R-Y14415 and its origins

R-14415/14416 is a very interesting subclade, and it is a pity FTDNA does not have information on the Uighur/Indian side, or SNP Tracker would have got the path correctly (more centered on the Pontic-Caspian steppes). Same lack of information – due to the lack of many other samples in other Asian Z2108 and Z2103 branches – affects older path nodes and TMRCA estimations. I think a big correction is expected soon to the SNP age estimations with help of FTDNA R&D team, but I don’t know exactly when; and that won’t solve the geographical problem, unless the nodes are manually pegged based on external information like YFull’s or from ancient DNA.

Anyway, I don’t think that the TMRCA estimates of Z2103 branches (currently ca. 3400 BC) are going to be much older than the formation dates estimated by YFull for Z2103 (ca. 4100 BC), although some branches might get a more reliable starting point for their migration. Based on YTree estimations with Iain McDonald’s method, maybe a little older for all of them.

Its distribution to the east and west of the steppes (starting ca. 3400 BC) appears to reflect the Late Repin (→ Early Yamnaya / Afanasievo) expansion, and the distribution later in Europe with R-Y14512 starting ca. 2600 BC reminds of the Bell Beaker expansion.

In fact, it has been found in ancient DNA (as a basal R-14415*/14416* subclade) in MOK19A and MOK22, from the Mokrin Necropolis, which confirms its spread with West Yamnaya/East Bell Beakers.

Nevertheless, the lack of a proper modern sampling makes it impossible to infer where the R-Y14414 subclade might have come from. It looks like a single late bottleneck event (ca. 1800 BC), possibly from Northern Europe (Germanic peoples??) due to (1) its modern presence in Sweden, Germany, or Scotland and (2) the more frequent BA-IA north→south European expansions; but these regions are clearly over-tested relative to SE Europe.

In short, I’d say this is one of the lineages whose modern distribution shows a paradigmatic Yamanaya-Afanasievo expansion, and in this case it has been now proven for the western part in ancient DNA. Maybe some of those Old Uyghurs from Mongolia published by Jeong et al. (2020) will show the subclade, too, but I think one is already within the R-CTS7763 branch, so that is probably more likely for the rest of them.

Sorry, I didn’t see the post. I have been tweaking the forum a little bit more, to see if I can make it work.

It’s impossible to know, but I don’t think you can describe the Swedish sample R-Y14422* as as “the most basal”, since it is just “basal”; in other words, it forms another parallel branch to yours, for which no modern relatives have yet been found. In fact, it separated so far back that only Late Repin would connect your line to his, with likely parallel migrations in different Yamnaya clans.

If anything, based on TMRCA, the Russian individual (also basal, but this to R-Y14422), as well as the approximately sister clades in a Swede and German (and later Scottish) might be quite relevant: it reminded me of the pattern of some ‘eastern’ haplogroups that have been recently found to be part of expanding Viking lineages.

The TMRCA changes are so radically different, though, that no particular migration can be easily described for the whole group. Also, there are many more testers from Western and Northern Europe, so my guess is that a similar testing level in Central-Eastern Europe might give a lot more samples (throughout the tree) and maybe change this first impression.

For example, it wouldn’t be surprising that R-Y14422 belonged to eastern Urnfield groups, and as such formed eventually part of Celtic migrations, hence its current distribution. Or that it remained a local lineage that formed eventually part of Slavic lines later migrating to the northwest. I wouldn’t bet for these alternatives right now, but they are certainly possible.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by .

Hi,

Thank you for the update. I’m following this topic.

That’s interesting, I’ll try to read through it.

Best regards,

Dmitry