouldn't have been these skulls. The rest is total nonsense. How on earth would you know that Samaritans are darker? Based on what evidence? People have to stop assuming modern Ashkenazim look exactly like Judeans of the first century. Their admixture, for one thing, puts that seriously in doubt.
> 
> As for Samaritans, I do indeed see some similarities with the that last posted reconstruction. 
> 
> [REDACTED]


I agree Ashkenazim don't look exactly like the Hebrews, I'm not claiming that for one second. That being said, none of the admixture models can explain Ashkenazi pigmentation - none. It follows that this came with them before migration to Europe, and perhaps was enhanced by the bottleneck, for whatever reason. Though, I keep reminding myself of the Minoan models who seemed to be pale too (and that cannot all be explained by the indoor vs outdoor lifestyle).

And those examples are somewhat dark for Samaritans (from a google search it appears you cherry-picked...), but yes, I was wrong in saying they were lighter than Italians. I guess I just personally imagine the ancient Hebrews as being a light olive hue, sort of like Assad - I find it really hard to believe that Ashkenazim became as pale as they are (only surpassed by Northern Europeans) from admixture with the actually almost always darker Southern Europeans, and it is basically impossible that they got that from non-Southern Europeans given the near total absence of WHG amongst other things.

Also one other thing - Samaritans probably took non-Jewish wives. I think this accounts for the darker features, and why they don't all have Assad-coloured olive skin. 

AND one final thing - whatever you may say, there is a significant proportion of people with the paler, Ashkenazi-like skin amongst the Samaritans. You would almost never find someone with pale skin and red hair amongst the Palestinians, but amongst the Samaritans it is hardly uncommon. From the Jewish Encyclopedia (it doesn't show any cases of red hair because the sample size is so small, and the percentage of redheads would never ever exceed 5% - it is around 2% probably, because as a rule the percentage of red beards is usually about double that of redheads):

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## Maleth

There is a believe among Jews that the father of Jesus was Pantera who (if not mistaken) was a Roman General. (I think its recorded in the Talmund) If this holds any truth then its pointless trying to figure out what Jesus looked like, and probably would have a particular different look to the rest of the people around him. Even in the case for the faithful who believe that Jesus was a result of a virgin birth....would he look exactly like his mother.....Either way it will remain an Enigma.

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## Salento

If Jesus had been the son of a Roman General, would have benefited of the courtesy of a clean and maybe private execution.
It seems improbable that the Son of a Roman General would have been Nailed to a Cross for everybody to watch. imo
Romans had different standards for executions. 
Even Saint Paul (a Roman Citizen) wasn’t crucified, and got a quick death instead.

The Shroud of Turin (La Sindone) could be a Medieval forgery.

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## Angela

> I agree Ashkenazim don't look exactly like the Hebrews, I'm not claiming that for one second. That being said, none of the admixture models can explain Ashkenazi pigmentation - none. It follows that this came with them before migration to Europe, and perhaps was enhanced by the bottleneck, for whatever reason. Though, I keep reminding myself of the Minoan models who seemed to be pale too (and that cannot all be explained by the indoor vs outdoor lifestyle).
> 
> And those examples are somewhat dark for Samaritans (from a google search it appears you cherry-picked...), but yes, I was wrong in saying they were lighter than Italians. I guess I just personally imagine the ancient Hebrews as being a light olive hue, sort of like Assad - I find it really hard to believe that Ashkenazim became as pale as they are (only surpassed by Northern Europeans) from admixture with the actually almost always darker Southern Europeans, and it is basically impossible that they got that from non-Southern Europeans given the near total absence of WHG amongst other things.
> 
> Also one other thing - Samaritans probably took non-Jewish wives. I think this accounts for the darker features, and why they don't all have Assad-coloured olive skin. 
> 
> AND one final thing - whatever you may say, there is a significant proportion of people with the paler, Ashkenazi-like skin amongst the Samaritans. You would almost never find someone with pale skin and red hair amongst the Palestinians, but amongst the Samaritans it is hardly uncommon. From the Jewish Encyclopedia (it doesn't show any cases of red hair because the sample size is so small, and the percentage of redheads would never ever exceed 5% - it is around 2% probably, because as a rule the percentage of red beards is usually about double that of redheads):


Are you aware that you can't do a comparison of modern Samaritans versus Judeans of the first century when you don't have any data for first century Judeans?

