What Is the Best and Most Accurate Ancestry Calculator (DNA Testing)?

What Is the Best and Most Accurate Ancestry or Admixture Calculator from DNA Testing?

We Review 23andme, AncestryDNA, Family Tree DNA (FTDNA), DNA.Land, Dodecad, Eurogenes, etc.

Judging from community discussions in online forums, "Admixture" tests, where a company or entity takes your raw DNA data, puts it into a calculator, and then purports to tell you where your ancestors came from -- these are all the rage.  It is not rare for seemingly educated individuals to post on the Internet sheer and utter nonsense about their results, for example, assuming that a calculator identified their ancestry with something close to 100% accuracy.

In the online world, there is no such thing as perfect privacy.  And in DNA, there is no such thing as 100% accuracy for ancestry calculators. 

This is because all people are admixed, but not all ethnic groups form part of the samples.  Put another way, if your ancestors come from a valley in Switzerland where no one has ever been tested, you might show up in a test as French, German, Italian, Austrian, but not Swiss. 

You might say to yourself that you have documented ancestry back to the dawn of time that you are from Switzerland.  You may match other Swiss people exactly.  But because the Swiss are indeed mixes of the groups above, and because there are no specific, micro-targeted Swiss samples in the hypothetical database that match you more closely than those other nationalities, the test would be woefully inaccurate to YOU.  After all, you don't want a test to tell you you might be Northern Italian, if you are Swiss.  (For that matter, do you NEED a test to tell you that?  See below.)

In the online privacy world, they've named protections that are scientifically the best (and do their job pretty darn well) "Pretty Good Privacy."  In the DNA world, all we can hope for is "Pretty Good Accuracy" -- ancestry calculators that are scientifically grounded, don't make claims beyond what they can really do, and ones that get the broad regions correct in the very least.

The coolest benefit about living in a college town (Berkeley for this blogger) is that there are a ton of people from all over the world, with pretty well-defined ancestry.  For example, that Danish exchange student with 500 years of documented ancestors in Denmark?  That's a good candidate for testing some of these calculators.  Enough friends of mine have taken DNA tests, and we've plugged the results in the calculators across several paysites (testing companies) like 23andme and AncestryDNA, and free calculators, like the ones available on Gedmatch.  Who came out on top?

By far, the best and most accurate ancestry calculator is on 23andme.   Like all good scientists, they are humble instead of full of hubris.  They don't profess to give you one set of results and say, "this is it."  Instead, they give you three different results: standard, conservative, and speculative.  Each is pretty darn accurate for most of the people we know who have tested there and other sites.  Bottom line: 23andme's "Ancestry Composition" feature is outstanding, and the best, most accurate one online we could find.

It is our opinion that the least accurate ancestry calculator is at the new site DNA.land.  And the one on FTDNA is a close second.  Both are terrible.  Almost everyone who used the feature on DNA.land reported that the calculator is way off; just not ready for prime time at time of writing this post.

How do these calculators work?  Well, remember, the data that comes out is only as good as the data that comes in.  It is worth to always remember the concept that computer programmers call "GIGO: Garbage In, Garbage Out."  What this means is that if the data on which a conclusion is based is faulty, the answer will also be faulty.  With calculators, this manifests itself two ways: with a shifted focus, or faulty or incomplete baseline data.

By a different focus, we mean: Several calculators, for example, the MDLP Ethnicity Calculator, also offered (with Eurogenes and Dodecad and Gedrosia) at Gedmatch, stands for Magnus Ducatiae Lituania Project.  As you might have guessed from its name, it focuses on the people from lands that used to form the Grand Duchy of Lithuania: places in Northeast Europe, including Poland, Estonia, etc. 

MDLP seeks to be very good at calculating ethnic tidbits of interest to those populations.  But is is good for determining the difference between, say, a Catalonian Spaniard and a Northern Italian?  No, it's actually quite bad on that front.  That's simply not its focus. 

Similarly, there are other calculators on Gedmatch that exist to focus on and cater to Asians, Africans, even mixed race folks.  And within European populations, you have other focuses, like Dodecad, which seems Grecocentric, for lack of a better word.  None of these will do that great outside their focus areas.  So take the results from those ones with a grain of salt, unless you happen to hail from their regions of focus.

Don't believe that?  Think I'm being extreme?  If you are European, try putting your data in a calculator that is focused on another population.  Like the East Asian-focused calculators.  It won't tell you that you are NOT East Asian.  It will tell you which East Asian population you resemble the most.  To be clear: if all a calculator has is East Asian samples, a European will be told he or she is Japanese or Chinese.  This same concept applies within European focused calculators at the regional level.

In terms of bad baselines, recall the Swiss example above.  Europe is filled with micropopulations that exhibit a high degree of population homogeneity (a little inbred, to use the pejorative term).  If a calculator does not have a sample from your micropopulation (the narrow region where your ancestor lived for millennia), then you will get a faulty reading. 

Put simply (to use a French example): It's a big country.  Normans are not Basques, Provencals are not Bretagnes, etc.  That is why the best calculators are HONEST.  23andme discloses quite readily that for the huge populations in the middle of Europe (French, Germans, but also Benelux countries, etc.), it cannot spot the DNA with certainty 92% of the time. 

Does the 23andme website have any drawbacks?  Sure it does.  But they are minor compared to the others. 

First, its "Countries of Ancestry" feature is not what it could be.  But it's important to understand three things:  (1) This is NOT their ancestry calculator, but another feature entirely, so perhaps it's unfair perhaps for us to even review it in this space.  (2) It's experimental, and they state that.  (3) They are wisely phasing it out.  What was the problem with that feature?  Well, it gave you the list of countries of people who have the most matches with you.  Let's say for example you are half Italian, half Polish (a common mix in Chicago).  In other parts of Chicago, another common mix is half Polish, half Irish.  For whatever reason, people of Irish heritage have tested themselves at far greater numbers than the others. Your Polish DNA would overlap (match) with the people who reported they were half Polish, half Irish.  And this feature would then tell you that "a high percentage of the people who have DNA similar to yours are from Ireland."  Do you understand?  It's a huge problem, especially for smaller populations, especially because so many Americans are now half this, half that.  It's just not that edifying then.

