Reminder to Eurogenes and Davidski: You ARE NOT Your Y Chromosome, and Your Manhood Isn't Tied to It!

A great study just came out that confirms what many of us have noticed.  Increasingly, instead of dude being proud of their ethnic group (and risk being called racist) or even their soccer team (and risk being called a hooligan), many misguided men, especially in online forums, are tying their identity to their Y chromosome haplogroup!  

Yes, you laugh, I laugh, but any quick read of any of the worst offenders (Maciamo May at Expedia, Davidski at Eurogenes), will reveal this concept, as well as some very fragile male egos, redefined with junk pop-science.

The study is called:

Constructing Masculinity through Genetic Legacies: Family Histories, Y-Chromosomes, and “Viking Identities"

Some highlights:

The practice of searching for a Viking ancestor is, on one level, an exercise in redundancy. At a distance of a millennium, simple mathematics demonstrates that everyone, at least in Western Europe, and most probably further afield, has Viking ancestry (Rutherford 2016).

Rather, this kind of texture was what the participants in our research were interested in: the majority were seeking confirmation of Viking ancestry, for which they already had amassed a certain amount of (usually genealogical) evidence. For such individuals, to be told “yes, you are descended from Vikings, because everybody is”, is seemingly psychologically insufficient.

Critiques from population geneticists likening such claims to “genetic astrology” are widespread (e.g., Balding et al. 2010; Thomas 2013), while the problematic potential of such narratives to essentialise ethnic identities based on biology have also been highlighted (Fortier 2012; Morning 2014; Nash 2004a; Nelson 2008; Nordgren and Juengst 2009). To a lesser extent, how the forms of evidence used to access the remote past create gendered versions of history (usually favouring a patrilineal line of descent) has also been a cause for concern.

The problematic nature of relying on direct-line Y-chromosome tests for insights about “who you really are” is highlighted by the example of African-American users of DTC genetic testing seeking more information about their African ancestry, but regularly receiving results characteristic of European ancestry due to the grim realities of the sexual exploitation of female slaves by European owners (Tyler 2008; Nelson 2016). By way of contrast, discovering that one has a Y-chromosome characteristic or not of Viking ancestry may be seen as less of an existential challenge to one’s sense of self, and more of a form of recreation. However, as Sommer (2012) cautions, recreational genomics cannot necessarily be separated from wider political contestations of identity, culture, and gender.

In a similar vein, Nash (2012, 2015) argues that the cultural focus on “founding fathers”, such as Genghis Khan, to explain patterns of Y-chromosome variation (and genetic variation more broadly) draw on and simultaneously naturalise a patriarchal understanding of kinship. 

She also argues that popular accounts of such research tend towards a nostalgia for an imagined “heroic” past of simpler gender roles: one that represents men as warriors, women as passive, or even as possessions, and can “conjure up images of a harsher and simpler world of unlimited and often violent sex enjoyed by powerful men” (Nash 2015, p. 149).

Such a patriarchal “heroic” past chimes in with what Halewood and Hannam (2001, p. 566) have referred to as the “Anglo-American stereotypical representation of Viking heritage”: that of “sea-faring, sexist, and blood thirsty men raping and pillaging”. 

Even when Vikings are disassociated from violence and rape, they are still represented as somehow essentially masculine, and that this is encoded biologically. For instance, Kroløkke (2009) analysed the success of the Danish sperm bank, Cryos International in marketing its product as “Viking sperm”, and thereby as representing a genetically encoded masculine ideal.

Within this context, for an individual man to seek to establish his “Viking ancestry” is to situate himself, deliberately or otherwise, within a certain historical–cultural discourse of masculinity. 

LOL: Davidski, they've got you down buddy!  Substitute "Viking" in that sentence with "R1b" or "R1a" and half the "Bronze Age Studs" at Eurogenes will be crying in their soup.

The Genetics of the Ancient Romans

As we've noted before, there are a bunch of charlatans in the world of Ancient DNA.  The worst offender, perhaps, is a pseudonymous Belgian named Maciamo Hay, who runs a site called Eupedia.  This uneducated man knows just enough to sound knowledgable, and to delude himself and some of the similarly ignorant.  In the world of Ancient DNA, he is probably the best example of Dunning-Krueger effect out there.