I cherry pick nothing. Feel free to post a link for google or bing "Samaritan men" where we can all see all the pictures of light skinned Samaritans.

Make a baseless, scurrilous claim again that I have been dishonest in any way and there will be even more serious consequences.

@board,
There are a lot of scurrilous, non-contemporary claims about Jesus in the Talmud, for obvious reasons. Leaving aside all claims of the supernatural, a young Jewish woman who was "impure" with anyone would have been stoned to death.

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## Maleth

> If Jesus had been the son of a Roman General, would have benefited of the courtesy of a clean and maybe private execution.
> It seems improbable that the Son of a Roman General would have been Nailed to a Cross for everybody to watch. imo
> Romans had different standards for executions.


Even a virgin birth would have seemed odd and could be interpreted as a reason for execution. Its the very reason why Joseph took Mary under his protection. And if the narration in the Talmund was true, how would they have got to know about it? Complicated.

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> Are you aware that you can't do a comparison of modern Samaritans versus Judeans of the first century when you don't have any data for first century Judeans?
> 
> I cherry pick nothing. Feel free to post a link for google or bing "Samaritan men" where we can all see all the pictures of light skinned Samaritans.
> 
> Make a baseless, scurrilous claim again that I have been dishonest in any way and there will be even more serious consequences.


I am aware, but the point being most consider Samaritans as the closest modern representatives, if somewhat admixed with local women (as the mtDNA evidence seems to suggest - just as seems to be the case with all Jews). How can you explain those statistics? Do you think they somehow have more of these light features than the originals? And yes, I'm not claiming the Hebrews were Irish, but you get the point.

Answer me this if you can, where did Ashkenazi pigmentation come from? I bet you can't give me any good answer. You always seem to pick at my points, and just completely ignore any serious questions I have. For whatever reason, it's hard to have open discussion with you, which is all I want and all that should matter on an online forum.




> The Chalcolithic Israel samples were admitted to be a genetic dead end. Even then, they don't cluster with South Europeans or even Western Jews.
> 
> 
> 
> Are you denying that any Palestinians look like they belong to the Levant?
> 
> 
> 
> Indigenous Anatolians cluster with West Asian populations more than European ones so he might have just not been strictly indigenous.
> ...


I don't see what a genetic dead-end is meant to be, but regardless, the point is that if I made that claim BEFORE that study, you would have referred to the modern inhabitants in much the same way in refutation, maybe call me a Nordicist or something like that. Populations, and phenotypes, change. The Thracians were well-known for their red hair, yet look at modern day Bulgaria. 

And about Antinous and King David, you're completely missing the point. It is so ridiculously simple - phenotypes in a particular region are not static. Therefore, you cannot necessarily make any conclusions based on modern populations, though of course things can be ruled out (they weren't Black or Swedish).

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> Yeah, modern Lebanese are lighter skinned than Bronze Age Canaanites /Israelites. 
> 
> 
> 
> Samaritans, Druze, and Christian MENAs like Palestinians have traditionally not married outside their groups and so would be spared the foreign DNA that impacted their Muslim neighbors. They are all darker than Europeans. Which goes in line with the finding that the Sidon samples from Haber's (who cluster nearest with modern Samaritans) were darker than modern Lebanese.


I personally doubt that the modern Lebanese are lighter (and I do not remember that ever being reached as a conclusion - only that they picked up a bit extra Steppe), but that is all very speculative, as I am unaware as to the physical descriptions of the Phoenicians given iirc they wrote on some unstable form of parchment that has almost all degraded. Regardless of what you say, even though it is Chalcolithic, the point still stands that aDNA has shown that in the past, Levantine people were in fact lighter.