23andme also suffers from the same sample issues as many of the other ancestry calculators.  For example, 85% of Italian Americans (TRANSLATION: potential customers, since most people who test are from Britain or the US) hail from just 3 regions in the deep south of Italy: Campania (Naples), Calabria, and Sicily.  Yet the population samples that most of these websites use are from Tuscany.  Even though Dante tried to meld them, Tuscans are not Sicilians and vice-versa. 

Often, these calculators when they see Sicilian or rural Southern Italian genes, they, in effect, say: we don't know what you are! you are kind of Italian but you also resemble, a little bit, people from Cyprus or Jews.  So they give an odd result.  And then you have someone tested who says, "I might be Jewish."  No.  The answer is that your people were not included in the data-set by which the baseline was developed.  If they were, the calculator would recognize you as a run of the mill Sicilian.

All online ancestry alculators also suffer from lack of inter-operability and non-standardized terms.  For example, among the calculators on Gedmatch, some use the term "Caucasian" to mean "generalized European" (which is how it used in common parlance, of course).  Others use it to mean, the specific, like, from Soviet Georgia, Armenia, etc.

Here's the bottom line: don't expect any ethnicity or ethnic-origins calculator to be 100% correct.  Don't expect new insights if you have confirmed records.  In other words, if you look just like your dad (you're not a bastard), and you're not adopted, and you have records going back centuries -- why do you need an ethnicity calculator to begin with?

These admixture tests can help if you were adopted, and want to have a sense of where to start.  But keep in mind, the largest plurality of Americans come from German heritage, and yet the best currently cannot identify German DNA 92% of the time.

Avoid the mythology and those who oversimplify.  There are reliable sources out there in genetic genealogy, like Debbie Kennett -- and there are a lot of charlatans.  Be careful whenever someone oversimplifies to the point of exaggeration, falls into stereotypes, or tells you what you want to hear.  With DNA as with everything, the most parsimonious answer is often the best.  The exotic is often wrong.

As the science improves, you can't go wrong using the Standard or Conservative setting on the 23andme Ancestry Composition test.

READ MORE:

DNA Testing Is Often Inaccurate

Summary of Recent Pieces on the Topic

The Percentages Are Off

 

Toward A New Understanding of Etruscan Origins

As this now archived thread on Anthrogenica shows, the two sides to the Etruscan debate are like ships passing in the night.  They can't seem to agree on much.  This post attempts to reconcile them, sort of, while debunking what I call the Contemporaneous Anatolian Origin of the Etruscans (CAOE) Model.

When talking about the origins of a people, it is important to specify timing as well.  Even the best scientists are guilty of disobeying this rule when they speak or write in shorthand.  The most obvious example is this: do you have any African blood?  Do you have an African origin?  You might answer, "no" if you took the question to mean in the genealogical time period (the last 500 years) or even during the post-Paleolithic time period (the last 40,000 years)!

But, as you know, everyone on the planet has an African origin if you go back long enough.  All modern humans migrated out of Africa.  So the same statements, "that population is of African origin" is both true and false, depending on the time context.

Let's apply this to the Etruscans.

What we have learned recently is that ALL Europeans descend from three primary groups:  Western European Hunter Gatherers (who originated in Western Europe during the Mesolithic), Farmers (who migrated from the Near East during the Neolithic), and Steppe People (who migrated from the flatlands between Europe and Asia during the early Bronze Age).

When the CAOE "Etruscans are exotic" folks ply their wares, they argue that Etruscans had an origin in Anatolia or the Aegean, right before they appeared in Italy.  Now, the first Etruscan sites date from approximately 900 BC.  We have clear Etruscan inscriptions dating to 750 BC, so they were probably writing by 800 BC.

I have always doubted there was a mass migration of Etruscans (from the Near East) before their appearance in Italy.  There are just too many facts weighing against it.

Then it dawned on me: we *all* came from the Middle East at some point.  Is it possible this argument is one of degrees?  That the CAOE folks have their timing wrong?  That the CAOE folks should have the "C" knocked off their theory, and the disagreements would be synthesized?

Here is how it might have worked:

There was mass migration to Europe of farmers from the Near East, and it appears to have been quite strong around 3000 BC.  The final waves of farmers were migrating to Europe around 2500 BC.  Now is it proper to call these "Anatolians" or "Aegeans" or "Near Easterners."  Insofar as those designations are intended to mean anything beyond geography: no.  This was pre-race, and since these people "became" modern Europeans, any such designation is pretty meaningless.  Most modern Europeans are about 40% descended from these people.

Is it possible that the Etruscans, having a stable, affluent, consistent civilization, retained more of their cultural practices, traditions, and indeed language, and thus some vague collective memory of this mass migration?  Is it possible that the first Italian culture to have writing was able to transmit more culture down between the generations because of it?  Because that is how it works.

In other words, ALL peoples in Europe then and now are partly descended from farmers who originated in the Middle East a long time ago.  If the Etruscan people (bringing the language) was from one of the later waves, and the Etruscan society was stable and had the ability to transmit culture, could these transmissions and uniqueness be the signals that the CAOE folks misinterpret and cite as evidence for a later Anatolian origin of the Etruscans?

Let's be clear: the land of the Etruscans overlaps perfectly with the land of the Villanovans, and there is no evidence for discontinuity or rapid replacement or trauma when Villanovan culture becomes unequivocally Etruscan.  I firmly believe the odds of an Etruscan "migration" event around 900-750 BC is sheer fantasy.

BUT, I think it is possible that of the peoples in Italy, the Etruscans, by holding the richest, most fertile, most well-defended, and most defendable pieces of real estate, simply did not suffer any further migrations and inflows after they established themselves in say, 2000 BC.  In other words, the Indo-Europeanized peoples of Italy ALSO descend from Western Hunter Gatherers and Neolithic Farmers (and the genetic evidence CERTAINLY backs me up on this point), BUT the Indo-Europeanized peoples of Italy (Latins, Umbrians, Oscans), experienced a more recent inflow of both people and genes, which resulted in language and culture change.  The Etruscans, for reasons already given, did not.

To this day there is very little genetic difference between the people of Tuscany and their neighbors in Italy.  The ancient Etruscans cluster with Southern Italians genetically, which would be consistent with this theory: that the ancient Etruscans had a smidge more Neolithic Farmer, plus cultural continuity, because they did not suffer an upheaval like the other peoples, when the Iron Age Indo European speaking Steppe people invaded.

