Mid East
Middle East
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_East
In 1958, the State Department explained that the terms "Near East" and "Middle East" were interchangeable, and defined the region as including only Egypt, Syria, Israel, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Qatar....
Territories and regions usually considered within the Middle East: Traditionally included within the Middle East are Iran (Persia), Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, the Levant, the Arabian Peninsula, and Egypt. ...
Persian Empire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Empire
The Persian Empire refers to any of a series of imperial dynasties that were centred in Persia/Iran from the 6th century BC Achaemenid Empire era to the 20th century AD in the Qajar dynasty era.
Achaemenids: (550–330 BC) The first dynasty of the Persian Empire was created by Achaemenids, established by Cyrus the Great in 550 BC with the conquest of Median, Lydian and Babylonian empires. It covered much of the Ancient world when it was conquered by Alexander the Great.
Parthians and Sasanians: From 247 BC to 224 AD, Persia was ruled by the Parthian Empire (247 BC–224 AD), which supplanted the Hellenistic Seleucid Empire, and then by the Sassanian Empire (224–651 AD), which ruled up until the mid-7th century. The Persian Empire in the Sasanian era was interrupted by the Arab conquest of Persia in 651 AD, establishing the even larger Islamic caliphate, and later by the Mongol invasion. The main religion of ancient Persia was the native Zoroastrianism, but after the seventh century, it was slowly replaced by Islam which achieved a majority in the 10th century.
Safavids: The Safavid Empire (1501–1736 AD) was the first Persian Empire established after the Arab conquest of Persia by Shah Ismail I. From their base in Ardabil, the Safavid Persians established control over parts of Greater Persia/Iran and reasserted the Persian identity of the region, becoming the first native Persian dynasty since the Sasanian Empire to establish a unified Persian state. Literature, art and architecture flourished in the Safavid era once again, and it is often cited as the "rebirth of the Persian Empire". Safavids also announced Shia Islam as the official religion in the empire versus the Sunni Islam in the neighbouring Ottoman Empire.
Afsharid dynasty (1736–1796 AD)
Qajar dynasty (1785–1925 AD)
Achaemenid Empire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achaemenid_Empire
550 BC–330 BC Ranging at its greatest extent from the Balkans and Eastern Europe proper in the west to the Indus Valley in the east, it was larger than any previous empire in history,... The Achaemenid Empire is noted in Western history as the antagonist of the Greek city-states during the Greco-Persian Wars and for the emancipation of the Jewish exiles in Babylon. ...
the empire was instrumental in the spread of Zoroastrianism...
Origin: The Persian nation contains a number of tribes as listed here. ... : the Pasargadae, Maraphii, and Maspii, upon which all the other tribes are dependent. Of these, the Pasargadae are the most distinguished; they contain the clan of the Achaemenids from which spring the Perseid kings. Other tribes are the Panthialaei, Derusiaei, Germanii, all of which are attached to the soil, the remainder -the Dai, Mardi, Dropici, Sagarti, being nomadic.
The Achaemenid Empire was created by nomadic Persians. The name "Persia" is a Greek and Latin pronunciation of the native word referring to the country of the people originating from Persis their home territory located north of the Persian Gulf in southwestern Iran. The Achaemenid Empire was not the first Iranian empire, as by 6th century BC another group of ancient Iranian peoples had already established the short-lived Median Empire. The Iranian peoples had arrived in the region of what is today Iran c. 1000 BC and had for a number of centuries fallen under the domination of the Neo-Assyrian Empire (911–609 BC), based in northern Mesopotamia....
550 BC, Cyrus rose in rebellion against the Medes... the Persian Empire became the first to attempt to govern many different ethnic groups on the principle of equal responsibilities and rights for all people, so long as subjects paid their taxes and kept the peace.... The Persians from whom Cyrus hailed were originally nomadic pastoralists in the western Iranian Plateau and by 850 BC were calling themselves the Parsa and their constantly shifting territory Parsua, for the most part localized around Persis...
Ancient Greek writers provide some legendary information about Achaemenes by calling his tribe the Pasargadae and stating that he was "raised by an eagle". Plato, when writing about the Persians, identified Achaemenes with Perses, ancestor of the Persians in Greek mythology. According to Plato, Achaemenes was the same person as Perses, a son of the Ethiopian queen Andromeda and the Greek hero Perseus, and a grandson of Zeus. Later writers believed that Achaemenes and Perseus were different people,...
a huge Achaemenid army invaded the Balkans and tried to defeat the European Scythians roaming to the north of the Danube river. Darius' army subjugated several Thracian peoples, and virtually all other regions that touch the European part of the Black Sea, such as parts of nowadays Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, and Russia, before it returned to Asia Minor...The Persian troops subjugated gold-rich Thrace, the coastal Greek cities, as well as defeating and conquering the powerful Paeonians...
The Ionian Revolt constituted the first major conflict between Greece and the Achaemenid Empire, and as such represents the first phase of the Greco-Persian Wars....The final defeat of the Persians at Mycale encouraged the Greek cities of Asia to revolt, and the Persians lost all of their territories in Europe; Macedonia once again became independent....
Artaxerxes II: The extraordinary innovation of the Zoroastrian shrines can also be dated to his reign, and it was probably during this period that Zoroastrianism spread from Armenia throughout Asia Minor and the Levant. The construction of temples, though serving a religious purpose, was not a purely selfless act, as they also served as an important source of income. From the Babylonian kings, the Achaemenids had taken over the concept of a mandatory temple tax, a one-tenth tithe which all inhabitants paid to the temple nearest to their land or other source of income. A share of this income called the Quppu Sha Sharri, "king's chest"—an ingenious institution originally introduced by Nabonidus—was then turned over to the ruler....
The Persian army completely routed the Egyptians and occupied the Lower Delta of the Nile. Following Nectanebo fleeing to Ethiopia, all of Egypt submitted to Artaxerxes. The Jews in Egypt were sent either to Babylon or to the south coast of the Caspian Sea, the same location that the Jews of Phoenicia had earlier been sent. After this victory over the Egyptians, Artaxerxes had the city walls destroyed, started a reign of terror, and set about looting all the temples. Persia gained a significant amount of wealth from this looting. Artaxerxes also raised high taxes and attempted to weaken Egypt enough that it could never revolt against Persia. For the 10 years that Persia controlled Egypt, believers in the native religion were persecuted and sacred books were stolen.... Egypt remained a part of the Persian Empire until Alexander the Great's conquest of Egypt....
Alexander the Great (Alexander III of Macedon) defeated the Persian armies at Granicus (334 BC), followed by Issus (333 BC), and lastly at Gaugamela (331 BC). Afterwards, he marched on Susa and Persepolis which surrendered in early 330 BC.... Alexander generally kept the original Achaemenid administrative structure, leading some scholars to dub him as "the last of the Achaemenids"....
Kingdom of Pontus: The Achaemenid line would also be carried on through the Kingdom of Pontus, based in the Pontus region of northern Asia Minor. This Pontic Kingdom, a state of Persian origin, may even have been directly related to Darius the Great and the Achaemenid dynasty. It was founded by Mithridates I in 281 BC and lasted until its conquest by the Roman Republic in 63 BC. The kingdom grew to its largest extent under Mithridates VI the Great, who conquered Colchis, Cappadocia, Bithynia, the Greek colonies of the Tauric Chersonesos and for a brief time the Roman province of Asia. Thus, this Persian dynasty managed to survive and prosper in the Hellenistic world while the main Persian Empire had fallen....
Part of the cause of the Empire's decline had been the heavy tax burden put upon the state, which eventually led to economic decline....
“The armoured Persian horsemen and their death dealing chariots were invincible. No man dared face them” Herodotus... Persia would become the first empire, under Darius, to inaugurate and deploy the first regular imperial navy....the personnel for the imperial navy were often Phoenicians (mostly from Sidon), Egyptians and Greeks...
Herodotus, in his mid 5th century BC account of Persian residents of the Pontus, reports that Persian youths, from their fifth year to their twentieth year, were instructed in three things: to ride a horse, to draw a bow, and to speak the Truth. He further notes that: the most disgraceful thing in the world [the Persians] think, is to tell a lie; the next worst, to owe a debt: because, among other reasons, the debtor is obliged to tell lies. In Achaemenid Persia, the lie, druj, is considered to be a cardinal sin, and it was punishable by death in some extreme cases.... King Darius then tells us, The Lie made them rebellious, so that these men deceived the people....
During the reign of Cyrus and Darius, and as long as the seat of government was still at Susa in Elam, the language of the chancellery was Elamite....Elamite was used by the capital government in Susa, it was not a standardized language of government everywhere in the empire. The use of Elamite is not attested after 458 BC. Following the conquest of Mesopotamia, the Aramaic language (as used in that territory) was adopted as a "vehicle for written communication between the different regions of the vast empire with its different peoples and languages....
During the reign of Artaxerxes I and Darius II, Herodotus wrote "[the Persians] have no images of the gods, no temples nor altars, and consider the use of them a sign of folly. This comes, I think, from their not believing the gods to have the same nature with men, as the Greeks imagine." He claims the Persians offer sacrifice to: "the sun and moon, to the earth, to fire, to water, and to the winds. These are the only gods whose worship has come down to them from ancient times. At a later period they began the worship of Urania, which they borrowed from the Arabians and Assyrians. Mylitta is the name by which the Assyrians know this goddess, to whom the Persians referred as Anahita." (The original name here is Mithra, which has since been explained to be a confusion of Anahita with Mithra, understandable since they were commonly worshipped together in one temple).... Berosus also substantiates Herodotus when he says the Persians knew of no images of gods until Artaxerxes II erected those images. On the means of sacrifice, Herodotus adds "they raise no altar, light no fire, pour no libations."...
Darius the Great records that: Yaka timber was brought from Gandara and from Carmania. The gold was brought from Sardis and from Bactria ... the precious stone lapis-lazuli and carnelian ... was brought from Sogdiana. The turquoise from Chorasmia, the silver and ebony from Egypt, the ornamentation from Ionia, the ivory from Ethiopia and from Sindh and from Arachosia. The stone-cutters who wrought the stone, those were Ionians and Sardians. The goldsmiths were Medes and Egyptians. The men who wrought the wood, those were Sardians and Egyptians. The men who wrought the baked brick, those were Babylonians. The men who adorned the wall, those were Medes and Egyptians. ...
Parthian Empire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthian_Empire
The Parthian Empire (247 BC – 224 AD), also known as the Arsacid Empire was a major Iranian political and cultural power in ancient Iran....At its height, the Parthian Empire stretched from the northern reaches of the Euphrates, in what is now central-eastern Turkey, to eastern Iran. The empire, located on the Silk Road trade route between the Roman Empire in the Mediterranean Basin and the Han Empire of China, became a center of trade and commerce....
Persian, Hellenistic, and regional cultures....
The earliest enemies of the Parthians were the Seleucids in the west and the Scythians in the east.... Frequent civil wars between Parthian contenders to the throne proved more dangerous to the Empire's stability than foreign invasion... Parthian history is only known through external sources. These include mainly Greek and Roman histories, but also Chinese histories, prompted by the Han Chinese desire to form alliances against the Xiongnu.... Roman-Parthian Wars...Parthia expanded westward, they came into conflict with the Kingdom of Armenia, and eventually the late Roman Republic....Ardashir established the Sassanid Empire, which ruled Iran and much of the Near East until the Muslim conquests of the 7th century AD, although the Arsacid dynasty lived on through the Arsacid Dynasty of Armenia, the Arsacid dynasty of Iberia, and the Arsacid Dynasty of Caucasian Albania; all eponymous branches of the Parthian Arsacids....
Before Arsaces I of Parthia founded the Arsacid Dynasty, he was chieftain of the Parni, an ancient Central-Asian tribe of Iranian peoples and one of several nomadic tribes within the confederation of the Dahae....
While the Parthians regained the territories lost in the west, another threat arose in the east. In 177–176 BC the nomadic confederation of the Xiongnu dislodged the nomadic Yuezhi from their homelands in what is now Gansu province in Northwest China; the Yuezhi then migrated west into Bactria and displaced the Saka (Scythian) tribes. The Saka were forced to move further west, where they invaded the Parthian Empire's northeastern borders. Mithridates was thus forced to retire to Hyrcania after his conquest of Mesopotamia....
The Roman historian Justin reports that his successor Artabanus I of Parthia (r. c. 128–124 BC) shared a similar fate fighting nomads in the east. He claims Artabanus was killed by the Tokhari (identified as the Yuezhi), although Bivar believes Justin conflated them with the Saka...
121 BC. The Han embassy opened official trade relations with Parthia via the Silk Road...The Parthian Empire was enriched by taxing the Eurasian caravan trade in silk, the most highly priced luxury good imported by the Romans. Pearls were also a highly valued import from China, while the Chinese purchased Parthian spices, perfumes, and fruits....
The Yuezhi Kushan Empire in northern India largely guaranteed the security of Parthia's eastern border....
