{A possible ancient migration from Asia to Africa was proposed by Cruciani et al. (2002) to explain the presence of some unusual Y-chromosome lineages identified in West Africa. Haplogroup R1 (defined by M173 mutation), without further branch defining mutations (M269 and M17) specific to Europeans, accounted for ~40% of the Y-chromosomes in North-Cameroon, while not yet having been sampled elsewhere in Africa.}

Thought Writes:

The interesting thin is that this mutation appears in Africa at a time when cranial and skeletal remains in Europe are still tropical African in a phenotypic sense.

>> The interesting thin is that this mutation appears in Africa at a time when cranial and skeletal remains in Europe are still tropical African in a phenotypic sense.

Upper Paleolithic Europeans had prominent noses and chins, wide mandibles and deep eye sockets.

African Exodus
By Chris Stringer

"Nor does the picture get any clearer when we move on to the Cro-Magnons, the presumed ancestors of modern Europeans. Some were more like present day Australians or Africans, judged by objective anatomical categorizations..."

They give two explanations for the presence of U5 and U6.

"Haplogroups U5 and U6, on the other hand, were found to be restricted to populations that are thought to represent the descendants of a southern expansion of Berbers."

The problem is that there is no historical evidence to corroborate this explanation of Berber expansion southward.

"Thus, our U5 sequences from the Guinean Fulbe people corroborate Cruciani's hypothesis of a prehistoric migration from Eurasia to West Sub-Saharan Africa, testified by their present day restricted and localised distribution."

Nowq when did this prehistoric migration from Eurasia take place and what did the people look like? Why are the other populations near the Fulbe lacking U5?

"Haplogroup R1 (defined by M173 mutation), without further branch defining mutations (M269 and M17) specific to Europeans, accounted for ~40% of the Y-chromosomes in North-Cameroon, while not yet having been sampled elsewhere in Africa.}"

Once this Haplogroup is sampled elsewhere in Africa it will show that it is certainly not Eurasian in origin. We all know Northern Cameroonians are NOT the slightest bit Caucasoid morphological so this is a good example of why phenotype does correspond to genotype.

>> Once this Haplogroup is sampled elsewhere in Africa it will show that it is certainly not Eurasian in origin.

The origin of haplogroup R is not in dispute, as it is prevalent in Eurasia, absent in most of Africa and belongs to the Eurasian portion of the NRY phylogeny.

>> The problem is that there is no historical evidence to corroborate this explanation of Berber expansion southward.

There's never "historical" evidence among illiterate people.

>> Nowq when did this prehistoric migration from Eurasia take place and what did the people look like? Why are the other populations near the Fulbe lacking U5?

Berbers are Caucasoid, so U5/R were brought into West Africa by Caucasoid Berbers. Other ethnic groups lack U5 because they are more purely aboriginal.

"The origin of haplogroup R is not in dispute, as it is prevalent in Eurasia, absent in most of Africa and belongs to the Eurasian portion of the NRY phylogeny."

The authors give two explanations, a prehistoric migration from Eurasia and Berber expansion. If it was indeed prehistoric there would be some archaeological and skeletal evidence to support this. I'm sure they just didn't come in drop off their genes and leave no skeletal remains or other archaeological evidence.

"There's never "historical" evidence among illiterate people."

There is no historical evidence. If thats the case Dienekes, Greeks with their high incidence of haplogroup E which originated in East Africa are part Negroid.

"Berbers are Caucasoid, so U5/R were brought into West Africa by Caucasoid Berbers. Other ethnic groups lack U5 because they are more purely aboriginal."

When? Not all Berbers are Caucasoid and the historical evidence places no Berbers in Guinea. That still doesn't explain why only the Fulbe have it(low levels) and why the surrounding African groups don't. East Africans are Negroid so haplogroup E and M1 were brought into Greece by Negroid East Africans, using your logic.

The Fulbe (aka the Fulas or Fulani, including the famous Wodaabe tribe) themselves believe they are related to the Berbers or Arabs, and have a mixed negroid-caucasian appearance. See my post 'Wodabout the Wodaabe?' at www.gnxp.com.

