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Some interesting news in & research this week

Earliest evidence of horseback riding found in ‘eastern cowboys’ AAAS science.org/content/article/ea

The importance of the Yamnaya in the domestication of is well known, & the latest evidence for the dating comes from skeletal form rather than , but I find it frustrating when a report refers to genetic evidence without mentioning a single haplogroup. Why? (Hoping to be more accessible to gneral reader?)
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www.science.orgEarliest evidence of horseback riding found in ‘eastern cowboys’Wear and tear on human skeletons traces activity back 5000 years

Ancient Analysis Reconstructs Legacy of the ancient-origins.net/news-evolu

The absence of mention of haplogroups is even stranger in this piece, as

1) It notes limits of early work on the so-called Cohen Modal Haplotype, which involves Y-DNA

2) Whereas & Cohanim share similar traits, over half of Ashkenazic Levites display an unusual haplotype (formerly R1a1a, now called R1a-Y2619). So haplotypes are central to this genetic quest

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Ancient OriginsAncient DNA Analysis Reconstructs Legacy of the Biblical LevitesBy Dr. Eran Elhaik

The connection between the Levite and Yamnya histories is that the dominant ancestral haplogroups among the Yamnaya were R1a and R1b.

eupedia.com/genetics/yamna_cul

The seemingly anomalous Ashkenazic Levite was also a variant of R1a: R is commonly associated with Slavs, Vikings, and some populations of Iran and the Indian subcontinent.
Thus, some geneticists hypothesized that the source was converts from the Khaganate.

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/

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EupediaHistory and genetics of the Yamna cultureThe Yamna (Pit-Grave) culture is considered as one of the homelands of the Proto-Indo-European people. Discover how Yamnayans lived, what they looked like physically, and who they resembled genetically.

A much more sweeping theory posited a origin for the core population as a whole. A century ago, it was at least plausible to the extent that, like Ptolemaic astronomy, it accounted for appearances. However, modern and alike have rejected this view, which is today essentially the province of cranks & .

And that brings us back to the present article

Ancient DNA Analysis Reconstructs Legacy of the Biblical Levites |ancient-origins.net/news-evolu

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Ancient OriginsAncient DNA Analysis Reconstructs Legacy of the Biblical LevitesBy Dr. Eran Elhaik
Jim Wald

It is therefore intriguing (ironic) that, having rejected the widely accepted Middle Eastern & biblical origins of , Elhaik claims to be able to determine precisely the biblical and origins of , once again based on a novel methodology (here using autosomal

I will be interested to see the reaction in scientific publications


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