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Monday 21 November 2016

Approaching rice domestication in South Asia: New evidence from Indus settlements in northern India

J. Bates a, , , C.A. Petrie a, , R.N. Singh b,
a Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge, UK
b Department of AIHC and Archaeology, Banaras Hindu University, India
Received 17 February 2015, Revised 11 March 2016, Accepted 15 April 2016, Available online 21 November 2016
 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2016.04.018

Open Access funded by Arts and Humanities Research Council

 Highlights

We present new data for rice cultivation in the Indus Civilisation.

These data suggest rice domestication was linked with the east of this civilisation.

Rice domestication and cultivation need to be disentangled as issues.

Results suggest complex rice cultivation systems before c.1500 BCE.
 Abstract
The nature and timing of rice domestication and the development of rice cultivation in South Asia is much debated. In northern South Asia there is presently a significant gap (c.4200 years) between earliest evidence for the exploitation of wild rice (Lahuradewa c.6000 BCE) and earliest dated evidence for the utilisation of fully domesticated rice (Mahagara c.1800 BCE). The Indus Civilisation (c.3000–1500 BCE) developed and declined during the intervening period, and there has been debate about whether rice was adopted and exploited by Indus populations during this ‘gap’. This paper presents new analysis of spikelet bases and weeds collected from three Indus Civilisation settlements in north-west India, which provide insight into the way that rice was exploited. This analysis suggests that starting in the period before the Indus urban phase (Early Harappan) and continuing through the urban (Mature Harappan/Harappan), post-urban (Late Harappan) and on into the post-Indus Painted Grey Ware (PGW) period, there was a progressive increase in the proportion of domesticated-type spikelet bases and a decrease in wild-types. This pattern fits with a model of the slow development of rice exploitation from wild foraging to agriculture involving full cultivation. Importantly, the accompanying weeds show no increased proportions of wetland species during this period. Instead a mix of wetland and dryland species was identified, and although these data are preliminary, they suggest that the development of an independent rice tradition may have been intertwined with the practices of the eastern most Indus peoples. These data also suggest that when fully domesticated Oryza sativa ssp. japonica was introduced around 2000 BCE, it arrived in an area that was already familiar with domesticated rice cultivation and a range of cultivation techniques.
Keywords
Rice (Oryza sativa); Indus Civilisation; South Asia; Macrobotanical analysis; Cultivation systems

Yog.

See also :
Farming rice in India much older than thought, used as a ‘summer crop’ by the Indus Civilisation

Bloggers note : Well its out finally ;) . More fascinating researches are also coming on related subjects soon!.

51 comments:

Jaydeep said...

It is nice to see research being done both at Rakhigarhi and at Mehrgarh. Lets hope this trend is sustained for sometime so that in about 5 years we will significantly greater understanding of the Indus Saraswati Civilization.

Another paper which very neatly complements this archaeological report, is a genetics paper which argues for the independent domestication of rice in India, independent to that of China.

Here it is - https://www.researchgate.net/publication/283424991_Three_Geographically_Separate_Domestications_of_Asian_Rice

Jaydeep said...

By the way, do we have any updates regarding the Rakhigarhi aDNA ? Any idea about when the paper might come out ?

Nirjhar007 said...

About Rakhigarhi things are going ok . Several samples are under testings , don't worry its in great hands :).

About S Asian pre-history I have this theory that there are some undefined divisions of ASI . But in my rough proposal, after the de-urbanization of the IVC when localization was adopted , we saw the emergence of Rice as a prevalent staple and it were the Austro-Asiatics from SE Asia who actually brought the Japonica variety of it , which mixed with the local Indica variety . It is very interesting that this transition to rice occurred with Painted Grey Ware Culture heavily , the transition was also visible in Cemetery H period too so from around 2000 BC . You well know that both of the cultures are associated in the classic academic aryan invasion scenario, although they were all local developments . Earliest Painted Grey Ware object is actually found from Mathura which dates to ~2100 BC . Both this culture with others like OCP make out the Late Phase of the Harappan Civilization 1900-1300 BC , after that period archaeologists note that the second phase of urbanization occurred in South Asia , the very reason behind that was rice , it again boosted the economy and stabilized things , the Late Harappan tradition was forwarded from 1300-200 BC by Northern Black Polished Ware . So you see a complete set of serial cultures without a hiatus .