But we can just use some simple deductions - tell me where Ashkenazi pigmentation comes from, for example...

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> Yeah, modern Lebanese are lighter skinned than Bronze Age Canaanites /Israelites. 
> 
> 
> 
> Samaritans, Druze, and Christian MENAs like Palestinians have traditionally not married outside their groups and so would be spared the foreign DNA that impacted their Muslim neighbors. They are all darker than Europeans. Which goes in line with the finding that the Sidon samples from Haber's (who cluster nearest with modern Samaritans) were darker than modern Lebanese.


Ah, how could I forget this...



Second from right is an Asiatic (a Levantine, so candidate Hebrew). The Libyans (the four elaborately dressed men on the left, clearly of high social status, so it would be interesting to learn their story) actually look like modern Northern Atlantic folk, which is interesting to say the least. Far right is an Egyptian, and the black guy is Nubian. This is ancient Egyptian in origin, by the way, but a reconstruction - from similar actual pictures of the real murals, it appears the Asiatics (the candidates for Hebrew lookalikes) had somewhat of an olive hue to them, but a light olive, which is how the artist was able to mistake them for being that White. 

From ancient Egyptian depictions, which are the only known depictions of Levantines to my knowledge, it appears that the ancient Hebrews could be interpreted as having the sort of skin colour of Jerry Seinfeld, and presumably somewhat lighter due to tanning:





Also, in case you go googling him, it seems some images that pop up are him with a very obvious tan, so just saying. As far as I'm aware, you can't tan in the opposite direction, though, meaning the above images can be considered representative at the darker end of the spectrum even.

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

I think this guy is a great specimen too - American Syrian Jewish Chief Rabbi Saul Kassin:







I think you get the point of light olive-skin - that's how I see the ancient Hebrews...







Godspeed, Assad.

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## Salento

If Jesus never existed, St. Paul fooled us with the biggest prank of all time. :Grin: 

If the Shroud of Turin is real,
Jesus has Druze mtDNA!

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## Maleth

> If the Shroud of Turin is real,
> Jesus has Druze mtDNA!


Leonardo from Vinci was a genius. There were already many Jews around to pose as models one way or another as history tell us, so dna from drops of blood indicating middle eastern is defiantly not impossible. Relics were BIG business in the middle ages and preyed on the gullible.  :Sad: .

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## Maleth

@ToBeOrNotToBe This could be interesting https://www.livescience.com/40247-as...ean-genes.html

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## gyms

Now, a new study using modern forensic techniques suggests the bloodstains on the shroud are completely unrealistic, supporting arguments that it is a fake.

https://www.livescience.com/63093-sh...oodstains.html

“Neither of the investigators have the scientific qualifications to speak on it,” since as an anthropologist and a physician, the pair does not “have experience in human bloodstains,” explained Alfonso Sánchez Hermosilla, a doctor and forensic anthropologist of the research team of the Spanish Sindonology Center.

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/n...ew-study-84312

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## Angela

If I had to bet I would say that there was probably some variation in the Judeans of the first century AD, as there is in most West Eurasian groups. The likelihood that there would have been a presence of blonde, blue-eyed people is, imo, extremely low. 

The phenotype of Ashkenazim like Jerry Seinfeld is largely irrelevant, as they are anywhere from 40-60% European. I would think that 10-15% Polish and maybe an equal amount of Rhineland ancestry alone might be enough to change them up a bit. Plus, I don't think Europeans, not living amongst a lot of Jews, are aware of the fact that even among Ashkenazi Jews there's a lot of variation. Some look more like Rahm Emanuel than Jerry Seinfeld.



The phenotype of Syrian Jews is also largely irrelevant, as they have a great deal of Sephardic, i.e. European Jewish ancestry. Plus, Rabbis largely have been sequestered indoors studying the Torah and the Mishnah since early childhood, so they may not be the best example. 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_Jews

The only West Eurasian Jews who would have no European ancestry would be the Iraqi and Iranian Jews, although it could be said they've intermarried with their own set of locals. 