"The Fulbe (aka the Fulas or Fulani, including the famous Wodaabe tribe) themselves believe they are related to the Berbers or Arabs, and have a mixed negroid-caucasian appearance. See my post 'Wodabout the Wodaabe?' at www.gnxp.com."

Thats not true sir, sorry. The Fulbe, depending on where they're at have very low levels on mixture, so they are not Negroid/Caucasian hybrids. The perceived relationship to Arabs or Berbers has more to do with the fact that alot of Fulabes are Muslims and like to trace their origins or kinship to Arabs. I'm a descendant of a Hausa-Fulani father and I am very familiar with Fulbes. Their physical appearance has more to do with natural variation in Africans, not mixing with Berbers as the levels of mixture indicate.

{Not all Berbers are Caucasoid}

Thought Writes:

Good point. In fact the spread of the Berber speakers seems to correspond with the spread of the Afro-Asiatic languages and the Haplotype E3b2-M81 from Eastern Africa to NW Africa.

Luis et al.
2004

"This proposal is in accordance with a population expansion involving E3bs-M81 believed to have occurred in northwestern Africa ~2ky ago (Crucianni et al. 2002). The considerably older linear expansion estiame of the Egyptian E3b2-M81 (5.4 ky ago) is also compatible with this scenario."

Thought Writes:

In fact many of the Berber speakers in the Siwa oasis have phenotypes similar to other tropical Sub-Saharan East Africans.

{Their physical appearance has more to do with natural variation in Africans, not mixing with Berbers as the levels of mixture indicate.}

Thought Writes:

Some seem not to realize that physical anthrologists have long ago discarded the out of date "Hanitic" theory. Narrow noses and faces among Black Africans is consistent with adaptation to a hot/dry climate.

>> If thats the case Dienekes, Greeks with their high incidence of haplogroup E which originated in East Africa are part Negroid.

East Africans are Ethopid/Negrid in various proportion. The Ethiopid element is the more ancient. The racial situation in East Africa has changed since the ancestors of Eurasians left it, evidenced by the fact that modern East Africans possess Y haplogroups A, B and in some cases E3a and also mtDNA haplogroups L0, L1, L2. These are very ancient and lacking in Eurasia, indicating that they were added later to the East African original homeland of later Eurasians.

>> Not all Berbers are Caucasoid and the historical evidence places no Berbers in Guinea.

Berber is an ethno-linguistic designation, just as today not all Americans are Caucasoid. The original Proto-Berbers were Caucasoid racially.

>> In fact the spread of the Berber speakers seems to correspond with the spread of the Afro-Asiatic languages and the Haplotype E3b2-M81 from Eastern Africa to NW Africa.

Northern Africans came from the Near East: "the Neolithic transition in this part of the world was accompanied by demic diffusion of Afro-Asiatic speaking pastoralists from the Middle East."

000589.html

"Northern Africans came from the Near East: "the Neolithic transition in this part of the world was accompanied by demic diffusion of Afro-Asiatic speaking pastoralists from the Middle East."

If you're taking this to mean that Afro-Asiatic languages came to Africa via the Middle East you are wrong as genes cannot tell what person spoke what languages. Proto Afro-Asiatic left Africa in between 13,000 and 10,000 B.C., so those so-called "Afro-Asaitic speaking pastoralists" were speaking an Afro-Asiatic language that descended from the original proto Afro-Asiatic language that left Africa, so do not intentionally distort the text of that study.

"East Africans are Ethopid/Negrid in various proportion. The Ethiopid element is the more ancient. The racial situation in East Africa has changed since the ancestors of Eurasians left it"

What are you inferring by saying the racial situation changed? We are talking about genes, not bioanthropology. Ethiopid/Negrid aren't defined racial labels and is not used by anthropologists, so much for the semantical tapdancing.

" Berber is an ethno-linguistic designation, just as today not all Americans are Caucasoid. The original Proto-Berbers were Caucasoid racially."