This makes good sense.  This would explain also why the Etruscan language survived as a relic amidst a sea of Indo-European.

So next time you meet someone who thinks the Etruscans were contemporaneous (and ethnic) migrants to Italy from the Near East, remind them of the wealth of evidence against it.  And then, if they are the reasonable type, explain to them how ALL Europeans descended in a large part from people, who DID migrate to Europe from the same areas, just 1000 years before.  They could be spouting a mere truism, and be off by 1000 years or so.

Berkeley's "Center for the Study of Ancient Italy" Off to an Inauspicious Start

It started with so much promise.  A new, interdisciplinary center at a stellar university, dedicated to studying all matters ancient Italian.

Many of us had hoped it would focus more on the more understudied but significant Italic tribes (Umbrians, Lucani, etc.), but that dream quickly dissipated.  The center will have a "special emphasis on the Etruscans and Romans."  (If that makes you wonder how this makes it different from most existing efforts, you are not alone.)

But it is not this emphasis that calls the Center's academic rigor into question.  It is instead its first major effort, the Center's involvement in a workshop on the "Material Connections" between the Etruscans and Anatolia.

It acts like noticing similarities (and cultural exchanges) between ancient Mediterranean civilizations is something new and groundbreaking.  Yawn.  It's not.

But that is not the topic of this screed. Instead it is something that is frankly really surprising and deeply disappointing: the Center's website makes several pseudo-scientific statements that should be an embarrassment to anyone with one undergraduate class under her belt on historical or scientific method.

We quote verbatim from the Center for the Study of Ancient Italy's website, with commentary in bold italics (no pun intended).

"Similarities in Etruscan and Anatolian material culture have long been noted, but disciplinary boundaries ... have prevented scholars from exploring their implications."

Really?  You've got to be kidding me.  Plenty of scholars and other individuals have "explored" the "implications" of similarities ad nauseam.  In fact, there appears sometimes to be a neverending quest to find such similarities, based on the prejudiced assumption that if a culture was advanced and Italian, it simply had to be exogenous.

Then, the website continues with the somewhat redundant but absolutely bizarre statement that archaeologists apparently haven't studied enough the possible Anatolian connections with the Etruscans, and then a non-sequitur that recent DNA studies have muddied things further.  (Actually, they haven't, but we won't go into that here).

Then the two whoppers of all whoppers:

"This workshop will bring together international scholars for the very first time to explore the striking similarities between Anatolian and Etruscan material culture, without an agenda of proving or disproving Herodotus, [i.e., the ancient writer who claimed the Etruscans originated in Anatolia]."

1.  Really?  Is this really the "very first time" that any scholars have gotten together to talk about the alleged similarities between Etruscans and certain ancient Anatolian cultures? 

This is hype that is completely inappropriate for a scholarly web page.  

You want to bring together scholars for something totally new?  Put on a symposium about Dionysius of Helicarnassus, who unlike Herodotus had met an Etruscan, and lived among them for 20 years, and likely spoke their language, and had access to their histories now lost -- and who stated unequivocally that they were autochthonous.  Prove or disprove him.

2.  And the second part of that clause ("without an agenda or proving or disproving Herodotus") is criminal from the standpoint of historical or scientific method.  

You have a statement that this workshop will explore the "striking similarities between the two cultures" but that it won't be taking a side.

Come again?  

The conclusion has been stated before the study.  

The outcome has been determined before the workshop.  

Put in layman's terms, there is none of the "if" here, that marks scholarly hypothesis, with a hope for rigorous testing.  The bias is apparent from the statement.  "There are these massive similarities, but we're not taking a side."  LOL.

To add to the ridiculousness of this webpage, which really must be viewed in its entirety to be appreciated, it shows a painting by an Etruscan male holding up his right hand, and (gasp!) a painting of an Anatolian male holding up his right hand. 

If this Center wants to be taken seriously, here are some suggestions for topics:

1.  The similarities with Etruscan culture and Egyptian culture.  The tombs, the attitudes towards afterlife, certain gods and goddesses, certain foods and drinks consumed, certain pottery styles, the fact that the longest Etruscan text discovered was on an Egyptian mummy;

and

2.  The similarities with Etruscan culture with Campanian (native South Italic) culture.  Certain pottery styles, certain gods and goddesses, certain terms for officials, etc.

and

3.  The similarities with Etruscan culture with Greek culture.

and

4.  The similarities with Etruscan culture with Tartessian (ancient south of Spain) culture . . . Phoenician (ancient Lebanon) culture . . . Nuragic (ancient Sardinian) culture... on and on.

And then the question to pose:  Why is it that despite these other similarities, which in certain areas are "striking" do scholars continue to focus to the point of obsession on the alleged Anatolian similarities?  

Why, despite tremendous similarities between the Etruscans with Faliscans (Central Italy), Campanians (South Italy), Egyptians, Greeks, etc. -- why is it that no one tries to connect Etruscans to them?  It really is all Herodotus.  And the wacky "proof" to connect the Etruscans to Anatolians is the very same "evidence" that exists linking them to these other ancient cultures!

In other words, everyone knows the Mediterranean was the "superhighway" of the Ancient World, and that the traders, pirates, and warships traversed and interacted to a much higher degree than we moderns typically assume.  

So why do we continue to attach significance that the highly civilized Etruscans, the pirates and merchants of their time, borrowed culture from Anatolia?  

Why the focus on Anatolia, if it isn't to prove Herodotus?

Now THAT is a workshop I would love to see.

The other day as I enjoyed a Sapporo, watched my Sams-sung TV, and gazed at my replica Terracotta Army figures on my lawn, I wondered if some future Berkeley interdisciplinary student would assume I am of Japanese, Korean, and Chinese heritage.  (I'm an Irish-American, living in the Bay Area, which happens to trade a lot with Asia over the Pacific Ocean).

Sometimes the questions asked reveal a bias.

Sometimes the bias is so overwhelming that it overcomes all science.

Sometimes the premise is the conclusion.

Berkeley's "Center for the Study of Ancient Italy" has disappointed here.




 

Intact Samnite Tomb Discovered; Will They Recover DNA?

With all the focus in Southern Italian history being on exotic influences (which as we've posted before make up a very small part of the Italian genome), people often forget that there were people in Italy, in great numbers, who were highly civilized, before the peninsula was Romanized, and aside from the [insert invasion name here].

