There has been quite a bit of interest shown in the work that Ellen, Brian and I have been doing, so I will offer an overview of the matter, including what might turn out to be a very controversial thesis. Good luck to those who wish to refute it since the evidence from history, archaeology, and genetics is entirely consistent.
This study began when I noted that my R1a uncle, whose ancestry is from the Norse colony of the Shetland Islands, had 33 close matches with the Altai of Central Asia, nd only a scattering of others (e.g., India, China, and very few in Europe). Others from Shetland also had similar match patterns. Then a participant was assigned to haplogroup Q which is found only in Central Asia (Native Americans are Q3 but arose out of the same population). Then another of my participants was placed in haplogroup K, which is found in highest concentations in the Middle East and particularly in Central Asia. Clearly something that had not been previously documented was been observed here.
An extensive analysis of R1a showed a distinct Eastern European motif, and a very different Norse motif. The Norse patterns were bimodal in Norway proper, but in the orse
colonies (e.g., Iceland, Shetland, Faroe Islands, as well as the UK in general) there was a predominence of types that more closely resembled those along the Chinese border than Poland. I have charted the modal haplotype of many groups in Europe.
Thanks to access given to me by genetic researchers I have been in the fortunate position of having modal values of most of the tribal groups in Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and groups all the way to Turkey. The highest frequency of R1a anywhere is found among people such as the Kyrgyz, where it reaches a solid 63% of the population. It was
spectacular to see my uncle being an almost exact match to most of the groups in Central Asia, but bearing very little resemblance to any group in Eastern Europe. His Altai matches were not just an anomaly.
In addition, I plotted all the available Q signatures from Mongolia to Germany (where there are only a scattering that would be consistent with a sprinkling of Y chromosome left from the documented Hunnish incursions in Europe). None - the - less the highest rate of Q was Iceland, but it is also seen at about 4% in Shetland, Norway, and Sweden. Haplogroup Q has to contain the most diverse haplotypes imaginable - even within a single tribal unit.
Q can make up 60% or more of some tribal groups, but 20% or less being much more common. In Europe it is less than 1% except in Hungary where it may reach 3% (the Hun incursions would likely explain this finding).
K is even more rare, although less than 1% in Europe it reaches 12% among Mongolians. In Europe it is very spotty, but is recorded in Norway, Sweden, the Faroe Islands and Shetland.
In my quest to find the best haplotype match to my 3 Shetland participants, the only location which fit all three was the Azeri of Azerbaijan. This will take on great significance as we shall soon see.
There is ample archaeological and historical data on the tribes of Central Asia who moved on horseback in successive waves across the steepes from Kazakhstan to the Black Sea and beyond. There were the Scythians (whose elaborate mound burials were the subject of a 2003 National Geographical special), and subsequent groups of the same cultural backgroud who took the same route, displacing or absorbing their predecessors - the Cimmerians, the Sarmatians (Jagyres, Roxilani, and the Alans also known as the Ases) the Sakas, and the Huns.
Meanwhile in the 1st Century AD a group of Osterogoths moved from Sweden to Poland and made a relentless march south (all amply shown by the archaeological record) to reach the Don River which empties into the Black Sea via the Sea of Azov. By 362 AD there were three groups of people in the region, the Osterogoths between the Danube and the Don, and the Alani (Ases) east of the Don down to the Caucasus Mountains, and the recently arrived Huns north of the Alans also on the east side of the Don.
The Huns and Alans then absorbed the Osterogoths pushing the latter's western cousins across the Danube poised in turn to become the barbarians at the gates of Rome. Meanwhile those in the area of the Black Sea had become a melange and out of this "chaos" emerged a Hunnish leader known as Uldin. He is the first documented Hun or Alani "king" and he won many battles, and there are stories of how he used a severed head for warning the people at Adrianople of what was to come. He attacked
Roman territories, achieved great notariety, but disappeared from the historical record in 408 when the combined Germanic and Hunnish peoples moved north.
