- Ancient Egypt DNA: Are Modern Egyptians Related to Ancient Egyptians? [12/11/2025]
- Did the Arab Conquest Replace the Ancient Egyptians? The Myth of Population Replacement [12/11/2025]
Posted on 12/11/2025 6:10:15 AM PST by Cronos
An international team of researchers have successfully recovered and analysed ancient DNA from Egyptian mummies dating from approximately 1400 BCE to 400 BCE, including the first genome-wide data from three individuals. The study found that modern Egyptians share more ancestry with sub-Saharan Africans than ancient Egyptians did, whereas ancient Egyptians were found to be most closely related to ancient people from the Middle East and Western Asia.
This study counters prior scepticism about the possibility of recovering reliable ancient DNA from Egyptian mummies. Despite the potential issues of degradation and contamination caused by climate and mummification methods, the authors were able to use high-throughput DNA sequencing and robust authentication methods to ensure the ancient origin and reliability of the data. The study, published in the journal Nature Communications, shows that Egyptian mummies can be a reliable source of ancient DNA, and can contribute to a more accurate and refined understanding of Egypt’s history.
Egypt is a promising location for the study of ancient populations. It has a rich and well-documented history, and its geographic location and many interactions with populations from surrounding areas, in Africa, Asia and Europe, make it a dynamic region. Recent advances in the study of ancient DNA present an opportunity to test existing understandings of Egyptian history using ancient genetic data.
However, genetic studies of ancient Egyptian mummies are rare due to methodological and contamination issues. Although some of the first extractions of ancient DNA were from mummified remains, scientists have raised doubts as to whether genetic data, especially the nuclear DNA which encodes for the majority of the genome, from mummies would be reliable, and whether it could be recovered at all.
“The potential preservation of DNA has to be regarded with scepticism,” said Johannes Krause, Director at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History and senior author of the study. “The hot Egyptian climate, the high humidity levels in many tombs and some of the chemicals used in mummification techniques, contribute to DNA degradation and are thought to make the long-term survival of DNA in Egyptian mummies unlikely.”
For this study, the team, led by the University of Tübingen and the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Germany, and including researchers from the University of Cambridge, looked at genetic differentiation and population continuity over a 1,300 year timespan, and compared these results to modern populations.
The team sampled 151 mummified individuals from the archaeological site of Abusir el-Meleq, along the Nile River in Middle Egypt, from two anthropological collections hosted and curated at the University of Tübingen and the Felix von Luschan Skull Collection at the Museum of Prehistory of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Stiftung Preussicher Kulturbesitz.
In total, the authors recovered partial genomes from 90 individuals, and genome-wide datasets from three individuals. They were able to use the data gathered to test previous hypotheses drawn from archaeological and historical data, and from studies of modern DNA.
“In particular, we were interested in looking at changes and continuities in the genetic makeup of the ancient inhabitants of Abusir el-Meleq,” said Alexander Peltzer, one of the lead authors of the study from the University of Tübingen.
The team wanted to determine if the investigated ancient populations were affected at the genetic level by foreign conquest and domination during the time period under study, and compared these populations to modern Egyptian comparative populations.
“There is literary and archaeological evidence for foreign influence at the site, including the presence of individuals with Greek and Latin names and the use of foreign material culture,” said co-author W. Paul van Pelt from Cambridge’s Division of Archaeology. “However, neither of these provides direct evidence for the presence of foreigners or of individuals with a migration background, because many markers of Greek and Roman identity became ‘status symbols’ and were adopted by natives and foreigners alike. The combined use of artefacts, textual evidence and ancient DNA data allows a more holistic study of past identities and cultural exchange or ‘entanglement’.”
The study found that the inhabitants of Absur el-Meleq were most closely related to ancient populations in the Levant, and were also closely related to Neolithic populations from the Anatolian Peninsula and Europe. “The genetics of the Abusir el-Meleq community did not undergo any major shifts during the 1,300 year timespan we studied, suggesting that the population remained genetically relatively unaffected by foreign conquest and rule,” said Wolfgang Haak, group leader at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, and a co-author of the paper.