I do think the advent of rice was the reason of ASI admixture or for the boost , the ASI dominant people gained importance . So the Rakhigarhi aDNA IMO will also distinguish the Northern ASI to the'' South Eastern one'' . IMO the ASI that shows up in Malta boy and Iran Neolithic which both have R Y-DNA ( Although Iranian one is not very sure) belongs to a northern division of ASI . Only time will tell if this theory stands .


Jaydeep said...

Dear Nirjhar,

Sorry for the late reply. I have a slightly different view from yours here.

First of all, I do not believe that an actual pure ASI group ever existed. It is just a hypothetical construct and unless we find some Mesolithic aDNA from India which conform to this ASI model,I will not believe that ASI ever existed.

There are a few things that are pertinent to note here -

a. In the Gallego-Llorente paper on a single Iranian aDNA female sample from Ganj Dareh, if you have a look at the admixture graphs (Supplementary Info), at higher Ks, there is a South Asian component which is maximised in the tribal groups of India like the Mala. This looks like the hypothetical ASI since in most models the tribals in India are modelled as having the maximum ASI. Now the thing is, this ASI-like component which is maximised in tribals like the Mala, is also present in a small trace amount in the Neolithic Iranian sample of 10,000 YBP. How is that ?

Further, I would request you to have a look at the admixture graphs of the aDNA paper from Central Anatolia. They are quite interesting and unique. In those admixture graphs (again Supplementary Info), at higher Ks, we see a component which maximises among the tribals of Southern India. Now the most interesting thing in this paper is that - this ASI-like component is present in trace amounts among the CHG samples of Satsurblia & Kotias as well as in the Yamnaya samples. I do not know what to make of it. But it tells you that a migration out of South Asia looks quite on the cards.

Whether ASI existed as a real population or not, the presence of this ASI-like ancestry in Neolithic Iranians and also quite possibly among the CHG samples, tells us that ASI ancestry was quite spread out and admixed with the ANI across the subcontinent as early as the end of LGM.

Jaydeep said...

As far as rice domestication is concerned, I would request you to read the paper that I had earlier posted on this article.

India is one of the centers of rice domestication. Infact, not 1 but 2 varieties of rice have been domesticated in South Asia. This supports the early evidence of rice domestication from sites like Lahuradewa which has been proposed by Dr. Rakesh Tewari, who is now the ASI head. Early evidence of rice domestication/cultivation is also suggested from other sites like Koldihwa & Jhusi. What is needed in more archaeological research in the Gangetic plains. I am quite sure that we can find a continuous trail of rice domestication right from the early evidence of Lahuradewa upto the Bronze Age.

We also need to note that urbanism in the Gangetic plains is quite possibly as old as in the Saraswati Sindhu region. The problem is we just haven't explored the Up region for old sites. There are plenty of historical sites whose mounds are known but hardly any horizontal excavations have been carried out. So how do we know that there was no urban settlements in the Gangetic regions parallel with the Harappans ? Let us remember that our literary evidence does not suggest an earlier urbanism in the Saraswati-Sindhu region and a later one in the Gangetic plains.

I do not subscribe to the idea that Gangetic urbanism was the second urbanism that arose in the 1st millenium BC after the fall of the Saraswati Sindhu civilization. Let us note a few things here -

1. NBPW is conventionally dated to between 700 BC - 200 BC. We now have the earliest date of NBPW as 1500 BC and even the presence of NBPW in South India at the ancient site of Karur is around 800 BC.

2. PGW is dated to from 1200 BC - 700 BC. But we now have dates for PGW from Mathura & Alamgirpur which suggest that its origins are as old as 2100 BC.

