I have already argued that major Y-Haplogroup of North Africans is close to their dark skinned southern Africans. However, their skin colour and looks differ. I have argued it is probably because of matrilineages that are close to European matrilineages. Hebrew Bible gives some clues for this.
# And there was a famine in the land: and Abram went down into Egypt to sojourn there; for the famine was grievous in the land.
# And it came to pass, when he was come near to enter into Egypt, that he said unto Sarai his wife, Behold now, I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon:
# Therefore it shall come to pass, when the Egyptians shall see thee, that they shall say, This is his wife: and they will kill me, but they will save thee alive.
# Say, I pray thee, thou art my sister: that it may be well with me for thy sake; and my soul shall live because of thee.
# And it came to pass, that, when Abram was come into Egypt, the Egyptians beheld the woman that she was very fair.
# The princes also of Pharaoh saw her, and commended her before Pharaoh: and the woman was taken into Pharaoh's house.
As the characters of the Hebrew Bible are traced to present day Iraq/Iran regions, the chances are high that they were originally Y-Haplogroup J2a and mtDNA H or U people. It is likely at least one of the mutations responsible for light skin (on SLC24A5) arose in North-West of India. We have to observe West Asia aboriginal male J, European aboriginal male I are closely related to Indian aboriginal male H.
I have blogged about a recent study that discusses how West Asia and Europe is colonized by Proto-Indians. I feel we need to study some of our lighter skinned tribes like Halakki-s in Karnataka. Though their Y-Haplogroup is predominantly H, their mtDNA is majorly U something that is predominant in West Asia, North Africa and Europe.
3 comments:
I am not sure you can base genetic studies on Bible.
Generally a good article, but the there is a point in what I've just said. Your reply is most aprreciated.
:-). Well, what can I say? You have turned the idea of this post upside down. If you have read philological studies of the past, the interpretations of the texts didn't have any genetic basis (or had basis in pseudoscientific anthropometry studies). Nowadays, they are trying to fit the curve with genetic data. But I have based by interpretations of the texts on genetic data (not genetic data on scriptures, as you contend). There may be drawbacks with interpretations based on autosomal studies and coalescence time calculations but I believe uniparental lineages are still strong indicators of our post civilizational history.
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