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Genetics of Modern Greeks

In Ancestry DNA, what separates mainland Greeks from Albanians is significant admixture with "Mediterranean continuum" populations. Mainland Greeks have widespread "Southern Italy" ancestry as seen in Ancestry DNA and other testing companies. This is a result of admixture with Greeks from the islands, Tsakonia, Mani and places where Southern Italy is in higher percentages.

Until taking the DNA test, I did not know that mainland Greeks had as much admixture with the islands and other places. Learned that some mainland village surnames have roots in the east Aegean (Chios, Lesbos, etc.) and west Turkey. So it's not easy to separate Greeks: mainlanders here, islanders over there. That is apparent looking at so many family trees with the DNA results and running surname searches. In terms of ancient Greek ancestry, as south Italians and Greek islanders go, so go many Greek mainlanders. They are tied together, which is why they plot relatively closely, even overlapping in some cases.
 
Dahoi said:
Albanians dont have a lot of greek dna, this could be easly said by looking into their y-dna so the moment when Arvanites recived greek admixture was when they came in Greece and mixed with the native Greek population, in the same time, the native Greek population also recived Albanian admixture through mixing with Arvanites. The reson why Vlachs are similar with the neighbouring populations is due to mixing with them. Vlachs recived admixture from the neighbouring populations while in the same time neighbouring populations recived Vlach admixture.
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Albanians settled or in part pushed into areas populated by North Greeks. They definitely have Ancient Greek admixture and/or admixture that could have become Ancient Greek due to Hellenization, a process which other genetically identical people in Northern Greece have undergone during the Bronze Age. One way or the other, Arvanites have brought a good dosis of the same pasta in some regions in Greece, along with their unique elements.
We have documentation of Albanians pushing into some of the regions they now inhabit as late as the 12th century.

As for EV13, you made a valid point. But I would not put too much weight on Vlachs and Arvanites. Firstly, we have very few BA specimens to begin with. And they are mostly from royal tombs. There could have been non Mycenaean tribes in BA Greece, not speaking a word of Greek, carrying EV13. These tribes could have been Hellenized later on. And there were plenty of migrations and population movements during the Iron Age.

Looking into modern populations, Pontian Greeks have 10% of EV13. And these Greeks are mixed with Black Sea people who have less EV13. Also, Ionian Greeks and Cypriots have substantial degrees of EV13. Dodecanese Greeks have between 10% and 20% EV13. And their Slavic admixture is estimated by many researches to be close to zero. Also no Arvanites there either.

I can sympathize with the idea that Arvanites and Vlachs brought some more EV13 in Greece. But it seems like the bulk of EV13 spread into the Greek population before the Middle Ages.
 
Dianatomia said:
Looking into modern populations, Pontian Greeks have 10% of EV13. And these Greeks are mixed with Black Sea people who have less EV13. Also, Ionian Greeks and Cypriots have substantial degrees of EV13. Dodecanese Greeks have between 10% and 20% EV13. And their Slavic admixture is estimated by many researches to be close to zero. Also no Arvanites there.
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Is there any study which analyzed Pontian Greek Y-dna? Some of these ev-13 that are present in Anatolian Greeks and Islanders might have been brought by Mainlander Greeks.
 
Dahoi said:
Is there any study which analyzed Pontian Greek Y-dna? Some of these ev-13 that are present in Anatolian Greeks and Islanders might have been brought by Mainlander Greeks.
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pontus.png

There is a Pontic Greek diagram by Nrken19 on X.There is also one with subclades on familytreedna
 
There is an argument that E-V13 was already present during LBA-EIA time period in Greece, many cultural groups like Korakou near Corinthia, Lofkandi in Euboea are quite similar to Bukkelkeramik and the Kapitan Andreevo site where E-V13 was found in abundance. Now, whether this was reflected on actual migration it is as of yet unknown. Or whether more Northern Greek tribes adopted material culture of Proto Daco-Thracians and it gives glimpses that the actual E-V13-ers migrated is not known at this stage, but signs are there.

This has always been a point of debate and discussion:

Three whole pots and sherds of thirteen other vases from early Late Helladic IIIC contexts at the site of Korakou are identified as non-Mycenaean on the grounds of fabric, shape, decoration, and surface treatment. It is argued that, although being alien to Mycenaean ceramics, these pieces were nevertheless manufactured locally. They are thus taken to be evidence of an intrusive population element whose ultimate origin is to be sought in Bulgaria or possibly Rumania, where the intrusive pottery has its closest published affinities in material of earlier date. Discoveries of comparable non-Mycenaean pottery in roughly contemporary contexts at the other southern Greek sites of Lefkandi, Perati, Athens, and Mycenae suggest that the presence of northern intruders at Korakou may be more than a local phenomenon. The close correspondence between certain classes of the intrusive Korakou pottery and particular wares found at Troy only in the VIIb 1 and 2 settlements points towards a parallel situation at Troy where one or more new population elements probably settled following the destruction of Troy VIIa. Connection of the intruders with disturbances in southern Greece at the end of LH IIIB and with the destruction of Troy VIIa is possible, but far from certain. No reliable estimate of the numbers of the intruders can be made on the basis of evidence at present available.