3. OCP is associated with the Copper Hoard culture and is generally older to the PGW phase. I know atleast one archaeologist (Dr. M D Shahi I think), who has argued that the OCP is contemporary to the Early Harappan phase.

4. We now know from the efforts of Dr. Rakesh Tewari & his team that iron use was widespread across the Gangetic plains by 1800 BC.

The early dates for Iron use in the Gangetic region also supports the idea that the Chalcolithic phase and hence possibly the Copper Hoard Culture is likely to be older than that.

A lot of archaeological research is required across North India including the Gangetic plains. I am quite certain that the literary evidence from our ancient texts is very close to the truth and it argues for an early urbanism across North India not just the Saraswati Sindhu region.

----------

Coming to the point of rice farming - it looks very likely that the japonica rice was brought to India by the Austro-asiatic people like the Munda. However, as the paper that you've linked to argues, dry and wet rice farming was being done already since the Early Harappan phase and the introduction of japonica rice did not bring about any change in it. Therefore, I do not think that the introduction of japonica rice brought about any sort of revolution. It just added to the already formidable repertoire of the Harappan farmer.

Jaydeep said...

I think I misunderstood you a little. So you're suggesting a division of ASI into Northern ASI & Southern ASI. I think it is more likely that there were several HG populations across South Asia at the end of the LGM with already varying mix of ANI & ASI. With the Neolithic, a homogenity replaced the heterogenity across North India, but it likely took time to influence the region across the Vindhyas.

tim drake said...

"IMO the ASI that shows up in Iran Neolithic which both have R Y-DNA ( Although Iranian one is not very sure) belongs to a northern division of ASI " -- Nirjhar,could you point me to the paper which shows the ASI in a neolithic iran sample ? Btw when you talk about R Y-DNA in the iranian neolithic ,are you talking about R(xR1,xR2) ?

Nirjhar007 said...

Here :
https://media.nature.com/original/nature-assets/srep/2016/160809/srep31326/extref/srep31326-s1.pdf
see page 6 :
S5. ADMIXTURE shows that the Iranian herder shares a large part of its
genome with Caucasus Hunter Gatherers, with a small proportion of southern
Asian-like alleles


The cluster membership of published modern and ancient samples is similar to
previous analyses9,10. GD13a harbours mainly the “green” component found in
Caucasus Hunter-Gatherers. This is in agreement with our PCA analysis, as well as the geographic proximity of Iran to the Caucasus. Only modern populations which have the “green” component found in GD13A are shown in Fig. 1c. In addition to this component, GD13a also harbors a small component found in modern southern Asian populations.


Main paper here on which also Jaydeep discussed above, but remember ADMIXTURE is not very dependable for accuracy and the proportions are small :

https://www.nature.com/articles/srep31326

About the R it is not clear if it is R2 or not , some bloggers did snp calls and said its R2(https://genetiker.wordpress.com/2016/06/22/y-snp-calls-from-the-ancient-near-east/) , but not accepted by the geneticists it seems .
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature19310#supplementary-information
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/06/16/059311

tim drake said...

Thanks a lot ,Nirjhar. So,at k=20, it looks the GD13a sample looks like is composed of two components - one component which seems characteristic of the Kalash and other yellow component which seems like a sub division of ANI ? The kalash component also somehow creeps into the Mala . How long have been the Kalash isolated ,any idea ?

Nirjhar007 said...

Yes Kalash do have their own component , some say it is a result of drift /due to isolation etc . There is a possibility that the component is indeed archaic and genuine signal. I think when we will have the upcoming aDNA reults from Swat, that will help a lot regarding Kalash enigma .

tim drake said...

sorry to sound like a broken record but when will the results of rakhigarhi/harappa be published lol ?

Nirjhar007 said...