During the reign of Artabanus III, two Jewish commoners and brothers, Anilai and Asinai from Nehardea (near modern Fallujah, Iraq), led a revolt against the Parthian governor of Babylonia. After defeating the latter, the two were granted the right to govern the region by Artabanus III, who feared further rebellion elsewhere. Anilai's Parthian wife poisoned Asinai out of fear he would attack Anilai over his marriage to a gentile. Following this, Anilai became embroiled in an armed conflict with a son-in-law of Artabanus, who eventually defeated him. With the Jewish regime removed, the native Babylonians began to harass the local Jewish community, forcing them to emigrate to Seleucia. When that city rebelled against Parthian rule in 35–36 AD, the Jews were expelled again, this time by the local Greeks and Aramaeans. The exiled Jews fled to Ctesiphon, Nehardea, and Nisibis.
Playing with Fire! Iranians ring in Persian New Year with fire-jumping festival
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ekc5k2NkY1E
Published on Mar 19, 2019 Iranians in Tehran joined thousands around the world in ringing in the Persian New Year with a traditional fire festival on Chaharshanbe Suri, on the Tuesday evening before Nowruz. The celebration sees revellers jumping over bonfires in a tradition that harks back to ancient times. As they leap, the daring participants shout: 'Give me your beautiful red colour and take back my sickly pallor,' in what's considered a purifying ritual to remove the dirt from the previous year with the liveliness of the flames. The stunning spectacle takes place on the eve of the last Wednesday before Nowruz, or Persian New Year.
The Kassites From 1595 to 1153
The Kassites were an Asian people whose origin is still uncertain. Wilhelm Eilers suggests that he settled in northern Luristan. Walter Sommerfeld also gives an origin in the Zagros. Louis D. Levine suggested an installation on the eastern shore of Little Zab. Julian Reade places the kingdom of Namri (or Namar or KUR.ZALAG or Namar AI or Namar-in or KUR Namar, east of the province of Diyala) as the country of the Kassites. However it must be pointed out that to attest to one or the other of the propositions the archaeological or epigraphic proofs are missing.
The Kassite people are commonly credited with the fact that it was subjugated by an Indo-European clan, which took its name and established itself in southern Zagros (presumably to the region of present-day Luristan as proposed by Eilers).... We know that the Kassites were famous in the art of horse training, it is probably they who trivialized the animal in Babylonia...
The main literary works were hymns of praise to the Gods. It follows from this little material that has come to us that the Kassites spoke a language without a genetic link to any other known language. In the pantheon, the purely Kassite divinities were: The Shuqamuna (or Šuqamuna) war god, who had Shimaliya (or Shumalija or Šumalija), a divine patron of kingship....
Luristan bronze
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luristan_bronze
The area had, before the period of the bronzes, been the original home of the Kassites, who spoke a non-Iranian language, then under the control of the Iranian-speaking Medes....
"Many of our inferences rely on the limited number of ancient samples available, and we are only just beginning to reconstruct a genetic history of the Levant or the Near East..." ...haplogroup J was absent in all Natufian and Neolithic Levant male individuals examined thus far, but emerged during the Bronze Age in Lebanon and Jordan along with ancestry related to Iran_ChL. The admixture time also overlaps with the rise and fall of the Akkadian Empire which controlled the region from Iran to the Levant between ∼4.4 and 4.2 kya.... This supports the theory that the original Canaanites were not J hg and these original Canaanites were scattered by the new peoples probably the Semites (J hg subclades) who emigrated out of Egypt. Which kind of supports some mythologies such as the phoenix bird found in Turc mythology called Samruk which was the Phoenician mythology as well, and also of Egyptian Benu bird.
So either the phoenix bird came out of Egypt and up to central Asia, or it actually began in Asia and migrated to Phoenicia and into Egpyt which is my current belief travelling with the R1b hg people? Which would make the original phoenicians R1b who mixed with the local Canaanites who may have become the Phoenicians. This just speculation on my part but does fit all the gathered facts as I now understand it...
Continuity and Admixture in the Last Five Millennia of Levantine History from Ancient Canaanite and Present-Day Lebanese Genome Sequences
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0002929717302768
sequenced five whole genomes from ∼3,700-year-old individuals from the city of Sidon...also sequenced the genomes of 99 individuals from present-day Lebanon to catalog modern Levantine genetic diversity....This Canaanite-related ancestry derived from mixture between local Neolithic populations and eastern migrants genetically related to Chalcolithic Iranians. We estimate, using linkage-disequilibrium decay patterns, that admixture occurred 6,600–3,550 years ago, coinciding with recorded massive population movements in Mesopotamia during the mid-Holocene. ...In addition, we find Eurasian ancestry in the Lebanese not present in Bronze Age or earlier Levantines. We estimate that this Eurasian ancestry arrived in the Levant around 3,750–2,170 years ago during a period of successive conquests by distant populations....
the Bible reports the destruction of the Canaanite cities and the annihilation of its people; if true, the Canaanites could not have directly contributed genetically to present-day populations. However, no archaeological evidence has so far been found to support widespread destruction of Canaanite cities between the Bronze and Iron Ages: cities on the Levant coast such as Sidon and Tyre show continuity of occupation until the present day....
THE RESULTS OF THE 5 SAMPLES:
Time ybp Sex MT Hg Y Hg
3,700 M N1a3a J1-P58 (J1a2b)
3,650 M HV1b1 J2-M12 (J2b)
3,650 F K1a2
3,750 F R2
3,750 F H1bc
When we substituted present-day Near Easterners with a panel of 150 present-day populations available in the Human Origins dataset, we found that only Sardinians and Italian_North shared significantly more alleles with Sidon_BA compared with the Lebanese (Figure S8). Sardinians are known to have retained a large proportion of ancestry from Early European farmers (EEFs) and therefore the increased affinity to Sidon_BA could be related to a shared Neolithic ancestry. We computed f4(Lebanese, Sardinian/Italian_North; Sidon_BA, Levant_N) and found no evidence of increased affinity of Sardinians or Italian_North to Sidon_BA after the Neolithic (both Z-scores are positive)....
The PCA shows that Sidon_BA clusters with three individuals from Early Bronze Age Jordan (Jordan_BA) found in a cave above the Neolithic site of ‘Ain Ghazal and probably associated with an Early Bronze Age village close to the site. This suggests that people from the highly differentiated urban culture on the Levant coast and inland people with different modes of subsistence were nevertheless genetically similar, supporting previous reports that the different cultural groups who inhabited the Levant during the Bronze Age, such as the Ammonites, Moabites, Israelites, and Phoenicians, each achieved their own cultural identities but all shared a common genetic and ethnic root with Canaanites... Jordan_BA can be modeled as mixture of Neolithic Levant (Levant_N) and Chalcolithic Iran (Iran_ChL).... populations from the Caucasus and ancient Iran shared more alleles with Sidon_BA than with Neolithic Levant ... found good support for the model of Sidon_BA being a mixture of Levant_N (48.4% ± 4.2%) and Iran_ChL (51.6% ± 4.2%)... Ancient Eurasian is most negative for ancient populations from the Caucasus and Iran, suggesting an increase in ancestry related to these populations in Sidon after the Neolithic period. Modeling Sidon as mixture between Neolithic Levant and an ancient Eurasian population shows that Chalcolithic Iran fits the model best when using a large number of outgroups...
haplogroup J was absent in all Natufian and Neolithic Levant male individuals examined thus far, but emerged during the Bronze Age in Lebanon and Jordan along with ancestry related to Iran_ChL. All five Sidon_BA individuals had different mitochondrial DNA haplotypes...The most significant result was for mixture of Levant_N and Iran_ChL (p = 0.013) around 181 ± 54 generations ago, or ∼5,000 ± 1,500 ya...The admixture time also overlaps with the rise and fall of the Akkadian Empire which controlled the region from Iran to the Levant between ∼4.4 and 4.2 kya. The Akkadian collapse is argued to have been the result of a widespread aridification event around 4,200 ya... .
A Eurasian ancestry found in Eastern hunter-gatherers and the steppe Bronze Age appears in present-day Levantines after the Bronze Age....Many of our inferences rely on the limited number of ancient samples available, and we are only just beginning to reconstruct a genetic history of the Levant or the Near East...
Ancient DNA reveals fate of the mysterious Canaanites
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/07/ancient-dna-reveals-fate-mysterious-canaanites
When the pharaohs ruled Egypt and the ancient Greeks built their first cities, a mysterious people called the Canaanites dominated the Near East. Around 4000 years ago, they built cities across the Levant,...One of those sources is the Bible’s Old Testament, which suggests a grisly end for many Canaanites: After the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt, God ordered them to destroy Canaan and its people (though other passages suggest that some Canaanites may have survived). But did that really happen? Archaeological data suggests that Canaanite cities were never destroyed or abandoned. Now, ancient DNA recovered from five Canaanite skeletons suggests that these people survived to contribute their genes to millions of people living today.... About 50% of the Canaanites’ genes came from local farmers who settled the Levant about 10,000 years ago. But the other half was linked to an earlier population identified from skeletons found in Iran,...The researchers estimate these Eastern migrants arrived in the Levant and started mixing with locals around 5000 years ago.... present-day Lebanese population is largely descended from the ancient Canaanites, inheriting more than 90% of their genes from this ancient source. The other 7% may have come from migrants from Central Europe who moved to the Levant around 3000 years ago....
Canaan
https://www.ancient.eu/canaan/
THE CANAANITES WERE NON-SEMITES. WERE THE PEOPLE OF THE SOUTH LEVANT IN THE BRONZE AGE. WERE A MIX OF NEOLITHIC LOCALS + CHALCOLITHIC IRAN +/or BRONZE AGE CAUCASUS...
Canaanite Genomes Reveal Truth About Their Descendants
https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/canaanite-genomes-0013780
The people who lived in the area known as the Southern Levant - which is now recognized as Israel, the Palestinian Authority, Jordan, Lebanon, and parts of Syria - during the Bronze Age (circa 3500-1150 BC) are referred to in ancient biblical texts as the Canaanites...."Populations in the Southern Levant during the Bronze Age were not static,"...movement of people over long periods of time from the northeast of the Ancient Near East , including modern Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, into the Southern Levant region. ... "The Canaanites, albeit living in different city-states, were culturally and genetically similar," he adds. "In addition, this region has witnessed many later population movements, with people coming from the northeast, from the south, and from the northwest." ... The data suggest that the Canaanites descended from a mixture of earlier local Neolithic populations and populations related to Chalcolithic Iran and/or the Bronze Age Caucasus. The researchers documented a significant increase in the proportion of Iranian/Caucasus-related ancestry over time..."The strength of the migration from the northeast of the Ancient Near East, and the fact that this migration continued for many centuries, may help to explain why rulers of city-states in Canaan in the Late Bronze Age carry non-Semitic, Hurrian names,"...
Ghassulian
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghassulian
Ghassulian refers to a culture and an archaeological stage dating to the Middle and Late Chalcolithic Period in the Southern Levant (c. 4400 – c. 3500 BC).... The Ghassulian stage was characterized by small hamlet settlements of mixed farming peoples, who had immigrated from the north and settled in the southern Levant - today's Jordan, Israel and Palestine. People of the Beersheba Culture (a Ghassulian subculture) lived in underground dwellings - a unique phenomenon in the archaeological history of the region - or in houses that were trapezoid-shaped and built of mud-brick. Those were often built partially underground ... The Ghassulians were a Chalcolithic culture as they used stone tools but also smelted copper. Funerary customs show evidence that they buried their dead in stone dolmens...
All these settlements had been built in areas that had not been previously inhabited,... Several facts allow us to assume that the carriers of this culture were immigrants who had brought their own culture with them... This culture's characteristics indicate they had connections with neighboring regions and that their culture had not evolved in the southern Levant. Their origins are not known.... It could generally be said that most of these settlements date to the 2nd half of the 5th millennium BC, and that they usually existed for only a short period of time, with the exception of Teleilat el-Ghassul, where 8 successive layers of occupation from the Chalcolithic have been excavated, of which 6 are considered Ghassulian and the earlier, pre-Ghassulian, layers are thought to belong to the Besorian culture....
Keep in mind the results are based only on one, or just a few samples. It may, or may not be representative of the entire community, and it only represents the time frame of that individual. In conclusions, the authors reconstructed the genetic structure of ancient Levantines and found that a pre-Islamic expansion Levant was more genetically similar to Europeans than to current Middle Easterners....
Archaeogenetics of the Near East
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archaeogenetics_of_the_Near_East
The archaeogenetics of the Near East is the study of the genetics of past human populations (archaeogenetics) in the Ancient Near East using DNA from ancient remains. ... Contamination from handling and intrusion from microbes create obstacles to the recovery of Ancient DNA...
Egypt...most DNA studies have been carried out on modern Egyptian populations...Egypt's NRY frequency distributions appear to be much more similar to those of the Middle East ...Egyptians form a sister group to North African populations, including Berbers, Nubians and Canary Islanders....All the specimens were dated between 806 BC and 124 AD, a timeframe corresponding with the late Dynastic period. The researchers observed that one of the mummified individuals likely belonged to the mtDNA haplogroup I2, a maternal clade that is believed to have originated in Western Asia.
