Last week Davidski wondered if the teal people really existed and if so who they were (referring to the teal admixture from Haak et al. 2015 found in Yamna samples). My theory so far had been that R1b-P297 had mixed with West Asian people around the South Caucasus (or rather between East Anatolia and Northwest Iran) during the Early Neolithic before crossing over the Caucasus with their cattle. In this scenario, R1b-M269 and L23 would have arrived in the steppe in a fully hybrid form, roughly half Northeast European (from the paternal R1b side, with some maternal U5a1) and half West Asian (from the maternal H8, H15 and J1b1a side).
But the new paper on haplogroup G1 by Balanovsky et al. made me reconsider. I still stand by my old theory, except that R1b-M269 may have come back to the northern side of the Caucasus with less West Asian admixture than in the Yamna samples - perhaps 3/4 Northeast European and 1/4 West Asian (teal admixture). The extra teal admixture would have come from intermingling with other Neolithic migrants from West Asia to the Steppe, a group composed of Y-haplogroup G1 (and possibly T1a) and mt-haplogroups HV, H5a, N1a, I, W and X2. These people would have carried nearly 100% of teal West Asian admixture.
A strong argument in favour of a G1 population carrying mtDNA N1a, I, W and X is that all these lineages are basal Eurasian, as opposed to the bulk of Eurasian Y-DNA descended from macro-haplogroup IJK and of mtDNA descended from macro-haplogroup R.
A second argument is that all these basal Eurasian haplogroups are found in Central Asia, the Altai and Mongolia today, despite the very small frequency of R1b or European autosomal DNA.
A third argument is that most populations related to the Mongols or Turks have much higher frequencies of the teal West Asian admixture than the Mesolithic European blue admixture in the K=19 admixtures from Haak 2015 (I won't use K=20 as it is confusing). Yamna people were about 50-50, so it is not possible that the Indo-Europeans were the only ones who brought the teal admixture to Central Asia, Siberia and Mongolia. Only the Mansi and the Tubalar have 50-50 for these two admixtures. The Alatians and Kyrgyz have twice more teal than blue. The Yakuts, Uyghurs, Turkmens, Uzbeks and Hazars have about 5x more teal than blue. The Tu, Mongola and Xibo have a few percent's of teal but hardly any blue.
As the R1b tribes were the ones who supposedly developed the first bronze weapons, their first "victims" were their immediate Neolithic neighbours in the steppe. G1 men were killed, enslaved or in any case prevented from passing their Y chromosomes. Their lineages only survived south of the Caucasus, among the ancestors of the Bashkirs in Central Asia, and at the eastern end of the Eurasian steppe among the Mongols. G1 was brought back to Central Asia by the Mongols in the 13th century.
Female lineages were absorbed by the Yamna R1b people, which increased their West Asian admixture from 1/4 to nearly 1/2.
As a side note, I have long pondered the possibility that T1a male lineages made up a small minority of the Proto-Indo-Europeans (just like G2a3b1 and J2b2). It is possible that T1a were the last survivors of this G1 + T1a Neolithic Steppe population. Another possibility is that they came with R1b across the Caucasus. A third possibility, which I think is the most likely, is that T1a came through the Balkans. After all, T1a peaks in S-E Europe today and has been found among LBK Neolithic samples in Germany.
But the new paper on haplogroup G1 by Balanovsky et al. made me reconsider. I still stand by my old theory, except that R1b-M269 may have come back to the northern side of the Caucasus with less West Asian admixture than in the Yamna samples - perhaps 3/4 Northeast European and 1/4 West Asian (teal admixture). The extra teal admixture would have come from intermingling with other Neolithic migrants from West Asia to the Steppe, a group composed of Y-haplogroup G1 (and possibly T1a) and mt-haplogroups HV, H5a, N1a, I, W and X2. These people would have carried nearly 100% of teal West Asian admixture.
A strong argument in favour of a G1 population carrying mtDNA N1a, I, W and X is that all these lineages are basal Eurasian, as opposed to the bulk of Eurasian Y-DNA descended from macro-haplogroup IJK and of mtDNA descended from macro-haplogroup R.
A second argument is that all these basal Eurasian haplogroups are found in Central Asia, the Altai and Mongolia today, despite the very small frequency of R1b or European autosomal DNA.
A third argument is that most populations related to the Mongols or Turks have much higher frequencies of the teal West Asian admixture than the Mesolithic European blue admixture in the K=19 admixtures from Haak 2015 (I won't use K=20 as it is confusing). Yamna people were about 50-50, so it is not possible that the Indo-Europeans were the only ones who brought the teal admixture to Central Asia, Siberia and Mongolia. Only the Mansi and the Tubalar have 50-50 for these two admixtures. The Alatians and Kyrgyz have twice more teal than blue. The Yakuts, Uyghurs, Turkmens, Uzbeks and Hazars have about 5x more teal than blue. The Tu, Mongola and Xibo have a few percent's of teal but hardly any blue.
As the R1b tribes were the ones who supposedly developed the first bronze weapons, their first "victims" were their immediate Neolithic neighbours in the steppe. G1 men were killed, enslaved or in any case prevented from passing their Y chromosomes. Their lineages only survived south of the Caucasus, among the ancestors of the Bashkirs in Central Asia, and at the eastern end of the Eurasian steppe among the Mongols. G1 was brought back to Central Asia by the Mongols in the 13th century.
Female lineages were absorbed by the Yamna R1b people, which increased their West Asian admixture from 1/4 to nearly 1/2.
As a side note, I have long pondered the possibility that T1a male lineages made up a small minority of the Proto-Indo-Europeans (just like G2a3b1 and J2b2). It is possible that T1a were the last survivors of this G1 + T1a Neolithic Steppe population. Another possibility is that they came with R1b across the Caucasus. A third possibility, which I think is the most likely, is that T1a came through the Balkans. After all, T1a peaks in S-E Europe today and has been found among LBK Neolithic samples in Germany.