According to a poster in this site :
Had an exchange with Dr. Kumaraswamy Thangaraj. He said Rakhigarhi DNA publication would take several months. So, those holding their breath, please don't.
https://forums.bharat-rakshak.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6848&sid=52dc88aef5dbb9810160c5336baf37c1&start=4160%20the%204th%20or%205th%20message%20on%20this

The post was of 2nd March by ''Prem Kumar'' . But I am hearing rumors that in this month a paper of Harvard is coming out , that can include samples from Swat, Central Asia and maybe Mature Harappan too . If the paper comes out ,then it will be of huge importance of course.

tim drake said...

Nirjhar, about your northern ASI vs south-eastern ASI division, it doesn't look like that to my novice's eyes :). Take a look at K=19 and K=20 in the link you provided to me. The purple component (supposedly representing something like ASI which is maximised in Malas) doesn't really change from K=19 to K=20 in MA-1 (Malta buret boy). It's the yellow(ANI like) that fragments into a yellow and a dark blue (Kalash like).
That genetiker guy looks like quite the white supremacist lol.
What do you think about the ~6000 year old L1a (Y-chromosome) aDNA sample found in the middle east region ? Where do you think the origin of L lies ? Current guess is somewhere near Indus valley/Hindu Kush Mountains?

"But I am hearing rumors that in this month a paper of Harvard is coming out , that can include samples from Swat, Central Asia and maybe Mature Harappan too" --- Where did you hear the rumors and how can they publish mature harappan phase samples independent of rakhigarhi btw ?

Nirjhar007 said...

What do you think about the ~6000 year old L1a (Y-chromosome) aDNA sample found in the middle east region ? Where do you think the origin of L lies ? Current guess is somewhere near Indus valley/Hindu Kush Mountains?


Yes it is possible tat origin is near the arae you mention . Though IIRC that clade which was discovered in Armenia I think , was basal to Indian clades (ancestral) .

Where did you hear the rumors and how can they publish mature harappan phase samples independent of rakhigarhi btw ?

Ohh I heard them here , you can see also a recent development , it is also not a very neutral site :) but better than many ,:https://eurogenes.blogspot.in/2018/03/the-whiteboard.html

Perhaps they have samples from Pakistan .

tim drake said...

" Ohh I heard them here , you can see also a recent development , it is also not a very neutral site :) but better than many ,:https://eurogenes.blogspot.in/2018/03/the-whiteboard.html " --- So, Davidski is implying that rakhigarhi results are being held down for political reasons lol !!! THe NDA gov gets way too much hate than it deserves imo :)
However, i don't think that his book will include any harrappan samples imo because they are also under the supervision of CSIR and reich simply can't make profit from someone's else data unless there's some kind of commission/royalty involved. Like you said, it might rehash the ANI-ASI thing .
There is something that has been bugging my mind. Now , Buddha is supposed to have been born around 600 BCE,however some people think it might be as early as 1000 B.C . Witzel and some other people think that his clan Shakya is the Iranian Saka tribe. In that case, we know Sakas came and rule over northern and eastern India ( a lot of UP brahmins are actually from those lineages :/). So, what if this 3000-3500 year old arrival is not the Indo-European but the Saka arrival ?


" The two populations mixed together, Dr. Reich estimated, 2,000 to 4,000 years ago. " --- If the ANI and ASI never mixed before 2000-4000 years ago, why do we have ASI like component in the Kalash who are supposed to be have been isolated for many millenia ?

Are you buying that book nirjhar ?

Nirjhar007 said...

The association of the Shakyas with the Shakas is an old hypothesis,based only on a fortuitous similarity of name! :). The fact that scholars like Witzel supports this old baseless theory confirms that often he is not a serious scholar... I've found recently that the origin of the name Shak(i)ya is most probably related to the name sāka of the Teak tree, like the name of the near Koliya tribe is connected with the kola tree (jujube). This etymology is supported by legends in Buddhist texts and I find it really convincing.
Moreover, the Shakya race is consistently connected with the Solar race of Ikshvaku in the Puranas, which is based in the Eastern of Kosala. Scythians didn't appear here before 200 BC or so.

