A role for Kura-Araxes in the spread of V88?

[alan]

This is an excellent recent paper on the culture.

http://kura-arax.tau.ac.il/system/files/Kohl.pdf

Although I believe in a more northerly history for P297, I believe a subset of P25 probably passed south perhaps around 10000BC or so when this became possible again with the closing off of the black sea-caspian channel, possibly into northern Iran initially where it may well have a raised concentration according to a recent paper.

From this sort of position it could have given rise to V88 around 4000BC at the time the neolithic arrives in northern Iran plateau and then could have been encorporated into the kura-araxes network which reached NW Iran c. 3500-3000bc. The report above has an excellent map which shows an offshoot of this culture headed down the east Med to Israel and adajcent. If that spread down the Levant looks familar from other posts its because Kura-Araxes was the main controller of the southern part of the Cirumpontic Metallugical Provence . I think there are a number of echoes of kura-araxes in the V88 distribution outside Africa. This sort of date for its passing down the east Med. would agree with the younger age that is arrived at when African V88 is looked at alone. Note I am only saying it may have been AN element in this culture, not the main one.

[alan]

I would add that it is interesting that Maykop (zone all M269 and M73 today) was quite separate and very distinct from Kura-Araxes but they both appear overlap , albeit at different time, in NW Iran with the Maykop connection perhaps 4000-3400BC with that area being replaced with a Kura-Araxes period in the same area shortly after. Its and perhaps the extreme east end of the Caucasus are the only common denometor where both cultures were in the same zone. However, V88 is clearly something that has arised from a very distance P25 cousin of the P297 clades and they may have been separated since the late upper Palaeolithic. Presumably P25 was pretty much all there was before 10000BC. Based on archaeological considerations I see a potential divide in P25 occuring around 9 or 10000BC when what would have remained in P297* which is dated to this very moment and remaining P25*. That timewise corresponds very well to the opening up of the Caucasus-west side of Caspian north-south route and the appearance of epipalaeolithic groups around the south Caspian for the first time. This is also in the same ballpark as the younger dryas cold snap. A lot seems to fit some sort of geographical division in R1b starting at this time. Unfortunately not a lot of P25* survives and apparently no P297* which although annoying does fit into a sparsely populated epipalaeolithic scenario. We have nothing of substance for any of these lines until after 5000BC when we suddenly see M73, M269 and V88 appear. As I have posted many times before, I think that is a strong indicator that none of them was in the early farming zone of 9000-5000BC and makes the likeliest zone of their existance the steppe/north Caucasus and Northern Iran. I supect from the distributions of M73 and V88 that R1b had by then split into a northern P297 grop in the former areas and P25* in somewhere like northern Iran or the SE Causcasus. That geographical split, which would seem to me to have to have occurred between 10000BC and 5000BC would be the basis of the contrast between M73 and V88. The former remaining in the steppe and the later being incorporated into the northern fringes of the later farming world c. 5000bc and spread by Kura-Araxes as far as the Levant from c. 3500bc.

[alan]

This could be relevant to how people in the P25* era might have moved both north and south and divided in the end of the Palaeolithic but its behind a paywall.


http://www.sciencedirect.com/science...40618212003035

[TigerMW]

I would add that it is interesting that Maykop (zone all M269 and M73 today) was quite separate and very distinct from Kura-Araxes but they both appear overlap , albeit at different time, in NW Iran with the Maykop connection perhaps 4000-3400BC with that area being replaced with a Kura-Araxes period in the same area shortly after. Its and perhaps the extreme east end of the Caucasus are the only common denometor where both cultures were in the same zone. However, V88 is clearly something that has arised from a very distance P25 cousin of the P297 clades and they may have been separated since the late upper Palaeolithic. Presumably P25 was pretty much all there was before 10000BC. Based on archaeological considerations I see a potential divide in P25 occuring around 9 or 10000BC when what would have remained in P297* which is dated to this very moment and remaining P25*. That timewise corresponds very well to the opening up of the Caucasus-west side of Caspian north-south route and the appearance of epipalaeolithic groups around the south Caspian for the first time. This is also in the same ballpark as the younger dryas cold snap. A lot seems to fit some sort of geographical division in R1b starting at this time. Unfortunately not a lot of P25* survives and apparently no P297* which although annoying does fit into a sparsely populated epipalaeolithic scenario. We have nothing of substance for any of these lines until after 5000BC when we suddenly see M73, M269 and V88 appear. As I have posted many times before, I think that is a strong indicator that none of them was in the early farming zone of 9000-5000BC and makes the likeliest zone of their existance the steppe/north Caucasus and Northern Iran. I supect from the distributions of M73 and V88 that R1b had by then split into a northern P297 grop in the former areas and P25* in somewhere like northern Iran or the SE Causcasus. That geographical split, which would seem to me to have to have occurred between 10000BC and 5000BC would be the basis of the contrast between M73 and V88. The former remaining in the steppe and the later being incorporated into the northern fringes of the later farming world c. 5000bc and spread by Kura-Araxes as far as the Levant from c. 3500bc.

I admit this is very speculative going back this far in time, but I want to make sure I understand your proposed timeline/geography.

