Alexander the Great's FATHER is found.

[real expert]

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Alexander the Great's FATHER is found: Ancient Greek tomb discovered in 1977 is confirmed to contain the remains of King Philip II​

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The identification of the Royal Tombs in the Great Tumulus at Vergina, Macedonia, Greece: A comprehensive review​

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Highlights

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The skeletons belong to the father, the brother and the son of Alexander the Great.
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The skeletons studied are among the most historically important in Europe.
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This is a unique case for which there is BCE historical evidence for the skeletons.
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The review demonstrates the pitfalls in identifying skeletal evidence.
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Some of the items in Tomb II belonged to Alexander the Great.

Abstract​

This review contributes to the long-running debate over the identities of the occupants of the unspoiled 4th-century BCE Royal Tombs at Vergina, in northern Greece. The human skeletal remains from Royal Tombs I, II and III are related to the King and Pharaoh Alexander the Great. We review the skeletal evidence as well as archaeological, historic, and geological evidence. We evaluate the relative criticism concerning the identification of the occupants of the Royal Tombs. We studied the skeletal elements with the aid of macrophotography, radiographs and anatomic dissection. Stratigraphic evidence is provided. A knee fusion was found in the male skeleton of Tomb I consistent with the historic evidence of the lameness of King Philip II. No evidence of trauma was found in the male skeleton of Tomb II and evidence of cremation in the male and female skeletons is consistent with the historic evidence for King Arrhidaeus. The evidence presented supports the conclusion that Tomb I belongs to King Philip II, his wife Cleopatra and their newborn child. Tomb II belongs to King Arrhidaeus and his wife Adea Eurydice. Tomb III to Alexander IV. These conclusions refute the traditional speculation that Tomb II belongs to Philip II. Some of the artifacts in Tomb II belonged to Alexander the Great.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352409X23004546?via=ihub#f0015​

 

[Vallicanus]

Very interesting.
Any chance of genetic material from these Macedonian tombs?

 

[Vitruvius]

Very interesting.
Any chance of genetic material from these Macedonian tombs?

Imagine if our first Macedonian aDNA samples came from Alexander's family. I bet @Omino would love to see the results more than anybody. My guess is they will be similar to the neighboring IA Paeonians genetically or maybe a tad bit more southerly.

 

[qh777]

Time to get the autosomal, mtDNA and Y-DNA. And to generate G25 coords

 

[Omino]

Imagine if our first Macedonian aDNA samples came from Alexander's family. I bet @Omino would love to see the results more than anybody. My guess is they will be similar to the neighboring IA Paeonians genetically or maybe a tad bit more southerly.

I would definitely love to see the results and more samples from different eras.

 

[real expert]

Certainly, one of the biggest stories of the century would be a bombshell publication containing King Philip II's DNA results. To their great annoyance, the Greeks, who regard Alexander as the greatest of all time, are enraged by the fervent arguments on the internet by Albanians, Bulgarians, and Northern Macedonians claiming Alexander as their own. We may now make educated guesses about what the DNA results might reveal. The Macedonians, and specifically Philip II, might cluster with the Greeks of the Northern Mainland, like those from Thessaloniki, or they might be even more or less northerly shifted. Regardless, I'm assuming they won't end up looking like Mycenaeans.

To be honest, even though I am not Greek, I would be somewhat shocked if Philip II or the Macedonians proved to be non-Greek genetically. Anyway, Alexander the Great is responsible for Hellenizing and spreading Hellenism throughout the world and creating the Hellenistic age.

Besides, we can still hope to get Philip II's autosomal, mtDNA, and Y-DNA because he was not cremated.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352409X23004546?via=ihub#f0015

In conclusion, boney and literary evidence, all show that gracile Arrhidaeus was initially inhumed by Olympias and after about six months he was cremated dry (having lost much of his collagen during the burial period) by Cassander. Eurydice was cremated green after she was kept unburied (at the direction of Olympias) for about six months (therefore having most of her bone collagen preserved). The robust Philip II was not cremated but inhumed soon after death in Tomb I. The evidence for dry cremation indicates that Tomb II was a secondary burial consistent with the circumstances of Arrhidaeus’ death. Thus, all the evidence is consistent that King Philip II must be excluded as the occupant of Tomb II. Instead, only Arrhidaeus and Adea Eurydice can be the occupants of Tomb II.

 

[eupator]

His remains were on display in the museum since before I was born, I remember going there as a kid for a school trip.

