Berbers are white and caucasoid people?

[andresasj]

Berbers are white or caucasoid people?

 

[LeBrok]

Post definitions for both and we can tell.

 

[Twilight]

Berbers are white or caucasoid people?

The thing about race classification, you can only tell someone's race by the color of their skin or the shape of their skull. With the advent of genetics, it appears that we are all a mix of something. For example I can now say that I decended from Germanic, Celtic, West Slavic tribes and the Romans without much scrutiny. Before genetics, it could considered offensive to say you were decended from Anglo-Saxons simply because they were sometimes considered "Germanic Barbarians" and popular to emphasize our "Civilized" Roman Component.

As for Berbers, As Far as race goes they were considered either Hamitic or Semetiche historically. However with genetic technology Berbers can nowadays claim ancestors like African, Roman, Phoenician; via Carthrage, and Middle Eastern ancestry; via Islamic Settlement.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_(human_categorization)#/media/File:Meyers_b11_s0476a.jpg


Here is more information about the history of Berber culture.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berbers

 

[Angela]

Carlos, your post is totally off topic.

I have started a new thread for it.

 

[Athiudisc]

Berbers are white or caucasoid people?

Yes.

More seriously, they're "Caucasian," in the anthropological sense, and whether or not they're white depends on where you are and whom you're speaking with.

They're "white" according to my government, for example, but most of them wouldn't pass as white amongst random passersby here.

 

[bicicleur 2]

The thing about race classification, you can only tell someone's race by the color of their skin or the shape of their skull. With the advent of genetics, it appears that we are all a mix of something. For example I can now say that I decended from Germanic, Celtic, West Slavic tribes and the Romans without much scrutiny. Before genetics, it could considered offensive to say you were decended from Anglo-Saxons simply because they were sometimes considered "Germanic Barbarians" and popular to emphasize our "Civilized" Roman Component.

As for Berbers, As Far as race goes they were considered either Hamitic or Semetiche historically. However with genetic technology Berbers can nowadays claim ancestors like African, Roman, Phoenician; via Carthrage, and Middle Eastern ancestry; via Islamic Settlement.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_(human_categorization)#/media/File:Meyers_b11_s0476a.jpg


Here is more information about the history of Berber culture.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berbers

it is easier to describe Berbers not as a race but as speakers of a Berber language, or descendants thereof.

Y-DNA of the Berbers is quite well-known though

 

[Twilight]

it is easier to describe Berbers not as a race but as speakers of a Berber language, or descendants thereof.

Y-DNA of the Berbers is quite well-known though

I do admit, it's really difficult trying to explain and translate from Caucasoid race to Ancient civilizations. But thanks for posting more examples to my point.

This is another example of the Ancient African/Some Greco-Roman component that I was referring too
earlier. Greco-Romans also carried R1b-U152, J2 and some other lineages and some of the Romans settled in Africa

 

[Angela]

I'm not aware of any Ancient African/ Roman/Greek component in North Africa. I would caution that we don't yet know what yDna the Romans carried. We're all just speculating. However, if they had high percentages of relatively downstream R1b then it's highly unlikely they had much genetic impact in North Africa, as there's precious little of that in North Africa. Plus, while there were some Roman settlers in North Africa there weren't very many and they were very circumscribed as to location.

The genetic ties between the Berbers and all Europeans, not just Southern Europeans, is much older and stems from the Neolithic movements.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Africa_during_Antiquity#Roman_era

You're right that the old terms like Caucasoid have limited usefulness, although I suppose in a general sense, Caucasoid might be "West Eurasian". People who are majority West Eurasians can have minority admixture from other groups. So, the Berbers are majority "West Eurasian", but can have SSA admixture in varying percentages, just like South Asians, at least more northern South Asians, can have majority West Eurasian with minority ASE. Some of them are more like mestizo populations or even more slanted toward non-West Eurasian ancestry.

 

[Twilight]

I'm not aware of any Ancient African/ Roman/Greek component in North Africa. I would caution that we don't yet know what yDna the Romans carried. We're all just speculating. However, if they had high percentages of relatively downstream R1b then it's highly unlikely they had much genetic impact in North Africa, as there's precious little of that in North Africa. Plus, while there were some Roman settlers in North Africa there weren't very many and they were very circumscribed as to location.