One of the most recent studies:
https://journals.plos.org/plosgeneti...l.pgen.1006644

As for Asad, even among his very reproductively isolated minority, where recessive genes can float up, he's hardly "typical". 

Also, I think the entire discussion has gotten rather sidetracked. The "reconstructions" show the men as they most probably "were" i.e. with the weathered skin of men who have lived their lives outdoors under the Middle Eastern sun. The people of the Levant are not "black" skinned. They don't even have the complexion of people from North Africa, many of whom have up to 20% SSA in them. I think olive to light brown skinned probably covers the range. The features are also rather distinctive in most cases.

What possible reason would there be to insist that all first century Judeans looked like Asad rather than like most modern inhabitants of the Levant, other than a discomfort with picturing Jesus as "other"?

I do understand the impulse. Most people have a tendency to make important figures, especially religious figures, resemble them. That's why the Virgin of Guadalupe is Amerindian, and the Buddha looks East Asian. Here, however, we're supposed to be looking at facts, and specifically at genetics. 

Of course, the only way to really know is to get ancient dna from first century Judeans, or people from the time of the Maccabees, for example, and look at the snps. All the speculation in the world is no substitute. 

The controversy over the Shroud of Turin will not end until modern scientists can find a way to duplicate the process.

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## leperrine

Would love to see how they reconstructed this. On the left is the actual place of the "inscription" and on the right is the "proposed" reconstruction. 



Read the Journal at Cambridge and didn't see any details: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journ...81/core-reader 


"Shivta was a large village dated to the Byzantine period, which, at its fifth- to sixth-century AD peak included three churches (Figure 1). The site declined considerably in the Early Islamic period (seventh to late ninth centuries AD), and was then abandoned, until its nineteenth-century rediscovery. We examined the Shivta churches’ main features to reconstruct the site’s historical trajectory in the context of understanding the Byzantine collapse in the Negev Desert (Tepper et al. 2015, 2018). We documented the extant artwork depicting the transfiguration of Christ on the walls of Shivta’s southern church (Linn et al. 2017; Maayan-Fanar 2017)."


Link to the study mentioned in the above quote: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ar...l.pone.0185149

On a side note: 

I really enjoy the art from the Dura-Europos Synagogue in Syria. 

The Dura-Europos synagogue (or "Dura Europas", "Dura Europos" etc.) was an ancient synagogue uncovered at Dura-Europos, Syria, in 1932. The last phase of construction was dated by an Aramaic inscription to 244 CE, making it one of the oldest synagogues in the world. It was unique among the many ancient synagogues that have emerged from archaeological digs as the structure was preserved virtually intact, and it had extensive figurative wall-paintings, which came as a considerable surprise to scholars. These paintings are now displayed in the National Museum of Damascus. - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dura-Europos_synagogue 

Just a few below. I encourage everyone to check them all out.

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## gyms

The new astonishing phenomenon detected on the Shroud

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6iQGomNqTw

BTW. We know that Leonardo da Vinci was a genius.

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> If I had to bet I would say that there was probably some variation in the Judeans of the first century AD, as there is in most West Eurasian groups. The likelihood that there would have been a presence of blonde, blue-eyed people is, imo, extremely low. 
> 
> The phenotype of Ashkenazim like Jerry Seinfeld is largely irrelevant, as they are anywhere from 40-60% European. I would think that 10-15% Polish and maybe an equal amount of Rhineland ancestry alone might be enough to change them up a bit. Plus, I don't think Europeans, not living amongst a lot of Jews, are aware of the fact that even among Ashkenazi Jews there's a lot of variation. Some look more like Rahm Emanuel than Jerry Seinfeld.
> 
> 
> 
> The phenotype of Syrian Jews is also largely irrelevant, as they have a great deal of Sephardic, i.e. European Jewish ancestry. Plus, Rabbis largely have been sequestered indoors studying the Torah and the Mishnah since early childhood, so they may not be the best example. 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Syrian_Jews
> 
> ...