One of the most influential civilizations in Italy was that of the Samnites (Italian: Sanniti), a group of Oscan-speaking tribes, sometimes called "Sabellian," who lived in the interior of Italy.  If you are Italian and come from any region from Rome southward (including eastern Sicily), chances are that you are of predominantly Sabellian stock.  For hundreds of years, these hardy southern Italics fought off Roman domination and Greek colonization.

For a while it was even unclear who would be the master of Italy: the Romans or Samnites.  After the battle of the Caudine Forks (Samnite victory over Rome, 321 BC) and right before the battle of the Colline Gate (Roman victory over Samnites, 82 BC), it looked like the Samnites would be the masters of Italy (and perhaps an empire).

Archaeologists recently discovered an intact Samnite tomb, dating from 2400 years ago.  This was at the peak of Samnite ascendancy.

Let us hope they extract DNA.  We will confidently predict here that the DNA will be related to living people in Campania (incl Naples), Molise (the heart of Ancient Samnium), Basilicata, and Calabria (especially Cosenza province).

Here is the story if you want to read it.

The Top Ten Myths of Genetic Genealogy, Archaeogenetics, and DNA Testing (10 through 7)

Any scientist visiting the websites or online forums of Eupedia, Anthrogenica, or Apricity (to name a few) is mortified.  The amount of shorthand claims, pseudo-science, pop-anthropology, and myths perpetuated there are truly astonishing, and quite sad.  Below we list the Top Ten myths of this world.  We will update the post over time to link to specific offenders, so you can share the laughs we shared.

Don't be an idiot.  Learn these myths, and for the love of all things holy, don't propagate them!

10.  If you are of Scandinavian heritage (Denmark, Norway, Sweden), you are a "Viking."  

Example post: "my gma is half Swedish and I am very adventurous; must be the Viking LOL."  

Vikings were the marauders sailing from Scandinavia who invaded many parts of Europe during the years of approximately 600 AD - 1200 AD.   Those of Scandinavian blood are emphatically NOT "Viking."  The Vikings were the adventurous ones who left.  Scandinavians are descended of the ones who stayed home.  

While Scandinavians may share common origin with the Vikings dating back 1500 years, technically it's not correct to say they are descended from them.  And to the extent there is a gene for adventure-seeking, violence, or the so-called, "warrior" gene, it's more probable that the ones who stayed in Scandinavia (as fishermen and barley farmers) do NOT have that gene.

Many Russians, Ukrainians, English, Scots, Calabrians, Sicilians, and Northern French have a better claim to be "directly descended from Vikings."  Sorry.



9.  You can determine by a test on Eurogenes or Gedmatch the precise percentages of EEF-ANE-WHG that you are.

For the uninitiated, these acronyms stand for "Early European Farmer," "Ancient North Eurasian," and "Western [European] Hunter Gatherer."

Example post: "Username: SteppeOverlord  EEF: 21.345%, ANE: 19.876% WHG 58.779."

It's important to note that these hypothetical populations were reconstructed from...ONE SAMPLE EACH.  Thus, when you take the Eurogenes EEF ANE WHG test, you are comparing yourself to each of three skeletons: the EEF is the LBK sample found in Stuttgart, Germany.  The ANE is the Mal'ta boy found in Siberia.  The WHG is the Loschbour skeleton found in Belgium.  Citation.

These populations were themselves admixed, especially the Stuttgart sample.  It's not accurate to use one exemplar to represent an entire group, especially ones with the huge geographical ranges of the acronym populations.  It's much more accurate to say that you tested whatever percentage in common with Loschbour, Mal'ta, or Stuttgart.  

 Many of the genes inherited so many generations ago will be the result of identical by state, (more or less coincidence, or breeding back, in a way), than Identical By Descent.  Citation.  Europeans are a homogenous lot, and these tests don't therefore reveal much, if anything, and the terminology, turned to shorthand, stinks.


8.  Admixture percentages are due to a historical event.

Example post: "OMG!  I am English, Irish, German, and Polish.  But Dodecad says I have 6% Siberian; this must prove the legend in my family that my great-grandmother was a Cherokee princess!"

Or:

"I am South Italian.  But Eurogenes says I have 12% southwest Asian.  Must be the Greek blood!"

People tend to overestimate historical events (i.e., those we know about due to past events being recorded in writing), but tend to underestimate non-historical events.  This is a recent-ness bias that comes from a little knowledge about history, often expressed in shorthand, (i.e., South Italy was Greek).

It is however, almost always not true.  In the first example above: many Europeans, especially Northern Europeans, test positive for some Siberian/ANE/even Native-American-like ancestry, but this is almost certainly the result of ancient Admixture from the first Indo-Europeans from the steppe, who had substantial Asian-like ancestry.  For the second example: the people who populated Italy in prehistoric times were descended in many cases from the first farmers, who came from the southeast fringes of Europe.  Such signals in modern ancestry are way more likely to indicate ancient admixture from population sources with common ancestry to historical populations.

Sorry, but the boring is almost always more true than the interesting.



7.  People from places with many years of recorded history are more admixed than people with less history.

example post: "If you are of South Italian ancestry, you're probably part Roman, Greek, Scandinavian, Arab, and Jewish."

This one is so obvious it is painful to have to post.  But it's the corollary of number 8 above: a little historical knowledge being dangerous.

Imagine two regions: Region 1 is fairly remote, but has had extensive writing for 2600 years, and every marauder, political shift, kingdom, invasion, battle, language spoken, and petty dukedom is recorded in glorious detail.  Imagine another region, Region 2, that has had extensive writing and civilization for only about 1100 years.  There are large gaps in knowledge of what happened there, because of the lack of historians.

I just described Basilicata, Italy and Hesse, Germany.  Yet so many online "mytholographers" perpetuate the notions that people like Italians, Jews, and Greeks (i.e., those with 25+ centuries of intense recorded history) are more admixed than those without such extensive documentation (i.e., Germans, French, etc.)

You can't escape this, on any online forum, people speculating on exotic sources in Italian ancestry, and almost no one does this for Germans and French.

Just because we don't know who was invading another area during prehistory or the Dark Ages, does it mean it didn't happen?  Just because we don't know the name of the king who pillaged a territory, does it make him any less historical?  Because there is no Trojan War story for Hesse, Germany, does it mean there was no warfare, invasion, or exotic influences?