Many of these Ancient DNA practitioners spend their time trying to digest the most recent DNA studies, but don't ever come close to picking up a history book, much less to acquiring the deep, big-picture understanding of ancient history that is needed to explain the population movements that have occurred in places like Rome and Italy over time.

In this post, we go over those population movements, to review claims made by fools like Maciamo on Eupedia.

Let's start with his baldest misstatement: "In all logic, the ancient Romans, from the original founders of Rome to the patricians of the Roman Republic, should have been essentially R1b-U152 people."  This laughable statement was directly pulled from Eupedia on the same day that this post is dated, and as far as I can tell, it's still up.  (I just refuse to link to it, lest any more misinformation be circulated).

As Maciamo's own maps show! -- the distribution of U152 in Italy is centered in the ALPS, and radiates outward to all the parts of Italy that were previously inhabited by CELTS.

So: Where to begin?  How does one even start to explain history to someone so uneducated?

Let's start with something most people know.  The saying, "he's crossed the Rubicon" is a reference to Caesar crossing the Rubicone river.

Why was that so significant?  Because the Rubicon was the traditional BORDER of Italy at that time.  (49 BC.)  In other words, it was an act of war for Caesar to cross that border.  Where is the Rubicone river?  It's just south of modern Ravenna!

For 700 years, the "Italy" of Roman times -- that which was populated by Italians (versus Gauls) -- was the true peninsula parts (sticking out).  Never forget that.  The distribution of U152 clearly corresponds to where the population was Gaulish versus Roman!  U152 is the OPPOSITE of a Roman marker.

Southern Italy, on the other hand, was considered the most desirable real estate for much of the Roman Republic and early empire.  When Cicero listed the most beautiful and prosperous cities in Italy, most were in Southern Italy.  Places like Reggio Calabria and Capua.  When Mark Antony and Augustus' veterans demanded land, they demanded it in Southern Italy.

Furthermore, Rome devastated places like Samnium (modern Molise/Campania) and modern Cosenza, destroying most of the inhabitants, and then seizing the territory for Roman citizens.  Anyone who knows Roman history knows this.

Rome planted dozens (almost a hundred) of colonies (of Roman citizens) in Southern Italy.  Entire towns (like Vibo Valentia) were populated by tens of thousands of transplanted Romans.  These colonies were stocked BEFORE Rome became an empire, i.e., before it became cosmopolitan.  The people who founded these towns were of "pure" Roman stock.

Why does this matter?  Well, this blog is no Southern Italy apologist.  Southern Italy was a backwater for years.  Isolated and insignificant.  But from a genetic standpoint, those qualities ARE significant.

If you wanted to study the genetics of the Romans, would you go to a place where lots of people had passed through?  A place that was a successful and world port in the Middle Ages?  A place where people wanted to move to from elsewhere?  OF COURSE NOT.

You would WANT a backwater; a place unchanged over millennia.  The towns of South Italy (many of which who have never been invaded by anyone, thank you very much), are where you can find the descendants of Romans, unadulterated.

Well before modern genetic studies, very intelligent, very thorough researchers did large-scale demographic studies on Rome.  These folks, mostly British historians from Oxford, scoured records in churches and cemeteries, in abbeys and books -- everywhere, -- to estimate the population demography of Rome.  This much we know: at the dawn of the empire, "Italy" was Italy south of the Rubicon, well south of the Po.  The population was a mix of the local Italic tribes and Roman Latins, placed there as colonies.

Want to know the genetics of the Romans?  Look at which towns started out as Roman (not Gaulish, Maciamo!) and which towns have largely been untouched since.

Professor Chris Wickham produced exhaustive studies of Italy from 400-1000 AD.  He provides real numbers of the "others" in Italy.  He concludes the Goths and Lombards (German tribes who ruled large parts of Italy from 476 AD - c. 1000 AD) never were more than 2%-9% of the Italian population, and he believes aside from pockets in the South, they were clustered mostly in the North.  Again, it's the NORTHERN Italians with the non-Roman influences, not the Southerners.  Again, this skews the DNA of the North.  Don't assume the Southern differences from the North are from Southern exoticness.