Iran (Persia)...autosomal DNA and genome of an Iron Age Iranian sample taken from Teppe Hasanlu (971-832 BCE) and revealed it has close affinities to modern Iranians....Iranian Azeris are more related to the people of Georgia, than they are to other Iranians (Persians, Armenians, etc.), while the Persians, Armenians and Qashqai on the other hand were more related to each other....extremely high level of genetic diversity in the Iranian populations...strong genetic affinity of Indo-European speaking Persians and Turkic-speaking Qashqais, thus suggesting their origin from a common maternal ancestral gene pool....Among the most common MtDNA lineages in the nation, namely U3b3, appears to be restricted to populations of Iran and the Caucasus, while the sub-cluster U3b1a is common in the whole Near East region....Gilaks and Mazandarani most closely resemble their geographic and linguistic neighbors, namely other Iranian groups. However, their Y chromosome types most closely resemble those found in groups from the South Caucasus....
Iraq (Mesopotamia)..."The Assyrians are a fairly homogeneous group of people, believed to originate from the land of old Assyria in northern Iraq [..] they are Christians and are bona fide descendants of their ancient namesakes."..."the two Semitic populations (Assyrians and Syrians) are very distinct from each other...
Assyrians were homogeneous with respect to all other ethnic groups sampled in the study, regardless of religious affiliation.... "the modern Marsh Arabs of Iraq harbour mtDNAs and Y chromosomes that are predominantly of Middle Eastern origin....Tell Ashara (ancient Terqa) and Tell Masaikh (ancient Kar-Assurnasirpal) suggest a genetic link between the people of Bronze Age Mesopotamia and South Asia. genetic affinity to the Indian subcontinent , macrohaplogroup M, "M65a, M49 and/or M61 haplogroups carrying ancient Mesopotamians might have been the merchants from India"....
Levant (Israel, Syria, Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan)...Wells identified the haplogroup of the Canaanites as haplogroup J2 which originated in northern Mesopotamia. The National Geographic Genographic Project linked haplogroup J2 to the site of Jericho, Tel el-Sultan, ca. 8500 BCE and indicated that in modern populations, haplogroup J2 is found primarily in the Middle East, but also along the coasts of North Africa and Southern Europe, with especially high distribution among present-day Jewish populations (30%), Southern Italians (20%), and lower frequencies in Southern Spain (10%)....Druze are remarkable for the high frequency (35%) of males who carry the Y-chromosomal haplogroup L, which is otherwise uncommon in the Mideast...Cruciani in 2007 found E1b1b1a2 (E-V13) [one from Sub Clades of E1b1b1a1 (E-V12)] in high levels (>10% of the male population) in Turkish Cypriot and Druze Arab lineages. ...A study published by the National Academy of Sciences found that "the paternal gene pools of Jewish communities from Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East descended from a common Middle Eastern ancestral population"...significant female founder ancestry might also derive from the Middle East-with 40% of Ashkenazim descended from four women who lived about 2000–3000 years ago in the Middle East....Tradition holds that the Samaritans were a mixed group of Israelites who were not exiled. All Samaritan families were found in haplogroups J1 and J2, except the Cohen family which was found in haplogroup E3b1a-M78....
Lebanon...In conclusions, the authors reconstructed the genetic structure of ancient Levantines and found that a pre-Islamic expansion Levant was more genetically similar to Europeans than to current Middle Easterners....Lebanese can be best modeled as Sidon_BA 93% ± 1.6% and a Steppe Bronze Age population 7% ± 1.6%. In regards to phenotype, modern Lebanese were also found to be very close to ancient Levantine populations...
Turkey (Anatolia)...several studies have concluded that the historical (pre-Islamic and pre-Turkic) and indigenous Anatolian groups are in fact the primary source of the present-day Turkish population in addition to neighboring peoples, such as Balkan peoples (such as Phrygians and Macedonian Greeks), and Central Asian Turkic people, from the Turkic homelands in modern Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Kirghizstan....
[NOTES:
Amongst the ancient Greeks and some of the neighbouring nations, two very old alphabets appear to have been known. One of these was called the Pelasgic, the Attic, the Argive, or the Arcadian alphabet. It was probably the same as the Etruscan, or old Italian alphabet, which was also called Arcadian...
The other alphabet is called the Ionian, Phoenician, Cadmean, or Eolian. The Greeks give the conductor of this colony the name of Cadmus, and the people Phoenicians. The word Cadmus is a Hebrew word, which means an oriental person. One of the nations of the Canaanites conquered by Joshua is called by this name.
[THIS STATEMENT REFERS THE PHOENICIANS AS ORIENTAL. ORIENTAL WAS A TERM REFERRING TO ALL PEOPLES EAST OF GREECE WHEN FIRST USED, THEN PROGRESSED EASTWARD OVER THE YEARS SO THAT TODAY REFERS TO FAR EAST PEOPLES. ORIENTAL AS USED HERE COULD HAVE INCLUDED NEAR EAST, CENTRAL ASIA, INDIA, AND EVERYTHING EAST.]
MAGUSAN HERCULES.
In a very learned dissertation, at the end of his Treatise on the Sybils, he shews that this was fabricated by a colony of Dorian Phoenicians, from the city of Doro, or Dora, near Mount Carmel, between Ptolemais and Caesarea, in Syria. He supposes they were some of the same persons who erected the two famous pillars near Tangiers, urbs TJy%$ which Procopius* says, had on them a Phoenician inscription of the following import : 'Hfu«£ toytfy oi $tryofli$ euro vrpwranc* Iija-S ra AyrS wl* Navrf — nos ii sumus qui fugerunt a facie Josuae praedonis, filii Nane We are of those who fled from the face of Joshua the Robber, the son of Nun.
He supposes he was the same who built the temple at the pillars of Hercules, which Appian, in Ibericis, says, was built by the Phoenicians, and where the worship was con- ducted after the manner of the Phoenicians ;
[THIS STATEMENT SAYS THE PHOENICIANS CONSTRUCTED THE PILLARS OF HERCULES AND INSCRIBED THAT THEY WERE THE ONES WHO FLED FROM JOSHUA THE ROBBER. DOES THIS IMPLY THE PHOENICIANS WERE THE ORIGINAL CANAANITES?]
I now beg my reader to refer back to Chapter V. Section xxvii., and consider what Gallaeus has proved respecting the Dorians and the Syrian Hercules coming by the Pillars of Hercules, &c. ; and I ask this question, Might not the May-day festival of the Bull, the peculiar worship of Bacchus, be brought to the British isles by the Celt© through Gaul; and the April festival of the Ram, the peculiar worship of Hercules, be brought by the Pelasgi ?
M. Dupuis has proved beyond all doubt, that the worship of Bacchus, the Baghis of India, the Baal, Bel, Belenus, or Apollo, was the worship of the sun in Taurus. This I suppose to have been the worship of the Celtae, who came to Britain through Gaul. The worship of Hercules is also clearly proved by Mons. Dupuis to have been the sun in Aries ; and therefore, according to the precession of the equinoxes, receding a degree in 72 years, it must have been founded 2160 years after the sun first entered Taurus. In all the histories of the colonies coming to the pillars of Hercules, to Spain, to Zealand, to Ireland, Hercules is the protecting god ; thence I conclude that after the sun entered Aries, some of these colonies of Pelasgi, from Sidon or Tyre, were the people who built the pillars of Hercules : and successors of them might be the people who set up the pillars at T1/71C, stated to have been set up by fugitives from Joshua, the robber, the son of Nun; and they might also be the people who brought the festival of the first of April to Britain * This seems to me to account for the April festival, to say the least, in a manner not entirely inconsistent with probability.
Now in this migration to the Western world they might easily pass by land* across the bottom of the Delta of Egypt, the territory of the enemies of Joshua and of their allies, along the African coast, accompanied by a Tyrian fleet all the way to the Straits of Gibraltar, or to Tangiers, They might cross to Spain, from the nearest point of which they might sail thence by detachments ; and they might readily have set up the pillar, from the same religious motive which caused the pillars of the Israelites, of Hercules, and of Britain. Part of these fugitives might have gone to Zealand, part to Ireland, part to Britain.
THE STUDY OF BABYLON REVEALS THE LAND WAS TURANIAN AND BABYLON WAS RULED BY KASSITES BEFORE THE SEMITIC AKKADIANS ARRIVED FROM EGYPT AND ARABIA .
tHUS IT STANDS TO REASON THAT THE ORIGINAL CANAANITES WERE NOT SEMITES, WERE NOT J HG SUBCLADES. OR IT WAS A MIXED CULTURE OF SEVERAL HG's. THE PHOENICIANS MUST HAVE BEEN THE CANAANITES. EITHER IN WHOLE OR IN PART, A MIX OF LOCAL TRIBES WITH THE R1b PEOPLE FROM ASIA WHO CAME FROM WEST AND/OR CENTRAL ASIAN CONTINENT.
THEN AFTER JOSHUA STOLE THE LAND FROM THE CANAANITES THE CANAANITES FLED AND SOME PROBABLY GOING TO SPAIN, AND ON UP TO IRLAND AND BRITISH ISLES.
THUS, IT IS QUITE LIKELY THE PHOENICIANS WERE R1b HG IN WHOLE OR IN PART, AND MAY HAVE BEEN KASSITES. THIS COULD EXPLAIN ALSO WHY NO R1b IN CANAAN AFTER JOSHUA STOLE IT. BUT, AGAIN THIS IS SPECULATION ON MY PART.]
Source:
https://ia601309.us.archive.org/6/items/TheCelticDruids/The_Celtic_Druids.pdf
‘Fire and Brimstone’ that Destroyed Biblical Sodom Matches Findings of Cosmic Catastrophe 3,700 Years Ago
https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/sodom-meteor-0011030
THE LEVANT BELONGED TO THE CANAANITES BEFORE ABRAHAM STOLE IT. THEN THE HEBREWS STOLE IT AFTER THEY WERE KICKED OUT OF EGYPT. THEN THE JEWS STOLE IT AFTER THE BABYLONIANS KICKED THEM OUT OF BABYLON. THE SEMITES STOLE BABYLON FROM THE TURANIANS. THE ARABIC J HG FROM ARABIA BECAME THE DOMINANT PEOPLE IN THE LEVANT SINCE THE CANANITE GENOCIDE. AND THE E HG's BECOME THE MAJORITY RULE IN NORTH AFRICA. PRIOR TO THE NEOLITHIC IT WAS THE PALEOLITHIC BERBERS WHO WERE DOMINANT MAJORITY RULE OF ALL NORTH AFRICA. THE PALEO BERBER WAS NON AFRICAN AND WAS NOT NEITHER J NOR E HG.
THE JEWS HAVE COMMON ORIGINS IN MID EAST. DIASPORA JEWS ARE FROM THE LEVANT. ACCORDING TO THIS ARTICLE MOST DIASPORA JEWS FORM A DISTINGUISHING GENETIC PRINT WHICH OVERLIES DRUZE AND CYPRIOT LEVANTINIANS EVEN AMONG OTHER LENANTINIANS. ETHIOPIAN AND INDIAN JEWS DO NOT, DESPITE A CLEAR PATERNAL LINK TO LEVANTINE DIASPORA JEWS. ASHKENAZI JEWS ARE GENETICALLY DISTINGUISHABLE FROM NON JEWS OF EUROPEAN DESCENT CLEARLY SEPARATING THE JEW FROM THE NATIVE EUROPEAN. MOST DIASPORA JEWS PARTITION INTO ASHKENAZI-NORTH AFRICAN-SEPHARDI, CAUCASUS-MIDDLE EASTERN, AND YEMENITE. THIS LEVANTINE JEWISH DIASPORA PRINT CAN IMPLY SHARED GENETIC ANCESTRY, OR RECENT ADMIXTURE. MOST JEWS OTHER THAN THE ETHIOPIAN AND INDIAN JEWS OVERLIE NON-JEWS FROM LEVANT WHICH MEANS THE DIASPORA JEWS ARE A MIX OF OTHER NON JEW LEVANTINIANS. THE MALE DIASPORA JEW WAS THE BIGGER WHORE IN WEST INDIA IN CONTRAST TO THE ABSENSE OF SUBSAHARAN AFRICAN FEMALES WITH YEMIN AND MOROCCAN DIASPORA JEWS. OVERALL IT APPEARS THE JEWS BASTARDIZED THEMSELVES MUCH LESS WITH THE NIGGER PEOPLE COMPARED TO OTHER GROUPS IN THE SAME REGIONS (FIG.3). PROBABLY BECAUSE THEIR GOD COMMANDED THEM NOT TO ADULTERATE THEMSELVES NOR INTERMIX, AND ALL BASTARDS WILL BE CAST OUT AND NOT ALLOWED TO LIVE AMONG THEIR OWN PEOPLE....