The genetic ties between the Berbers and all Europeans, not just Southern Europeans, is much older and stems from the Neolithic movements.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Africa_during_Antiquity#Roman_era

You're right that the old terms like Caucasoid have limited usefulness, although I suppose in a general sense, Caucasoid might be "West Eurasian". People who are majority West Eurasians can have minority admixture from other groups. So, the Berbers are majority "West Eurasian", but can have SSA admixture in varying percentages, just like South Asians, at least more northern South Asians, can have majority West Eurasian with minority ASE. Some of them are more like mestizo populations or even more slanted toward non-West Eurasian ancestry.

Good to know on the ydna department, never really thought about Ancient civilization ydna being speculative before.:embarassed:

 

[RobertColumbia]

Classical peoples seem to have considered Berbers to be civilized or at least worthy of civilization. St. Augustine is probably one of the most famous Berbers that is commonly seen as a "European" person (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustine_of_Hippo), despite being from Africa and originating from an African ethnic group. He probably neither looked like some random Irish guy nor looked like a Viking, but he was seemingly accepted into a European Christian milieu. This likely leads to one of two conclusions:

1) Berbers, or at least St. Augustine, were considered white or Caucasoid by other European peoples, especially Romans and Greeks.
2) Classical European peoples, especially Greeks and Romans, did not recognize, or at least did not emphasize as important, the concept of whiteness or being Caucasoid.

 

[Angela]

Classical peoples seem to have considered Berbers to be civilized or at least worthy of civilization. St. Augustine is probably one of the most famous Berbers that is commonly seen as a "European" person (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustine_of_Hippo), despite being from Africa and originating from an African ethnic group. He probably neither looked like some random Irish guy nor looked like a Viking, but he was seemingly accepted into a European Christian milieu. This likely leads to one of two conclusions:

1) Berbers, or at least St. Augustine, were considered white or Caucasoid by other European peoples, especially Romans and Greeks.
2) Classical European peoples, especially Greeks and Romans, did not recognize, or at least did not emphasize as important, the concept of whiteness or being Caucasoid.

Perhaps both? They couldn't have been unaware of the differences in "phenotype" among the many different peoples they encountered, but to my knowledge while, for example, the Romans of the Republic hated the Carthaginians like poison, I don't recall that relative "shades" of pigmentation came into the matter. In terms of the "Syrians", which they often used as a blanket term for the Near East, and the "Egyptians", the early Romans of the Republic feared their influence in terms of their religions, their love of luxury, the "god" like status they gave their rulers, all things you might say they eventually adopted, but I don't remember reading of them fearing them because they "looked" different. Nor were slaves treated differently based on "race" to my knowledge. Bad or good it was all the same, although "educated", "literate" slaves, so slaves from Greece or the Near East were more valued in many cases. An educated, coastal North African would undoubtedly have been considered "civilized", I would think, if not some pastoral nomad of the more interior areas.

In terms of the Berbers we don't even know what they looked like at the time that they came into contact with Rome. We would need a string of ancient dna results to know whether at that time more of them looked like the first picture, which is now a minority, or the second, which is also a minority, or somewhere in between, or how much variation there was, for that matter, within and between areas.

As for Augustine, I was condemned to study "The Confessions" in high school, even translated some of him from the original, and I don't think his "race" ever came up, but then neither did the "race" of the Egyptian hermits and monks, or of Jews like Jesus, and Mary, and Peter, and Paul, and on and on. Anyway, despite the fact that I resented translating him as much as I did translating Caesar, I quite liked Augustine...there he was, intellectually and spiritually drawn to his mother's religion, but quite unable for a long time to drag himself away from the fleshpots and all his vices. Well, all Monica's praying worked in the end, which is why she was held up to us as the model of Catholic motherhood, but I do like his very human prayer, "Lord, grant me chastity; but not yet."

That wasn't the part emphasized by my teachers of course. We were to have the utmost respect for him. We were also taught to mourn the fall of his "city", "The City of Man", Hippo, in his dichotomy, to the barbarians as he lay dying. Our teacher made it very affecting, indeed. The North Africans were part of the "civilized" world; it was the Vandals who were the barbarians. Maybe that's part of why I find so many things posted on these kinds of Boards so bizarre.