The French and Germans are so "admixed" (i.e., generic European) that 23andme cannot identify their DNA 92% of the time.  Citation.  Yet the poor Greeks have to tolerate in every discussion, excruciating detail and speculation about every single exotic strain in their blood.

Aside from the remotest, hard-to-get-to, isolated regions of Europe (Finns, Northwest Irish, Basques, and Sardinians), everyone has been invaded, repeatedly, and everyone is very very admixed.  The paradigm, of focusing only on certain peoples for this, has to change, because it's simply not accurate.

Check back soon for the rest of the Top 10 list.

Ancient DNA Provides A New Understanding of Haplogroup I2a1a M26

Below is a map of confirmed instances of I-M26 found in prehistoric remains.  Lots of others could have potentially been added -- ancestral clades, closely related sister clades, and ones where the coverages is insufficient to determine whether it is indeed M26 (or L672 L160 etc.)  But we decided to err on the side of being conservative.

Going chronologically, we have M26 in what is now Sweden, at the Motala site, at 7730 BP (Before Present).  These were Hunter/Gatherers.

Next, we have it at the La Spina site, in modern Spain, at 5765 BP.  This was a Megalithic site, during the Neolithic.  Farming was already in Spain at that time.

Next we find it at Treilles, modern France, at 5015 BP.  This was a Megalithic/Neolithic site of farmers, near the coast.

Next we find it in the Remedello culture, of Northern Italy, at 4758 BP.  This was a Chalcolithic (Copper Age) site.  Per Robert S.P. Beekes, "bears all the marks of an Indo-European invasion: a new style of ceramics, a new burial rite, changes in the social structure, the introduction of a warrior aristocracy, the intro- duction of metallurgy, the horse and the chariot. But it is still not possible to assign language groups to particular culture."

Finally, for now, researchers have found it in the Megalithic culture of central France, near the Dolmen of Villaneuve-Sur-Yonne, 4753 BP, and again, of course, farming was present.  

In modern times, we find M26 at 37% in Sardinia, certainly an outlier due to substantial founder effect.

But it is also found at up to 10% in Samnite country in Molise, Italy (and in significant numbers in Cosenza province of northern Calabria).  It is found at 5-9% in Spain, including Basque country.  At up to 7% on Sicily.  And 3% in many areas of England and Ireland, especially places like the Channel Islands.  It is still found at 1% in Southern Sweden.

So, given all that we know, what is a sensible theory for M26's distribution and spread?  

We've heard them all, and each has merit: that is represents Megalithic Mariners, who went around old Europe converting local populations and building huge monuments like Stonehenge and the Nuraghe.   That it represents the spread of Cardial Ware culture, along the western Mediterranean seaboard.  That it represents the spread of farming, either as hunter/gatherers who adopted farming quickly, or as a rare clade of Haplogroup I that was predominantly farmers since the dawn of agriculture.  Finally, some posit that it represents a caste (or not) of people embedded in other haplogroups in motion, most often listed as G2a or R1b.

All have merit, none are perfect.  Let's go through the logical conclusions and form a model.

The presence of M26 amongst the hunter/gatherers of Motala, and its widespread ancient distribution by the dawn of the Neolithic tell us that it is a most ancient indigenous European clade.  

We believe that it is safe to say that the first modern humans in Europe, Aurignacians, aka Cro-Magnons, bore haplogroup C.  (Although during the Paleolithic, that far back, it is really anyone's guess whether Hg C came in during one the next phases).

M26, along with its brother clades within Haplogroup I2, most likely formed a part of the second wave of European hunter/gatherers, and was presumably present among the Epi-Gravettians and the Magdalenians.

How then does one explain its wide distribution and adaptive nature throughout the continent during the Neolithic? 

Perhaps the answer is simple.  These were people who have been in Europe for a long time, and are adaptable, and are survivors.

Europe was settled in waves, and not just the three big ones (Hunter/Gatherer, Farmers, Steppe Horsemen), which is an oversimplification.  

Imagine Europe as a pipe.  It has three entry points: the steppes of Russia from people heading due west, the Balkans/river corridors from people heading northwest, and the Mediterranean from people heading north.

Imagine a party.  The "Emtwentysix" family was among the first to arrive.  When they got to the house, they represented maybe 15% of the guests.  But as more guests arrived, some through the front door, some through the back door, and some through the side door, the Emtwentysix family became a smaller percentage of the total guests, now just 0.5-3%.  

When the family arrived, they were playing foosball together.  But at some point, some members of the family joined a group of other guests who were dancing, and some joined groups of other guests who were playing video games.

You get the analogy.  

None of the above theories may be 100% accurate, and yet all theories may be accurate in their own way. 

For example, it is doubtful that I-M26 first showed up in Europe with the Cardium Pottery culture, but it could have been among the groups (as it was clearly in Italy for a long time) that encountered the Cardial peoples, and then became a component of said peoples, heading west along the western Mediterranean seaboard.  

Similarly, in Northern Italy, M26 peoples could have been among the first who were Indo-Europeanized, in the Remedello culture, and then part of the secondary expansion into Italy, which formed the Oscan-speaking Sabellic tribes (Samnites, Brutti, and Sicels).  

In other places, clearly M26 was Megalithic acculturated, and its odd distribution in places where Megaliths appear is intriguing for sure.  

And lastly, some of its distribution could reflect later movements by obsidian traders or something similar.

Prehistory is a series of periods of demographic expansion followed by demographic crisis.  Good hunting, good weather, good crops, absence of disease, and other factors make people have more babies.  Then luck turns, and some lines die out, while other lines come to the party.  Since the Bronze Age in Europe, it has mostly been a demographic march to more population as time goes by.  

We would like to see a study comparing the M26 in Sweden, Ireland, Spain, the Italian mainland, and Sardinia, to see who is ancestral to whom, or how and when the different groups separated.

But the bottom line appears to be that M26 has been in Europe a long time, and like all lineages that were there a long time, its distribution will have changed a bit and its absolute numbers will have gone down, but these Most Adaptable Hunter Gatherers (MAHGs) continue to intrigue.