The data shows that modern Egyptians share approximately 8% more ancestry on the nuclear level with sub-Saharan African populations than the inhabitants of Abusir el-Meleq, suggesting that an increase in sub-Saharan African gene flow into Egypt occurred within the last 2,000 years. Possible causal factors may have been improved mobility down the Nile River, increased long-distance trade between sub-Saharan Africa and Egypt, and the trans-Saharan slave trade that began approximately 1,300 years ago.
Is this W. Paul van Pelt related to Linus van Pelt? Of course Snoopy is Charlie Brown’s dog, not Linus’.
Or that Cleopatra was black (as so many believe).
She was Greek.
The 4th-century Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus has this to say about Egyptians' appearance:
"Now the men of Egypt are, as a rule, somewhat swarthy and dark of complexion..." (22.16.23)
The Latin reads: Homines autem Aegyptii plerique subfusculi sunt et atrati...
Subfusculus is from fuscus, "dark-colored, dark, black"--the sub prefix would indicate "somewhat." Atratus is from ater, "black. dark."
St. Paul was mistaken for an Egyptian (Acts 21.38) by a Roman chiliarch in Jerusalem--who obviously thought that a white man might be an Egyptian. The Roman didn't think Paul was a Jew from Alexandria but a regular Egyptian.
Midianites or Ishmaelites sold Joseph as a slave in Egypt (Genesis 37). They were white, but not Europeans.
Cleopatra was Greek. Most of the ancient Egyptians were Greek. Negroes did not fly biplanes around the pyramids. Well actually they did until the White man stole their technology. White man always trying to keep the Black man down.
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After that, they vowed “Never Again!” and moved to Wakanda ...
“many markers of Greek and Roman identity”
The “We wuz Egypzun Kangz” afrocentrist crowd ain’t gonna like this.
Yes. Sub-Saharan Africans could claim the Nubians or the builders of Great Zimbabwe.
“white” is a skin tone.
Perhaps you mean the rough term “Caucasian”
And yes, Arabs, Indians (including the dark skinned Tamils), etc. are all “Caucasian”
Cleopatra was Macedonian by ancestry, with perhaps some Egyptian ancestry. In Hellenistic times there were lots of Greeks in Alexandria and in some other places in Egypt, but the original Egyptian population was not Greek. DNA studies show they were mostly related to the people of western Asia (with some sub-Saharan ancestry mixed in).
Why are whites called Caucasians anyway? The populations of the Caucasus (Armenians, Georgians, etc.) form a very small fraction of the white people of the world.
“BCE” has been around for a while. I think I first encountered it in 1970.“
You will see a pattern among those who use it.
Cleopatra was Macedonian by ancestry,
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I was quoting another poster hence the —
Sorry, didn’t notice the line. The original poster was evidently being sarcastic.
I remember a professor saying we should use BCE and CE because BC and AD would offend Muslims. From her surname I believe she was Jewish.
“Most of the ancient Egyptians were Greek”
—> that is incorrect, so, so incorrect.
The “Greeks” who were the ruling elite of the Egyptian kingdom from 300 BC to 50 BC were Macedonians technically, a part-Greek, part-Thracian/Dacian entity.
These were only ever the top tier of the elite, like the top 0.1% of the population.
The Ptolemy’s mostly married themselves - brothers to sisters or at most to first cousins, so they were heavily inbred.
But these Ptolemys were only the 33rd - yes, the THIRTY-THIRD dynasty ruling over the Egyptians.
Most of the prior dynasties were native Egyptian - but there were also the “Black Pharoahs” - the Nubians who were definitely dark skinned.
There was also the Assyrian dynasty, the Libyan and prior to that the Hyksos dynasties.
Mohammedans don’t mind the use of the terms Before Christ and AD - they use their own Hegira calendar, but BC and AD don’t offend them as “Isa” is a prophet in their philosophy
Her ancestors don’t matter. She was a professor and thus 99% chance she was an indoctrinated leftist.
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