About the book , well I will probably buy it but not before reading some reviews ;) ..

tim drake said...

I am not sure the Buddhist texts are exactly unbiased but anyways ,let's leave it. Other point that might be a bit sensitive but the strict jaati endogamy ,it's something that's supposed to have started somewhere around 60-70 generations ago only right (as inferred from some genetics study) ? What's the suitable generation time in indian context (considering marriages used to happen early and it was for most part a stable society with decent population size) ? Somewhere between 22-25 years ?

tim drake said...

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-18893-8 -- have you seen this ?? Some "western Eurasian" mtDNA haplogroups present in Kashmir predating the "the event" . Quoting from the paper.
--- "West Eurasian haplogroup W has been reported in Europe with the age of 18400 YBP, we observed an age of 15033.1 YBP with 95% HPD of (11539.9–20022.5). While as, Haplogroup H which has been estimated to originate around (12846.0) YBP, but our estimates show it around 15747.3 YBP in J&K with 95% HPD of (11917.5–21518.1). Thus, the diversity and deep in time coalescence ages of known European HGs in the region highlight the importance of the region for exploring its plausibility as differentiation ground of many maternal lineages that might have migrated to Europe from the region post glacial maximum"

I remember seeing R(xR1,xR2) and R (xR1a,xR1b) Y-DNA haplogroups in Kashmir. I wonder why are these not analysed properly in higher resolution and put in the R tree. !

Nirjhar007 said...

About the endogamy IMO such predictions based on modern dna is not very useful , we will need aDNA to confirm the situation :) . I think for generation that range you mention is acceptable :).

About the basal groups, I think they were not tested for further downsteam snps .

tim drake said...

Another question since you have been very kind to a noob like me (just rehashing the question put on an other forum) - Dr chaubey thinks that R1a-M780 marker is not nested central Asian branch/Eastern European but this figure https://www.nature.com/articles/ejhg201450/figures/1 places it under Z-93. Do you have any idea why? (In this https://www.yfull.com/tree/R1a/ it is included in the R-Y3 i think)

Nirjhar007 said...

Y3/M780 is sub branch of branch Z-93 and also parent of Indian/S Asia specific L-657.
M780 is found in S Asia and Roma people who came from there.

tim drake said...

Nirjhar ,if you could answer another nooby question from me but is there any evidence that the steppe people were speaking any language let alone proto Indo- European ? If no then how accurate is to connect the migration with the bringing of indo-european languages even in Europe that Haak did in his 2015 paper !!

Nirjhar007 said...

I think there is no direct evidence(ancient script) for their language(s). But considering the significance of their ancestry(autosomal and y-dna), which is visible in modern Indo-european groups of europe and also other sites which are associted, with indo-european cultures, like Corded Ware or Bell beaker or even Sintahta,Andronovo, they should be related to IE's.

tim drake said...

Nirjhar , I am not sure if you watched the latest SI video on AMT which had Dr Chaubey as a guest. Starting at 26:30, he was talking about aDNA samples in which he said that according to the preliminary results, there was a "dravidian" expansion towards north-Western of India but no migration from West to east. I wonder what he means by dravidian expansion ,did he mean ASI ??

Nirjhar007 said...

Yes I think he means ASI rich population,around 2000 bc I think will make good sense.

tim drake said...

So , when do you think the R1a* would have likely arrived in South Asia (I know I might be jumping at steep conclusions here) ?

tim drake said...

Nirjhar ,anything interesting in Reich's book ?

Nirjhar007 said...

I think it should be in S asia from ~3000 BC at least. I don't think S Asian R1a is limited to R1a-Z93.

I haven't read the book yet, don't expect he will go outside traditionalist AIT approach .

Nirjhar007 said...