 

[eupator]

To their great annoyance, the Greeks, who regard Alexander as the greatest of all time, are enraged by the fervent arguments on the internet by Albanians, Bulgarians, and Northern Macedonians claiming Alexander as their own.

Ye, ye, he was from an imaginary group, parent of modern balkanoid we-wuzzers, that left no linguistic trace other than Greek even though his son conquered the eastern world all the way to India.

 

[Vitruvius]

Certainly, one of the biggest stories of the century would be a bombshell publication containing King Philip II's DNA results. To their great annoyance, the Greeks, who regard Alexander as the greatest of all time, are enraged by the fervent arguments on the internet by Albanians, Bulgarians, and Northern Macedonians claiming Alexander as their own.

Reminds me of the same types who claim Northern Italians as Celtic/Germanic or modern Southern Italians as Arabs/North Africans; hopelessly destitute people whose national history and identity has to be fabricated or stolen from others to make them feel satisfied. It's a rather widespread and pathetic phenomenon.

We may now make educated guesses about what the DNA results might reveal. The Macedonians, and specifically Philip II, might cluster with the Greeks of the Northern Mainland, like those from Thessaloniki, or they might be even more or less northerly shifted. Regardless, I'm assuming they won't end up looking like Mycenaeans.

I agree with this assumption strongly. Anyone who thinks they will get a Campanian or Cretan like population average in ancient Macedonia is in for a rude awakening. I'm winking at the Slavic repopulation crowd in particular, here.

 

[Aspar]

Reminds me of the same types who claim Northern Italians as Celtic/Germanic or modern Southern Italians as Arabs/North Africans; hopelessly destitute people whose national history and identity has to be fabricated or stolen from others to make them feel satisfied. It's a rather widespread and pathetic phenomenon.



I agree with this assumption strongly. Anyone who thinks they will get a Campanian or Cretan like population average in ancient Macedonia is in for a rude awakening. I'm winking at the Slavic repopulation crowd in particular, here.

I'm not sure why you are bringing this but Macedonia(Greek part) was indeed heavily settled by Slavic population ever since from the 6th century. It never stopped having a Slavic population.
On the other hand, Greeks from Macedonia do have a lot of Slavic ancestry one way or another.
It's visible on every level of the DNA.
They aren't even that different from the surrounding Slavic populations genetically.

 

[epirus1000]

Imagine if our first Macedonian aDNA samples came from Alexander's family. I bet @Omino would love to see the results more than anybody. My guess is they will be similar to the neighboring IA Paeonians genetically or maybe a tad bit more southerly.

I would say a bit more northerly, the Dardanian type E-v13.

 

[epirus1000]

Certainly, one of the biggest stories of the century would be a bombshell publication containing King Philip II's DNA results. To their great annoyance, the Greeks, who regard Alexander as the greatest of all time, are enraged by the fervent arguments on the internet by Albanians, Bulgarians, and Northern Macedonians claiming Alexander as their own. We may now make educated guesses about what the DNA results might reveal. The Macedonians, and specifically Philip II, might cluster with the Greeks of the Northern Mainland, like those from Thessaloniki, or they might be even more or less northerly shifted. Regardless, I'm assuming they won't end up looking like Mycenaeans.

To be honest, even though I am not Greek, I would be somewhat shocked if Philip II or the Macedonians proved to be non-Greek genetically. Anyway, Alexander the Great is responsible for Hellenizing and spreading Hellenism throughout the world and creating the Hellenistic age.

Besides, we can still hope to get Philip II's autosomal, mtDNA, and Y-DNA because he was not cremated.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352409X23004546?via=ihub#f0015

If the DNA results of King Philip were convenient to Greeks, those would be published since ages. There are two options left, one is to publish results of other remains and of course the miniscule chance of publishing the real results.

 

[Omino]

If the DNA results of King Philip were convenient to Greeks, those would be published since ages. There are two options left, one is to publish results of other remains and of course the miniscule chance of publishing the real results.

There is also the obvious option that the remains aren't in good condition to extract DNA from like numerous others but this is too difficult for a delusional nationalist to understand.
So the delusional nationalist will write some nonsensical conspiracy theory to transform a scientific thread to a Article from "the onion".

 

[Vitruvius]

I'm not sure why you are bringing this but Macedonia(Greek part) was indeed heavily settled by Slavic population ever since from the 6th century. It never stopped having a Slavic population.
On the other hand, Greeks from Macedonia do have a lot of Slavic ancestry one way or another.
It's visible on every level of the DNA.
They aren't even that different from the surrounding Slavic populations genetically.