 

Allentoft Study Shows I2a1a in Bronze Age Remedello in Northern Italy

If you've been following Ancient DNA lately, you know that Allentoft et al came out with results of eastern Bronze Age populations.  The data confirm an expansion out of the steppes and likely give credence to a two or three wave Indo European expansion.

Paul Heggarty gives an excellent analysis here, perhaps the best on the web.

This post will focus on the study's implications for I-M26.  It is possible that M26 was linked perhaps to the spread of Cardium Pottery, which spread from Italy rapidly: 2,000 km from the gulf of Genoa to the estuary of the Mondego in probably no more than 100–200 years. This suggests a seafaring expansion by planting colonies along the coast.

Whether M26 spread with Cardial Ware, or existed before it and those people became acculturated by it, with the findings from Treilles and Remedello, we have confirmation that M26 was the lineage of some of the very first waves of inhabitants of Italy and the western Mediterranean, and that it persisted through very different times, since the Remedello culture was very different from its predecessors and very similar to steppe cultures.

How Little We Know About Ancient DNA

I've frequented several of the Ancient DNA discussion boards lately, and have been flummoxed by the self-important, self-promoted, self-described "experts," who proclaim to know precise migration patterns of Ancient Europeans.

These same "experts" even go so far as to claim to be able to tie specific haplogroups to languages, tribes, and epochs.  They will make broad statements, like, "all of Europe was populated by [this haplogroup or that], which represented the [Cro-Magnons or whatever], until they were replaced, en masse, by the [new Haplogroup.]"

(Often the dominant invader haplogroup in their theories tends to be the one of the posting "expert," but that's just coincidence, I'm sure.)

Contrasting these experts are some bona fide theoreticians, who point out that we have less than 100 samples of Caucasian Ancient DNA, and that a simple cultural fact, for example, if one tribe cremated their dead and another tribe buried their dead, could contribute to the number of ancient skeletons that make it to the present day.

So, what I decided to do was to plot the confirmed ancient NR Y Chromosome haplogroup samples on a map, to show whatever it shows.

What I discovered was a complete lack of any real patterns.  In other words, it's too early to tell.  We need way more aDNA.

I used the excellent data from Ancestral Journeys.  All maps are labeled.  All times and locations are approximate.  All maps are copyrighted, but feel free to share, as long as you link to this page or attribute to me.  (The final map is not mine, but purports to represent modern majorities).

I think from these maps it is clear that several of the widely accepted theories are bunk.  For example, looking at these maps, it is clear that Haplogroup G2 is a candidate too for one of the original populations of Europe.  It was ubiquitous.  The wiseguys all postulate that it originated in the western Caucasus, near where it is currently dominant, and moved west with the migratory herders or agriculturalists.  However, it is just as likely from looking at these maps that it once simply was everywhere, in a band in central Europe, along the major rivers, stretching from northern Spain to the Caucasus, and that its current location is one where it RECEDED to, not originated from.

What other theories can be questioned by these maps?

Corrected European Regional Percentages (Yet Again) for I-M26 12a1a

Some have pointed out that the early studies showing high M26 in Castile suffered from small sample sizes.  Further, more recent posts and agglomerations of studies show different numbers than what is quoted below.  While Eupedia is usually full of pseudoscientific malarky, this post purports to have collected studies.  And this website claims to have done the same, specific to Spain.

So, taken together, we get the following on our M26 I2a1a leaderboard:

(1) Sardinia (Island Isolated) ~37%
(2) Samnium (Mountainous Central Italy) ~10%
(3) Navarre (Mountainous Northern Spain) ~9%
(4) Sicily (Another Island) ~7%
(5) Basque Country (More Mountains) ~5%
(6) Aragon, Spain ~5%
(7) England, Ireland, and ALL W. European Islands whether Mediterranean, Atlantic, or Channel  ~3%


We also have some allegations (no studies cited) that Andalusia (Spain) is in double digits.


From what I can tell, this is the picture that has emerged.  Please cite links to studies if you have any.

Corrected Study Confirms Even More I-M26 12a1a In Archaic Zones of Italy

The great paper by Brisghelli, et. al., referred to and discussed extensively below, has been updated and corrected.  The updates are stunning.  Now, the descendants of the once-mighty Samnites, the rugged mountain-dwellers of the Southern Italian interior, have shown to be 10% I-M26.

The corrected table can be found by clicking this link.

This pushes Samnites into third place in the M26 frequency chart.  It also confirms what I've posted previously about M26 being found in large numbers among Northern Calabrian mountaineers, who have long been noted to be offshoots of the Samnites.  (The Ancient sources said that the Brutti broke off from the Lucanians, and the Lucanians broke off from the Samnites.  Each of these hardy tribes battle Rome for supremacy in pre-Empire Italy, and they almost won.)

But I digress.  Here are the updated charts of frequency for M-26:


Sardinia ~37%
Castile ~19%
Samnium ~10%
Sicily ~7%
Basque Country ~5%
England, Ireland, and ALL W. European Islands whether Mediterranean, Atlantic, or Channel  ~3%
General Italy/France ~2%


This might clear things up a bit for the spread of M26.

M26's ancestral clade, P37.2, is concentrated very strongly in the Balkans, and that all data seems to indicate that M26 followed a route that went westward through Italy.  In other words, if there had been no stop in Italy, there'd be no stop in Sardinia.  No Italy, no southern France.  Thus, unless there was a back migration of M26 eastward, the M26 there is likely to be ancestral to the M26 that is more westerly. 

An eastward migration is highly unlikely, be cause the Italian regions where it is found (South and Central Appenines) are extremely isolated, and far from the typical coastal routes.  So it is unlikely that a few Sardinian slaves, for example, or English pirates or whatever, spread it.  Samnium and Cosenza are way up in the mountains.

Also, there is a U5 mtDNA clade in Sardinia connected to M26 that bears evidence of an Italian refugium that contributed (in a small way) to the post-glacial expansion of mankind into Europe. 

In other words, synthesizing the various sources, one gets: I2 likely evolved in Anatolia a very long time ago.  It spread westward for sure.  A major stopping point was the Balkans, where regular old P37.2 evolved.  Another stop was Italy, likely, perhaps Piedmont, which is on the French border.  M26 likely evolved there, perhaps during a period of glacial expansion.

Alternatively, the timing of this westward spread is later, and mirrors the Cardium culture.  Either way, South Central Italy (Samnium) is directly west of the Balkans.  And it is isolated.  A strong candidate for a similar Founder effect, like what happened in Sardinia. 