Are you saying this based on bioanthropology or are you trying to equate genes with race again? Bioanthroplogy tells us that North Africa was always heterogenous and phenotypically diverse.

"The racial situation in East Africa has changed since the ancestors of Eurasians left it, evidenced by the fact that modern East Africans possess Y haplogroups A, B and in some cases E3a and also mtDNA haplogroups L0, L1, L2. These are very ancient and lacking in Eurasia, indicating that they were added later to the East African original homeland of later Eurasians."

As far as the L haplogroups are concerned, the reason L0-L2 are lacking in Eurasia is because OOA migrants carried L3 from whence haplogroups M and N left Africa to populate the rest of the world. So no, L0-L2 wasn't added later and if they did they arose in and within Africa, not from outside.

>> If you're taking this to mean that Afro-Asiatic languages came to Africa via the Middle East you are wrong as genes cannot tell what person spoke what languages.

Pre-Arab North Africans spoke Afroasiatic languages like Ancient Egyptian and Berber languages. These North Africans came from the Near East, bringing their languages with them.

>> Proto Afro-Asiatic left Africa in between 13,000 and 10,000 B.C.

That is just a theory. An alternative theory is that Afroasiatic languages evolved in the Near East. Even if what you're saying is true, it is still the case that Afroasiatic languages in North Africa were not indigenous in Africa, but came from the Near East.

>> So no, L0-L2 wasn't added later and if they did they arose in and within Africa, not from outside.

L0-L2 arose in Africa, but not in east Africa, and more specifically the region from which Eurasians originated. Let me make this clearer:

1. Eurasians originated from a region X in East Africa.
   
2. Eurasians lack L0-L2 and A-B, hence region X did not have L0-L2 and A-B when the Eurasians left X.
   
3. Today, east Africans have L0-L2 and A-B
   

The inescapable conclusion is that there has been a racial change in East Africa, with the addition of L0-L2 and A-B that was previously lacking there and in particular in the region where Eurasians originated.

[long irrelevant excerpt removed]

As we can see from a linguist, Ancient Egyptian the language didn't came from the outside by Neolithic people from the Near East and for them to say it was Afro-Asiatic pastoralists does not imply these peoples brought Afro-Asiatic languages into North Africa. Furthermore the linguistic evidence trumps YOUR theory because though Ancient Egyptian and Berber are related to Semitic languages in the Near East, there is no evidence that the proto-languages for these branches of Afro-Asiatic were ever spoken in the Near East, thats why genetics cannot be used to infer the spread of language. What you are saying is that North Africa was devoid of Afro-asiatic languages until Near Easterners brought them in, an assumption that study you cited does not imply. Your thinking real simplistic to say the least.

"That is just a theory. An alternative theory is that Afroasiatic languages evolved in the Near East. Even if what you're saying is true, it is still the case that Afroasiatic languages in North Africa were not indigenous in Africa, but came from the Near East."

The most widely accepted and plausible theory is that Afro-Asiatic languages came from Africa and this is based on the diversity of Afro-Asiatic being spoken in Africa where all branches are spoken versus on in the Near east where only 1 is spoken. And yes, Afro-asiatic languages spoken in North Africa came from Africans, not from invading Middle Easterners, quit distorting that genetic study. If those people were Afro-Asiatic speaking they appeared to have not affected the languages of Ancient Egyptian and Berber for these languages are distinct enough to form a separate branch of their own within Afro-Asiatic.

I will not discuss your a priori assumptions about the origin of North Africans and Afroasiatic languages. The genetic evidence is clear: North African Y-chromosomal diversity is inconsistent with the presence of North Africans in Africa in pre-Neolithic times, and consistent with their migration to N. Africa in the Neolithic from the Near East. They brought with them agriculture and Afroasiatic languages.

Whether or not Afroasiatic languages were already spoken in E. Africa before the Neolithic is a separate issue. Maybe yes, maybe no. The fact is that North Africans (and their languages) did not reach North Africa directly from East Africa but from the Near East.

I'm not going to argue with Art of War, as experience shows that there is no point in arguing with people with fixed ideas.