Currently existing evidence points to the opposite conclusion. If there is any Slavic ancestry at all in modern Greeks it's small enough to be effectively invisible. Their "northern" profile (relative to the Mycenaeans and Modern Greek islanders) was already present as an average in Iron age and Hellenistic era Paeonia. Only FYROM/North Macedonia shows signs of Slavic and Central European introgression.

If you want to bet money on Hellenistic era Macedonians looking significantly different, then be my guest, but it's not a bet I would take.

 

[Aspar]

Currently existing evidence points to the opposite conclusion. If there is any Slavic ancestry at all in modern Greeks it's small enough to be effectively invisible. Their "northern" profile (relative to the Mycenaeans and Modern Greek islanders) was already present as an average in Iron age and Hellenistic era Paeonia. Only FYROM/North Macedonia shows signs of Slavic and Central European introgression.

If you want to bet money on Hellenistic era Macedonians looking significantly different, then be my guest, but it's not a bet I would take.

Are these distances based on G25 coordinates?
Even if so, what do these prove?
Admixture and pca based distances are totally different aspects that aren't necessarily correlated and most of the time they aren't.
You can mix a Cypriot and an English and get an offspring that plots like North Italian.
Now replace these individuals with whole populations and after a while you will get even smoother admixture and distances with the North Italians.
The only way to tell them apart is if you model them against very ancient populations such as WHG, Iran_Neo, EHG and such.

To cut story short, try model the Macedonian Greeks and the Paeonians with these ancients and put some heavy Balto-Slavic drifted sample in the mix.
I would really want to see the results. Try model them with any professional or amateurish tool available.

On the other hand, I'm not denying the Greeks any ancient ancestry, however to say that the Slavic ancestry is practically invisible in modern Macedonian Greeks is not very sustainable.

No, those distances won't prove nothing I'm afraid. It will take more extensive research to get closer to the truth. A research involving both yDna, admixture and IBD matching.

Props to Eupator, this is how I can be modeled with qpAdm:

results$weights
# A tibble: 2 × 5
  target left                            weight    se     z
  <chr>  <chr>                            <dbl> <dbl> <dbl>
1 aspar  Macedonia_Classical_Hellenistic  0.587 0.119  4.92
2 aspar  Russia_Sunghir_Medieval.SG       0.413 0.119  3.46
> results$popdrop
# A tibble: 3 × 13
  pat      wt   dof chisq             p f4rank Macedonia_Classical_Hel…¹ Russi…² feasi…³ best  dofdiff chisq…⁴ p_nes…⁵
  <chr> <dbl> <dbl> <dbl>         <dbl>  <dbl>                     <dbl>   <dbl> <lgl>   <lgl>   <dbl>   <dbl>   <dbl>
1 00        0    23  38.1 0.0248             1                     0.587   0.413 TRUE    NA         NA    NA        NA
2 01        1    24  69.3 0.00000276         0                     1      NA     TRUE    TRUE        0   -21.3       1
3 10        1    24  90.6 0.00000000114      0                    NA       1     TRUE    TRUE       NA    NA        NA

I'm from FYROM if it makes you feel better that name.
Now you show me a genuine Macedonian Greek result modeled with these exact populations for the sake of continuing this debate.

 

[Vitruvius]

Are these distances based on G25 coordinates?

They're the G25 averages of the ancient Paeonians sequenced in the southern arc study.

Even if so, what do these prove?

It concretely proves that there were already high steppe populations bordering Macedonia over a thousand years before the first Slavs would arrive to the Balkans. The Paeonians sequenced so far had individuals that were both totally normative to the modern Greek Macedonian average in the Hellenistic age and also a bit more northerly, similar to northern Italians in the Iron age.

To elaborate more it proves that this profile which we see in Greek Mainlanders long predates the arrival of the Slavs in this region. If we find the same profile normative to Greek Macedonia, it will effectively prove continuity from ancients to moderns with a distinct lack of far more northerly Slavic input.

Admixture and pca based distances are totally different aspects that aren't necessarily correlated and most of the time they aren't.
You can mix a Cypriot and an English and get an offspring that plots like North Italian.
Now replace these individuals with whole populations and after a while you will get even smoother admixture and distances with the North Italians.
The only way to tell them apart is if you model them against very ancient populations such as WHG, Iran_Neo, EHG and such.