From Italy, it spread to Sardinia, and points further west.  M26 then had a second expansion during the Bronze or Copper Age, which was seaborne.  Others have speculated this mirrors the Megalith culture, and I see no reason why this is not a possibility.  The second spread was clearly seaborne.

I think the M26 found way up in the remote mountains of Italy is a great candidate to be ancestral to the others.  We need some more research on the SNPs to solve this once and for all.  As recent R1b research has shown, the STRs are not enough.

Scholars Finally Apply Some Logic (Not Mythology) To Etruscan Origins

If you read the old Roman and Greek historians, you will notice that they mix their religions and mythology into their writing.  For example, a casual perusal of Suetonius will reveal detailed historical facts and stuff about how talking cows portended the eventual rise of this Emperor or that.  Even the most serious historians will pass along foundation myths, for example, how Hercules visited this German tribe or that, or how some random tribe of Spaniards or Gauls claimed descent from Troy.

No one takes these other facts seriously, except with respect to the Etruscans.

It's been well-documented that the Etruscans (and the Romans) both embellished ties to the older civilizations of the east, only upon an uptick in contacts with the East. 

The Romans invented ties with Troy to beef up their bona fides when faced with older, Hellenistic cultures.  The Etruscans did this too.

When the Etruscans were battling the Greeks for cultural supremacy, they constantly faced snobbery because the Greeks were "older" than them.  So the Etruscans, who also wanted increased trade with Asia Minor, invented ties with the Lydians there.  One or two ancient historians reported this, and enshrined the myth.

If knowledge of Ancient History ain't your thing, just consider how many modern rappers of African-American heritage (to establish their bonafides) call themselves "Gotti" or some variation of the Italian Godfather theme. 

The problem is that certain modern armchair historians, due to lack of perspective, or some animus toward how much of Western Civ originated in Italy, or due to some notion that Northern Italians racially superior, welcome and embrace the exotic Etruscans hypothesis.  They have done so for a while, despite absolutely ZERO evidence of any invasion or cultural shift in Etruscan areas in pre-Etruscan times.  In fact, there is nothing but continuity between Villanovans and their Etruscan successors in the region!

Anyway, now we have genetic studies that finally shut the door on the dummies. 

The link can be found here. 

The study basically found that there are no more ties with Etruscans to the Near East than there are for other Mediterranean cultures, and that any such links are due to the very first farmers migrating to populate Europe at the dawn of post-Ice Age history.

This has been been confirmed by other evidence too, summarized here.

Can we finally put this "Exotic Etruscans" myth to bed, alongside the other ancient myths, like that Aeneas carried the founders of Rome to Italy from Troy on his back, and that eagles pooping caused Vespasian to become Emperor?  Those also appear in ancient histories, after all.

EXCITING NEWS: New Study Finds Significant M26 Among South Central Italy Mountain Dwellers

Confirms theory that M26 likely represents aboriginal Italians.

In 2009, Maria Pala et al first put out the theory that YCC Hg I-M26 represented the aboriginal Italians, who had stayed in a small Italian refugium during the LGM.  The paper was called "Mitochondrial Haplogroup U5b3: A Distant Echo of the Epipaleolithic in Italy and the Legacy of the Early Sardinians" and can be found here.  It was kind of an added bonus theory in the paper, which focused on mtDNA but put forth the idea en passant.

Now, a landmark study on Italian Y chromosomes shows significant I-M26 in the archaic Samnium region of Italy.  This is and was always a rugged, remote, mountainous part of Italy known even in Roman times as being populated by some of the earliest inhabitants of Italy.  This, coupled with what American genetic genealogists already knew (which is the presence of M26 in many males from remote parts of mountainous northern Calabria), would seem to confirm the theory that M26 was present in an Italian refugium during the epipaleolithic.  And that those people went on to populate Sardinia and other coastal regions of southwest Europe.

Is Y-Chromosome Haplogroup M26 Norman? The Answer Can Be Found By Resorting to Logic

M26 is a clade of Haplogroup I on the Y Chromosome.  (It is sometimes called I2a1, but I disfavor such nomenclature, because I have lived through M26 being renamed often.  It is subject to subjective and regular change, which makes research hard.  M26 used to be known as Eu-8 and I1b2.) 

M26 is found in large numbers in Sardinia.  Between 37-40% of the males there bear it.  It is also found regularly in the Iberian peninsula: Basque Country, Castile, Aragon, Portugal, etc.  Lastly, all of the islands in Western Europe show M26 as well: Ireland, England, the Balearic Islands, Pantellaria, etc.  Some have stated that M26 must have spread, after its initial emergence, via the ocean, since it is found almost exclusively along the coasts of western Europe.

There are tens of theories on what the spread of M26 correlates to, both prehistoric and historical.  Some posit it tracks the spread of Cardium Pottery or Atlantic Bronze Age culture or Megalith builders.  Many now believe that M26 tracks Sardinian obsidian traders, because (a) it has been shown that Sardinian obsidian traders sailed the oceans plying their wares; (b) during that period was the only period where Sardinia was an exporter of humans; (c) and of course the large concentration of M26 in Sardinia.  All of these theories relate to prehistoric happenings, of course. 

Some believe M26 tracks historical migrations.  Possible candidates include the Roman slave trade, the Spanish empire, or the Normans. 

This exercise attempts to go through each theory as it relates to the discovery of several I-M26 in the Calabria region of South Italy.  M26’s presence in Calabria could likely be the key to resolving the issue once and for all, yet this seems to have escaped modern scholarship.

Below is the list of just a few of the publicly available Calabrian clans that bear M26, tested by a major lab:

Caracciolo – exact origin unknown

Faga – Cortale, Catanzaro

Funicella – San Vincenzo La Costa, Cosenza

Gatto – Lago, Cosenza

Lamantia – Sicilian, but originally from Amantea, Cosenza

Rondinella – Gioiosa Ionica, Reggio Calabria

The presence of M26 in Calabria is rather unique, since it is the easternmost that it is found in real quantity.  It also is not an obvious place for it.   

Below, each theory for M26 in Calabria is stated, and how this fits in the puzzle, is examined.  Then, I offer an opinion on each theory.