Well firstly, Seinfeld is half-Ashkenazi and half-Syrian Jewish, but forgetting individual examples for now - that STILL doesn't explain the red hair (and I never claimed blonde hair would be common - anthropologists consider light brown hair blonde). Jews have comparable levels of red hair to all Europeans except NW Europeans, so unless you think Ashkenazim are heavily NW European, there is no way admixture with Europeans is responsible for the red hair. The 40-60% European estimate isn't based on "White" Europeans, it's as you know based on Southern Europeans - who Ashkenazim are lighter than.

And about Syrian Jews - yeah, fair enough, there is some Sephardic ancestry, but WHY does it matter when this Iberian ancestry picked up would be by far not the largest component, but also given the fact that Spaniards are not THAT lighter, and certainly not as redheaded (and even then, I'd only put Northern Spaniards as being lighter on average). Again, in medieval Spain (and Italy too for that matter), red hair was associated with Jews and Jewish ancestry. In Spain, it wasn't uncommon that you could be accused of being Jewish simply because you had red hair - during the Spanish Inquisition, ALL with red hair were seen as Jews. Polish Jews, especially those from Galicia (the "purest" Ashkenazis in all likelihood - I am 1/4 Galitzianer, and by coincidence that grandparent had bright ginger hair), had a frequency of over 5% for red hair. Now, look at this map:



That puts Jews in the second highest frequency bracket (besides the >10% bracket), clearly then Jewish red hair is not from a European source, unless we're half-Welsh.

And this isn't based on some primitive tribalistic impulse - I don't feel much of a connection to the Hebrews (I identify as Ashkenazi). I just genuinely find it very hard to believe that the Hebrews would have been that dark, if Ashkenazim are as light as they are (not Irish, but still pretty light). One perhaps noteworthy thing to mention is that Ashkenazim are more red-haired than are light, if that makes any sense - for example, Germans are paler than Ashkenazim on the whole, but apart from Northwestern pockets are all less red-haired.

I consider that Egyptian mural the best evidence right now as to the actual rough skin colour of the Hebrews, which is basically a light olive (like that Syrian Chief Rabbi).

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## Maleth

> The new astonishing phenomenon detected on the Shroud
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6iQGomNqTw
> 
> BTW. We know that Leonardo da Vinci was a genius.


Radio carbon dating is more reliable in my opinion ;)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioc...hroud_of_Turin

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

As always, nobody refuses to acknowledge my point about Ashkenazi red hair. I've been saying it on-and-off for ages.

It CANNOT be explained by admixture with Europeans. Therefore, it is of a West Asian source. The semi-fictional King David did not get his red hair from admixture with Italians, Eastern Europeans, Germans or Greeks.

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

This is an extremely interesting read - I first saw this article about a year ago, but I don't think I ever posted it here.

It is about the extremely obvious connection of the Habiru people to the Hebrew people.

https://www.newenglishreview.org/Rob...ish_Tradition/

The Habiru people are in all likelihood related to the earlier Hyksos people (immigrants to the Levant and Egypt from West Asia, just as with the Jewish mythos of Mesopotamian origin). And, what do you know, the Hyksos people were associated by the ancient Egyptians with...

*Red hair!

*Obviously this doesn't constitute a proof, but I absolutely love it when things like this just fall so well together.

THAT is, in my opinion, the origin of Ashkenazi red hair (and light skin). For whatever reason, this was either preserved best among Ashkenazim, or was enhanced through later contacts during migration to Italy through Anatolia and Greece (which I think is how Ashkenazim got to Italy, before being invited to the Rhineland).

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> [Redacted]


Angela, see my above post and the linked article, I think you'd actually appreciate the read.

