Tautalus
Regular Member
- Messages
- 562
- Reaction score
- 1,430
- Points
- 93
- Ethnic group
- Portuguese
- Y-DNA haplogroup
- I2-M223 / I-FTB15368
- mtDNA haplogroup
- H6a1b2y
The study investigated the genetic history of medieval Sicily by analysing ancient DNA from 111 individuals excavated from 18 archaeological sites dating between the 5th and 15th centuries CE. Researchers successfully recovered mitochondrial DNA from 67 individuals and genome-wide DNA from 32 individuals, allowing them to examine how successive political and religious changes under Byzantine, Islamic, Norman, and Swabian rule influenced the island’s population.
The findings challenge the traditional view that each conquest resulted in large-scale population replacement. Instead, Sicily remained genetically diverse throughout the medieval period, reflecting its role as a major crossroads between Europe, North Africa, and the Near East. The study found that North African ancestry was already present before the Islamic conquest, indicating that migration across the Mediterranean had been occurring for centuries. During the Islamic period, individuals with ancestry from West Africa and Northern Europe also appeared, demonstrating that long-distance migration became even more widespread.
Despite the coexistence of Christian, Muslim, and Jewish communities, genetic ancestry generally did not correspond to religious burial practices. Individuals buried according to Islamic and Christian traditions often shared similar genetic backgrounds, suggesting that cultural or religious identity was not determined by ancestry alone. Only at the site of Segesta was there evidence of some genetic clustering associated with burial customs.
The study also identified several individuals with Sub-Saharan African ancestry, particularly in Islamic cemeteries, while one individual displayed mixed European and African ancestry, providing rare genetic evidence that intermarriage between different populations occurred. However, the authors note that the available data cannot determine whether these individuals were migrants themselves or descendants of earlier migrants, nor can it reveal their social status, including whether they were free or enslaved.
Overall, the research concludes that medieval Sicily was a highly interconnected and multicultural society shaped by centuries of migration rather than repeated population replacement. The authors emphasise that combining ancient DNA with archaeological and historical evidence provides a more complete understanding of how migration, cultural interaction, and political change shaped medieval Mediterranean societies.
The findings challenge the traditional view that each conquest resulted in large-scale population replacement. Instead, Sicily remained genetically diverse throughout the medieval period, reflecting its role as a major crossroads between Europe, North Africa, and the Near East. The study found that North African ancestry was already present before the Islamic conquest, indicating that migration across the Mediterranean had been occurring for centuries. During the Islamic period, individuals with ancestry from West Africa and Northern Europe also appeared, demonstrating that long-distance migration became even more widespread.
Despite the coexistence of Christian, Muslim, and Jewish communities, genetic ancestry generally did not correspond to religious burial practices. Individuals buried according to Islamic and Christian traditions often shared similar genetic backgrounds, suggesting that cultural or religious identity was not determined by ancestry alone. Only at the site of Segesta was there evidence of some genetic clustering associated with burial customs.
The study also identified several individuals with Sub-Saharan African ancestry, particularly in Islamic cemeteries, while one individual displayed mixed European and African ancestry, providing rare genetic evidence that intermarriage between different populations occurred. However, the authors note that the available data cannot determine whether these individuals were migrants themselves or descendants of earlier migrants, nor can it reveal their social status, including whether they were free or enslaved.
Overall, the research concludes that medieval Sicily was a highly interconnected and multicultural society shaped by centuries of migration rather than repeated population replacement. The authors emphasise that combining ancient DNA with archaeological and historical evidence provides a more complete understanding of how migration, cultural interaction, and political change shaped medieval Mediterranean societies.
Abstract
Medieval Sicily, located at the intersection of Europe, North Africa and the Near East, experienced successive political and religious transitions under Byzantine, Aghlabid, Fatimid, Norman, and Swabian rule. While it is well established that these events led to multi-faith societies, the long-term genetic impact of regime change is unclear. To evaluate this potential impact, we applied ancient genomic analysis to 111 archaeological Sicilian individuals, leading to successful mitochondrial haplotype inferences for 67 individuals and genome-wide analyses for 32 individuals dated between the 5th and 15th centuries CE. In contrast to simple narratives of population replacement, the data indicate nuanced and unappreciated demographic shifts. Several individuals dating before the Islamic conquest of Sicily exhibit substantial North African ancestry, evidencing movement across the Mediterranean Sea before this conquest. Individuals buried in Islamic cemeteries during the 9th to 11th century were found to have diverse ancestries deriving from populations around the Mediterranean Basin, however, the same ancestry components are also found in earlier periods, limiting what can be inferred about intra-Mediterranean migrations in this dataset. Nonetheless, the Islamic period marks the appearance of individuals with distant ancestral origins, West Africa and Northern Europe. During the Norman period, Christian and Islamic burials show the same genetic diversity maintained for hundreds of years, however, by the late medieval period, the ancestry components shifted toward modern European populations. Altogether, the study demonstrates the value of examining recent periods with ancient DNA methodologies to better understand how culture, identity and mobility impacted demography in the past.
Genetic histories of individuals from multi-faith medieval Sicily
Medieval Sicily, located at the intersection of Europe, North Africa and the Near East, experienced successive political and religious transitions under Byzantine, Aghlabid, Fatimid, Norman, and Swabian rule. While it is well established that these events led to multi-faith societies, the...journals.plos.org
Y-Dna haplogroups
| Individual Genetic ID | Burial rite | Y haplogroup (Yleaf software) | Y-haplogroup branch (ISOGG Y Tree 2019-2020) |
| QERBN10 | Christian (Byzantine) | J2a1a1a2b2a3b1b3b2b3a1a~ | J2a1a1a2b2-M67 |
| TLBN8 | Islamic | E1b1b1a1a2a2~ | E1b1b1a1a2-V65 |
| GABN2 | Islamic | E1b1b1a1b1a | E1b1b1a1b1a-V13 |
| GABN1 | Undetermined | E1b1b1b1a1~ | E1b1b1b1a-M81 |
| GABN5 | Islamic | E1b1b1b1a1c | E1b1b1b1a-M81 |
| SVBN1 | Islamic | E1b1b1b1~ | E1b1b1b1-M310.1 |
| GABN6 | Christian | E1b1b1b1b | E1b1b1b1-M310.1 |
| MABN1 | Islamic | E1b1b1b2a | E1b1b1b2-Z830 |
| CSPBN2 | Islamic | E1b1a1a1a1c1b~ | E1b1-P2 |
| VGBN6 | Christian (Byzantine) | J1a2a1a2~ | J1-M267 |
| CDMBN4 | Non-Islamic (Christian or Jewish) | J1a2a1a2d2b2b2c4d2a2a5a1e2d~ | J1-M267 |
| TLBN14 | Islamic | J1a2b2b~ | J1-M267 |
| SAVBN5 | Christian | J2b2a1a1a~ | J2b2a-M241 |
| SAVBN11 | Christian | J2a1a1a2a1a2~ | J2-M172 |
| GABN9 | Islamic | J2a1a1b2a1b2~ | J2-M172 |
| TLBN7 | Islamic | R1a1a1~ | R1a1a-M17 |
| CSPBN1 | Islamic | R1a1a1b1a1a1c1a3~ | R1a1a-M17 |
| QERBN31 | Christian (Byzantine) | R1b1a1b1b3 | R1b1a1b-M269 |
| SAVBN10 | Christian | T1a1a1b2b2b1a | T1a-M70 |
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