(1) There is no significance to Calabrian M26:  Lots of Calabrians have tested M26 because DNA testing is largely an American and UK phenomenon, and Calabrians simply represent a large portion of Italian-Americans.  As a threshold, this theory cannot be ignored.  As anyone who participates in genetic genealogy knows, there are far more samples of R1b because home DNA testing has lots of western European participants.  Under this theory, M26 would have a steady distribution across most of Italy, but would show up in so many American genetic genealogy sites simply because a large percentage of those getting tested were Italian-Americans from Calabria.  Evaluation: unlikely.  There is a large corpus of works testing Italians in Italy, and M26 has shown up in several regions besides Calabria.  But if M26 were indeed evenly spread across Italy, we would expect to see large numbers of test kits coming back M26 from other large groups of Italian-American source populations, i.e., Neapolitans.  This has not been the case.  There do appear to be higher percentages of M26 in Calabria.

(2) Calabrian M26 signifies the first humans in Italy:  Italy was a small refugium during the LGM and the males who existed there were M26.  M26 spread along the coast of Italy and found its way to Sardinia, where it had a founder effect.  Calabria, as the toe of Italy and with its inpenetrable mountains, is where the remnants of a relict M26 population were driven by subsequent invaders.  M26 thus represents aboriginal Italians from way back.  This theory was set out in “Mitochondrial haplogroup U5b3: a distant echo of the epipaleolithic in Italy and the legacy of the early Sardinians.”  (Available for free in its entirety on Google).  It is buttressed by the earliest Homo Sapiens and significant Gravettian finds being in the Calabria area.  (Grotto della Romito, etc.)  It also would make sense that aboriginal Italians would be slowly driven into the wild mountains at the very bottom of the peninsula, by subsequent invasions over time.  Evaluation: very possible.  There is an easy way to test this.  Either the Calabrian M26 represents the foundational (upstream) branch, or it doesn’t.  Either it shows itself to be ancestral to Sardinian M26 (and all others), or it does not.  Also, Calabrian M26 samples should be very divergent from those in the rest of Western Europe.

(3) M26 was spread WEST by the cardial ware culture.  Makers of Cardium pottery have been shown to have taken a western route along the Mediterranean, and cardial ware has been posited to correlate with M26.  The M26 is Calabria represents those who stayed behind in Italy on the way to Sardinia.  This Evaluation: possible.   Again, there is an easy way to test this.  Either the Calabrian M26 represents the foundational (upstream) branch, or it doesn’t.  Either it shows itself to be as old as Sardinian M26, or it does not.

(4) M26 was spread EAST:  M26 was spread easterly into Italy, from more western Atlantic Bronze Age cultures, or from Sardinian obsidian traders, or from Western European Megalith builders.  Again, if you Google search or Wikipedia these concepts, you can readily see the various theories.  Sardinian obsidian, the black gold (or more accurately, the advanced military hardware) of ages past, was spread by Sardinian obsidian traders all over western Europe, for one example.  Evaluation: possible.   As above, there is an easy way to test this.  The Calabrian M26 should show its closest MRCA to be that of Sardinian M26, and this should be between 3000 and 4000 years ago.

Possible Historical Sources:

(5) Roman era causes:  M26 in Calabria represents Sardinian slaves brought into Calabria during Roman times.  Rome fought a series of wars in Sardinia around 200 B.C.  They brought back vast quantities of slaves.  For a while, Romans had a saying, “as cheap as a Sardinian slave.”  Rome also conquered Calabria around this time, and turned vast tracts into public lands.  The public lands were cultivated by slaves, and their descendants bear M26.  If ~40% of Sardinian slaves bore M26, it follows that a few propagated, and entered the general population.  Evaluation: possible but not likely.  There were many other agricultural regions in Italy besides Calabria.  If Sardinian slaves were so prevalent around Italy in 200 BC, there should be an even spread of M26 in Italy.  There simply is not.  Yes, there are other mechanisms (Iberian mercenaries in Hannibal’s army, Spartacus revolts) that could explain a Roman era M26 propagation.  But again, these are easily testable.  If Calabrian M26 represents Sardinian slaves from 200 BC (or Iberian mercenaries from the same time), those who tested positive should cluster very closely with the source populations.  I don’t believe they do.

(6) Normans:  M26 in Calabria represents the blood of Viking overlords.  The Normans did by coincidence conquer a number of lands where there is M26: the UK, Calabria, etc.  M26 in Calabria could represent the descendants of these individuals.  Evaluation: unlikely.  The Normans also didn’t conquer many lands where there is M26.  They had no presence in Basque country, many of the Spanish states, the interior of Ireland, Pantellaria in Italy, etc.  Plus the Calabrian M26 would need to cluster with Northern French M26, which it does not.  Furthermore, the Norman invasion of Italy was only about 1000 years ago, not only during historical times, but at the cusp of surnames.  I believe most of those testing positive for M26 from Calabria do not bear Norman surnames.  (Examples of Norman surnames are Ruggiero, Gandolfini, etc.)  Those testing positive for M26 from Calabria have Latin surnames.

(7) Spaniards:  The Spanish ruled Calabria so the M26 there likely just comes from Spanish settlers.  There is much M26 is certain provinces of Spain and therefore, if 20% of colonists, mercenaries, or adventurers bore the gene, it would make sense that a percentage of Calabrians still bear the gene today.  Evaluation: unlikely.  Again, easily testable:  The Spanish presence in Calabria was so recent that Calabrians testing positive for M26 should be virtually identical to Spanish sources.  It’s not.  Moreover, some of the Calabrian families testing positive for M26 have their trees traced back to the 1500s, with only Italian names. 

Taking the big picture here, you can decide.  I personally think Theory (2) or (3) is most likely, that M26 in Calabria represents a very ancient people.  Even in Roman times, Calabria was called the First Italy.  The tribes that existed there that blended with the Romans were called the Itali (from which the entire peninsula was named).  The mountains in Calabria, with dense pine forests, high peaks covered with snow, and non-navigable passes are an ideal place for the original Italian population to be found. 

Comparing the STR data from these  Calabrian families, it shows that they are most closely related to other Calabrians, and estimates of TMRCA among the Calabrians is as recent as 500 years ago.  The next closest from what I could see from a very quick look were samples from the UK, England and Ireland, with a TMCRA back in prehistory.  This would seem to eliminate theories 5-7 above.