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## Salento

> As always, nobody refuses to acknowledge my point about Ashkenazi red hair. I've been saying it on-and-off for ages.
> 
> It CANNOT be explained by admixture with Europeans. Therefore, it is of a West Asian source. The semi-fictional King David did not get his red hair from admixture with Italians, Eastern Europeans, Germans or Greeks.


I’m sorry you’re frustrated.
It’s understandable. 
It’s not about Hair Color.
imo Names of Religious groups shouldn’t be included on any DNA results. Or at least not yet.
They should stick only with the location. (for now)

Some Companies and free Calculators, often fail miserably to differentiate between Ashkenazi vs East and South Europeans.

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> I’m sorry you’re frustrated.
> It’s understandable. 
> 
> imo Names of Religious groups shouldn’t be included on any DNA results. Or at least not yet.
> They should stick only with the location. (for now)
> 
> Some Companies and free Calculators, often fail miserably to differentiate between Ashkenazi vs East and South Europeans.


I'm not that frustrated lol, and with Jews it isn't just religious - it's ethnic too. I'm practically atheist yet if I send my spit off to 23andme, they can tell me I'm fully Ashkenazi. That sort of precision is pretty amazing the more I think about it - not just for Ashkenazim, of course.

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## gyms

> Radio carbon dating is more reliable in my opinion ;)
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioc...hroud_of_Turin


 *What went wrong with the Shroud‘s radiocarbon date? 

https://www.shroud.com/pdfs/ohiomaloneypaper.pdf


http://www.innoval.com/C14/
*

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## Aaron1981

Difficult to say since the Roman era ones look far too European to me (although it may have been the look of the EEF - longish, narrow head, still very common throughout Europe today), as do any of the Jewish members you folks have posted. Then again, who really knows since apparently the Iron Age brought "Steppe" admixture to the Levant, and there have been post-Iron migrations to the area from Arab and other groups.

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## Salento

> ....... and with Jews it isn't just religious - it's ethnic too. ........ yet if I send my spit off to 23andme, they can tell me I'm fully Ashkenazi. That sort of precision is pretty amazing the more I think about it - not just for Ashkenazim, of course.


Answering:




> ..... imo Names of Religious groups shouldn’t be included on any DNA results. Or at least not yet.
> They should stick only with the location. (for now)....


From LivingDNA:
*For the moment, our test does not report on percentages of Jewish ancestry.*
_...... We appreciate that the question of genetic Jewish ancestry is of particular interest for some individuals, and it is definitely an interesting one for science to investigate. We are currently exploring the best ways to present/address this question, to include in further developments of our product..._

https://support.livingdna.com/hc/en-...wish-ancestry-

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## O Neill

Talking of early dipictions of Christ.
This here Jordan lead Codice is an interesting artifact.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jordan_Lead_Codices

Its hard to find much as the experts waved there magic wand over it to make it vanish.
Nearly worked but not quite. Science came to its rescue as it was indeed 2000 years old.
It shows a wealthy and powerful king Jesus who practiced a 1000 year old religion and seems
to decend from king david.

King Izates 2nd is my best bet. He's mum queen helena gave her weath to the poor and has the largest tomb in the city of david.
Izates was crucified and his elder brother ruled after him, They all funded the rebels against the Romans. Seems obvious to me.

They are blood decent of the house of david who was a pharaoh from Tanis.

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## MOESAN

> We already have solid representatives of the Ancient Levant in modern Druze, Samaritans, and Palestinians. Not one passes as Italians.


Do you know what your say?
You gets very fast to conclusions: there are in all the Mediterranea (lands, not sea) a percentage of people who could pass among all the above mentioned people, if this is not the most frequent types there - I think in some Samaritans by instance. Nothing of these pops are strictly homogenous and they propose several profiles, inside their general and vague "southern" appearance