The genome-wide structure of the Jewish people
https://www.academia.edu/3550542/The_genome-wide_structure_of_the_Jewish_people
Historical evidence suggests common origins in the Middle East, followed by migrations leading to the establishment of communities of Jews in Europe, Africa and Asia, in what is termed the Jewish Diaspora....Here we use high-density bead arrays to genotype individuals from 14 Jewish Diaspora communities and compare these patterns of genome-wide diversity with those from 69 Old World non-Jewish populations,... Principal component and structure-like analyses identify previously unrecognized genetic substructure within the Middle East. Most Jewish samples form a remarkably tight subcluster that overlies Druze and Cypriot samples but not samples from other Levantine populations or paired Diaspora host populations. In contrast, Ethiopian Jews (Beta Israel) and Indian Jews (Bene Israel and Cochini) cluster with neighbouring autochthonous populations in Ethiopia and western India, respectively, despite a clear paternal link between the Bene Israel and the Levant. These results cast light on the variegated genetic architecture of the Middle East, and trace the origins of most Jewish Diaspora communities to the Levant.... identified genome-wide patterns of variation that distinguished between Ashkenazi Jews and non-Jews of European descent. Similarly, a large-scale survey of autosomal microsatellites found that samples from four Jewish communities clustered close to each other and intermediate between non-Jewish Middle Eastern and European populations....
Focusing on the Middle Eastern populations in the PC1–PC2 plot reveals more geographically refined groupings. Populations of the Caucasus, flanked by Cypriots, form an almost uninterrupted rim that separates the bulk of Europeans from Middle Eastern populations. Bedouins, Jordanians, Palestinians and Saudi Arabians are located in close proximity to each other, which is consistent with a common origin in the Arabian Peninsula[MOST PROBABLY J HG AND POSSIBLY SOME E HG], whereas the Egyptian, Moroccan, Mozabite Berber, and Yemenite samples are located closer to sub-Saharan populations[NEOLITHIC AND RECENT. PRIOR THERE WERE NO E AND J HG's IN NORTH AFRICA.] ...
Most Jewish samples, other than those from Ethiopia and India, overlie non-Jewish samples from the Levant. The tight cluster comprising the Ashkenazi, Caucasus (Azerbaijani and Georgian), Middle Eastern (Iranian and Iraqi), north African (Moroccan) and Sephardi (Bulgarian and Turkish) Jewish communities, as well as Samaritans, strongly overlaps Israeli Druze and is centrally located on the principal component analysis (PCA) plot when compared with Middle Eastern, European Mediterranean, Anatolian and Caucasus non-Jewish populations. This Jewish cluster consists of samples from most Jewish communities studied here, which together cover more than 90% of the current world Jewish population; this is consistent with an ancestral Levantine contribution to much of contemporary Jewry. A compact cluster of Yemenite Jews, which is also located within an assemblage of Levantine samples, overlaps primarily with Bedouins but also with Saudi individuals. In contrast, Ethiopian and Indian Jews are located close to those from neighbouring host populations. Ethiopian Jews clustered with Semitic-speaking rather than Cushitic-speaking Ethiopians....
To glean further details of Levantine genetic structure, we repeated PCA on a restricted set of samples from west Eurasia... These analyses reveal three distinct Near Eastern Jewish subclusters: the first group is located between Middle Eastern and European populations and consists of Ashkenazi, Moroccan and Sephardi Jews. The second group, comprising the Middle Eastern and Caucasus Jewish communities, is positioned within the large conglomerate of non-Jewish populations of the region. The third group contains only a tight cluster of Yemenite Jews.... We note that membership of a sample in a component that is predominant in, but not restricted to, a specific geographic region is not sufficient to infer its genetic origins. Membership in several genetic components can imply either a shared genetic ancestry or a recent admixture of sampled individuals.
Y-chromosome data point to a unique paternal genetic link between the Bene Israel community and the Levant, whereas the absence of sub-Saharan African maternal lineages in Yemenite and Moroccan Jews (in contrast to their hosts) suggests limited maternal gene flow.... close relationship between most contemporary Jews and non-Jewish populations from the Levant.... This study further uncovers genetic structure that partitions most Jewish samples into Ashkenazi–north African–Sephardi, Caucasus–Middle Eastern, and Yemenite subclusters....
Jews are Not Native European
https://sites.google.com/site/n8iveuropean/home/miscellaneous/jews-not-native
HERE'S YOUR DEAL. EITHER SUBMIT TO ISRAEL AS YOUR MASTA AND BE THEIR SLAVES FOR THE JEWS, OR YOU WILL BE GENOCIDED.
EXCEPT IF YOU ARE CANANITE THEN YOU ONLY GET GENOCIDE.
AS A SLAVE FOR THE JEWS YOU MUST OBEY THEIR GOD WHICH MEANS YOU ARE A JEW AND YOU MUST KILL OFF ALL YOUR OWN PEOPLE WHO DONT BECOME SLAVES FOR THE JEWS.
EXCEPT IF YOU ARE A CANANITE THEN YOU MUST KILL YOURSELF AND ALL YOUR OWN PEOPLE.
IF YOU ARE NOT A JEW THEN YOU MUST BECOME A CHRISTIAN AND PRETEND YOU ARE A JEW, AND OBEY THE GOD OF THE JEWS BECUZ CHRISTIANS ARE SLAVES OF THE JEWS...
Jewish Interpretations of the Canaanite Genocide wheatoncollege
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FdNO2SFcsg
The Religions of Ancient Canaan and Phoenicia***
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c9klkMKZczA
Why the Enormous Nimrod Castle Was Built in a Massive Hurry
https://www.ancient-origins.net/ancient-places-asia/nimrod-castle-0014298
Nimrod Castle, a is well preserved 13 th century fortress. It is located in the Golan Heights , which is currently administered by Israel but was in the past part of Syrian territory. The international community does not recognize Israel’s right to govern the Golan Heights.... built by Al-Aziz Uthman a nephew of Saladin, the founder of the Ayyubid Dynasty in around 1228. It was constructed in order to prevent the Crusaders of the 6 th Crusade from attacking Damascus.... In 1260 the Mongols attacked Syria and seized the castle, destroying some of its defenses.... The Mamluks defeated the Mongols at the Battle of Ain Jalut in 1260 and captured the castle.... It later fell into the hands of the Ottomans who used it as a penitentiary, mainly for imprisoning nobles.... An 18 th century earthquake resulted in the castle being abandoned and it became the home of shepherds and their flocks. The castle got its present name from Syrian Druze refugees who fled to the Golan Heights after a sectarian civil war in 1860 in Lebanon and Syria. They named the castle after Nimrod, a biblical king and great hunter. Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria in the Six-Day War....
A glimpse at the intricate mosaic of ethnicities from Mesopotamia: Paternal lineages of the Northern Iraqi Arabs, Kurds, Syriacs, Turkmens and Yazidis
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0187408
While the most prevalent four lineages observed in the combined dataset were J1 (17.98%), R1b (12.81%), R1a (12.40%) and J2a1b (12.19%), the distributions among the five ethnic groups were found to vary significantly:
(a) 14 different haplogroups were observed in Arabs, with the three most common being J1 (38.61%), R1a (12.87%) and T (8.91%),
(b) 15 different haplogroups were observed in Kurds, with the three most common being J2a1b (20.20%), J1 / R1a (17.17%) and E1b1b (13.13%),
(c) 10 different haplogroups were observed in Syriacs, with the three most common being R1b (30.23%), T (17.44%) and J2a1b (15.12%),
(d) 16 different haplogroups were observed in Turkmens, with the three most common being E1b1b (17.53%), J1 / J2a1b / R1a (12.37%) and G2a (10.31%) and
(e) 11 different haplogroups were observed in Yazidis, with the three most common being R1b (20.79%), L (11.88%) and G2a / J2a1x J2a1b/h (10.89%).
Fig 5 depicts M-JN analyses for the four most prevalent Y-chromosomal haplogroups
observed in the combined dataset, namely J1, R1b, R1a and J2a1b. The proposed ancestral modal haplotypes for these three networks comprised samples from the following ethnic groups:
(a) Arab / Kurdish / Turkmen for J1,
(b) an unknown ancestor for R1a/R1b, which was closest to two Yazidi haplotypes from R1b and a Kurdish haplotype for R1a, and
(c) Syriac / Kurdish for J2a1b.
The following TMRCA estimates were made using both the genealogical and evolutionary Y-STR mutation rates (estimates in brackets are given in the same order):
J1 (3782 +/- 825 and 14640 +/- 3193 years),
R1a (6309 +/- 1610 and 24422 +/- 6230 years),
R1b (9314 +/- 2214 and 36051 +/- 8571 years) and
J2a1b (4006 +/- 907 and 15506 +/- 3513 years)....
the DYS448 locus was invariably excluded due to the biallelic pattern, and suggested a time-scale of 468±287 to 936±597 years and 1811+/-1109 to 3622±2309 years, respectively....
in silico haplogroup assignment tools could perhaps provide some insights when proper Y-SNP data is not available. So, in silico with great caution, the following relevant conclusions were made based on such produced data alone. The R (25%) and J (39%) macrohaplogroups were found to account for over 60% in total for the combined dataset from Northern Iraq...
One of these earlier studies included Y-SNP-based haplogroups distribution for four Kurdish populations in total from Turkey, Georgia and Turkmenistan, where J2 and R were observed up to 32% and 37%, respectively. In a more recent study focusing on different ethnic groups from Iran, haplogroups J2 and R were both observed at 24% in Kurds, wherein R1a alone accounted for 20%. Consequently, results from these earlier studies are in good agreement with those for Northern Iraqi Kurds from the current study, wherein J2 subclades were found to account for 22%, while lineages R1a and R1b together accounted for 21%, and with R1a at 17%.
Y-chromosomal data on various Arabic-speaking populations across a wide geography ranging from North Africa to West Asia are also available in the literature, often pointing out to the heterogeneous nature of these populations and reflective of their panethnic composition. Y-chromosomal haplogroup distributions in Marsh Arabs from the eastern part of Iraq were also investigated, wherein J1 was found to be the most prevalent lineage with its three markers accounting for 81% in total. Hence, results from the current study on the Northern Iraqi Arabs are in good agreement with those for Marsh Arabs because J1 lineages accounted for around 39% in the former, constituting the highest not only in this ethnic group, but also among all five analyzed....
a distinction should perhaps be made between the Turkic populations from Turkmenistan in Central Asia and elsewhere, such as in Northern Iraq and Northern Syria. At least the Northern Iraqi Turkmen, although still Turkic and thus with historical links with Central Asia, have even closer links with the Turkic populations from Anatolia and/or Azerbaijan/Northwestern Iran. Earlier investigations on the Turkmen population in Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and Iran, suggested that haplogroup Q was the most prevalent accounting for 34%, 73% and 43%, in that order. An earlier study from the Turkmenistan population per se also exists, albeit of relatively poor Y-SNP typing resolution, whereby the most prevalent haplogroups observed were P(xR1a), J and N(x3) with the frequencies of 52%, 24% and 10%, in that order. Results from the current study suggest that haplogroup distribution for the Northern Iraqi Turkmen population is more similar to that of other Northern Iraqi populations, such as Kurds, as well as Turkish populations in Southeastern Anatolia and Cyprus. Results from the current study also suggested that, the paternal lineages of the Northern Iraqi Syriacs are rather homogenous, and exhibit signs of a strong population bottleneck, a situation perhaps even further emphasized due to strict endogamy known to be practiced in this ethnic group. This also seems to be the case for the Northern Iraqi Yazidis, where strict endogamy is also practiced in a relatively small and isolated population of around half a million people....
Consequently, despite corresponding to isolated and homogenous populations, contemporary Syriacs and Yazidis from Northern Iraq may in fact have a stronger continuity with the original genetic stock of the Mesopotamian people, which possibly provided the basis for the ethnogenesis of various subsequent Near Eastern populations...
Earlier Y-chromosomal haplogroup distribution data on Syriacs from Northern Iraq and Iran suggested an overall dominance by the R and J haplogroups. In particular, in the most recent study with the highest haplogroup resolution, R1a, R1b, J1 and J2 sub-clades were found to account for 8%, 29%, 15% and 15% in that order among Assyrians from Iran. In this respect, the results from the current study, albeit on Northern Iraqi Syriacs are in good agreement because J and R subclades were observed at 36% and 41%, respectively, where R1a, R1b, J1 and J2 sub-clades accounted for 11%, 30%, 12% and 24%....
Results from the current study suggest dominance by R haplogroup subclades among Yazidis, where R1a and R1b account for 9% and 21%, respectively. M-JN and associated TMRCA analyses on haplotypes with J1, J2a1b, R1a and R1b haplogroup assignments among Northern Iraqis all suggested in situ radiation as a plausible model to explain the diversity of the corresponding paternal lineages. This is because there were seemingly:
(a) a number of star-like descent clusters in the J1 network, exclusively or partially comprised of Arab haplotypes, which dominated the overall network,
(b) two star-like descent clusters in the R1b network, one comprising Syriac and the other Yazidi haplotypes, which also both dominated the overall network, and
(c) two star-like descent clusters in the J2a1b network, one comprising Syriac / Kurdish and the other Yazidi haplotypes, although the overall network was dominated by Kurdish haplotypes.