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Dahoi said:
Is there any study which analyzed Pontian Greek Y-dna? Some of these ev-13 that are present in Anatolian Greeks and Islanders might have been brought by Mainlander Greeks.
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Dahoi,which Greek population do you want to learn for?Pontic Greeks?Cretans?Macedonians? These are very different populations(and they want different models also)
 
Gelondi said:
This is from the link that I send above, they model Albanian admixture using Albanian medieval samples.
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The problem with this model
Is that medieval Albanians and mainland Greeks are close enough even without direct admixture (eg Arvanites into the Greek gene pool) taken into consideration. So this will still somewhat overfit.
 
Dahoi said:
Is there any study which analyzed Pontian Greek Y-dna? Some of these ev-13 that are present in Anatolian Greeks and Islanders might have been brought by Mainlander Greeks.
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One study (Balanovsky et al., 2011, on Greeks of the Caucasus and Black Sea) reported EV13 in Pontian Greeks at about 10–12%.Some smaller samples from Pontian Greeks in Greece (descendants of refugees after the 1923 population exchange) show similar levels, around 10–15%.

Some islanders have almost no Slavic ancestry. If they were mainland Greek migrations, they would have brought some Slavic ancestry as well, along EV13. But islanders from the Dodecanese only have EV13. Where did they get it from? It is certainly older than the Slavic migrations. I would still argue that non Mycenaean groups were present in BA Greece having EV13.

Or it spread like wildfire during the imperial Roman era. Mostly through maritime routes. Because in inner Anatolia i.e. it decreases.
 
Ralphie Boy said:
In Ancestry DNA, what separates mainland Greeks from Albanians is significant admixture with "Mediterranean continuum" populations. Mainland Greeks have widespread "Southern Italy" ancestry as seen in Ancestry DNA and other testing companies. This is a result of admixture with Greeks from the islands, Tsakonia, Mani and places where Southern Italy is in higher percentages.

Until taking the DNA test, I did not know that mainland Greeks had as much admixture with the islands and other places. Learned that some mainland village surnames have roots in the east Aegean (Chios, Lesbos, etc.) and west Turkey. So it's not easy to separate Greeks: mainlanders here, islanders over there. That is apparent looking at so many family trees with the DNA results and running surname searches. In terms of ancient Greek ancestry, as south Italians and Greek islanders go, so go many Greek mainlanders. They are tied together, which is why they plot relatively closely, even overlapping in some cases.
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Indeed Italy is also tied to mainland Greece to some extend, south Italy in particular. I am 50% from Messinia in Peloponnesus and all dna services agree on seeing a bit of Italian in me. I never thought much of it, since Greeks and south Italians in particular share ancestry and have a history of mixing with each other so I attributed it to plain similarity. (I have zero known ancestry from the islands and I can trace both my paternal and maternal lines as far back as the 18th century and they are firmly in the same areas of mainland Greece, North Messinia and Spercheios Valley).

But recently I visited ancient Messini. The site is located 10-15km from the villages my paternal ancestors come from. The place was rebuilt by Thebans around 379BCE, after they defeated Sparta. What they did was to try and bolster its population by bringing back messinians since many have fled a century prior after their final defeat vs the Spartans (they were engaged in a perpetual war vs Sparta). They went as far as bringing in people from Messina and Rhegion (Reggio Calabria). 23andme insists I have a bit of ancestry precisely from Sicily and Calabria. I don’t think it is a coincidence any more.
 