The Prose Eddas and the Heimskringla written from historical sources available to the Icelander Snorri Sturluson are fascinating in the detail about Norse history offered - including very specific information that can be verified. Since he, as was then the scaldic tradition, wrote stories of mythical deeds he is written off as a writer of fiction, not fact. Many over the years have challenged these assumptions, including the most recent, Thorburn Heyerdahl who actually brought back to Norway the tribesmen he believed to be the ancestors of the Norse aristocracy (the Azeri of Azerbaijan).
Basically Snorri said that the ancestors of the Norse kings resided east of the river Don, and were led by Odin, who had vast holdings south of the Ural Mountains. He and is people were known as Ases, or Asir, and after many battles (in one case his possession of a severed head is emphasized), he left two brothers in charge of his
main power base along a ridge of the Caucasus Mountains (Asgaard - likely Chasgar) and with his people headed north. Most, however were men as apprently they took "women of the land" in Scandanavia as wives.
When he reached Sweden he negotiated a power sharing arrangement with then King Gyfir who was made a deal he could not refuse (the Aser / Ases having a mighty rmy)
and Odin lived at Gamla Uppsala on Lake Malar in Sweden where he died and was buried. This would have been approximately 450 AD. There are 3 burial mounds (an old Scythian burial tradition not seen in Sweden until then) at Gamla Uppsala dated to the 5th and 6th Centuries and associated with descendants of Odin mentioned in the Yngling Sagas.
It seems that the people noted by Snorri the Ases (Alans), or Asir may have been the Azer (which means Fire in Persian and High in Turkic), ancestors to the Azerbaijanis.
Recall that of all the groups anywhere only the Azeri sample contained individuals whose haplotypes were very similar to the three Shetland participants. As a matter of fact the Azeri K was a 10/11 match to the Shetland participant.
These were perhaps the group led by the "two brothers" of Odin, who in recent times have seen large scale migrations of Middle Eastern peoples such that presently the dominant presently is J.
In Scandanavia I estimate that about 40% of the R1a, and all of the Q and K can be traced to the Alani - Hun migration in the early 400s BC.
Concerning R1a, the three markers of most consequence in teasing out the European variety in Norway from the Asian type appear to be DYS19, DYS389i,ii, and YCAIIa,b. Others also have predictive value (but oddly, none in the second panel of 13 markers) and I will be developing an algorithm to separate out the R1a Norwegians who closely resemble the Eastern Europeans (also seen in their match profile in the Haplogroup Database of FTDNA), from those whose ancestors appear to have originated in Kazakhstan. All of this information with specific modal haplotypes of every conceivable population for R1a, Q, and K will soon be avaiable on my website (if permission can be granted to publish summaries of the data owned by genetic researchers).
I am hoping that Ellen and Brian can show that Ashkenazi and Levite Jews have a similar genetic profile with some originating in Eastern Europe, and others among the same group of people who left Kazakhstan and merged with the Norse, but the ancestors of some Jews headed in a southerly direction.
Regretfully the above story is of necessity abridged and so the full weight of evidence cannot be seen. There is so much more that can only be told with the modal
haplotype tables I have created for each population unit (e.g., tribal groups along the Chinese border). Hopefully this brief expose will heighten interest and tide those interested over until I obtain permission to publish the modal haplotypes found in the unpublished databases.
The authors were kind enough to send me the SNP and haplotype of every participant in their studies of Central and Western Asia. Now if every paper was like that of Cinnioglu (2004) for Turkey, and Helgason (2000) for Iceland - models for studies that follow - there would not be a delay. When Jim Wilson and I do our studies of Norway, Scotland, etc. we will be using SNPs, 37 marker haplotypes, surnames and will publish every single haplotype with surname and SNP marker (or make it available via a URL).
Although some of you may feel the urge to critique this thesis, I would ask you to hold off until you have seen the 40 page report I have created.
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