@Twilight,

Absent ancient dna, which we've gotten only recently, how can the assignment of y dna lineages be anything but speculative? Granted, some speculations are more supported by modern dna studies, archaeology, linguistics, etc., than others, but major mistakes can be made. After all, many people thought until just recently that down stream R1b clades originated in, and spread from, the Atlantic seaboard.

 

[Twilight]

Twilight,

Absent ancient dna, which we've gotten only recently, how can the assignment of y dna lineages be anything but speculative? Granted, some speculations are more supported by modern dna studies, archaeology, linguistics, etc., than others, but major mistakes can be made. After all, many people thought until just recently that down stream R1b clades originated in, and spread from, the Atlantic seaboard.

True, all archeology, genetics and linguistics are prone to errors. However regardless the Romans settled there regardless of how small their genetic contribution and I feel like it is worth celebrating as well as other ancient civilizations that came before and after. It's almost like finding a possible long distance cousin. Some tribes are prone to assimilate so no country is 100% of one ancient race or civilization. Personally genetics for me is also like picking exploring places in history where you might have overlooked.

 

[MOESAN]

Classical peoples seem to have considered Berbers to be civilized or at least worthy of civilization. St. Augustine is probably one of the most famous Berbers that is commonly seen as a "European" person (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustine_of_Hippo), despite being from Africa and originating from an African ethnic group. He probably neither looked like some random Irish guy nor looked like a Viking, but he was seemingly accepted into a European Christian milieu. This likely leads to one of two conclusions:

1) Berbers, or at least St. Augustine, were considered white or Caucasoid by other European peoples, especially Romans and Greeks.
2) Classical European peoples, especially Greeks and Romans, did not recognize, or at least did not emphasize as important, the concept of whiteness or being Caucasoid.

There is some illogical aspect in your twin statements (no offense). If the concept of whiteness or caucasoidness was without sense for these ancients, then tour first statement is senseless.
More generally, I think first Berbers were very "white" and "caucasoids". We cannot take in account the southern Targhi or Touareg (I'm lost concerning singular and plural) as basis. When you take Kabyles or Rifians of Marocco as example you have 'west-asian' people, nothing else. And the Arabic inheritage cannot be taken as typically Berber.
Concerning the too well known opposition between genetics and typology, I would say there is NO race at all because all of us (animals) have genes inherited from older stages of mamals history. "Race" concept appears when a LOT of differences are found between groups, and when these differences are correlate with isolation. Otherwise we are chimps or apes, perhaps pigs... Allways some relativity.
&: as said Maciamo, even "tiger" or "lion" are not race concepts on the basis of genetics! they can cross-reproduce themselves with reproductive descendants!

 

[Angela]

Moesan, I don't think it's that difficult to understand what Robert Columbia was getting at, especially if you look at it in an American context. Plus, he phrased it as an either/or proposition. I'm the one who probably messed things up.

In America, "whiteness" determined your social and legal status. The main groups for a long time were British/German descended people among whom there were a lot of blonde/blue-eyed/fair skinned members, and Africans or Amerindians. So, "whiteness" and even "Caucasian" came to be defined in that context. North Africans and even West Asians can't fit into those categories easily with or without visible SSA admixture. There were all sorts of lawsuits, for example, where the Lebanese had to fight in the courts to be recognized as "white" people.

Now, it's true that perhaps the "original" North Africans were of a mainly "West Asian" type, although we can't know that for sure without some ancient samples. They still wouldn't necessarily have been classified as "white" by American census takers of the time, although they were, of course, "Caucasoid".

It's also true that neither of those terms would have been known or understood by the Romans, and furthermore there's nothing that I know of to indicate that even had some of the North African slaves at that time had some SSA admixture, that they would have necessarily been treated differently than, say, a Greek slave, solely on that basis.

Robert, if I got that wrong, feel free to let me have it!

 

[Promenade]

I also believe that white and caucasoid are somewhat subjective terms that mean different things to different people but I think I understand what andresasj is trying to ask here and I wont touch upon the semantics of it.

I think his question boils down to if the Berbers were people of an unusually lighter phenotype than we expect from the North African region or fairer looking than non Berber populations there.

