Vitruvius
Well-known member
- Messages
- 633
- Reaction score
- 1,177
- Points
- 91
- Ethnic group
- Italian
- Y-DNA haplogroup
- I1
- mtDNA haplogroup
- H5a1
Any impact of the Greek colonies on broadly Southern France, in particular the area of Marseille, would definitely be an interesting topic to investigate. But the reported similarity here is of South-Eastern France (up almost to the borders with Switzerland) with "TSI", not with Greeks. As to my "theory" above which is not even a theory but just my two cents, I know very well that Tuscans (TSI) are not Ligurians yet they would be a better match to the latter than the Greeks.
Yes, and Marseille is part of South-Eastern France. Also, genetic distance to modern Tuscans is being used as simply an arbitrary reference population chosen to represent central Italians - not some sort of documentation of direct contribution or admixture from Tuscany (which I think is historically rather unlikely). It's quite clear that northern Italians show closer autosomal relation as you've mentioned. I historically, I would presume Ligurian and later Roman influence would be primary vectors for Italian influence as you've mentioned. This however doesn't exclude the possibility of some Greek contribution, just as there may be also a minority of what is ultimately Greek ancestry in many modern northern Italians as well.
On the other hand if you are implying that the Greek genetic profile is practically indistinguishable from that of Tuscans (which is highly debateable), then the same "TSI" (which in fact would be Greek, or the same as Greek) affinity should show up also in Empuries and other Greek colonies of the Western Mediterranean.
I'm not sure why you seem to think this considering the topic of Tuscans was something you have injected into the conversation, not myself. I don't think it's a huge stretch of logic to say that part of the elevated Caucasian ancestry of the modern southern french may not just come from Italian colonization but also the historically documented Greek city states of Southern France. Ancient Greek profiles (at least those we have so far) are mostly rather distinguishable from modern C. Italians with perhaps but a few exceptions, but I fail to see how this idea relates as I'm not advocating some sort of 100% genetic turnover of Celtic populations.