New Evidence Supports Modern Greeks Having DNA of Ancient Mycenaeans

GreekReporter.com ^ | June 22, 2020 | Stavros Anastasiou

[SunkenCiv]

New emerging DNA evidence suggests that living Greeks are indeed descendants of the ancient Mycenaeans, who ruled mainland Greece and the Aegean Sea from 1,600 BC to 1,200 BC.

The proof comes from a study in which scientists analyzed the genes from the teeth of 19 people across various archaeological sites within mainland Greece and Mycenae. A total of 1.2 million letters of genetic code were compared to those of 334 people across the world.

Genetic information was also compiled from a group of thirty modern Greek individuals in order to compare it to the ancient genomes. This allowed researchers to effectively plot how individuals were related to one another.

One aspect that was revealed in the study was how the Mycenaeans themselves were closely related to the Minoan civilization, which flourished on the island of Crete from 2,000 BC to 1,400 BC.

Both cultures were shown to carry genes for brown hair and brown eyes, characteristics that are reflected on their frescoes and pottery, despite having different languages.

Fresco of a Mycenaean Woman depicted with dark hair and eyes.

According to Harvard population geneticist Iosif Lazaridis, any difference between the two civilizations suggests that a second wave of people came to mainland Greece from Eastern Europe, yet were unable to reach the island of Crete — and in time they became known as the Mycenaeans.

After comparing the DNA of modern Greeks to ancient Mycenaeans, a genetic overlap was discovered that suggests that these ancient Bronze Age civilizations laid the genetic groundwork for later peoples.

[OneVike]

I agree

But another way we learned much the save information is is the spread of languages in how they developed from different civilizations geographically

To me the genealogical morphing of languages from one to another has been something I learned many years ago

Sinilar to this study you shared. However The DNA tracing is much much more convincing, yet it led to a similar result

[OneVike]

LOL

Too funny

Carter’s election to the Presidency which ultimately led to the advent of modern day Islamic uprisings

Which when looking at the possible results could very well lead to the end of modern day civilization as we know it

[Verginius Rufus]

But who were the Mycenaeans? They spoke an early form of Greek, as the Linear B tablets show. Greek is an Indo-European language--the ancestral language was probably spoken in the area north of the Black Sea and brought to Greece and elsewhere. But the indigenous population was not exterminated. There are many place names of pre-Greek origin which were still used in classical times (Athens, Corinth, Tiryns, Knossos, Parnassus, and many others) as well as many loan words of pre-Greek origin (labyrinthos, terebinthos, erebinthos, glossa/glotta, thalassa/thalatta, melissa, etc.). In Herodotus' time there were still a few places where "Pelasgian" speakers spoke a non-Greek language, perhaps the descendants of the earlier population.

So as far as DNA goes, the modern Greeks probably have inherited DNA from people who were in Greece in Neolithic and Early Bronze Age times before the Greek language was brought into Greece.

[SunkenCiv]

The DNA studies are not as compelling to me, because we lose half the possible sequences available at our conception. Comparing a handful of ancient samples (which isn't even done in this study) with the current local DNA is unlikely to tell us much -- all it can tell us is where (if anywhere) the ancient samples survive. This study just looked at the relationships between some living people and some other living people. While languages *can* be learned by new arrivals, it seems more likely that they'll displace the previous language speakers, or they wouldn't have moved in in the first place.

[SunkenCiv]

Whoops, you'd think I'd pay more attention to what I post.

The proof comes from a study in which scientists analyzed the genes from the teeth of 19 people across various archaeological sites within mainland Greece and Mycenae.

[SunkenCiv]

• The Linear B Tablets and Mycenaean Social, Political, and Economic Organization [2004]
• Phaistos Disk: Greek or Luwian? [2009]
• The Birth of Bureaucracy (Where Long Lines, Red Tape & Arcane Rules Began; 1650 to 1100 B.C.) [2012]
• Rare Cuneiform Script Found on Island of Malta [2011]
• Ancient Tablet Found: Oldest Readable Writing in Europe [2011]
• Mycenaean and Hittite Diplomatic Correspondence: Fact and Fiction [ PDF file ] [2007]
• First Minoan Shipwreck: An unprecedented find off the coast of Crete [2010]

[SunkenCiv]

This is one of those times I wish TinyPic had survived. Had a nice map of -inthos place names I'd sort of scanned out of, I forget which book. The -inthos suffix is from Carian, which is related to other languages, possibly including Etruscan (which is related to Lemnian).

[Verginius Rufus]

The civilization of Thera had ties to the Minoan civilization, but the eruption which buried the ancient site on Thera occurred about the time the Mycenaeans were starting to flourish, so Thera may have had no influence on Mycenae.

Nevertheless there were many therapods in ancient Greece (and there are many still today). I remember seeing some when I was in Greece many years ago. They were turkeys (no doubt a legacy of the Ottoman period).

[Verginius Rufus]

The -nth- and -ss- (or -tt-) place names occur both on Crete and on mainland Greece, and also in Asia Minor (e.g., Halicarnassus). Sometimes it is -nd- instead of -nth-.

[Track9]

Wonder who the Dorians were?

They were a minor third and flat 7th from Ionian.

[Savage Beast]

Yes, if they could reach Troy, which they did, they could reach Crete.

[SunkenCiv]

LOL!