In conclusion, data presented herein constitutes a significant primer for further population studies and forensic investigations in Northern Iraq, such as the missing person identification efforts due to past and present conflicts. Novel insights into the molecular anthropology of Near Eastern populations are also expected due to hitherto scantity of genetic data from this corner of the world of immense historical importance. However, it should be noted that the major limitation to this study is the lack of Y-SNP genotyping.
The Genocide of Assyrians That Started in Iraq Continues in Syria
http://www.aina.org/releases/20150227041934.htm
(AINA) -- On Monday, February 23 ISIS attacked 35 Assyrian villages on the Khabur river in the Hassaka province in northeast Syria (AINA 2015-02-23). At least 9 Assyrians fighters were killed defending their villages. Up to 373 Assyrians were captured. 3000 Assyrians fled from their villages and are now in shelters in Hasaka and Qamishli....
The list of atrocities against Assyrians in Syria is very long; it includes murders, kidnappings and the destruction of cultural resources, including churches and ancient Assyrian historical artifacts.
In Iraq it has been the same. With the first church bombing on June 24, 2004 there began a relentless, low grade genocide (report) which culminated in the displacement of 200,000 Assyrians from the Nineveh Plain by ISIS (report). Where the population of Assyrians in Iraq was at 1.4 million in 2004, it has dwindled to 300,000 in 2015. Most fled to Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey --and now these same refugees will be forced to flee from Syria, along with the Assyrians of Syria.
ISIS has not only killed and displaced Assyrians in Syria and Iraq, it has destroyed the Assyrian cultural heritage. It has destroyed 118 churches in Iraq (report) and 6 in Syria. It has destroyed Assyrian archaeological sites and historical artifacts in Iraq and Syria....
This is genocide -- there is no other word for it. This is the erasure of a nation from the land...
Ur : The Rise and Fall of the Ancient Sumerian City State
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MiumMPqmMQ
The amorites from the west weakened Ur, then Elamites from the east dealt the final blow.
The Faravahar: The Ancient Zoroastrian Symbol of Iran
https://www.ancient-origins.net/human-origins-religions/faravahar-0014784
In its form as a winged disc, the Faravahar was used long before the Achaemenids came to power. It is likely that the Persians adopted this symbol from the Assyrians, who also used it widely in their monumental art. Unlike the Zoroastrian Faravahar, the Assyrian symbol has a human figure depicted within the disc. The symbol, and the figure in the disc, is meant to represent Assur, the national god of the Assyrians....
Apart from the Achaemenids and Assyrians, the winged disc was also used by other ancient Near Eastern powers, perhaps most notably the ancient Egyptians, from whom the Assyrians may have adopted the symbol. Unlike the Faravahar, the Egyptian winged disc has no human figure associated with it. The symbol is meant to be a solar disc, and a representation of Horus, the falcon-headed god. Therefore, the Faravahar, though in a slightly different form, was already in use long before its adoption by the Zoroastrians and Achaemenids....
Following the demise of the Achaemenids in the 4 th century BC, the Faravahar seems to have fallen out of use, as it did not appear in the art of their successors....Faravahar was not used much until the 20 th century AD, when it was revived as a nationalistic icon. This is, in part, due to the adoption of this ancient symbol by the Pahlavi dynasty, established by Reza Shah Pahlavi when he came to power in Iran in 1925 AD. Even after the Islamic Revolution of 1979, the Faravahar, despite being a Zoroastrian symbol, was tolerated by the new government and preserved as Iran’s national symbol....
ARCHAIC MAN FAR ENOUGH BACK IN TIME MAY HAVE BEEN GENETICALLY CLOSE ENOUGH TO MONKEYS AND APES TO PRODUCE A HYBRID MONKEY MAN. SOME OR ALL OF THE MONKEY PEOPLE COME OUT OF AFRICA REPLACING ARCHAIC MAN ABOUT 100 TO 125KYA INTO THE LEVANT. BUT NO MORE EVIDENCE IN THE LEVANT FOR ANOTHER 50KY LATER ABOUT 50 TO 75KYA BY M AND N mtDNA. N GOES TO WEST EURASIA, AND M AND N TAKE A SOUTHERLY COASTAL ROUTE TO SOUTH ASIA TO AUSTRALIA TO OCEANIA. SOME SAY IT WAS 2 MIGRATION ROUTES OUT OF AFRICA AND SOME SAY IT WAS 1 WHERE PART OF N MIGRATES TO WEST EURASIA FROM INDIA. THIS STUDY REVEALS ARABIA HAS NONE OF THESE FIRST OR SECOND PEOPLES WHICH INDICATES A COASTAL FAST ROUTE THRU ARABIA, OR RESEARCH HAS NOT YET FOUND RESIDUAL LINEAGE FIRST PEOPLE. ARABIA IS NEOLITHIC AND MORE RECENT PEOPLES FROM AFRICA, INDIA, INDONESIA, AUSTRALIA, AND WEST EURASIA. J1b IS THE MAJORITY mt HAPLOGROUP OF ARABIA....
Mitochondrial DNA structure in the Arabian Peninsula
http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2148/8/45
The hypothesis that modern humans originated in Africa and later migrated out to Eurasia replacing there archaic humans has continued to gain support from genetic contributions. Anthropologically, the most ancient presence of modern humans out of Africa has been documented in the Levant about 95–125 kya, and in Australia about 50–70 kya... two dispersals from Africa were proposed: A northern route that reached western and central Asia through the Near East, and a Southern route that, coasting Asia, reached Australia.... recent analysis, based on a greater number of sequences, pushed back the lower bound of the out-of-Africa migration, signed by the L3 radiation, to around 85 kya. This date is no so far from the above commented presence of modern humans in the Levant about 100–125 kya....After that, it seems that, at least in the Levant, there was a long period of population bottleneck, as there is no modern human evidence in the area until 50 kyr later, again in a relatively warm period (OIS 3). This contraction phase might be reflected in the basal roots of M and N lineages by the accumulation of 4 and 5 mutations before their next radiation around 60 kya...
based on the phylogeographic distribution of M and N mtDNA clusters, with the latter prevalent in western Eurasia and the former more frequent in southern and eastern Asia, it was proposed that two successive migrations out of Africa occurred, being M and N the mitochondrial signals of the southern and northern routes respectively... However, posterior studies revealed the presence of autochthonous M and N lineages all along the southern route, from South Asia, through Malaysia and to Near Oceania and Australia. Accordingly, it was hypothesized that both lineages were carried out in a unique migration, and even more, that the southern coastal trail was the only route, being the western Eurasian colonization the result of an early offshoot of the southern radiation in India...
However, it seems that the bulk of the Arab mtDNA lineages have northern Neolithic or more recent Asian or African origins...the lack of N and/or M autochthonous lineages left the southern route without genetic support. It could be that unfavorable climatic conditions forced a fast migration through Arabia without leaving a permanent track, but it is also possible that sample sizes have been insufficient to detect ancient residual lineages in the present day Arab populations....A total of 365 different mtDNA haplotypes were observed in 553 Saudi Arab sequences....
Sub-Saharan Africa L lineages in Saudi Arabia account for 10% of the total...It is supposed that the bulk of these African lineages reached the area as consequence of slave trade, but more ancient historic contacts with northeast Africa are also well documented.
M lineages in Saudi Arabia account for 7% of the total. Half of them belong to the M1 African clade...It seems that, likewise L lineages, the M1 presence in the Arabian Peninsula signals a predominant East African influence with possible minor introductions from the Levant....The majority (12) of the 19 M lineages found in the Arabian Peninsula that do not belong to M1 have matches or are related to Indian clades... All these Indian M sequences have been found in Arabia as isolated lineages that belong to clusters with deep roots and high diversity in India. Therefore, its presence in Arabia is better explained by recent backflow from India than by supposthat these lineages are footsteps of an M ancestral migration across Arabia....
All the main non R West Eurasian haplogroups that directly spread from the root of macrohaplogroup N (N1a, N1b, N1c, I, W, X) were present in Saudi Arabia albeit in low frequencies. Summing up, their total frequency only represents 12% of the Saudi pool....
Macrohaplogroup R is the main branch of N and their major subclades (H, J-T, K-U) embraced the majority of the West Eurasian mtDNA lineages. In Saudi Arabia R derivates represent a (70.5 ± 2.4)% of the total having a homogeneous regional distribution... As a whole, haplogroup J reaches its highest frequency in Saudi Arabia, where its regional distribution is also significantly heterogeneous, but opposite to that found for (preHV)1. For the J, the West (37.5%) and Southeast (25.7%) regions have higher frequencies than the Central (17.6%) and North (16.3%) regions. Heterogeneity in the whole Peninsula is also significant being Saudi Arabia (21%) and Qatar (17.8%) the two countries with the highest J frequencies....With the Qatar exception, J1b is the most frequent subclade in the Arabian Peninsula... Using time for the most recent common ancestor (TMRCA) as an upper bound for a cluster radiation, we estimated a Paleolithic time of 29,040 ± 8,061 years for the entire J1b clade and a Neolithic age of 9,175 ± 3,092 years for the J1b1a1 subclade.... It seems therefore that the first J1b radiation mainly affected southern countries whereas secondary spreads reached northern areas probably due to better climatic conditions. At this respect it is worth mentioning that a subsequent J1b1a1 radiation had a northwest European expansion being a Georgian and a Russian its only detected outsiders. In addition, several J1b expansions occurred in the Near East; whereas others were mainly confined to the Arabian Peninsula. The TMRCA for the whole J1b haplogroup based on HVSI sequences was of 19,480 ± 4,119 years... the HVSI based age for J1b1a1 (10,621 ± 4,982)... For the age calculation of the Arab 16136 branch, two Yemeni Jews that shared the 16069-16126-16136-16145-16221 haplotype were included. The age obtained (11,099 ± 8,381 years) is similar to that calculated for the northern J1b1a1 subclade, pointing to a simultaneous spread of different J1b branches in different geographic areas...
it is worth mentioning that all the Saudi samples, including a small Bedouin sample, closely cluster together. However, two Arabian Peninsula countries, Yemen and UAE, showed marginal positions. The first, due to its greater frequency of African L haplogroups, congruently approaches Egypt and Nubian, whereas the second, due to the relative scarcity of this African component and the greater contribution of Eurasian clades (as HV, some T subgroups, and the whole U haplogroup, excepting U6) to its mtDNA pool, is placed in close proximity to the Near East samples... The more distant positions of Yemen, grouped with African samples, and the UAE, and in a lesser degree the Qatar and Oman, proximity to NeEast countries, reflect their different frequencies of African and Eurasian lineages in their respective mitochondrial pools. Roughly, the African contribution to whole Arabian Peninsula accounts for 20% of its lineages if, in addition to all the L haplogroups, the North African M1 and U6 clades are added....
Yemen has the largest contribution of L lineages. So, most probably, this area was the entrance gate of a portion of these lineages in prehistoric times, which participated in the building of the primitive Arabian population. Later, received gene flows from North Africa and the Near East, and suffered expansions and retractions in humid or arid climatic periods...the presence of western Africa L lineages and the different composition of L subclades in the African pool of different countries might reflect unequal participation of the primitive and the recent slave trade substrates in their respective African components....
radiation ages of (preHV)1 and J1b clades and their derivate branches, striking similarities but also differences can be observed. The first expansion of both clades in the Near East had similar Paleolithic ages around 20,000 years ago. However whereas the ancestral HVSI motif of the (preHV)1 expansion was barely present in Saudi Arabia , the ancestral HVSI motif of the J1b radiation had an important incidence in that area suggesting an active role in Arabia of the first J1b spread but not for that of (preHV)1. The succeeding most important radiations of both clades, (preHV)1a1 and J1b1a1 had, again, similar ages around 10,000 years that place them in Neolithic times. Now, in both cases, there is a shortage or absence of the ancestral motif in Arabia discarding this area as a radiation center. However, it participated in the (preHV)1a1 spread but not in the J1b1a1 one. Finally, the third more abundant subclades, (preHV)1b rooted by 16304 and J1b rooted by 16136 had the Arabian Peninsula as the most probable source of expansion. Nevertheless, whereas the J1b branch TMRCA (11,099 ± 8,381 years ago) was contemporary to that of the northern J1b1a1, the recalculated age of the (preHV)1b branch (by adding all the new HVSI sequences found in the present survey to the ones previously used), was of only 4,036 ± 2,211 years ago which situates this expansion in the Bronze Age....
However, the link between the East Asia M10 clade and the Australian M42 clade, if not due to convergence, seems to be more interesting as it would confirm, once more, the rapid expansion of macrohaplogroup M all along the Asian coasts. The lack of autochthonous M and N lineages in the present day Arabian Peninsula populations confirms that this area was not a place of demographic expansion in the dispersal out of Africa.
