European Farmer mtDNA in the Cucuteni-Trypillia Culture

                             

Nikitin et al. 2016 just published mtDNA results for nine members of the East European Neolithic Cucuteni-Trypillia Culture. They died around 3500 BC and were buried in the Verteba cave in SouthWestern Ukraine. The results are below...

H=4 
H5*, H5b*, H1b1*, H
U8b1=2
U8b1a2b, U8b1b
T2b*=1
HV6-24=1
HV0=1

This dose of mtDNA from Cucunteni-Trypillia is made up entirely of typical Neolithic European farmer lineages. This confirms, like farmers in other parts of Europe, that they weren't simply local forgers who learned how to farm but were instead to a large extent descended of Neolithic farmers from Southeast Europe and the Near East.

As Steppe pastoralists, like Yamnaya, moved westward to Europe around 3000 BC they ran into and (probably)intermarried with the farmers of Eastern Europe, like the Cucunteni-Trypillia farmers. The genes of Eastern European farmers could have therefore been carried alongside Steppe genes to many parts of Europe during the Chalcolithic and Bronze ages.

Interestingly ancient farmers from Romania had an impressively high frequency of mHG H(about 60%). The new data from Ukraine is consistent with that high frequency of H. Four of the Nine of these Cucunteni-Trypillia farmers belonged to mHG H. Maybe farmers from Eastern Europe can help explain high frequencies of mHG H in modern Europeans. Maybe. The data doesn't strongly support this idea or storngly not support. I'm just throwing out the possibility that farmers from Eastern European contributed lots of ancestry to modern Europeans.

Not only does it appear Eastern European farmers had a lot of H but one of the Cucunteni-Trypillia farmers belonged to typical modern (Eastern)European mHG H1b. Not a single H1b exists in the about 600 mtDNA samples from Neolithic Germany, Hungary, and Spain. But today every part of Europe has at least 1% H1b. Eastern Europeans; Poles, Lithuanians, Slovaks, Bosnians, etc., have the most H1b(3-4%). Though H1b is mostly European it has also been found in the Near East, Iran, and Western Siberia

Below are the only other instances of H1b in ancient DNA...

4700-4500 YBP, Poland/Ukraine border.
1358 BC, Mongolia.

The Bronze age H1b individual from Mongolia was of mixed Eastern European and North Asian ancestry, his H1b was from Eastern Europe.

Spain, Past and Present

A lot of changes arose in Spanish mtDNA after the Neolithic. mtDNA sequenced from Iron age Spain indicates those changes had occurred by circa 300 BC.

Modern and Spanish mHG frequencies are included in the following spreadsheets along with mHG frequencies of other ancient and modern Europeans…Spain
mHG Frequencies
JT, N1, U5

For convenience here is a picture comparing modern and ancient Spanish mHG frequencies. mHGs with significantly different frequencies in modern and ancient Spain are highlighted....Notice Iron age Spain is similar to Modern

The two mHG which differ in frequency the most are H and K.

Neolithic Spain had a whopping 27-30% K and an unimpressive 20-25% H. Modern and Iron age Spain has/had a whopping 40-45% H and an unimpressive 7% K.

mHG frequencies in modern Spain are basically indistinguishable to mHG frequencies in most of modern Europe. mHG frequencies in Neolithic Spain were basically indistinguishable to mHG frequencies in Neolithic Germany and Hungary.

The same mtDNA changes which occurred in Spain after the Neolithic occurred in much of Europe. I think a mixture of migration from “Asia”(inclu. mostly “Eastern Europe”) and natural selection caused(I gave my reasons in this post) those changes to occur.

Furthermore there are many mHGs which exist in modern Spain at over 1% or just under 1% but haven’t been found in Neolithic Spain yet…..
L(xM, N): Modern Spain(2%), Neolithic Spain(0.5%)
M1: Modern Spain(0.7%), Neolithic Spain(0%)
N1b1: Modern Spain(0.5%), Neolithic Spain(0%)
R1: Modern Spain(0.3-0.5%), Neolithic Spain(0%)
U6: Modern Spain(2%), Neolithic Spain(0%)
U5a: Modern Spain(2-3%), Iron age Spain(4%), Neolithic Spain(0.5%)
U8b1, U8a1a: Modern Spain(0.5-1%), Neolithic Spain(0%)
U9a: Modern Spain(0.5%), Neolithic Spain(0%)
T1a: Modern Spain(1.5-2%), Iron age Spain(2%), Neolithic Spain(0%)
T2c1: Modern Spain(1-1.5%), Neolithic Spain(0.5%)
I: Modern Spain(2-3%), Neolithic Spain(0%)
H6: Modern Spain(1-2%), Neolithic Spain(0%)
HV6-24: Modern Spain(1.5-2%), Neolithic Spain(0%)
W: Modern Spain(1%), Iron age Spain(6%), Neolithic Spain(0%)

U6, L(xM, N), and M1 indicate modern Spanish have maternal ancestry from Africa which Neolithic Spanish did not have. The L(xM, N) mHGs modern Spanish belong to are mostly the same L(xM, N) mHGs NorthWest Africans belong. The two most common L(xM, N) mHGs in both locations are L1b and L2a1. The single L(xM, N) from Neolithic Spain belonged to L1b.