You can model any population with an almost infinite number of mutually exclusive admixture scenarios with these tools, but that doesn't mean any of them actually happened or are accurate. Admixture modelling is just a "guess" and not definitive measure of ancestry by itself. These "guesses" only become evidenced when we begin to see historic/prehistoric samples published which show a broad introgression of genetic profiles which were previously uncommon to a given region, such was what we saw in Serbia in the Danubian frontier study. If said profiles become permanently normative or shift the average permanently it is assumed a measurable admixture scenario has affected the population.

By comparison distances are not really able to be manipulated like source populations. You plug in populations and compare them against one another. In this case the result we get is that the ancient Paeonians effectively overlap Modern Greek Mainlanders and Northern Italians. It's doubtful ancient Paeonian contributed anything to Italy, but the fact that they bordered Macedonia is significant. It implies long term and unaltered population continuity in the Greek Macedonia.

To cut story short, try model the Macedonian Greeks and the Paeonians with these ancients and put some heavy Balto-Slavic drifted sample in the mix.
I would really want to see the results. Try model them with any professional or amateurish tool available.

You can model them any number of ways as you've already mentioned. I don't really care too much about that. What's more important to answer this question is if the ancient samples show continuity throughout the ages in the same region or not. If we get a bunch of Modern Cretan-like ancient Macedonians who later turn out to form a cline with northern european and slavic populations in the middle ages which homogenize to a modern average then yes, your Slavic repopulation hypothesis would be evidenced.

But on the flip side scenario if ancient Macedonia turns up as Paeonian-like and we do not see a northward shift in this profile to present day then the repopulation hypothesis is thoroughly invalidated. Considering the Paeonians lived on the border of Macedonia itself, this expectation seems the most reasonable.

On the other hand, I'm not denying the Greeks any ancient ancestry, however to say that the Slavic ancestry is practically invisible in modern Macedonian Greeks is not very sustainable.

I don't think anyone here is denying the idea of Greeks having Greek ancestry at all, but are attempting to deny them the possibility of continuity with ancient Macedonians which is a standpoint that I find unsustainable based off of current evidence. I don't see significant Slavic contributions in modern Greek profiles.

No, those distances won't prove nothing I'm afraid. It will take more extensive research to get closer to the truth. A research involving both yDna, admixture and IBD matching.

The point was that the ancient profile average evidences a lot, not that it is a definitive answer by itself. The actual Greek Macedonian results if we ever get them will be much more definitive. aDNA recovery is in effect a process of mapping ancient populations and then comparing any later shifts in ancestry to prior norms. I think we all agree that we'd like to see more samples, but distance alone is far less biased than modelling guesswork which suffers from overfit and source population bias. I can't modify the distance here and neither can you.

I'm from FYROM if it makes you feel better that name.

I don't have any problem with your ethnic background to be clear. I just disagree with the idea of large amounts of Slavic input into Greece as things stand.

 

[Hawk]

You must have been hiding under the stone not reading the news and now denying any Slavic admixture in Balkans including Greece.

Remove Slavic admixture and Balkanians are Iron Age Balkanites.

Slavs made an impact both by Y-DNA and autosomally, it's easy to see in Greek Macedonia the amount of R1a + I2a paternally and the autosomal affiliations.

In Balkan Peninsula among Albanians and Greeks it ranges around 15-25% autosomally, and the rest of Balkanites range between ~30-65%.

 

[Juan.delajara]

According to the tradition, the Argead dynasty came from the Peloponnese (early Argead kings used the Argean wolf on their coins), so I guess a J2 Y-HG for Philip II. Let's wait and see...

 

[Vitruvius]

Remove Slavic admixture and Balkanians are Iron Age Balkanites.

Correct, which is why Macedonian Greeks and other mainlanders look autosomally like Iron Age Paeonians right now.

Slavs made an impact both by Y-DNA and autosomally, it's easy to see in Greek Macedonia the amount of R1a + I2a paternally and the autosomal affiliations.

You cannot claim at all how much Y-DNA changed on a population whose predecessors we don't even have access to. What's more is that Y-DNA is not useful for quantifying ancestry so it's a moot point.

You must have been hiding under the stone not reading the news and now denying any Slavic admixture in Balkans

I never denied Slavic admixture in the Balkans as a whole.

 

[Hawk]

I never denied Slavic admixture in the Balkans as a whole.

You are trying to deny the obvious, there is autosomal Slavic influence among Macedonian Greeks, i would say the amount is far less than other Balkan Slavs and comparable to Albanians. This is not even up for discussion. We all have seen the autosomal over and over again.