"I haven't read the book yet, don't expect he will go outside traditionalist AIT approach ." -- Closer in line to what a bird told me :) . Talks about how ASI is not itself a homogenous population but ASI itself might be a mixture of iranian-farmer related ancestry and native hunter-gatherer of South Asia. Seems like you MIGHT be right about two divisions of ASI. He is placing the arrival of ANI (steppe-related ancestry + iranian farmer related ancestry) after around 5000 years ago. Sprinklings of repressive nature of "you know what" added :)

I accidentally deleted your comment :), yes, it is interesting.You mean this which was posted in Eurogenes ? :
https://s31.postimg.org/sf75kz5uz/screenshot_348.png
https://s31.postimg.org/oittp1aln/screenshot_349.png

tim drake said...

Na, didn't see eurogenes though. The kindle-book costs less than 500 INR though .

Nirjhar007 said...

I see :).

tim drake said...

Nirjhar, is it ok to relate Y-haplogroups with components like ANI/ASI and their subdivisions ? One can say that a layer of ANI comes from R1a (related to Steppe) and other one J2 + L (Iran_farmer). Similarly older J haplogroups related branches also found in isolated south indian tribes would likely form the part Iranian-Farmer like ancestry in ASI while H haplogroup would likely be the indigenous hunter gatherer,right ?
O2 would be the AAA component.
Where does R2 come into picture though ?

Nirjhar007 said...

What you say is apparently ok, given the current state of data :). But imo it is not very robust to relate y or mtdna to specific ancestry, mass migrations can be detected well from autosomal composition, but haplgroups are more independent and prone to ancestry change.

tim drake said...

Nirjhar , if i remember correctly there was an earlier variant of Moorjani's model (2011) that estimated population mixture around 3500-1200 years but later in 2013 ,they estimated it around 4200-1900 years. I am not able to find the earlier paper. Do you know what led to the change of dates ? Also, they use the generation time as 29 years which is high in indian context as i wrote earlier. Somewhere between 23-25 years would be more suited considering people used to get married by 20 back in the classical age and pre-classical age :)

Another question though a bit touchy but don't you think that the population bottleneck caused by sub-structuring for close to ~ 2000-1500 years has increased the disease rate in the population ? I mean for some groups ,it's worse than finnish and askenazi jews.

Nirjhar007 said...

Though I am not sure on this, but the first draft was based on the idea mainly that is the AIT, which is generally put around ~1500 bc, but later after fine tuning a bit , they had to change things a bit .I agree of course that the generation time is a bit high.

I think what you say is interesting :).

tim drake said...

" I think what you say is interesting :). " -- :(

Nirjhar , in the admixture analysis of various populations , i see a small % dark blue component (typical of sardinians) in UP brahamins and khastriyas. What do you think is that component denoting ?

Nirjhar007 said...

What? :).

About that component, it should be related to EEF (Early European Farmer) ancestry which ultimately came from anatolia(Anatolian Neolithic Farmers), the Sardinians are full of it :).The % in Indians however, is very small/noise level and not necessarily indicating any true ancestry.

tim drake said...

" What? :). " -- that sad smiley was because i think the sub-structuring and the strict marriage practices that the communities maintained for close to 70-80 generations with very low gene flow across them might be one of the reasons for the decline in last 1000 years. A dude known an Narendranath Dutta once told something similar some 100 years ago however he was no scientist :)

i was talking to an bhartiya , he's R1a1-L657, he told me that out of andronovo,sintastha, ust_ishim and Malta boy , he had the highest match with Ust_ishim and then with Malta and lowest with andronovo and sintastha ones :/ . (might be because of ASI that ust_ishim and malta harbor).

Check out this stuff (shoddy piece though) - http://www.dailypioneer.com/vivacity/dravidian-languages-originated-4500-years-ago.html

" About that component, it should be related to EEF (Early European Farmer) ancestry which ultimately came from anatolia(Anatolian Neolithic Farmers), the Sardinians are full of it " -- thank you , you have very patiently cleared lot of my doubts throughout the past 2 days.

Nirjhar007 said...

i think the sub-structuring and the strict marriage practices that the communities maintained for close to 70-80 generations with very low gene flow across them might be one of the reasons for the decline in last 1000 years. A dude known an Narendranath Dutta once told something similar some 100 years ago however he was no scientist :).