For any other readers who are interested in the question of Fulani origins, I refer to my post at gnxp and trhe anthropological works cited there.

The idea that the Fulani have mixed origins is a very old one. Early travellers in the region noticed that the Fulani looked different from neighbouring peoples, and invented various hypotheses, some very far-fetched, to account for it. But the new genetic evidence seems to confirm that they have partly Caucasoid ancestry.

{But the new genetic evidence seems to confirm that they have partly Caucasoid ancestry}

Thought Writes:

This person is obviously using the term "caucasoid" to reference a genetic sequence in populations that were still morphologically tropically adapted. Terms like "caucasoid" and "negroid" are the last stand of the subtle (and not so subtle) white supremacists who can't stand the fact that it was Black East Aficans that fathered what we call Western Civilization. They use genetic traits and physical charcteristics as if they were naturally interchangeable. NE Africa/Egyptian cranial remains are consistent with other Sub-saharan types from 33,000 B.C. to 2000 B.C.

E-M78δ predates the birth of animal husbandry and plant domestication in the Near East. E-M78α post dates these changes.

I don't attach any importance to the term 'caucasoid', and I really don't care whether the ancestors of the Fulani came from Asia, Europe, or from Africa north of the Sahara.

The point is simply that the genetic evidence seems to confirm that they have a substantial proportion of ancestry coming from outside sub-Saharan Africa, which is what their own traditions say, and what you would guess from their appearance anyway. If you check out the quotations in my gnxp post, you will see that the Fulani (or at least the more traditional, nomadic ones), very definitely do not see themselves as 'black'.

{The point is simply that the genetic evidence seems to confirm that they have a substantial proportion of ancestry coming from outside sub-Saharan Africa, which is what their own traditions say, and what you would guess from their appearance anyway.}

Thought Writes:

The problem with your theory is that the proposed in-migration occurred at a time when Eurasian populations still exhibited physical features similar to Africans. Narrow noses and faces are a result of Africans adapting to a hot, dry climate. The Lemba have genes that originate outside of Africa, yet this has had little bearing on their physical features. Any in-migration at the proposed time given would be by a group of Black Eurasians, migrating back into Africa. Caucasoids, had not yet evolved.

The extract quoted by Dienekes describes the migration as 'prehistoric', and I don't know if it can be dated more precisely than that.

From skeletal remains, etc, a recognisably 'Caucasoid' phenotype existed at least 5,000 years ago, and I would guess that the ancestors of the Fulbe/Fulani migrated into sub-Saharan Africa after that date. In fact, much of the spread of the Fulbe across what is now Niger and northern Nigeria has occurred within *historic* times. Of course, there has been a lot of intermating with nearby sub-Saharan populations, despite the Fulbe racist prejudice against 'eating the fruit of the bitter black plum tree'.

The poster signing as "Art of War" wrote (July 10th, 11:14 PM),

"The most widely accepted and plausible theory is that Afro-Asiatic languages came from Africa and this is based on the diversity of Afro-Asiatic being spoken in Africa where all branches are spoken, versus in the Near east where only 1 is spoken."

Let's apply the same reasoning in another case, to see how it holds up. Let's write:

"The most widely accepted and plausible theory is that the Romance languages came from outside the Italian peninsula and this is based on the diversity of Romance languages being spoken outside the Italian peninsula where all branches are spoken, versus inside the Italian peninsula where only one is spoken."

Furthermore, though I happen to know strictly nothing of current theories of the origins of Afro-Asiatic, the claim that any firm evidence exists that it originated or "first left Africa" (Art of War's post of same date, 3:34 PM) between twelve and fifteen thousand years ago is simply not credible on its face, when no other language origins in the world are even the subject of hypotheses as far back as a small fraction of that. Indo-European's origins for instance cannot even be hypothesized about, let alone any firm conclusions drawn, longer ago than something like three or four thousand BC. Any dogmatic linguistic claim about any language in the world dating to ten thousand or thirteen thousand years BC simply cannot be taken seriously.

-- Fred Scrooby (used to sign as "Unadorned")