>More than 5,000 years ago a nomadic group of shepherds rode out of the steppes of eastern Europe to conquer the rest of the continent. The group, today known as the Yamna or Pit Grave culture, brought with them an innovative new technology, wheeled carts, which enabled them to quickly occupy new lands. More than 4,500 years ago, the descendants of these people reached the Iberian peninsula and wiped out the local men, according to new research by a team of international scientists.
>“The collision of these two populations was not friendly; instead, the men who arrived almost completely pushed out the local men,” explains David Reich, a genetics professor at Harvard University who presented the results of the research at an event organized by New Scientist magazine on September 22, ahead of the study’s publication.
>The arrival of the hostile invaders in what is today Spain and Portugal had “a rapid and generalized genetic impact,” said Spanish scientist Íñigo Olalde at a conference two weeks ago in Jena, Germany. According to Olalde, during the Bronze Age, the subsequent populations had “40% of their genetic information and 100% of their Y chromosomes from the migrants.”
>Given that children inherit the Y chromosome from their fathers, “this means that the men who arrived had preferential access to local women, again and again,” said Reich at the September event.
>The study, which analyzed the DNA of the remains of 153 individuals dug up in the Iberian peninsula, is set to be published in one of the most important scientific journals in the world. Neither Reich or Olade, who are both from Harvard University, wanted to offer any more details. The geneticist Carles Lalueza-Fox, from the Barcelona Institute of Evolutionary Biology, also worked on the research.
elpais.com
Is all of Europe just a land inhabited by rape babies?