Conclusion: Although there is evidence of Neolithic and more recent expansions in the Arabian Peninsula, mainly detected by (preHV)1 and J1b lineages, the lack of primitive autochthonous M and N sequences, suggests that this area has been more a receptor of human migrations, including historic ones, from Africa, India, Indonesia and even Australia than a demographic expansion center along the proposed southern coastal route....
SEMITE IS AN 18TH CENTURY CE TERM TO DESCRIBE A LANGUAGE SPOKEN IN MIDEAST NAMED AFTER SHEM. WITHOUT GETTING SPECIFIC SHEM WENT TO ARABIAN PENINSULA, HAM TO NORTH EAST AFRICA. JAPHETH WENT NORTH OF SHEM. BETWEEN 30TH AND 25TH CENTURY BCE THE SEMITE AKKADIAN LANGUAGE ADAPTED THE SUMERIAN CUNEIFORM. TURAN WAS THE LANGUAGE SPOKEN THERE BEFORE SEMITE TAKEOVER. THE EARLIEST LANGUAGES ARE SUMERIANS, ELAMITES, EGYPTIANS, AND LULLUBI. SEMITE IS NOT A RACE BUT A LANGUAGE. DIFFERENT RACES IN THE AREA WOULD SPEAK SEMITIC FOR EXAMPLE CANANITES ARE CALLED HAMITIC BUT, WOULD SPEAK SEMITIC. HAMITES ORIGINALLY USED HIEROGLYPHS. SEMITIC USE SYLLABOGRAMS.
THE ORIGINS OF THE FIRST SEMITIC PEOPLES IS POSSIBLY MESOPOTAMIA, EAST MED, ARABIA, OR LEVANT....
Semitic languages
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semitic_languages
The Semitic languages, are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family originating in the Middle East... Semitic languages occur in written form from a very early historical date, with East Semitic Akkadian and Eblaite texts (written in a script adapted from Sumerian cuneiform) appearing from the 30th century BCE and the 25th century BCE in Mesopotamia and the north eastern Levant respectively. The only earlier attested languages are Sumerian, Elamite (2800 BCE to 550 BCE, both language isolates), Egyptian, and the unclassified Lullubi (30th century BCE).
Most scripts used to write Semitic languages are abjads – a type of alphabetic script that omits some or all of the vowels, which is feasible for these languages because the consonants in the Semitic languages are the primary carriers of meaning....Among them are the Ugaritic, Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew, Syriac, Arabic, and ancient South Arabian alphabets....
The term "Semitic" was created by members of the Göttingen School of History, and specifically by August Ludwig von Schlözer (1781). Johann Gottfried Eichhorn (1787) coined the name "Semitic" in the late 18th century to designate the languages closely related to Arabic, Aramaic, and Hebrew. The choice of name was derived from Shem, one of the three sons of Noah in the genealogical accounts of the biblical Book of Genesis, or more precisely from the Koine Greek rendering of the name, Σήμ (Sēm). Eichhorn is credited with popularising the term, particularly via a 1795 article "Semitische Sprachen" (Semitic languages) in which he justified the terminology against criticism that Hebrew and Canaanite were the same language despite Canaan being "Hamitic" in the Table of Nations.
In the Mosaic Table of Nations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generations_of_Noah, those names which are listed as Semites are purely names of tribes who speak the so-called Oriental languages and live in Southwest Asia. As far as we can trace the history of these very languages back in time, they have always been written with syllabograms or with alphabetic script (never with hieroglyphs or pictograms); and the legends about the invention of the syllabograms and alphabetic script go back to the Semites. In contrast, all so called Hamitic peoples originally used hieroglyphs, until they here and there, either through contact with the Semites, or through their settlement among them, became familiar with their syllabograms or alphabetic script, and partly adopted them. In the 19th century, "Semitic" became the conventional name; however, an alternative name, "Syro-Arabian languages", was later introduced...
There are several locations proposed as possible sites for prehistoric origins of Semitic-speaking peoples: Mesopotamia, the Levant, East Mediterranean, the Arabian Peninsula, and North Africa, with the most recent Bayesian studies supporting the view that Semitic originated in the Levant circa 3800 BC, and was later also introduced to the Horn of Africa in approximately 800 BC from the southern Arabian peninsula, and to North Africa via Phoenician colonists at approximately the same time....
History. Ancient Semitic-speaking peoples:
Canaanite languages, a branch of the Northwest Semitic languages included Amorite, first attested in the 21st century BC, Edomite, Hebrew, Ammonite, Moabite, Phoenician (Punic/Carthaginian), Samaritan Hebrew, Ekronite, Amalekite and Sutean. They were spoken in what is today Israel, Syria, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories, Jordan, the northern Sinai peninsula, some northern and eastern parts of the Arabian peninsula, southwest fringes of Turkey, and in the case of Phoenician, coastal regions of Tunisia (Carthage), Libya and Algeria, and possibly in Malta and other Mediterranean islands.
Ugaritic, a Northwest Semitic language closely related to but distinct from the Canaanite group was spoken in the kingdom of Ugarit in north western Syria.
A hybrid Canaano-Akkadian language also emerged in Canaan (Israel,Jordan, Lebanon) during the 14th century BC, incorporating elements of the Mesopotamian East Semitic Akkadian language of Assyria and Babylonia with the West Semitic Canaanite languages.
Aramaic, a still living ancient Northwest Semitic language, first attested in the 12th century BC in the northern Levant, gradually replaced the East Semitic and Canaanite languages across much of the Near East, particularly after being adopted as the lingua franca of the vast Neo-Assyrian Empire (911-605 BC) by Tiglath-Pileser III during the 8th century BC, and being retained by the succeeding Neo-Babylonian and Achaemenid Empires.
The Chaldean language (not to be confused with Aramaic or its Biblical variant, sometimes referred to as Chaldean) was a Northwest Semitic language also, possibly closely related to Aramaic, but no examples of the language remain, as after settling in south eastern Mesopotamia from the Levant during the 9th century BC the Chaldeans appear to have rapidly adopted the Akkadian and Aramaic languages of the indigenous Mesopotamians.
Old South Arabian languages (classified as South Semitic and therefore distinct from the Central Semitic language of Arabic which developed over 1000 years later) were spoken in the kingdoms of Dilmun, Meluhha, Sheba, Ubar, Socotra and Magan, which in modern terms encompassed part of the eastern coast of Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain, Qatar, Oman and Yemen.[citation needed] South Semitic languages are thought to have spread to the Horn of Africa circa 8th century BC where the Ge'ez language emerged (though the direction of influence remains uncertain). ...
137 human genomes from the Middle East fill gaps in human history
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/08/210804123500.htm
Some of their most notable findings include the following:
⦁ The identification of 4.8 million new gene variants that are specific to Middle Eastern populations that could now provide the basis for future research.
⦁ Genetic variants that show evidence of selection -- in other words, mutations that spread unusually quickly -- potentially due to adaptation to the changing environment and lifestyle.
⦁ In the Levant, where agriculture was first developed, populations experienced a massive growth around the transition to agriculture that wasn't paralleled in Arabia.
⦁ Arabian populations suffered a severe population decrease around 6,000 years ago, which coincides with the change in climate in Arabia turning it from a green, wet region into the largest sand desert in the world today.
⦁ Middle Easterners descend from the same population that expanded out of Africa 50,000 to 60,000 years ago.
⦁ Arabian groups have significantly lower Neanderthal ancestry than other Eurasians, potentially caused by excess basal Eurasian and African ancestry in Arabians that depletes their Neanderthal ancestry
⦁ The movement of populations during the Bronze Age potentially spread the Semitic languages from the Levant to Arabia and East Africa.
⦁ An increase in the frequency of variants associated with type 2 diabetes in some populations in the past 2,000 years, suggesting that variants that were beneficial in the past are today associated with diseases.
BRONZE AGE TO IRON AGE A EUROPEAN MIGRATION INTO ASHKELON POSSIBLY THE SEA PEOPLES. LATE IRON AGE THIS GENETIC SIGNAL DISAPPEARS. POST NEOLITHIC ANCIENT PEOPLE FROM IRAN AND/OR THE CAUCASUS PLUS LEVANTINES. ASHKELON LATE BRONZE AGE ARE 60% CHALCOLITHIC LEVANTINES PLUS 30% TO 35% CHALCOLITHIC IRANIANS PLUS 5% TO 10% WHG; OR THE IRANIAN COULD BE ANATOLIAN EBA AND BA PLUS ARMENIAN CHALCOLITHIC. IRON AGE 1 ADDS ADDITIONAL EUROPEAN GENETICS, INCLUDES 14% MESOLITHIC WHG. IRON AGE 1 IS 43% GREEK CRETE BRONZE AGE PLUS ASHKELON LATE BRONZE AGE, OR THE GREEK COMPONENT COULD BE 35% MODERN SARDINIAN+22% IBERIAN BRONZE AGE+STEPPE BRONZE AGE. SARDINIAN AND IBERIAN WERE BEST FIT. THE EUROPEAN GENETICS WERE GENOCIDED IN THE LATE IRON AGE EITHER THEY INTERBRED THEMSELVES OUT OF EXISTANCE OR DID NOT REPRODUCE AT ALL, OR A FOREIGN POPULATION OUTSIDE OF ASHKELON REPLACED THE EUROPEAN GENETICS. THE INCREASE IN EUROPEAN GENES IN LATE BRONZE AGE IS SIMULTANEOUS WITH THE ARRIVAL OF THE PHILISTINES TO THE LEVANT COAST....
Ancient DNA sheds light on the genetic origins of early Iron Age Philistines
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aax0061
The ancient Mediterranean port city of Ashkelon, identified as “Philistine” during the Iron Age, underwent a marked cultural change between the Late Bronze and the early Iron Age. It has been long debated whether this change was driven by a substantial movement of people, possibly linked to a larger migration of the so-called “Sea Peoples.” Here, we report genome-wide data of 10 Bronze and Iron Age individuals from Ashkelon. We find that the early Iron Age population was genetically distinct due to a European-related admixture. This genetic signal is no longer detectible in the later Iron Age population. Our results support that a migration event occurred during the Bronze to Iron Age transition in Ashkelon but did not leave a long-lasting genetic signature....
Recent ancient DNA (aDNA) studies have reported a high degree of genetic continuity in the Levant during the late Pleistocene and early Holocene that was followed by increasing population admixtures with Anatolian- and Iranian-related populations at least up to the Middle Bronze Age. Genome-wide data from Late Bronze and Iron Age populations have, so far, not been available for this region.... The early Iron Age population was distinct in its high genetic affinity to European derived populations and in the high variation of that affinity, suggesting that a gene flow from a European-related gene pool entered Ashkelon either at the end of the Bronze Age or at the beginning of the Iron Age. Of the available contemporaneous populations, we model the southern European gene pool as the best proxy for this in coming gene flow. Last, we observe that the excess European affinity of the early Iron Age individuals does not persist in the later Iron Age population, suggesting that it had a limited genetic impact on the long-term population structure of the people in Ashkelon....
The ASH_LBA individuals overlap with the cline of present-day Near Easterners and
are close to earlier Bronze Age Levantines and Anatolians [Early Bronze Age individuals from ‘Ain-Ghazal, Jordan labeled “Jordan_EBA”; Middle Bronze Age individuals from Sidon, Lebanon labeled “Lebanon_MBA”; and Early to Late Bronze Age individuals from
Central Anatolia labeled “Anatolia_EBA” and “Anatolia_MLBA”, respectively]. Compared to earlier Levantines [Levantine early farmers from present-day Jordan and Israel labeled “Levant_N” and Chalcolithic individuals from Peqi’in, Israel labeled “Levant_ChL”]...
the Bronze Age individuals including ASH_LBA are all shifted along PC2 toward Ancient Iranian and Caucasus individuals [e.g., the Caucasus Mesolithic hunter-gatherers labeled “CHG”; early farmers excavated from present-day Iran labeled “Iran_N”; and the Chalcolithic individuals excavated from present-day western Iran labeled Iran_ChL”], in agreement with previous observations.... Caucasus-related populations (such as CHG, Iran_N, and Iran_ChL) compared to the Neolithic/Chalcolithic Levantines (Levant_N and
Levant_ChL), confirming previous reports of post-Neolithic gene flows from prehistoric populations related to Iran or the Caucasus into the Levant. Accordingly, modeling ASH_LBA as a two- way admixture using qpAdm produced a fitting model in which ASH_LBA derives around 60% of their ancestry from Levant_ChL (60.0 ± 6.5%; estimate ±1 SE) and the rest from Iran_ChL. The spatiotemporal origins of this post-Neolithic gene flow remain broadly defined since alternative two-way models also fit, albeit with smaller P values. In these models, Anatolia_EBA/ Anatolia_BA/ Armenia_ChL are used as the second source, replacing Iran_ChL...
In comparison to ASH_LBA, the four ASH_IA1 individuals from the following Iron Age I period are, on average, shifted along PC1 toward the European cline and are more spread out along PC1, overlapping with ASH_LBA on one extreme and with the Greek Late Bronze Age “S_Greece_LBA” on the other. Similarly, genetic clustering assigns ASH_IA1 with an average of 14% contribution from a cluster maximized in the Mesolithic European hunter-gatherers labeled “WHG”. This component is inferred only in small proportions in earlier Bronze Age Levantine populations (2 to 9%)... compared to ASH_LBA, ASH_IA1 has additional European-related ancestry....