Chances are, Northern Italian DNA is different because it started with a large dollop of Gaulish (Celtic) genes, and they received a small smattering of Germanic genes.  This is why northern Italians appear, well, more "northern."  Southern Italian DNA, for the most part is not different because of subsequent influences or invasions.  Southern Italians are generally darker (although not by much) because of the absence of Gaulish and Germanic influences.  But those southerners more closely represent Roman DNA as it was around the years 200 BC - 50 AD.

Wickham also studied the Byzantine (Eastern Roman empire, Greek-speaking), Norman (French Viking) and Saracen (Arab or North African) occupying forces in Italy, and concluded that for peninsular Italy, these forces were tiny, much less than 1% of the population, and that they left no real permanent traces.  Again, this is because these were occupying armies not settlers.  Please note contrary to popular belief, much of the towns and villages of Southern Italy were never physically occupied by ANY of these groups, even though suzerainty and tax payments did change hands.  Was Paris after the Nazis any less French?

Folks like Maciamo also greatly UNDERESTIMATE the effect of Roman colonies throughout the Mediterranean.  Rome, through much of its thousand-year history, was a population EXPORTER.  Romans bred like crazy -- there was never enough land to go around -- and they, as the most powerful people of their era, felt it was their prerogative to seize lands of the conquered and place their citizens' families there, to live long and prosper.  It wasn't like now, where middle class families have 2.5 kids.  Then, (aside from the patricians), a family had as many kids as it could afford -- as many kids as it could feed.  Romans had many kids...

A look at the map of Roman colonies shows just how widespread this practice was.   Note the concentration in Italy and Spain, followed by France and Romania.  Yes folks, there's a reason why the Latin language survived in those regions, and why Romance derivatives are still spoken there today.

Despite the Romans exporting so many people, I have never seen one of these modern, unschooled-in-history geneticists raise the question as to whether the similarities between South/Central Italian DNA and that of say, Greece,or North Africa is due to Roman OUTFLOW of genes.  These idiotic (and perhaps racist?) people only repeat the Quentin Tarantino-esque claims that the similarity between such genes must be from exotic INFLOWS into the population of Italy.

It's really idiotic if you think about it.  Rome locates a colony of 25,000 Italian FAMILIES in some town in backwater Greece (or North Africa), and the town prospers for 1000 years and still exists today.  A Byzantine (or Saracen) garrison of 1000 men holds an Italian town for 100 years and then departs.  But many dummies online ascribe the similarity between Italian and Greek (or North African) genes to the latter?  Incredibly myopic.

Anyway, in conclusion:

Maciamo Hay is an idiot.  He should read some JB Bury, some Sir Ronald Syme, and some Chris Wickham.

Geneticists should realize if they want to find Roman genetics, they should try to discern the similarities between backwater (untouched/remote) towns in Southern Italy and Spain, which were settled around the same time with Roman colonists.  There, you can detect and isolate the signal of Roman genetics.

And genetic similarities between Italy and the rest of the Mediterranean could just as easily be due to pre-Roman factors or Roman OUTFLOWS as they are to post-Roman inflows into Italy.

Related Posts: The Genetics of the Ancient Romans, Part II

Banned from Anthrogenica, Censored by Eurogenes, Laugh at Eupedia

Several posters at Davidski's Eurogenes blog have noted that they've been banned from Anthrogenica for challenging the Kool-Aid drinking orthodoxy that infects that website.

The pattern almost always goes as follows.  A regular Anthrogenica poster says something like, "Isn't the Kool-Aid grand?"  A newcomer says, "I don't want to drink your Kool-Aid."  The Anthrogenica regular says, "I'm right, you idiot."  And then the newcomer says, "You're the idiot" -- and yep, you guessed it, only one of them gets banned.

It's gotten so bad that some of the best citizen-scientist minds, and almost all contrarian voices, are gone from that website.  In the old days, the orthodoxy sought to excommunicate Galileo from the Catholic faith.  Now they excommunicate posters from the major discussion websites.  No dissent allowed.

With Dienekes inactive, Eurogenes is where many go for discussion.  But Davidski has been very heavy with the censorship button there too.  Post something he disagrees with?  He removes your comment.  It's really sad.