[SunkenCiv]

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2. Badaga, Bagatha, Balinese, Bamum, Bassa (Vah), Batak, Baybayin (Tagalog), Beitha Kukju, Bengali, Benjamin Franklin's Phonetic Alphabet, Bilang-bilang, Bima, Blackfoot, Blissymbolics, Borama / Gadabuursi, Brahmi, Braille, Buhid, Burmese

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6. Faliscan, Fraktur, Fraser

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8. Hanguel (Korean), Hanifi, Hanuno'o, Hebrew, Hieroglyphs (Egyptian), Hiragana (Japanese), Hittite

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12. Lampung, Lanna, Lao, Latin, Lepcha, Lepontic, Limbu, Linear A, Linear B, Loma, Lontara/Makasar, Lota Ende, Lower Tanana, Luo Lakeside Script, Luwian, Lycian, Lydian

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14. Nabataean, Naguaké Taíno Pictographic Alphabet, Nandinagari, Naxi, Ndjuká, New Tai Lue, Newa (Prachalit Nepal), N'Ko, North Picene, Nüshu, Nwagụ Aneke

15. Odia, Ogham, Oirat Clear Script, Ojibwe, Ol Chiki (Santali), Old Church Slavonic, Old Elamite, Old Italic, Old English, Old Nubian, Old Permic, Old Persian Cuneiform, Old Turkic (Orkhon / Yenisei), Osage, Oscan

16. Pahawh Hmong, Pahlavi, Paleo-Hebrew, Pallava, Parthian, Pau Cin Hau, Phags-pa, Phaistos Disc script, Phoenician, Phrygian, Pitman Initial Teaching Alphabet, Pollard script, Proto-Elamite, Proto-Sinaitic / Proto-Canaanite, Psalter, Punic

17. Quikscript/Read Alphabet

18. Rana, Ranjana, Rejang, Roman Cursive, Rongo Rongo, Runic, Rustic Captials

19. Sabaean, Samaritan, Santali (Ol Chiki), Sasak, Sawndip (Old Zhuang), Satera Jontal, Savara, Semaphore, Shan, Sharda, Shavian, Shorthand, Siddham, Simpel-Fonetik, Sindhi, Sinhala, Sogdian, Solresol, Somali (Osmanya), Sorang Sompeng, Sourashtra, South Arabian, South Picene, Soyombo, Sugali, Sui, Sumerian Cuneiform, Sundanese, Sütterlin, Sutton SignWriting, Syloti Nagri, Syriac, Székely-Hungarian Rovás (Hungarian Runes)

20. Tagbanwa, Tai Lue, Taíno, Takri, Tamil, Tammari, Tangut (Hsihsia), Telugu, Thaana, Thai, Thompson / Nlaka'pamux, Tibetan, Tifinagh, Tigalari (Tulu), Tikamuli, Tocharian, Todhri, Tolong Siki

21. Ugaritic, Umbrian, Uyghur

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23. Welsh Braille

24. Xixia (Tangut), Xibe

25. Yenisei (Old Turkic), Yerukula, Yi, Yi Jing Hexagrams, Younger Futhark, Yugtun

26. Zaghawa, Zhuang (話僮 / Sawndip)

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[SunkenCiv]

There's no link between a volcanic eruption and the destruction of the Minoan sites -- that indicates the arrival of the Mycenaeans. Herodotus wrote a nice chunk about Calliste/There/Santorini and nothing about any eruption. The caldera is very prehistoric (10s or 100s of 1000s of years old, perhaps on the order of the age of the caldera at Kos), and from antiquity we've got just one account of an eruption, about 200 BC.

[SunkenCiv]

Also on both sides of the Adriatic, and some on the Tyrrhenian side of Italy, Sicily, west shore (and inland) of the Black Sea, the Aegean, Cyprus, and throughout Anatolia. (found the scan).

[ConservativeMind]

What gene is responsible for Greeks who are lazy?

[SunkenCiv]

I'm not too sure that's unique, I'm lazy as hell.

[SunkenCiv]

There's a FLW design, the Meyer May House, in Grand Rapids; a block east there's another design that was done by a protege. The May house was fully restored about 25 years ago (they even demolished an addition that held a more modern and better kitchen) and it has one of those FLW-style seance dining rooms.

The Sowden House is Mayan Revival (it sez here) but the floor layout and the organization reminds me more of a classical Roman house.

[Verginius Rufus]

There is a famous 2nd-millennium BC site on Thera which was excavated in the period after WWII. There are famous frescoes from the buildings there now in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens. It was covered by volcanic ash (like Pompeii). Some of the ash landed on Greenland and back in the 1980s someone calculated from Greenland ice cores that the ash dated to 1628 B.C. I think there is some quibbling about the exact date but definitely there was an eruption during the Bronze Age. Classical Greek historians are not reliable about what happened 1000 years earlier.

I don't know if we have any evidence for what language was spoken by the people on Thera before the eruption.

[gleeaikin]

A wave is when a group of people are pushed out of their home area when severe conditions or invasion by a stronger group force them or make it desirable to move elsewhere. We had a wave of Europeans in the 1840s as a result of potato blight in Ireland. Then another in the 1880’s after various social upheavals and struggles in Europe. My mother’s parents came as a result of that one. So the first wave apparently reached Crete, but the second wave did not. There were probably enough genetic differences to determine which ones reached Crete and which did not.