Using DNA to find Goths

[sturlus]

Dear Arthur and Authurn
You post interesting thoughts in your remarks and I am sorry to have 
been away for some time now, not being able to participate. We have 
had a very interesting period of collecting on the Canary Islands. 
And next week we will travel to the Ukraine, to stay for two weeks 
mainly on the Crimea and in and around Mariupol.

We will in this first visit do collections mainly among the Greek 
settlements and especially in the Mariupol area on the Sea of Azov 
coast, where the Greeks are very well organized in cultural groups. 
This first visit to this area, hopefully of many, has first of all 
the goal of establishing good long term relationships in the areas 
we will visit, in addition to the goal of collecting DNA-samples.

Searching among the Greek cultural groups is something we have 
chosen to do, because there might be a chance that late Crimean-
Goths have been integrated into Greek communities. This is of 
course, if Crimean Goths survived into the 14-15 hundreds. As you 
may recall, two visitors came to visit Busbecq in Istanbul, one Goth 
who had completely forgotten his own language and a Greek, who had 
learned Crimean Gothic and it was him who gave Busbecq the words 
that we now know. Remember that we only are able to search Y-
cromosone or Mitocondrial DNA lines that go in straight lines 
backwards, as of now, and this doesn't make things easier, but could 
give us some interesting straight father-son lines from the past.

I agree with Authurn that the haplogroup I is very interesting. 
Regarding Haplogroups, click on this link 
http://www.dnaheritage.com/ysnptree.asp and point 
on I to see where we can find I in today's populations in the world. 
I do also agree with Arthur that the Goths made it more or less as a 
whole down to the Black Sea area. Who knows what we might find! We 
are also invited to visit an Crimean Gothic archeologic site in 
Bahkchisaray, by the way, which will be very interesting. I'll be 
sure to keep everyone posted!

Wish us luck!

Sturla


--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "authurn2002" <harry at ...> wrote:
>
> --- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, Arthur Jones <arthurobin2002@> 
wrote:
> 
> 
> Hi Arthur,
> 
> What I mean is one must either compare ancient with ancient or 
modern
> with modern, because of the way the y chromosone develops. 
> 
> For example, a good place to start looking for a marker would be in
> Haplogroup I. It is widespread throughout Europe but virtually 
absent
> elsewhere. It developed in southern europe and spread northwards 
after
> the Last Glacial Maximum. It exists in high frequencies in the
> germanic world and is low in Italy and Iberia.
> 
> HGI has several developments of its own, the most common being, 
I1a,
> I1b and I1c.
> 
> I1a originated in Franco-Cantabria and spread to northwestern 
Europe
> after the Last Glacial Maximum. Its maximum frequency today is in
> Norwegians (38.9%) and is frequent in Scandinavia and Germany (25%)
> 
> I1b is divided into I1b2, frequent in Sardinia and the Basque 
country,
> and undifferentiated I1b*, with a wide distribution and higher
> frequency, and a primary focus in the eastern Balkans (up to 40% in
> Bosnians). I1b* originated somewhere between the Adriatic and the
> Black Sea.
> 
> I1c is correlated with I1a and shares a common haplotype with it,
> indicating a shared history of the two. Maximum frequency of 12.5% 
in
> Germans.
> 
> It is however the timing of these developments which is difficult. 
The
> changes can be thought of as HGI being the trunk of a tree and the
> later developments as being the branches and the twigs.
> 
> Each of the above has several more recent developments which 
brings us
> very roughly into the migration period age. Even if one was lucky
> enough to find one of these later developments common to say 3 
ancient
> graves, it would still be too widespread to be of much use.
> 
> We can't match such ancient dna with modern dna because the modern
> material contains yet more developments.
> 
> Modern populations provide better matches precisely because of 
this.
> 
> cheers
> 
> authurn
> a resident of elmet
>









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