I myself have tried to post my most recent thread, about applying simple demographics to his "Conquest and Warfare" fantasies, and he always removes my comments asap.

What does that leave?  Eupedia?  Maciamo is a reductio ad absurdem idiot, who also doesn't hesitate to ban people with any contrarian viewpoint.

So, this is it.  This is your thread.  This thread (and this website) is for anyone Banned From Anthrogenica, or Censored by Eurogenes.

Post away.  You will not be censored here.

On the Need for More Interdisciplinariness in "Interdisciplinary" Studies

Ah, if they were all as good as Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza.  The pioneer of interdisciplinary studies, and a Renaissance man, he would thoroughly immerse himself in genetics, demography, history, archaeology, and linguistics -- or find collaborators who could augment his knowledge.  Thus, his work SAW THE BIG PICTURE. 

A new paper out shows that modern "interdisciplinary" studies aren't so interdisciplinary at all.

It's called Mapping European Population Movement through Genomic Research by Patrick J. Geary and Krishna Veeramah.  You can read it by clicking here.

The authors show that many geneticists writing about history simply pick up some bogus two-bit history book.  That is why you get so much pseudo-science out there.

I once talked to a guy, a fairly educated scientist from another discipline, who felt he saw some marker in European genes.  So he did some google searches as to which tribe had ever moved in the rough place where he found the markers.  He then published a paper claiming he found a Cimbri-specific marker.  But he didn't read the rest of the history; had he done so, he would have grasped perhaps that that tribe was wiped out by Gaius Marius in the first century BC....

The paper also points out that there isn't enough precision in genetics, because geneticists don't bother to understand that different regions have different histories.  What good is knowing some person was French, without logging if that person is Provencal or Norman?  Very little....

Best quote from the paper: "The Ralph and Coop study, while highly rigorous at the level of the population genetic analysis, included no historians or archaeologists, and the only historical literature cited, presumably to »identify« the Hunnic contribution to European population, was a general history of Europe, a survey of Slavic history, and two articles in the New Cambridge Medieval History. The Busby et al. study also included no historians or archaeologists on its team, and the only historical literature cited was a Penguin History of the World, Peter Heather’s survey of the Early Middle Ages, and a survey of Muslims in Italy. Unlike these studies, designed and executed  exclusively by geneticists who then look through a few general historical handbooks to try to find stories that might explain their data..."

In other words, many scientific papers suffer from the same thing that plagues the Anthrogenica or even worse, Maciamo's horrifically bad Eupedia: "a LITTLE knowledge is dangerous."  They don't bother grasping the big picture in genetics, demography, history, archaeology, and linguistics...

The Sad Case of the Orthodoxy and the Posth Article on Pleistocene Demographics

Just a couple months ago, in the context of the peopling of Ireland, I emphasized on Eupeida (and here) how important it is to put all the Theories Du Jour that are based on modern uniparental distributions through a model based on population demographics and sound logic.

Specifically, I emphasized that ancient population sizes were minuscule compared to modern ones, and that if a population started a long long time ago, with a size that was way way small -- compared to subsequent waves -- that it would give a false signal that the original population was "conquered" or "outcompeted" or "never existed" or originated somewhere incorrect.   I cautioned against those four errors.  

This engendered quite the debate on Eupedia forums.  When backed into a corner and shown the weakness of his "R1b Were Studly Conquerors Theory," the "blindly following the current orthodoxy" folks react badly.
 
Many "Interwebz Scientistz" fail to grasp these concepts.  They favor their own wacky, biased theories based on what they see today only.  If a land is populated by one people, they must be all conquering studs, right?

Today, Posth et. al put out an extensive paper on Pleistocene demographics.  

Its shocking discovery?  Just like Y DNA Hg C existed in Europe in tiny numbers among the very first Europeans, so did mtDNA Hg M.

M disappeared eventually, due to the simple fact that its initial population size was tiny, and that because it had been there so long, the odds that certain women didn't have daughters, each generation, eventually meant it was not passed on.  Remember, we're talking uniparental markers here.  

The authors commented exactly as I did: up to now, people mistakenly believed that Hg M never set foot in Europe -- or that if it did, it was killed off or whatever by a new wave.  Sorry, both theories are wrong.