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## MOESAN

No offense to anyone, but I red so much weird things in this thread.
Red hairs are less seldom among Askhenaze Jews than among the most of Europe, OK. Red hairs can be caused by a lot of mutations (7, I think, 3 very common among red hairs, for the most in Northern Europe), I don't know the distribution of these mutations among Jews - But can we say Askenaze as a whole are light haired and light eyed and very light skinned? No, SPITE the relatively high % of red hairs - I know a lot of pops with as a mean less red haired men but more light skinned men. 
oir the present question (supposed look of Jesus), today Askenaze Jews are a mix of a lot of populations and there supposed earlier population of origin is only an element in their DNA making, even if this element is surely heavy enough - On plottings of diverse systems, they plot between Southern Italians, Chypriots and Greeks - and this supposed source population (I see myself in Near-East, evidently) was already a mixed one, where roughly said Natufians and Anatolian people were the basis, enriched later by people from Iran AND even later (MLBA, I think) by people from Caucasus, even North Caucasus. At the look level, you cannot cluster completely pops of Palestine with pops of the Lebanon, neighbours however - 
So, too much unknown elements for me in this question concerning the depictation of Jesus; this post is just to try to show the numerous obstacles I see here.

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## bigblob

Ashkenazi Jews are overwhelmingly related to the males of the Levant but Ashkenazi females carry mostly MTDNA from Greeks/Italians.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/release...0509003653.htm

Ashkenazi males are more related to Palestinians than European males:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palest...enetic_studies

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## ToBeOrNotToBe

> Ashkenazi Jews are overwhelmingly related to the males of the Levant but Ashkenazi females carry mostly MTDNA from Greeks/Italians.
> 
> https://www.sciencedaily.com/release...0509003653.htm
> 
> Ashkenazi males are more related to Palestinians than European males:
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palest...enetic_studies


Nobody knows much about the mtDNA really, anybody claiming they can pinpoint it beyond broad regions is a liar. The Y DNA is about 90% Middle Eastern though, which would suggest European-like admixture on the female side, but when that took place and with what population is mostly unknown (other than that population must have not had much WHG, so it can't have been modern "Whites", and that combined with Ashkenazi pigmentation puts a Southern European origin of Ashkenazi "European-ness" very much into question). Personally, I think a Kura-Araxes source of this Euro-ness is most likely, and that Jews managed to preserve this ancestry well. Alternatively, it could be down to the Philistines, however I'd expect them to have significant WHG if they were ultimately Beaker-derived.

I love this example, so consider Ramses II and his red hair and pale skin (and much older Ancient Egyptians too, but he is best preserved). Where could that have come from, admixture with modern Europeans? What about King David, surely the most significant probably at least partly real figure in Jewish mythology, who was a redhead? And the plenty of other redheaded folk in the Bible - of course, they all looked Palestinian, I mean it's obviously hair dye right? These redheads described probably looked like this fellow, look how strong he is in his swarthiness, how brave! Having pale skin is oppressive. And forget about that Chalcolithic study that showed pale skin and blue eyes in the Middle East, the Middle East has always been brown and only dumb Nazi White supremacists claim otherwise, especially the "Nordicists [who edit the Wikipedia pages]" *ahem Angela*.

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## bigblob

Ancient Jewish MTDNA from the 1st Century results:
From the Tomb of the Shroud in Jerusalem:
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ar...l.pone.0008319

Results:

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## bigblob

Lol. The average Palestinian does not look like your pic.


As for Ramesess 2, he had light skin and red hair in his youth.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramesses_II#Mummy

So where did ancient Egyptians originate? From the Middle East of course. Just about every last Haplogroup taken from Egyptian mummies originated in the Middle East. According to the DNA taken from the Abusir el Meleq mummies, they had light skin, dark hair and eyes:
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms15694

In fact, ancient Egyptians would have resembled the pic of Palestinians I put up. Modern Jewish groups are related to Palestinians and other peoples of Israel, like the Samaritans.

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## bigblob

As for red hair and blue eyes amongst Jews. THERE ARE PLENTY OF INDIGENOUS MIDDLE EASTERN PEOPLE WHO HAVE RED AND BLONDE HAIR. They are NOT Europeans:
Palestinians:

Syrians:


Yazidi:

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