The other mHGs don’t conclusively indicate maternal ancestry from any particular region. U5a, T1a, T2c1, I, R1, W, HV6-24, and H6 are all present in ancient mtDNA from Central and Eastern Europe at high frequencies. It’s possible that region lent Spain those mHGs. But I and T1a are also frequent in the Middle East.

Along with differences there are also noticeable similarities between Neolithic and Modern Spanish mtDNA. Both have a higher frequency of J2b1a, J2a1a, T2a1b, U5b, U5b3, and U5b1i than ancient and modern Europeans from other regions.

Nuclear DNA confirms considerable genetic changes took place in Spain after the Neolithic age. Here’s how modern Spanish come out when they’re modeled as a mixture of Neolithic Spanish and other ancient and modern humans.

Spanish_Andalucia
Middle Neolithic Spain: 48%
Eastern Europe(Yamnaya): 24%
Near East(Cypriot): 22%
Africa(Mozabite): 6%

So nuclear DNA Spain probably received migration from Eastern Europe(Yamnaya), the Near East(Cypriot), and Africa(Mozabite) after the Neolithic. mtDNA is pretty consistent with this.

New mtDNA from Stone age Eastern Europe(Latvia, Ukraine)

Yesterday Jones at al. 2017 published genome-wide, including mtDNA, data of 8 ancient individuals from Latvia and Ukraine. Three are Mesolithic Latvians, one is a Mesolithic Ukrainian, one is a Early Neolithic Ukrainian, two are Middle Neolithic Latvians, one is a Late Neolithic Corded Ware Latvian.

Here's a link to Jones at al. 2017's Figure 1 which displays the mtDNA results of these 8 Stone age Eastern Europeans. I added the new ancient mtDNA to my European Hunter Gatherer and Bronze age Northern European spreadsheets.

These Stone age Eastern Europeans can potentially give detailed insight into the origins of modern Europeans. Because of other ancient DNA we know all modern Europeans are mostly a mixture of the "Steppe", "EEF", and "WHG" populations but we don't know which "Steppe", etc. populations contributed to which modern Europeans.

Maybe people similar to these Stone age Eastern Europeans specifically gave modern Eastern Europeans a lot of their "WHG" ancestry. Maybe other Europeans got a lot of their "WHG" from WHGs who lived in other parts of Europe.

Mesolithic Baltic(Sweden, Latvia, Lithuania) HGs can be labeled as WHG or at least very similar. Their mtDNA makeup though is different from Western European WHGs.

	Western Europe HGs	Baltic HGs
U5b	78	12.5
U5a	17	50
U4	3	25
U2	3	12.5

Now let's look at who in Europe today has the most and least U5b, U5a, and U4.

Most U5b...

U5b
Sweden	7.4
Andalusia Spain	6.5
Galicia Spain	6
BeloRussia	6
North Poland	5.4

Least U5b...

North Italy	2
Denmark	2
South Italy	2.2
Ukraine	2.5
Russia	3

Most U5a...

Mari(Russia)	12.5
East Baltic	11.3
Ukraine	10
Russia	7.5
Sweden	7.1

Least U5a...

Andalusia Spain	2.5
South Italy	2.6
Ireland	3.3
Greece	3.3
Galicia Spain	3.5

Most U4...

NW Russia	6
Bosnia	5.7
East Germany	5.6
East Baltic	5.2
Poland	5

Least U4...

North Italy	0
SW France	1.2
Andalusia Spain	1.7
Ireland	1.3
South Italy	1.8

U5b, U5a, and U4 frequencies in modern Europe have geographic trends. U5a and especially U4 peak in Eastern Europe. Is this because Eastern European hunter gatherers had a lot of U4 and U5a? Does U5b peak in Iberia because Western European hunter gatherers had a lot of U5b? That's all just hypothesis, we'll have to wait for more data to confirm it.

I've recently gathered a lot of new European data and will make a post about haplogroup frequencies in Europe soon so stay tuned.