It is WONDERFUL to see another peer-reviewed, scholarly paper making this exact same point, and backing it up with newfound data.

As the paper indicates:

-These first hunter gatherers started with a TINY initial population size.

-There is a loss every generation of males having males or females having female offspring.

-I've calculated the approximate odds of a male not having a male child or a female not having a female child (i.e. looking like their uniparental marker was "conquered") at 12.5%, each generation, totally random.

-The longer a population has existed in a locale (and being free of mutations), the more generations go by, the greater the chance that random happenstance, chance, etc. will make it appear that a Hg either never existed or was slaughtered in a mass killing/enslavement/mate preference.

Now you have further proof of it.

I'm waiting to hear how Hg M died out because of some studly new more beautiful females who moved in.  Oh woops, Maciamo doesn't post here.  And he doesn't himself bear Hg M.  And M is not linked to R1b...

The Cassidy Earthquake: Neolithic and Bronze Age migration to Ireland and establishment of the insular Atlantic genome

Lara Cassidy et al. just put out a paper that injects a bit of welcome science into the world of R1b fantasy theories.  Those theories, of marauding bands of R1b warriors, are popular on online messenger boards.  (One prominent board even maintains that most of Western Europe -- millions and millions of men -- are R1b because they are descended from royalty).

Here are the findings from this recent paper:

1.  The very derived downstream clades of R1b like R1b1a2a1a2c were well-established in Ireland by 3750 before the present.  There is no evidence the ancient specimens in the paper were the first generation in Ireland, so it is likely they were present by 2000 BCE.

2.  The population of the Central European migrants to Ireland, who were herders, and had some Steppe-derived ancestry, were MUCH higher, compared to hunter gatherers.  In other words, R1b is so common in Ireland because of massive migration of such people.

3.  This is emphatically NOT consistent with pioneer colonization and elite dominance.

4.  The current distributions in many parts of Western Europe are due to a LACK of invasions since (no Anglo-Saxon or Roman penetration.) In other words, this was a second but more prounounced founder effect of sorts.

5.  This is consistent with comparisons to more centrally located, easy to reach locales, like Italy, where the genomes show greater variability in both autosomes and Y DNA, due to introgressions that occurred after the late Neolithic and early Bronze Age migrations.  (Cavalli-Sforza's admonishment to understand the difference between an expansion and an "impansion" come to mind.)

6. In Western Europe, Bell Beaker culture is the most likely candidate for the spread of R1b and related autosomal genes.

7.  R1b and this Western European expansion is strongly scientifically correlated to lactose persistence, which likely provided the demographic advantage to propagate in larger numbers in places like Hibernia.

8.  As an addendum, the megaliths of Western Europe are indeed likely linked to early cardial cultures, who bore of mix of HG and farming genes, which correlate to I-M26 in Ireland and Sardinia.

WOW!

 

The Spread of Haplogroups in Europe, Especially R1b

This post is intended to be a general foray into what I call "The Two -Ics" that explain modern haplogroup distributions: demographics and mathematics.  IMO, both are poorly understood.

It's been said, "to be an R1b Fantasist, you have to believe that I2-M26 came to predominate Sardinia by chance (e.g., Founder Effect and Drift) -- but that R1b came to predominate other locales (e.g., Ireland or Spain) by merit (e.g., military superiority or sexual selection)." 

It's also been said, "to be an R1b Fantasist, you have to now believe that R1b marks the spread of the first pastoralists, equestrians, and herders, and that you're now 100% correct that is right -- when just 2-3 years ago, you were 100% that Hg G2 was the mark of the first pastoralists and herders."

With respect to the first saying, I believe that most of the R1b apologists understand the former concepts (of chance as they apply to archaeogenetics), so this post is designed to build upon that knowledge, and add some demographics and mathematics too.

With respect to the second saying, I believe what is most key in a discipline like archaeogenetics is to recognize that theories and findings change from year to year, but the underpinnings of solid scientific method do not.