I gather you think that at 10,000 BC and immediately before, R1b-P25 was found in the Iranian Plateau area before P297 and V88 existed. Are you including Southeast Caucasus in the range of P25 at this point?

Where do you think V88 arose and entered into elements of what would be Kura-Araxes? Do you think this occurred in the Southern Levant? Do you think V88 and has something to do with early Copper work there and its connection into the headwaters of the Tigris and Anatolia?

[alan]

I admit this is very speculative going back this far in time, but I want to make sure I understand your proposed timeline/geography.

I gather you think that at 10,000 BC and immediately before, R1b-P25 was found in the Iranian Plateau area before P297 and V88 existed. Are you including Southeast Caucasus in the range of P25 at this point?

Where do you think V88 arose and entered into elements of what would be Kura-Araxes? Do you think this occurred in the Southern Levant? Do you think V88 and has something to do with early Copper work there and its connection into the headwaters of the Tigris and Anatolia?

I think P25 could have radiated in several directions from the Caspian area as per my other thread in the R general section. different branches of P25* may have pushed or been pushed in different directions by the dynamic conditions of that sea around 15000-10000BC. I think the P25 lineage responsible for P297 probably ended up towards the north-west end of the sea. However, other P25 lineages would have remained in the south end around north Iran and perhaps the south Caucasus, areas where the sea didnt much change large parts of that coast.

So, by around 9000BC there may have been a situation where P25* lineages remained around north Iran and the Caucasus while the P297* SNP occured in a P25 lineage that had headed north to the north Caucasus steppe interface. It puts P297 in the right sort of position to later expand as M269 and M73 in the north Caucasus/steppe interface in 5-4000BC perhaps driven by the late arrival of the Neolithic then shortly after by Maykop.

Another P25* line could have remained to the south around northern Iran and/or the south Caucasus and could have been the basis for V88 to come into expand with Kura-Araxes culture. I think the distribution of the latter bears some resemblence to that clade. It doesnt bear any resemblance to M269 and especially M73. It has always been clear from there branching from the future P297 line before 10000BC that these clades could have been seperated since the Palaeolithic and have different stories.

That of course is just one possible model, in this case one that sees the roots of the future clade pattern as being set down at the end of the Palaeolithic. It is just one option but it actually makes a lot of sense to me now I understand the history of the Caspian sea in that period.

[J Man]

I have a feeling that J2a-M410 maybe have been part of the Kura-Araxes culture in a big part also. Maybe even more than R1b.

[alan]

I have a feeling that J2a-M410 maybe have been part of the Kura-Araxes culture in a big part also. Maybe even more than R1b.

True. V88 may have just been a small part.

[J Man]

True. V88 may have just been a small part.

Quite possible. It is an interesting culture for sure though. It was probably composed mainly of J2a, G2a, J1* and some R1b individuals I would think. Who knows for sure though?

[alan]

Quite possible. It is an interesting culture for sure though. It was probably composed mainly of J2a, G2a, J1* and some R1b individuals I would think. Who knows for sure though?

Certainly I think V88 was a small component, probably caused by some P25 who were left at the south end of the Caspian and south Caucasus area after the fluctuations of that sea. The latter may well have separated the P25* that was ancestral to V88 from that which led to the P297 groups. The best evidence for this separation is the massive difference between the earliest major subclades of the two lines - V88 and M73. V88's age of expansion would put it in the sort of area where farming arrived late and its period would fit well with it being encorporated in the Kura-Araxes expansion and its odd distribution actually fits the cultural expansion southwards down the Levant very well. The Kura-Araxes of course was the main driver of the southern half of the CMP metallurgical provence too. Its a very good fit IMO in terms of date and distribution. But yes it was just an element in that culture. There is no problem in seeing V88 as having a very different history from P297 as their ancestral two P25* lines probably branched from each other in the 15000-10000BC ERA when the Caspian grew more than 6 fold from its small LGM size, more than twice that of today, and they would have been widely separated for a long period with southern P25* elements naturally being in the north Iran-south Caucasus sort of area and in a different mix than the remainder. They would have been very different culturally, linguistically etc after the 5000 years of separation and different mixing by the time clades like V88 arose in the south and M73 in the north c. 5000BC. There would no single cultural-linguistic identity for all P25 groups and at the very least they would have likely been divided into northern and southern cultural-linguistic zones.

[TigerMW]

Certainly I think V88 was a small component, probably caused by some P25 who were left at the south end of the Caspian and south Caucasus area after the fluctuations of that sea. The latter may well have separated the P25* that was ancestral to V88 from that which led to the P297 groups. The best evidence for this separation is the massive difference between the earliest major subclades of the two lines - V88 and M73. V88's age of expansion would put it in the sort of area where farming arrived late and its period would fit well with it being encorporated in the Kura-Araxes expansion and its odd distribution actually fits the cultural expansion southwards down the Levant very well. The Kura-Araxes of course was the main driver of the southern half of the CMP metallurgical provence too. Its a very good fit IMO in terms of date and distribution. But yes it was just an element in that culture. There is no problem in seeing V88 as having a very different history from P297 ....

Is there any evidence of V88 in populations in Anatolia?