The best supported one infers that ASH_IA1 derives around 43% of ancestry from the Greek Bronze Age “Crete_Odigitria_BA” (43.1 ± 19.2%) and the rest from the ASH_LBA population. ASH_IA1 could also be modeled with either the modern “Sardinian” (35.2 ± 2P 17.4%; = 0.070), the Bronze Age “Iberia_BA” (21.8 ± 21.1%; or the Bronze Age Steppe_MLBA” (15.7 ± 9.1%; as the second source population to ASH_LBA.... only the models including “Sardinian,” “Crete_Odigitria_BA,” or “Iberia_BA” as the candidate population provided a good fit...the tested candidate populations from Anatolia, Egypt, and the Levant that did not produce well-fitting models can be excluded as potential sources of the admixture observed in ASH_IA1....
The transient excess of European-related genetic affinity in ASH_IA1 can be explained by two scenarios. The early Iron Age European related genetic component could have been diluted by either the local Ashkelon population to the undetectable level at the time of the later Iron Age individuals or by a gene flow from a population outside of Ashkelon introduced during the final stages of the early Iron Age or the beginning of the later Iron Age...
Our analysis suggests that this genetic distinction is due to a European-related gene flow introduced in Ashkelon during either the end of the Bronze Age or the beginning of the Iron Age. This timing is in accord with estimates of the Philistines arrival to the coast of the Levant, based on archeological and textual records. We find that, within no more than two centuries, this genetic footprint introduced during the early Iron Age is no longer detectable and seems to be diluted by a local Levantine- related gene pool.... We do not rule out that some gene flow occurred during the Bronze Age....
BIBLE SAYS PHILISTINES DESCEND FROM CASLUHITES AN EGYPTIAN PEOPLE.
COULD THIS BE THE CASSITES A KUSH TRIBE IN THE KUSH KINGDOM THAT ALSO WENT TO FORM THE HINDU KUSH KINGDOM BASED ON NAME SIMILARITY? BUT THEY BECOME A DIFFERENT PEOPLE IN DEUTERONOMY HISTORY. MIZRAIM BEGAT THE PATHRUSIM, CASLUHIM, OUT OF WHOM CAME THE PHILISTINES, AND THE CAPHTORIM. THE CAPHTORITES WERE CONSIDERED FROM CRETE WHILE CASHLUHIM IS FROM CYRENAICA. BIBLE SAYS AS GOD BROUGHT ISRAEL FROM EGYPT, HE ALSO BROUGHT THE PHILISTINES "FROM CAPHTOR". IN THE GREEK "FROM CAPPADOCIA". PHILISTINES WERE MERCENARIES FOR EGYPT IN ISRAEL IN 12 CENTURY BCE. THEY WERE A MINORITY AMONG THE CANAANITES IN 12 CENTURY BCE. CASLUHITE PALESTINE WERE SEA PEOPLE WHO ATTACKED LATE 19TH DYNASTY EGYPT.
ARCHAELOGICAL FINDS SUGGEST THEY WERE FROM ANATOLIA AND CYPRUS IN THE 12 CENTURY BCE IN 2 STAGES. REIGN OF RAMESSES III THEY WERE LIMITED TO COASTAL REGION OF THE 5 CITIES. AT THE COLLAPSE OF EGYPT IN CANAAN THEY SPREAD INLAND. PHILISTINES CAME BY SHIP BEFORE 1175BCE. THEIR DNA IS SOUTH EUROPEAN 20% TO 60% SIMILAR TO CRETE, IBERIA, AND MODERN SARDINIA.
Philistines
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philistines
The Philistines were an ancient people who lived on the south coast of Canaan from the 12th century BC until 604 BC, when their polity, after having already been subjugated for centuries by the Neo-Assyrian Empire, was finally destroyed by King Nebuchadnezzar II of the Neo-Babylonian Empire. After becoming part of his empire and its successor, the Persian Empire, they lost their distinct ethnic identity and disappeared from the historical and archaeological record by the late 5th century BC. The Philistines are known for their biblical conflict with the Israelites. Though the primary source of information about the Philistines is the Hebrew Bible, they are first attested to in reliefs at the Temple of Ramses III at Medinet Habu, in which they are called Peleset...
three Ashkelon populations derive most of their ancestry from the local Semitic-speaking Levantine gene pool, the early Iron Age population was genetically distinct due to a European-related admixture; this genetic signal is no longer detectable in the later Iron Age population. According to the authors, the admixture was likely due to a "gene flow from a European-related gene pool" during the Bronze to Iron Age transition...
In the Book of Genesis, the Philistines are said to descend from the Casluhites, an Egyptian people. However, according to rabbinic sources, these Philistines were different from those described in the Deuteronomistic history...portrays them at one period of time as among the Kingdom of Israel's most dangerous enemies....
Torah (Pentateuch): With regard to descendants of Mizraim, the biblical progenitor of the Egyptians, the Table of Nations in Genesis 10 states in Hebrew:...says that those whom Mizraim begat included "the Pathrusim, Casluhim, out of whom came the Philistines, and the Caphtorim."... Interestingly, the Caphtorites were considered to derive from Crete while Cashluhim derived from Cyrenaica... The Torah does not record the Philistines as one of the nations to be displaced from Canaan....God also directed the Israelites away from the Philistines upon their Exodus from Egypt...
According to the Talmud, the Philistines of Genesis intermingled with the Avvites....
Throughout the Deuteronomistic history...the term "Philistines" means simply "non-Israelites of the Promised Land" when used in the context of Samson, Saul and David....
the Philistines dominated the Israelites in the times of Samson, who fought and killed over a thousand...they even captured the Ark of the Covenant for a few months. A few biblical texts, reflecting the importance of Gath, seem to portray Late Iron I and Early Iron II memories...among the arch-enemies of the Israelites...
The Bible paints the Philistines as the main enemy of the Israelites (prior to the rise of the Neo-Assyrian Empire and Neo-Babylonian Empire) with a state of almost perpetual war between the two. The Philistine cities lost their independence to Assyria, and revolts in the following years were all crushed. They were subsequently absorbed into the Neo-Babylonian Empire and the Achaemenid Empire, and disappeared as a distinct ethnic group by the late 5th century BC...
Amos in 1:8 sets the Philistines / ἀλλοφύλοι at Ashdod and Ekron. In 9:7 God is quoted asserting that, as he brought Israel from Egypt, he also brought the Philistines from Caphtor. In the Greek this is, instead, bringing the ἀλλόφυλοι from Cappadocia....
king of Palistin (the northern Sea Peoples).... the presence of Philistine pottery in northern Israel to their role as mercenaries for the Egyptians during the Egyptian military administration of the land in the 12th century BCE. This presence may also indicate further expansion of the Philistines to the valley during the 11th century BCE, or their trade with the Israelites....if the Philistines did settle the valley, they were a minority that blended within the Canaanite population during the 12th century BCE....
biblical scholars have connected the biblical Philistines with the Egyptian "Peleset" inscriptions; and since 1873, both have been connected with the Aegean "Pelasgians". The evidence for these connections is etymological and has been disputed....
Based on the Peleset inscriptions, it has been suggested that the Casluhite Philistines formed part of the conjectured "Sea Peoples" who repeatedly attacked Egypt during the later Nineteenth Dynasty. Though they were eventually repulsed by Ramesses III, he finally resettled them, according to the theory, to rebuild the coastal towns in Canaan...
description of the fate of some of the conjectured Sea Peoples. Ramesses claims that, having brought the prisoners to Egypt, he "settled them in strongholds, bound in my name.... The "Peleset" appear in four different texts from the time of the New Kingdom. Two of these dated to the time of the reign of Ramesses III (1186–1155 BC). Another was composed in the period immediately following the death of Ramesses III (Papyrus Harris I). The fourth, the Onomasticon of Amenope, is dated to some time between the end of the 12th or early 11th century BC....
coalition of Sea Peoples, among them the Peleset, who are said in the accompanying text to have been defeated by Ramesses III during his Year 8 campaign and settled their captives in fortresses in southern Canaan....another related theory suggests that Philistines invaded and settled the coastal plain for themselves. The soldiers were quite tall and clean-shaven. They wore breastplates and short kilts, and their superior weapons included chariots drawn by two horses. They carried small shields and fought with straight swords and spears....
The only mention in an Egyptian source of the Peleset in conjunction with any of the five cities that are said in the Bible to have made up the Philistine pentapolis comes in the Onomasticon of Amenope. The sequence in question has been translated as: "Ashkelon, Ashdod, Gaza, Assyria, Shubaru [...] Sherden, Tjekker, Peleset, Khurma [...]" Scholars have advanced the possibility that the other Sea Peoples mentioned were connected to these cities in some way as well....
Many scholars have interpreted the ceramic and technological evidence attested to by archaeology as being associated with the Philistine advent in the area as strongly suggestive that they formed part of a large scale immigration to southern Canaan, probably from Anatolia and Cyprus, in the 12th century BCE...
The proposed connection between Mycenaean culture and Philistine culture was further documented by finds at the excavation of Ashdod, Ekron, Ashkelon, and more recently Gath, four of the five Philistine cities in Canaan. The fifth city is Gaza. Especially notable is the early Philistine pottery, a locally made version of the Aegean Mycenaean Late Helladic IIIC pottery, which is decorated in shades of brown and black. This later developed into the distinctive Philistine pottery of the Iron Age I... Mycenaean megaron hall buildings; other unusual architectural features are paved benches and podiums. Among the finds are three small bronze wheels with eight spokes.... "Potnia", the title given to an ancient Mycenaean goddess. Excavations in Ashkelon, Ekron, and Gath reveal dog and pig bones which show signs of having been butchered, implying that these animals were part of the residents' diet. Among other findings there are wineries where fermented wine was produced, as well as loom weights resembling those of Mycenaean sites in Greece. Further evidence of the Aegean origin of the initial Philistine settlers was provided by studying their burial practices in the so far only discovered Philistine cemetery, excavated at Ashkelon....
the settlement of the Philistines took place in two stages. In the first, dated to the reign of Ramesses III, they were limited to the coastal plain, the region of the Five Cities; in the second, dated to the collapse of Egyptian hegemony in southern Canaan, their influence spread inland beyond the coast....
Archaeological evidence...indicates that the Philistines were not native to Canaan.... Philistines came to Canaan by ships before the Battle of the Delta circa 1175 BCE. DNA was extracted from the skeletons for archaeogenetic population analysis.... "Philistines" during the Iron Age, derived most of their ancestry from the local Levantine gene pool, but with a certain amount of Southern-European-related admixture... The DNA suggests an influx of people of European heritage into Ashkelon in the twelfth century BC... "with 20 to 60 per cent similarity to DNA from ancient skeletons from Crete and Iberia and that from modern people living in Sardinia."...
Modern archaeologists agree that the Philistines were different from their neighbors: Their arrival on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean in the early 12th century B.C. is marked by pottery with close parallels to the ancient Greek world, the use of an Aegean—instead of a Semitic—script, and the consumption of pork. Nevertheless, Cretans were not too unfamiliar with the Levant, with connections being established since the Minoan era, as seen by their influence on Tel Kabri....
Bible cites Dagon as the main Philistine god... The deities worshipped in the area were Baal, Astarte, and Dagon, PT[-]YH, Ashdoda...
DAGON WAS MOSTLY AN INLAND GOD IN SYRIA MIDDLE EUPHRATES. IN UGARIT HE BECAME INTRODUCED POSSIBLY BY THE RETURNING PHOENICIANS WHO HAD BEGUN AS A PEOPLE FROM LYBIA THRU EGYPT INTO LEVANT UP TO ANATOLIA AND DOWN EUPHRATES. FROM THE SYRIANS THE PHOENICIANS MAY HAVE ADOPTED IN PART DAGAN AND AS THEY RETURN BACK TO PHOENICIA THEY MAY HAVE ADDED DAGAN? THE PHOENICIANS DESCEND FROM POSEIDON GOD OF THE SEA AND HIS CONSORT LYBIA THE SYBIL IMMORTAL NYMPH. THE PELASGIANS ARE DESCENDED FROM POSEIDON AND LARISSA, OR ZEUS AND NIOBE....
Dagon
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagon
was a god worshiped in ancient Syria across the middle of the Euphrates, especially in Tuttul and Terqa, and known in Mesopotamia, where rulers regarded him as the god capable of granting them kingship over the western areas. Attestations of Dagan from coastal areas are much less frequent and come mostly from Ugarit. According to the Hebrew Bible, Dagan was the national god of the Philistines, with temples at Ashdod and Gaza, but Biblical literature is the only source for this....
No known text deals with the parentage or creation of Dagan. His wife was Shalash, and his children were Hadad (in Ugarit known as Baal) and possibly Hebat... Dagan, "father of gods,"...