Dahoi said:
Continental Greeks and Islanders
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Continental Greeks are a mix of Roman Greeks(Mugla Profile),Slavs who came in the 6th Century,Medieval Albanians and South Slavs,the only difficult thing which stops us for modelling them to like 100% accuracy,is the separation of Slavic and South Slavic ancestry.When we get more Roman and Byzantine Greek Samples,we will be able to model them with absolute accuracy.Now Islanders are similar to the Roman Greek profile,with some minor Eastern Meditteranean and Balkanic ancestry,which could be brought by Mainlanders
 
Thucydides enjoyer said:
Continental Greeks are a mix of Roman Greeks(Mugla Profile),Slavs who came in the 6th Century,Medieval Albanians and South Slavs,the only difficult thing which stops us for modelling them to like 100% accuracy,is the separation of Slavic and South Slavic ancestry.When we get more Roman and Byzantine Greek Samples,we will be able to model them with absolute accuracy.Now Islanders are similar to the Roman Greek profile,with some minor Eastern Meditteranean and Balkanic ancestry,which could be brought by Mainlanders
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Please stop talking out of your arse. We don't know how genetically homogeneous or heterogeneous "Roman Greeks" were across regions from the north to the south of the mainland, and across the Ionian and Aegean islands.
 
lockdownboredom said:
Please stop talking out of your arse. We don't know how genetically homogeneous or heterogeneous "Roman Greeks" were across regions from the north to the south of the mainland, and across the Ionian and Aegean islands.
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I dont think the differences would be huge.There would be some differences in Balkanic or/and Levantine admixture,but that is the main profile.
 
lockdownboredom said:
Main profile? We don't have samples to know what profile(s) existed. So quit the bullshit.
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We have samples from the West Coast of Anatolia,where Greeks have settled for centuries.The profile of these samples is also found in Imperial Rome,and it is similar to Greek islanders,who havent been impacted much by migrations from the Balkanic Peninsula.However, we obviously need new samples, but that's the prevailing theory so far.
 
Thucydides enjoyer said:
I dont think the differences would be huge.There would be some differences in Balkanic or/and Levantine admixture,but that is the main profile.
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Main profile? We don't have samples to know what profile(s) existed. So quit the bullshit.
Thucydides enjoyer said:
We have samples from the West Coast of Anatolia,where Greeks have settled for centuries.The profile of these samples is also found in Imperial Rome,and it is similar to Greek islanders,who havent been impacted much by migrations from the Balkanic Peninsula.However, we obviously need new samples, but that's the prevailing theory so far.
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Lol West Coast of Anatolia, congrats, from an entirely different continent from other Greeks, hahaha, great logic my man. Yeah, we have samples from Pontus too where Greeks have established themselves for centuries who harbour a different profile to Western Anatolians. Whatever that means, anyway, those samples are all over the shop. We have African samples too from Anatolia, guess Greeks were part SSA too. Clearly you have an agenda to jump to moronic conclusions.
 
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Thucydides enjoyer said:
We have samples from the West Coast of Anatolia,where Greeks have settled for centuries.The profile of these samples is also found in Imperial Rome,and it is similar to Greek islanders,who havent been impacted much by migrations from the Balkanic Peninsula.However, we obviously need new samples, but that's the prevailing theory so far.
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Quite true, but I would argue that the East Greeks ultimately formed their own cluster. After all, the areas were heavily settled by continental Greeks. But there were indigenous inhabitants there as well. And they were not necessarily similar to the indigenous inhabitants of continental Greeks.

Basically, even the Greeks from the Black Sea region can be identified as a type of Ancient Greeks. If they had this genetic make up for thousands of years, who are we to say that they are less Greeks than others? Ancient Greeks were not Mycenaeans solely.
 
Cypriots, Aegean islanders, Pontics, Italiotes, Anatolians, mainlanders and even Levantine Rum are all Greeks. This needs to be driven home. And yes they all have their own clusters, they had their own cluster from the get go, when the ethnogenesis of Greeks began (Bronze Age Greeks of Greece and Bronze Age Greeks of Cyprus were distinct because they formed from different local elements-still, they were both Greek). Within the clusters themselves there is variance and even some people that are assimilated. Case in point the bilingual populations (Slavic-Greek) of Greek Macedonia-they are aware of what they are yet most of them refuse the minority status.

Taking all these into consideration, I doubt we will find one profile that encompasses all Roman era Greeks. They are an imperial population, I expect variance.
 
lockdownboredom said:
Main profile? We don't have samples to know what profile(s) existed. So quit the bullshit.


Lol West Coast of Anatolia, congrats, from an entirely different continent from other Greeks, hahaha, great logic my man. Yeah, we have samples from Pontus too where Greeks have established themselves for centuries who harbour a different profile to Western Anatolians. Whatever that means, anyway, those samples are all over the shop. We have African samples too from Anatolia, guess Greeks were part SSA too. Clearly you have an agenda to jump to moronic conclusions.
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Mycenaeans were close to the people who inhabited the west coast of anatolia,since the tribes who inhabited west anatolia were present also in Greece,but not close to Kaskians,so that doesnt make any sense.I dont have any agenda,i just present my idea of what Roman Greeks could have looked like.The samples from the future will prove if i am wrong or right.
 
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