Let's get into it:

First, it is crucial to outline the possible outcomes.  Every generation, every clade and subclade of every Haplogroup has three "options" (or three outcomes).  Those are:

1.  Mutate (i.e., become something else)
2.  Propagate -- and, in more or less the same form, by having a male child who survives
3.  Die out, by having only daughters, or by having male children who fail to themselves breed

The "stakes" were more pronounced during prehistory than today, because the population sizes were so profoundly lower.  If you don't grasp this and accept it as fact, you can't grasp what I will detail later.

Population of Europe Over Selected Times  

(YBP = Years Before Present)

~50,000 YBP: No more than 10,000 (Neandertals)

~38,000 YBP - 19,000 YBP: No more than 37,000, likely population just 5,000

~12,000 YBP: About 28,000

~2000 YBP: About 35,000,000

-0 YBP: About 743,000,000

You can read more here.

In essence, you must remember that the population of Europe at the beginning of the time we are discussing (the post-glacial-maximum recolonization through the Bronze Age) was about 28,000 and peaked at maybe 100,000.  This is hard for the modern mind to comprehend, I know.  There were less people from Spain to Ukraine then, than there are in one city block in London now.

There are two takeaways:

1.  This made the population more susceptible to chance events, like a plague outbreak, or a famine in an area.

2.  This made the population more susceptible to massive dilution, when population started on its massive upward trajectory, after people started drinking milk, wine, and beer, when they started making cheese, when they started farming cereals and living in one spot, and when they started herding animals and having meat at will.

Going back to our three outcomes for Y Haplogroups, every generation: the first "takeaway" above should inform several likely mechanisms of how R1b spread over time.  If they entered a territory and had different disease resistance, it could have meant that large numbers of a tiny starting population would die off. 

Similarly, because the initial population was so small, when larger populations migrated for whatever reason, indeed possibly even as refugees from other regions, the other haplogroups would seem to have shrunk in size, whereas it really is different population sizes.

All this is just build up.  Our main focus, however, is the simple application of mathematics to Outcome 3 above.

This is what you need to know before we start:

1.  Hunter/gatherer women space babies on average 4.5 years apart, whereas farmers and moderns space them 1.5 years apart.

2.  The average paleolithic woman would have about 3.8 children.

3.  Infant mortality among hunter/gatherers is 30 times higher than among "civilized", and reached approximately 25% at many points during history.

4.  If the average hunter/gatherer family consisted of 3 children to live to adulthood, the odds of each family having just female kids survive was 12.5% each generation.  (.5 x .5 x .5)

Now just these numbers by themselves (HGs having fewer kids than farmers or pastoralists) explain a LOT. 

But the main point is thus: "older" non-mutated Y-chromosome haplogroups are found in lesser numbers simply because they are...older...

Every generation that a Hg exists and doesn't change, there is a 12.5% chance that those bearing it, in any one family, will not pass it along.  To be very clear: if a Hg does not mutate into something else -- or does not die entirely -- its numbers and distribution will decrease over time.  This applies to all except the most recent arrival, which is currently breeding like rabbits.  For example:

Many people believe that C1a was the first Y Hg in Europe.  There were probably just 5000-15,000 of them at any time.  By definition, the Hg C1a are folks that did not go on to mutate into any of the downstream clades.  Over time, the odds will catch up.

Many people believe that I2 was the next Y Hg in Europe.  There were probably just 10,000 - 50,000 of them at any time.  By definition, these are members of the IJ branch, and not members of F or K who mutated.  Over time, the odds will catch up.

These very simple concepts explain much of the modern distribution of haplogroups in Europe.  Is it more complex?  Sure.  Were there other factors?  Absolutely.  But over time, you cannot escape mathematics and demography being the biggest factors.

A Review of All Theories, on Why R1b Is So Common in Western Europeans

The great Roman historian Tacitus begins the Germania by discussing how the Germans are separated from certain peoples by mountains, and separated from other peoples by rivers -- and where there were no rivers or mountains, the peoples were separated by Fear.

A similar, intangible concept applies today, to understanding why R1b is so common in Western Europe.  Some of it can be gleaned by archaeology, some of it can be gleaned by DNA -- and where archaeology and DNA cannot provide an answer, we must resort to what makes us human: Logic.

Below is a review of all of possible models explaining why R1b and its subclades are common throughout Western Europe.  After reading it, you decide which is the most logical.