In Mesopotamia, Dagan was equated with Enlil due to their shared role as "fathers of gods." This equation was eventually codified by the god list An-Anum, which additionally equated their spouses with each other.... dKUR, a shortened version of Enlil's epithet dKur-gal (Great Mountain), stood for Dagan's name in the late Bronze Age....
Dagan played an important role in the Middle Euphrates region...His primary cult center was Tuttul, conquered by the kingdom of Mari in the 25th century BCE. In 3rd millennium BCE, Tuttul Dagan was the god believed to bestow kingship upon rulers...
Terqa was the location of another prominent temple of Dagan, and a weapon sent from the temple of Hadad in Halab, likely representing the mace wielded by the weather god in his battle with the sea (analogous to the battle between Baal and Yam in the Ugaritic Baal cycle) was held in it. He was already called Bel-Terqa in texts from 3rd millennium BCE Ebla. In Emar, Dagan was the most senior god in offering lists, preceding the weather god (Baal/Hadad) and the city god, whose name was written logographically as NIN.URTA.
Mesopotamian rulers saw Dagan as the lord of the western lands (e.g., ancient Syria) and thanked him for enabling their conquests in that area....In Mesopotamian sources, Dagan is sometimes regarded as equal in rank to the great city gods of Sumer and Akkad. One text uses the formula "Ishtar in Eanna, Enlil in Nippur, Dagan in Tuttul, Ninhursag in Kesh, Ea in Eridu."...
In Nippur, Dagan shared a temple with Ishara, first attested during the reign of Amar-Suen. Both deities were likely introduced from Mari and were linked only by their northwestern origin. Ishbi-Erra of Isin was a devotee of Dagan, possibly due to his Amorite heritage: Ibbi-Sin of Ur referred to him as "man of Mari" and "traveling rubbish salesman of non-Sumerian origin." ... A few of the Amorite kings of Assyria mention Dagan in their inscriptions....
Evidence from the coastal city of Ugarit is inconclusive. Whether a temple initially often identified as Dagan's was dedicated to him rather than El is a matter of scholarly debate. Two stelae from said temple, located close to that of Baal, are inscribed with dedications to Dagan. In lists of gods and offerings from Ugarit, Dagan sometimes follows El but precedes Baal. Two such examples are known, but in six Dagan follows El and Baal...
Dagan plays no active role in Ugaritic myths (such as the Baal cycle), though Baal is frequently referred to as his "son" or "lineage."... It's disputed if Dagan and El were regarded as one and the same. Joseph Fontenrose speculated in an article from 1957 that, whatever their deep origins, at Ugarit Dagan was sometimes identified with El...
she assumes both in Ugarit and in Phoenician beliefs Dagan/Dagon was merely an element introduced from the culture of inland Syria and played no significant role himself....It's therefore doubtful if he was prominent in Phoenician religion....
Philo of Byblos, Sanchuniathon reportedly made Dagon the brother of Cronus, both sons of the Sky (Uranus) and Earth (Gaia), but not Hadad's biological father....The Byzantine Etymologicon Magnum lists Dagon as the "Phoenician Cronus."...
The first to cast doubt on the "fish" etymology was Schmצkel (1928), who nonetheless suggested that while Dagon was not in origin a "fish god", the association with dגg "fish" among the maritime Canaanites (Phoenicians) would have affected the god's iconography. However, later he correctly identified it as a medieval invention. Modern researchers not only do not accept it, but even question if Dagan/Dagon was worshiped in coastal areas in any significant capacity....
In the Hebrew Bible, Dagon is referenced three times as the head god of the Philistines; however, there are no references to Dagan as a Canaanite god. According to the Bible, his temples were located at Beth-dagon in the territory of the tribe of Asher (Joshua 19.27), and in Gaza (see Judges 16.23, which tells soon after how the temple is destroyed by Samson as his last act). Another temple, located in Ashdod, was mentioned in 1 Samuel 5:2–7 and again as late as 1 Maccabees 10.83 and 11.4. King Saul's head was displayed in a temple of Dagon after his death (1 Chronicles 10:8–10). There was also a second place known as Beth-Dagon in Judah (Joshua 15.41).
The account in 1 Samuel 5.2–7 relates how the Ark of the Covenant was captured by the Philistines and taken to Dagon's temple in Ashdod. The following morning the Ashdodites found the image of Dagon lying prostrate before the ark....
22 REMAINS FROM LATE CHALCOLITHIC PEQI'IN CAVE ISRAEL WERE 57% LOCAL LEVANT NEOLITHIC+ 26% ANATOLIAN NEOLITHIC+ 17% IRAN CHALCOLITHIC.
LEVANT BRONZE AGE SOUTH WAS 58% LEVANT NEOLITHIC+ 42% IRAN CHALCOLITHIC. LEVANT CHALCOLITHIC GAVE NO ANCESTRY TO LEVANT BRONZE AGE IN SOUTH LEVANT BUT, IT DID IN NORTH LEVANT BRONZE AGE WHERE IT PAIRED WITH IRAN NEOLITHIC OR LATE NEOLITHIC OR HOTUIIIB. THEY CARRIED THE PALEOLITHIC WEST EUROPEAN BLUE EYE GENE AT FREQUENCY OF 49% (PROBABLY VIA THE ANATOLIAN), AND ALSO CARRIED THE LIGHT SKIN GENE. THEY WERE A HOMOGENOUS GROUP WITH 9 OUT OF 10 MALES WERE T YDNA HG IN CHALCOLITHIC PEQI'IN CAVE ISRAEL. THE NEOLITHIC AND EPIPALEOLITHIC WERE E YDNA HG, AND BRONZE AGE WERE ALL J YDNA HG. CHALCOLITHIC TO BRONZE AGE IN LEVANT SAW POPULATION EXTINCTION, CULTURAL UPHEAVAL, MASS ABANDONMENT...
Ancient DNA from Chalcolithic Israel reveals the role of population mixture in cultural transformation
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-05649-9
Late Chalcolithic period in the southern Levant (4500–3900/3800 BCE) is qualitatively distinct from previous and subsequent periods...from 22 individuals from Peqi’in Cave, Israel. These individuals were part of a homogeneous population that can be modeled as deriving ~57% of its ancestry from groups related to those of the local Levant Neolithic, ~17% from groups related to those of the Iran Chalcolithic, and ~26% from groups related to those of the Anatolian Neolithic....
Previous genome-wide ancient DNA studies from the Near East have revealed that at the time when agriculture developed, populations from Anatolia, Iran, and the Levant were approximately as genetically differentiated from each other as present day Europeans and East Asians are today. By the Bronze Age, however, expansion of different Near Eastern agriculturalist populations—Anatolian, Iranian, and Levantine—in all directions and admixture with each other substantially homogenized populations across the region, thereby contributing to the relatively low genetic differentiation that prevails today.
Showed that the Levant Bronze Age population from the site of 'Ain Ghazal, Jordan (2490–2300 BCE) could be fit statistically as a mixture of around 56% ancestry from a group related to Levantine Pre-Pottery Neolithic agriculturalists (represented by ancient DNA from Motza, Israel and 'Ain Ghazal, Jordan; 8300–6700 BCE) and 44% related to populations of the Iranian Chalcolithic (Seh Gabi, Iran; 4680–3662 calBCE). Suggested that the Canaanite Levant Bronze Age population from the site of Sidon, Lebanon (~1700 BCE) could be modeled as a mixture of the same two groups albeit in different proportions (48% Levant Neolithic related and 52% Iran Chalcolithic-related)....
A total of 20 Peqi’in samples appear to be unrelated to each other to the limits of our resolution (that is, genetic analysis suggested that they were not first, second, or third degree relatives of each other), and we used these as our analysis set.... We also observe an increase in genetic diversity over time in the Levant... We conclude that while the Levant_N and Levant_ChL populations are clearly related, the Levant_ChL population cannot be modeled as descending directly from the Levant_N population without additional admixture related to ancient Iranian agriculturalists.... This suggests that the Levant_ChL population is descended from a population related to Levant_N, but also harbors ancestry from non-Levantine populations related to those of Iran or the Caucasus that Levant_N does not share (or at least share to the same extent)...
The ancestry of the Levant Chalcolithic people: we find no plausible two-way admixture models... We found multiple candidates for three-way admixture models, always including (1) Levant_N (2) either Anatolia_N or Europe_EN and (3) either Iran_ChL, Iran_N, Iran_LN, Iran_-HotuIIIb or Levant_BA_North.... Based on this uniquely fitting qpAdm model we infer the ancestry of Levant_ChL to be the result of a three-way admixture of populations related to Levant_N (57%), Iran_ChL (17%), and Anatolia_N (26%).
The ancestry of late Levantine Bronze Age populations: It was striking to us that previously published Bronze Age Levantine samples from the sites of 'Ain Ghazal in present-day Jordan (Levant_BA_South) and Sidon in present-day Lebanon (Levant_BA_North) can be modeled as two-way admixtures, without the Anatolia_N contribution that is required to model the Levant_ChL population. This suggests that the
Levant_ChL population may not be directly ancestral to these later Bronze Age Levantine populations, because if it were, we would also expect to detect an Anatolia_N component of ancestry.... Only the model including Levant_N and Iran_ChL remains plausible under all conditions. Thus, we can conclude that groups related to Levant_ChL contributed little ancestry to Levant_BA_South. We observe a qualitatively different pattern in the Levant_-BA_North samples from Sidon, Lebanon, where models including Levant_ChL paired with either Iran_N, Iran_LN, or Iran_HotuIIIb populations appear to be a significantly better fit than those including Levant_N + Iran_ChL....
These results imply that a population that harbored ancestry more closely related to Levant_ChL than to Levant_N contributed to the Levant_BA_North population, even if it did not contribute detectably to the Levant_BA_South population. Levant_BA_South and Levant_ChL share ancestry following the separation of both of them from the ancestors of Levant_N and Iran_ChL. Thus, in the past there existed an unsampled population that contributed both to Levant_ChL and to Levant_BA_South, even though Levant_ChL cannot be the direct ancestor of Levant_BA_South because, as described above, it harbors Anatolia_N-related ancestry not present in Levant_BA_South....
We find that a minimum of three source populations continues to be required to model the ancestry of these Levantine populations, supporting a model in which at least three separate sources of ancestry are present in the Levant between the Neolithic, Chalcolithic, and Bronze Age....
Biologically important mutations in the Peqi’in population: We highlight three findings of interest. First, an allele (G) at rs12913832 near the OCA2 gene, with a proven association to blue eye color in individuals of European descent, has an estimated alternative allele frequency of 49% in the Levant_ChL population, suggesting that the blue-eyed phenotype was common in the Levant_ChL. Second, an allele at rs1426654 in the SLC24A5 gene which is one of the most important determinants of light pigmentation in West Eurasians is fixed for the derived allele (A) in the Levant_ChL population suggesting that a light skinned phenotype may have been common in this population, although any inferences about skin pigmentation based on allele frequencies observed at a single site need to be viewed with caution....
The current study provides insight into a long-standing debate in the prehistory of
the Levant, implying that the emergence of the Chalcolithic material culture was associated with population movement and turnover.... We find that the individuals buried in Peqi’in Cave represent a relatively genetically homogenous population. This homogeneity is evident not only in the genome-wide analyses but also in the fact that most of the male individuals (nine out of ten) belong to the Y-chromosome haplogroup T, a lineage thought to have diversified in the Near East. This finding contrasts with both earlier (Neolithic and Epipaleolithic) Levantine populations, which were dominated by haplogroup E, and later Bronze Age individuals, all of whom belonged to haplogroup J.
Our finding that the Levant_ChL population can be well modeled as a three-way admixture between Levant_N (57%), Anatolia_N (26%), and Iran_ChL (17%), while the Levant_-BA_South can be modeled as a mixture of Levant_N (58%) and Iran_ChL (42%), but has little if any additional Anatolia_N related ancestry, can only be explained by multiple episodes of population movement. The presence of Iran_ChL-related ancestry in both populations–but not in the earlier Levant_N–suggests a history of spread into the Levant of peoples related to Iranian agriculturalists, which must have occurred at least by the time of the Chalcolithic. The Anatolian_N component present in the Levant_ChL but not in the Levant_BA_South sample suggests that there was also a separate spread of Anatolian-related people into the region. The Levant_BA_South population may thus represent a remnant of a population that formed after an initial spread of Iran_ChL-related ancestry into the Levant that was not affected by the spread of an Anatolia_N-related population, or perhaps a reintroduction of a population without Anatolia_N-related ancestry to the region. We additionally find that the Levant_ChL population does not serve as a likely source of the Levantine-related ancestry in present-day East African populations....
Our finding of genetic discontinuity between the Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age periods also resonates with aspects of the archeological record marked by dramatic changes in settlement patterns, large-scale abandonment of sites, many fewer items with symbolic meaning, and shifts in burial practices, including the disappearance of secondary burial in ossuaries. This supports the view that profound cultural upheaval, leading to the extinction of populations, was associated with the collapse of the Chalcolithic culture in this region....