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Archiver > GENEALOGY-DNA > 2008-05 > 1211545038


From: Alan R <>
Subject: Re: [DNA] S21/S28 Split+m223 stuff
Date: Fri, 23 May 2008 12:17:18 +0000 (GMT)


David Faux said

I believe that the finding of S28 being older than S21 is an artifact reflecting a skewing of the data. At a time in the not too distant past there was a massive Ui Neill or Genghis - like effect which created the extremely large "Frisian type" of S21. Hence by including these in with the rest of the haplogroup it artificially lowers the age and gives the illusion of being more youthful than it really is. S21 sits on a S116 negative plafform along with R1b1c* "Eastern type". S28 sits atop S116 positive so the probability that it is older than S21 makes very little sense to me. Clearly a reasonable assumption that S116 and S21 occured about about the same time. However here we are being asked to accept an unusual assertion that despite being downstream of the juncture of S21 and S116, that S28 is older than S21 - not in my world, not without evidence beyond unrooted numerical calculations.

My reply

I am not sure it is illogical for S28 to be older than S21. All we know is that at one point prior to these markers there was an S116-line (ancestral state) and an S116+ line (derived). The two lines could have run in parallel for some time prior to the S21 and S28 mutations occurring on either line. The S21 may just have happened to have taken place at a far further distance along the ancestral S116- line than S28 happened along the younger S116+ line. So, unless I am misinterpreting this, its perfectly possible for S21 to be younger than S28. So, I am not necessarily surprised if the MRCA of S28 is a little older than the MRCA of S21 and that the inter-clade MRCA is not greatly older. The scenario of a rapid sequence of an S116 +/- split then two further mutations (one along each line) coinciding with prolific lines seems plausible enough and suggestive of a major demographic event. Timing of the latter is the big issue. For me, this makes the
S116- S21- people especially interesting and of course their relationship with eastern R1b1c. I cant help feeling that an important part of the story of R1b's movement is wrapped up in them.

A later date say in the Neolithic for the initial spread of S116- into western Europe from south-eastern Europe would in some ways tie in with the archaeological picture. In the Neolithic, the SE of Europe was the driving force of the spread of farming westwards both in terms of the Linearbandkeramic and Cardial cultures which appear to have originated around Hungary and the Adriatic Balkans coast respectively but probably both had at least partial deeper roots in the southern Balkans stretching back to Greece and then Turkey. Now, in my opinion, that's hardly an origin-to-destination route that simple modern distribution and frequency would scream out at you but it apparently fits the suggested relative seniority of R1b clades. Perhaps it could have been achieved by a series of unusual demographic effects during the unbelievably rapid spread and expansion that is proven to have happened in the case of both the Neolithic cultures noted above. One
problem with the theory is that farming spread by two main routes (up the Danube etc and along the Med.) as noted above and it would seem a leap to suggest that in both cases a minority (surely they were - but who knows?) of R1b people among the mass from the SE of Europe just so happened in both cases to mushroom in the west at the expense of other lines among the settlers (unless selection was a factor - see recent post re the R1b and mtDNA H baby boom possibility). It is certainly very hard to explain the present distribution of R1b in western Europe in terms of Neolithic settlement unless both cultures are involked. For instance the Iberian Neolithic and perhaps large areas of France, Italy and Switzerland seem to have been mainly subject to Cardial influence while other areas of central to western Europe from Hungary to the Low Counties seem to have been influenced by Linearbandkeramic. If anything the R1b theory probably fits better the Cardial
angle but it cant easily explain it all. BTW, the Neolithic of the British Isles is as usual idiosyncratic and insular meaning continental origins are hard to pinpoint although northern France seems the most likely source both in terms of material culture and geography. Unfortunately there seems to be a lot of debate going on about the origins of the northern French Neolithic too, with the debate focusing on relative importance of Cardal, Linearbandkeramic and indigenous elements.

Other than this Neolithic scenario I have just painted, it seems to me that to find a scenario that would explain the relative ages of eastern and western R1b (old SE, younger as one moves west) I think one has to go all the way back before the LGM and invoke multiple LGM refugia i.e the 'traditional' R1b explanation. I just don't see any other obviously demographically profound SE to north-west spread other than in the early Neolithic and in the pre-LGM settlement. Obviously once the S116- ancestral line was established in the west, this and later derivatives could have been further spread from there by later movements so the Neolithic distribution of R1b in the west need no have been as extensive as it later was. This might also tie up with the popular (in the last 20 years) theory of the Neolithic arrival of Indo-Europeans. For what its worth, the Cardial culture has been linked by some academeics with the arrival of the Italo-Celtic branch of
Indo-European languages. It has also long been commented by many that the strength of R1b in the west bears some correlation (albeit only on a crude scale with several anomalies in detail) with the degree of influence of the Celts. Obviously the Basques don't help this theory but I wouldn't rule this out completely.

Alan

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