1.  The Bronze-Age Badasses.

The theory goes:R1b males were an awesome military force, who swept through Europe and killed the overwhelming majority of other males in their path.  They started in modern Ukraine as bad-ass horsemen.  But by the time they got to the coasts, they turned into bad-ass sailors and navigators.  These horsemen built boats, and Ireland and England were next to be mowed down by their genocidal awesomeness.  Despite traveling the length of Europe, they were still pure R1b by the time they reached Ireland.  Sufficiently that some counties in Ireland are 80-98% R1b today.  This R1b Empire was the largest that Europe ever knew.  Not even Caesar's stretched from Ireland to Ukraine!  Even though there was plenty of open space in Europe (the population being less than 1/1000th of what it is today), they decided to conquer an empire this vast expanse and risk the lives of themselves and their children, just because they were such badasses.  They were such efficient killers they left no trace in archaeological records in Western Europe of destruction or razing.  Despite well-established standards for evolution of language, the empire spoke vastly different languages (i.e. Latin and Ukrainian), despite this all happening just 1000 years or so before the beginnings of Rome and Greece.

Believe it or not, this theory is favored by some people today, who just happen to be R1b males.

2.  The Irresistible Indo-Europeans  

This theory goes: R1b males had uniformly gorgeous looks, tremendous wealth, and all-star qualities that made all hunter-gatherer women swoon with delight.  Whether they had bright red hair, or looked like James Buchanan, cavewomen of all groups throughout Europe dropped their guys and decided to procreate with these R1b studs.  None of the local guys resisted.  They too were enamored by the R1b good looks, and some kind of genetic superiority that made them and their genes irresistible.  

Believe it or not, this theory is favored by some people today.  No, really.  They actually posted it in comments below.  And they just happen to be R1b males.

3.  Colonizing Conquistadores

This theory is a variation of theory 1, minus the genocide.  The theory is: just model the R1b spread after that of the Spanish conquest of the New World.  Nevermind that the Spanish had guns, germs, and steel.  Nevermind that they had cannon, smallpox, and boats that could traverse oceans.  Nevermind that in most places in Latin America, the native haplogroups like Q and C still dominate.  Just ignore these things and model R1b after the Spanish.

4.  Lactase Persistence

At last we enter the realm of the plausible. 

This theory goes as follows: very basal subclades of R1b were present throughout Europe in tiny pockets for a very long time.  

This is why a slightly more downstream clade of R1b*, ancestral to modern lineages, was found, already in Els Trocs Spain, 7000 years ago.  

I mean think about it.  He couldn't have flown there.  And in 5100 BC, he couldn't have even ridden a horse.  

We know that R1 originated in Eurasia, and that it was present on both ends of Europe by 5100 BC.

If you adopt regular migration theories for on-foot migrations, these very basal R1b people in Spain were likely present in small pockets throughout Europe by 6000 BC.  Perhaps in the modern Czech Republic, perhaps in France, perhaps in modern Germany.  We only have ~400 aDNA samples from this epoch, and a smaller percentage of them have been tested for Y DNA.

Perhaps they lived in a moist climate less likely to preserve remains.  Perhaps they cremated their dead.  Perhaps archaeologists ignore their tiny region.  But one thing is certain:  Basal R1b was present in Europe, end to end, by about 6000 BC.

At some point, during a period of profound starvation, Western Europeans evolved a tremendous caloric advantage: the ability to digest milk.  No more killing the cow to eat and therefore live: you can live off of turning grass into protein.

Let's assume the first humans to evolve this, living in some nameless, forgotten pocket of Germany or England or France or Spain were majority R1b, then their population would EXPLODE.  In a time of mass starvation and famine, those with a caloric advantage would propagate exponentially.  

(Perhaps these people come to worship the cow to some degree, creating taboos to killing it, as we see in modern lands, creating idols of bulls, as we saw in many ancient cultures, and creating elaborate drinking vessels in the shape of Bell Beakers -- but I digress...)

The population of Europe at this time was maybe a million people across the whole continent.  If you figure that R1b people had a greater fertility rate (more kids per female, less time to wean because of cowmil availability, less time between kids, healthier kids, more kids reaching adulthood to propagate), then the simple math of exponential demography will show that within as few as 200 years, your uniparental markers will dominate the landscape.