I've actually noticed from anecdotal observation that the Kabyle people of Algeria seem much lighter than the arabic speaking population(One I know has blonde highlights, they also seem taller than the average north african). Wikipedia claims that Carleton S. Coone noted a "a major nordic contribution" in the Kabyle. Of course they do not have any Scandinavian ancestry(I doubt the Vandals left much of a legacy) and Coone's classifications were amateur, but it just goes to show that for a long period of time people have noticed the Kabyle and other Berber populations have an usually fair phenotype. I'm sure everyone's familiar with the Egyptian hieroglyph of the four populations(Egyptian, Nubian, Asiatic and Libyan) depicting the Libyan as looking uncannily fair compared to their swarthy Egyptian neighbors. Kabyle, Riffians and other Berber populations might have represented the original fairer looking inhabitants of the area that were displaced, but that is complete speculation on my behalf.

I've read Augustine's Confessions and I dont remember him describing the physical appearance of the Africans vs the Romans, he was much more concerned with his religious crisis. If there was any kind of ethnic prejudice against the north African populations by the Romans I believe he would have touched upon it. Considering how the the north African provinces were much wealthier than many non italic European provinces at the time they were probably accepted much more and considered more civilized in Rome and Milan as compared to say a Gaul would be. So I dont think you could discern the physical appearance of north africans at the time based on that.

We have genetic samples from ancient north africa now, correct? Genetic studies done on modern Kabyle y-dna shows a high percentage of Haplogroup R1 (16 percent) and these were done in areas that were least secluded. I have no clue if it has any correlation with their lighter features but I'm just throwing out things I've come across.
What does the analysis on the ancient populations there reveal about their autosomal and y-dna? Do the samples have any genes known to be linked with fairer features?

 

[Angela]

We don't have ancient autosomal dna from North Africa, which is what would tell you about pigmentation...

As for the Berbers, it depends which Berbers are under discussion. The Tuareg are Berbers too.

The Mozabites:

They're about 20% SSA, to the best of my recollection.


Also, I don't think it's accurate to see Berber North Africans versus "Arab" North Africans as two completely distinct ethnic groups. A lot of so called, by themselves as well as by others, "Arab" North Africans, have a lot of "Berber" ancestry; it's just that they no longer speak a Berber language. There's still a lot of controversy as to how much of an impact the "Arab" invasions actually had.


http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Berber

"The Berbers live mainly in Morocco (between 35 percent-60 percent of the population) and in Algeria(about 15 33 percent of the population), as well as Libya and Tunisia, though exact statistics are unavailable. [7] Most North Africans who consider themselves Arab also have significant Berberancestry. [8] Prominent Berber groups include the Kabyles of northern Algeria, who number approximately four million and have kept, to a large degree, their original language and culture; and the Chleuh (francophone plural of Arabic "Shalh") and Tashelhiyt of south Morocco, numbering about eight million. Other groups include the Riffians of north Morocco, the Chaouia of Algeria, and theTuareg of the Sahara. "

Also, could you please provide a source for the percentage of R1b in North Africa? My recollection is that it varies a great deal by country. It's also important whether we're talking about upstream or downstream clades.

In my opinion, the Wiki article on North African genetics is not reliable as it looks as if one of the internet warriors has been at it.

You can look at this Henn et al paper on their autosomal make up, but I'm not so sure about the relatively recent date they come up with for West African admixture(post or contemporary to the Arab slaves trade. There are all sorts of problems with those programs. Anyway, there's a difference between East African and West African.

http://journals.plos.org/plosgenetics/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgen.1002397

.

 

[Carlos]

In my mind wikipedia, only 20% of Moroccan men are Arabs the rest would Berbers. That 20% is likely to have autosomal berber due to the time of the conquest and Islamization of Morocco, Berbers probably took at first wives after Arab women would bring. As I have ascertained there are three kinds of Berbers, 1. Berbers of great rectitude. 2. traders Berbers. 3. Berbers given to revelry and carousing.


Personally I consider it the white or Caucasoid, from this part of Europe from which I speak is not required or values ​​that the skin is white as snow, you can even see as a lack or absence of any ingredient. You may elsewhere from another point of view the European Nordic model is considered as the example of the white race, the very northern Europe, perhaps North America and other fans, but from Western Europe where I am not given exclusivity north Europe in the monopoly of the white race. I do not like to talk about these issues but has since left.

 

[andresasj]

Thanks for answer!

 

[andresasj]

Ignore it. I do not know the answer to the question can anyone help me
:embarassed::grin::grin::grin::grin::grin:

 

[andresasj]

Thanks for your question! ^^)