Slovak Y-DNA Research

Research

Eulau Y-DNA markers

In the October 2008 an article called
Ancient DNA, Strontium isotopes, and osteological analyses shed light on social and kinship organization of the Later Stone Age.
by authors
Wolfgang Haak, Guido Brandt,Hylke N. de Jong, Christian Meyer, Robert Ganslmeier, Volker Heyd, Chris Hawkesworth, Alistair W. G. Pike, Harald Meller a Kurt W. Alt
was issued in theProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) journal.
PNAS 2008 105:18226-18231
Full text of this article in the pdf format is not free available.

In the article the STR markers values detected from three 4 600 years old (radiocarbon dating gave results 2631 - 2571 B.C.) male skeletal relics from a burial ground near Eulau were published. With some help of other genetic methods and tests it was found out that the remainders belong to a father and his two sons. A common haplotype contains altogether 16 indentified markers of a haplogroup R1a.
These values are compared here to Y-DNA profiles from Czech and Slovak YDNA databases. This represents the third (March 2009) Y-DNA markers' comparison of individuals deceased more than 3 000 years ago that we know of on the Genebáze.

Eulau is situated nearby Naumburg in Sachsen-Anhalt, Germany.

Acquired Y-STR haplotype

From three male individuals (father and sons) there were identified these markers as follows:

The table si taken from the quoted work above. The first column indicates individuals: Ind. 4 means a father, Ind. 2 and 3 sons.
The 2nd column, indicated as .Ex., determines an origin of a sample for a DNA test: A means a tooth.

What do the Eulau discoveries tell us ?

Until the recent time the genetics genealogy could use only the results acquired from living individuals to examine male lines (chromozome Y). Depending on how the particular haplogroups and their subgroups are geographically dislocated nowadays it can be presumed, where they occured before, where the migration routes lead and so on. However, DNA isolation methods improved so much in last few years that it enabled in several cases to determine Y-STR markers' values even of the individuals deceased a long time ago. THe Eulau burial ground remainders are immensely interesting for us since thet originate from the central Europe and give us data about a particular sample of a local population o 4 600 years ago. So what do the result tell us?

If some prospective descendants of the Eulau haplotype carries lived until today, theirs actual haplotype must have a difference of GD=2 - 4, for the regularities discovered until this time say that each haplotype begins to mutate in a certain number of generation. It means that people today being with such difference from the Eulau haplotype can deem themselves as prospective descendants or close relatives of the people burried in Eulau 4 600 years ago.

Haplotypes close to the Eulau haplotype up to a genetic distance 4 originate only from Norway, Great Britain, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Slovenia. Not untill the GD=5 the other European countries do occur.

This discovery represents another argument against the statement that each R1a haplogroup carrier living today in our country is of so called Slavic origin. It is already the second support of the fact that R1a haplogroup has occured in middle Europe since the Neolith. It is likely that the people with haplotypes close to those from Eulau were the first, or the ones of them, who brought the R1a haplogroup to middle Europe. The fact that the recent haplotypes closest to the one from Eulau ca be found in Norway, Great Britain, Czech Republic and Slovakia can point to a probable origin of R1a amongst Celts and Germans.

Individual profiles and theirs comparison, matches and genetic distances with users of Czech and Slovak Y-DNA database.

Significant matches haplotype Eulau

(Ysearch standards)

ID	db	dys19	dys389-1	dys389-2	dys390	dys391	dys392	dys393	dys385a	dys385b	dys437	dys438	dys439	dys448	dys456	dys458	Y-GATA	dys635	Match	Region	Haplogroup	genetic distance
Eulau		16	13	30	25	11	-	14	11	14	14	11	10	19	16	15	12	23	-	D	R1a (Hapest)
8EGCP	Ysearch	16	13	30	25	11	11	14	11	14	14	11	10	19	16	15	13	23	15/16	?PL	R1a*	1
PFG37	Ysearch	16	13	30	25	11	11	13	11	14	14	11	10	19	15	15	12	23	14/16	Norway	R1a*	2
6ZUSE	Ysearch	15	13	30	25	11	11	15	11	14	14	11	10	19	16	15	12	23	14/16	?GB	R1a*	2
O1805	CZ	17	13	30	25	11	11	14	11	14	14	11	10	20	15	15	12	23	13/16	CZ	R1a (Hapest)	3
JCC7T	Ysearch	15	13	30	25	11	11	13	11	14	14	11	10	20	16	15	12	23	13/16	?GB	R1a*	3
WYDZB	Ysearch	15	13	30	25	11	11	14	11	14	14	11	10	20	15	15	12	23	13/16	?GB	R1a*	3
JTCJQ	Ysearch	16	13	30	24	11	11	13	11	14	14	11	10	20	16	15	12	23	13/16	Slovakia	R1a*	3
GG5CH	Ysearch	16	13	30	24	11	11	13	11	14	14	11	10	20	16	15	12	23	13/16	Norway	R1a*	3
O1839	CZ	15	13	30	25	11	11	13	11	14	14	11	11	20	16	15	12	23	12/16	CZ	R1a (Hapest)	4
NV9JB	Ysearch	16	13	31	25	11	11	13	11	15	14	11	10	20	16	15	12	23	12/16	Slovenia	R1a*	4
MAC7E	Ysearch	16	13	30	25	10	11	13	11	14	14	11	10	20	16	15	11	23	12/16	Scotland	R1a*	4
4DZF5	Ysearch	16	13	29	25	10	11	13	11	14	14	11	10	20	16	15	12	23	12/16	?GB	R1a*	4
EMZHJ	Ysearch	16	13	30	25	11	11	13	11	13	14	11	10	20	16	15	13	23	12/16	GB, Kent	R1a*	4
24MB4	Ysearch	15	13	30	25	11	11	13	11	14	14	11	10	20	16	15	12	-	12/15	-	R1a1-Modal-G	3
ZFG4G	Ysearch	16	13	30	25	11	11	13	11	14	14	11	10	20	16	16	12	-	12/15	-	MESKb modal	3
R1a1 modal	Ysearch K2SH3	15	13	30	25	10	11	13	11	14	14	11	10	20	16	15	11	-	10/15	-	R1a1* modal	4

Comment
The Ysearch haplotype 8EGCP is indicated as "Neol", which may mean a theoretically created haplotype (may stand for neolithic?), not some haplotype of a particular individual.
Unforfunatelly, its contact person does not reply to our inquiries.

The last three haplotypes in the table (marked red) are theoretical modal haplotypes.

Processed 18.03.2008

Jiří Pavlíček, Ludvík Urban

Graph of haplogroup R1a made by use of Median Joining Network method for 17 markers show the position of Eulau haplotype among haplotypes of Czech and Slovak Y-DNA databases.

Added 10.06.2009

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