It should be noted that the various genes for lactase persistence mirror closely the distribution of R1b-S21 even today.

5.  Refugees and Different Cultural Attitudes

If you know a little about history or current events, this one is not hard to imagine.  The historical example is the Goths; the modern example is what is happening in Lebanon with Syrian refugees.

People used to think the Goths were bad-ass, uncivilized, warlike, mighty (insert "supreme" adjective here) Germanic overlords who conquered much of the Roman world. But anyone who knows the history understands that the truth is a little kinder to them (kinder, depending on if you believe being peaceful and not purposefully killing people is a good thing).

The Goths were not some mighty tribe hell-bent on destruction, who willfully took over the Roman Empire. Just the opposite: they started out from modern South Sweden because of FAMINE. They were so weak, they were forced to WANDER for centuries. Finally, they invaded the Roman Empire, because the Huns EVICTED them from their steppe lands in modern Ukraine.

In other words, one of the baddest-ass people in most people's minds were refugees, forced to emigrate not because they wanted to conquer, but because they themselves had been evicted from their homelands by famine (first) and then another people (the Huns).

If that is too hard on you, let's imagine something happening today. The population of Lebanon is about 2 million people. Aside from the districts controlled by terrible people, many of the coastal folks are pretty wealthy, modern, and diverse. They don't have extraordinarily high birthrates.

All hell has broken loose near them, in a country you may have heard a lot of recently. It's called Syria. In the last two years, Lebanon...has been swamped with 2 million Syrian refugees.

In other words, the population of the country has doubled, in a generation, from an influx of refugees.

Now imagine the Lebanese bear Haplogroup L, we will call it. Imagine like many wealthier people today, they're not having 20 kids each. More like 1 or 2.

Imagine the Syrian refugees bear Haplogroup S, we will call it. Imagine like many poorer people today, they DO have many kids...

The "old" samples within this area we call Lebanon will all be Haplogroup L. A future archaeologist would find that to be the case.

The "new" samples, after a few generations, will be like 75-25%, with Haplogroup S clearly "winning out." The cause is a mix of migration -- plus different cultural attitudes toward having kids.

Did the Syrian refugees "conquer" the Lebanese?  (No.)

Is it safe to say that the Syrian refugees genes were "selected for?" (No).

That the Syrian men were "more attractive" to women? (No).

That they bore some kind of genetic advantage, that made them fitter? (Again, no.) 

6.  Different Starting Population Sizes, Different In Time

This one is the hardest to fathom almost, because it is almost circular.  It states simply that R1b is the most numerous in Western Europe because they started out more populous, and were the most recent immigrants.  

Western Europe is a cul-de-sac for overland migrations.  Almost all haplogroups originated in Africa or the Near East, but came into Western Europe via the eastern entry points into Europe.  Iberia is the end of the cul-de-sac.

Imagine a 100-acre parcel. At first, it is a hunting preserve of sorts. It is inhabited by 5 families who own 20 acres each. They love the deer and geese they harvest from said land.

Next some farmers move in. 50 acres are used for farming. They support 10 farming families, who each have 5 acres.

The land is supporting 5 hunters and 10 farmers. (Have the farmers been "selected for?" No.  They are more numerous and more recent migrants).

Finally, some others land in the area. There are 100 refugee families or maybe just people who tolerate living close to one another, so they squeeze into one acre of the land. They have metals, which they trade for food, so they are able to live in a much smaller parcel.

Have they been selected for?  Again, no.

I just described something that has happened in recorded history several times, and surely in prehistory too.

Older, less numerous populations will appear to be "drowned out," unless you are careful. It's just simple math.  Those who have been in a locale the longest will be diluted over time.  

7. Disease

Many plagues in Western Europe entered through the east.  Since R1b-bearing males were the largest migration from the east, it must be considered that different immune systems played a role in their spread.
  

In sum: R1b could be simply the most common haplogroup in Western Europe because it came there later, in greater numbers, and perhaps as part of a people who had different cultural attitudes toward having children.

In subsequent posts, I will link or recap demographic studies that show the clear power of exponential growth with even tiny differences in birthrates.