I see :).

he's R1a1-L657, he told me that out of andronovo,sintastha, ust_ishim and Malta boy , he had the highest match with Ust_ishim and then with Malta and lowest with andronovo and sintastha ones :/ . (might be because of ASI that ust_ishim and malta harbor). .

The main reason that Andronovo,Sintashta don't work well as possible ancestral population to Indians because they all also have notable % of EEF/Anatolian related ancestry , that Indians lack as said previously .Also archaeologically, a mass movement from Andronovo horizon to India is disproved, already.

Dravidians origin, I think the aDNA from S India is key. But imo they should be indigenous, we will see soon. BTW I am hearing Reich in his book explicitly says, that he's own opinion is that the PIE homeland was south of the Caucasus! :). But they still try to salvage the steppe thing in part, it seems.

tim drake said...

" But imo they should be indigenous, we will see soon" -- I am very skeptical on being able to extract high quality DNA from ancient skeletons in south India ( the climate isn't conducive), may be we can get some skeletons from the himalayan regions.

"BTW I am hearing Reich in his book explicitly says, that he's own opinion is that the PIE
homeland was south of the Caucasus! :) " -- somewhere near Turkey/ Northen Iran then ? On what basis does he say that ? Iranian_Neolithic like ancestry in Steppe dudes ?

Nirjhar007 said...

somewhere near Turkey/ Northen Iran then ? On what basis does he say that ? Iranian_Neolithic like ancestry in Steppe dudes ?

I think because of the spread of CHG/Iran ancestry ,that spread to steppe cultures from Eneolithic and also the absence of any Steppe related ancestry in BA Anatolia, so far and also insignificant presence of it in Mycenaeans.But for Indo-Iranian, they are still favoring steppe with no alternatives .

tim drake said...

"But for Indo-Iranian, they are still favoring steppe with no alternatives." --- I think this is because of the admixing that his model detected during the 4200-1900 YBP and steppe-like ancestry present in ANI. Forget the indo-european stuff for a sec ,how old do you think the RgVeda is ? It's definitely not 3500 year old imo

Nirjhar007 said...

About the dating of RV, I think dating it to 2000-1500 bc makes good sense. See this beautiful research about chronology :
https://www.academia.edu/7683313/The_Chronology_of_Puranic_Kings_and_Rigvedic_Rishis_in_Comparison_with_the_Phases_of_the_Sindhu_Sarasvati_Civilization

tim drake said...

Thanks, will read the PDF . Some people place RgVeda earlier with the earliest hymns composed prior to 3000 bc. Sardinians do have some R2 Y - DNA. Do you think it's the result of Roma incursion ?

Nirjhar007 said...

Yes its possibly Roma.

tim drake said...

A bird once told me that he has conversed with dr chaubey and he told that Dr Chaubey is a supporter of arrival of "certain people" between 2500 BC - 5000 BC

Nirjhar007 said...

I see :).

tim drake said...

Nirjhar, not sure if you know this but with the current scenario where jaatis are vouching for the "backward" tag (oh,the irony !) in order to get reservation and freebies (as already seen with the inclusion of new jaatis under the OBC tag),don't you think such kind of changing mobility (at least on paper) will change the haplogroups distribution when future research takes place ? (jaatis which were placed as high or middle will be counted as low lol)

Nirjhar007 said...

Yes, I agree and it is funny indeed :).

tim drake said...

At yfull.com/tree ,In Arunachal Pradesh,I am seeing 16 R1a , 16 H, 12 R2 , 8 L, 4 J2. So, i have two doubts

1. Are you aware of any study having Y-DNA data from AR because i am not ? I also don't think that so many people from AR would send samples for private tests :) .

2. How do we have such deep penetration of "mainland" Y-DNAs in AR ? I was expecting O's and D's but i didn't find that at yfull.com.

Nirjhar007 said...

1. Can be NRI related.

2. Indo-European speakers are there too.