The Origins of Indo-European DNA and the Yamnaya Culture…
Channel: Celtic History Decoded
Date: 03/03/2024

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The Origins of Indo-European DNA and the Yamnaya Culture…

What are the origins of Indo-European DNA and is it part of your genetic heritage? In one of my last videos, I looked at some of the properties of Indo-European DNA and how it spread across Eurasia with the expansion of various archaeological cultures, most notably the Yamnaya culture of the Pontic-Caspian Steppe, with many other cultures related to the Yamnaya, such as the Corded Ware Culture. In this video, I want to look at the genetic origins of the Yamnaya people themselves and the Steppe ancestry they spread. Its not all good news however, and at the end of this video, I will discuss how the spread of Yamnaya DNA across Eurasia may have helped to spread the chance of developing a debilitating disease. 

Now on a high level, genetic studies have suggested that the people of the Yamnaya culture can be modelled as a genetic admixture between a population related to Eastern Hunter-Gatherers (EHG) and people related to hunter-gatherers from the Caucasus (CHG), with additional admixture from Anatolian, Levantine, or Early European farmers. The Yamnaya are considered Western Steppe Herders. Haplogroup R1b, specifically the Z2103 subclade of R1b-L23, is the most common Y-DNA haplogroup found among the Yamnaya specimens.

Now lets look at this in a little more detail. A study published in Nature earlier this year looked at the Population genomics of post-glacial western Eurasia. The authors begin by noting that Yamnaya ancestry (that is, ‘steppe’ ancestry) has been characterized broadly as a mix between Eastern Hunter-Gatherer ancestry and Caucasus hunter-gatherer (CHG), formed in a hypothetical admixture between a ‘northern’ steppe source and a ‘southern’ Caucasus source. However, the exact origins of these ancestry sources have not been identified.

Sources:

Celtic History Decoded - Indo-European DNA: The Genetic Migration of Indo-Europeans… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hq6c8tFfAnU  

Who were the Yamna people genetically? https://www.eupedia.com/genetics/yamna_culture.shtml 

Allentoft, M.E., Sikora, M., Refoyo-Martínez, A. et al. Population genomics of post-glacial western Eurasia. Nature 625, 301–311 (2024) https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06865-0#citeas 

Barrie, W., Yang, Y., Irving-Pease, E.K. et al. Elevated genetic risk for multiple sclerosis emerged in steppe pastoralist populations. Nature 625, 321–328 (2024). https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06618-z#citeas 

How ancient herders rewrote northern Europeans’ genetic story https://www.sciencenews.org/article/yamnaya-herders-dna-europeans-genetic-multiple-sclerosis 

Allentoft, M.E., Sikora, M., Fischer, A. et al. 100 ancient genomes show repeated population turnovers in Neolithic Denmark. Nature 625, 329–337 (2024). https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-023-06862-3#citeas
 
Haak W. et al. Massive migration from the steppe was a source for Indo-European languages in Europe. Nature. 2015 Jun 11;522(7555):207-11. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5048219/  

Eastern Hunter-Gatherer - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Hunter-Gatherer 

Caucasus hunter-gatherer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caucasus_hunter-gatherer

Declaration of Arbroath https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declaration_of_Arbroath 

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

Creative Commons Imagery:

Wojciech Pędzich, Robert Molyneaux https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Yamnaya_phenotype,_Reconstruction,_male,_grave_Novooleksiivka;_Ukraine.png Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en 

Andrea Hanel, Carsten Carlberg https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Yamnaya_pastoralists,_main_genetic_ancestry.png Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en 

XVodolazx https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Yamna_culture_tomb.jpg Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en 

#ancestry #dna #yamnaya