Afghan DNA discussion

[thisismyaccount]

https://www.theapricity.com/forum/showthread.php?399240-To-what-extent-are-these-people-representative-of-Lebanon/page3

Carrying the discussion from here

[Negah]

I will post later today.

[Avicenna]

One thing I'll note is that my observations seem to be correct once again, if pashtuns ( from both Pakistan and Afghanistan) are pretty much levantines levels of pigmentation ( genetically speaking ) but lighter in eye pigmentation, then that means Tajiks( mountain actual Tajiks ), Nuristanis and Pashayis should theoretically be EVEN lighter than levantines. Although I do believe pashtuns in general carry the highest amount of alleles for lighter eyes, especially in the central Highland and northeastern pashtuns. ( Paktia, Paktika, Wardak,Kabul, Laghman, Khost, Logar, Nangarhar, Waziristan).

[Wandal]

One thing I'll note is that my observations seem to be correct once again, if pashtuns ( from both Pakistan and Afghanistan) are pretty much levantines levels of pigmentation ( genetically speaking ) but lighter in eye pigmentation, then that means Tajiks( mountain actual Tajiks ), Nuristanis and Pashayis should theoretically be EVEN lighter than levantines. Although I do believe pashtuns in general carry the highest amount of alleles for lighter eyes, especially in the central Highland and northeastern pashtuns. ( Paktia, Paktika, Wardak,Kabul, Laghman, Khost, Logar, Nangarhar, Waziristan).

I think it should be obvious that none of them are homogeneous. In my opinion the most important questions are why does more than 50% of Afghan population have R1A (they admit, it could be more) and why are there some examples in different tribes who are very Nordic. Either they were part of an ancient Indus Valley civilisation (possibly Arkaim was part of that) or they were left behind by the ancestors of Goths and Venedovians.

[Avicenna]

I think it should be obvious that none of them are homogeneous. In my opinion the most important questions are why does more than 50% of Afghan population have R1A (they admit, it could be more) and why are there some examples in different tribes who are very Nordic. Either they were part of an ancient Indus Valley civilisation (possibly Arkaim was part of that) or they were left behind by the ancestors of Goths and Venedovians.

Because they directly descend from R1a who looked like this

https://i.ibb.co/F4fTMwDL/IMG-20251127-222051.jpg

No, this is not a European man, he's from a the succeeding Andronovo cultures in central Asia, most likely around late bronze age times.

[Wandal]

Because they directly descend from R1a who looked like this


he's from a the succeeding Andronovo cultures in central Asia, most likely around late bronze age times.


I don't believe in the stories of "Sintashta culture" "Andronovo culture" "Corded Ware" "Hunter Gatherer" "Yamnaya culture"

None of that is reliable and is mostly scholars supporting one another's theories and just diversions.

"Bronze Age" is another fake term.

[Avicenna]

I don't believe in the stories of "Sintashta culture" "Andronovo culture" "Corded Ware" "Hunter Gatherer" "Yamnaya culture"

None of that is reliable and is mostly scholars supporting one another's theories and just diversions.

"Bronze Age" is another fake term.

Then it's going to be very difficult to discuss with someone who won't believe this, but proposes a theory about Goths ending up in Afghanistan and the reason for why some look Nordic. Afghanistan is not north Africa or levant, where the crusaders, Romans, Vandals etc left a footprint in the region.

[Wandal]

Then it's going to be very difficult to discuss with someone who won't believe this, but proposes a theory about Goths ending up in Afghanistan and the reason for why some look Nordic. Afghanistan is not north Africa or levant, where the crusaders, Romans, Vandals etc left a footprint in the region.

I said "ancestors of"

And actually the word "Goth" is very ancient and is a Sumerian word.

[Figaro]

I don't believe in the stories of "Sintashta culture" "Andronovo culture" "Corded Ware" "Hunter Gatherer" "Yamnaya culture"

None of that is reliable and is mostly scholars supporting one another's theories and just diversions.

"Bronze Age" is another fake term.

What is your take? Really just curious.

[Avicenna]

I said "ancestors of"

And actually the word "Goth" is very ancient and is a Sumerian word.

You are coming up with all sorts of theories when the blaring obvious fact is that Afghanistan is home to Aryan descendants.

[thisismyaccount]

You are coming up with all sorts of theories when the blaring obvious fact is that Afghanistan is home to Aryan descendants.

Don't bother. Apparently archeological sites belonging to pastoralist andronovo aryan ancestors of south, central and West asians today isn't good enough for him. Even if their haplogroups shows ancestry to the their own haplogroups, and they all show considerably amount of EHG and CHG while pre-aryans didn't. Even said aryan pastoralists samples are even found in Tajikistan and Afghanistan too.

[Negah]

@thisismyaccount and @avicenna


Let's do this right because I think this is the only way the conversation will actually move along the correct path. Before we go any further, we need to establish the correct terminology and the correct timeline. A lot of times i get confused on these threads because events and timelines get mixed up, events that happened thousands of years apart. People lump things together that have nothing to do with each other and then build an argument on top of that. So let’s clean this up, once, with sources, so we are on the same page.

1) “Iranian Neolithic” isn’t “Iranian.”

Iran_N, ie, Iranian Neolithic = the very early farmers living in the Zagros Mountains, this is around 10,000 to 7,500 BCE.

These people are NOT Persians, not Kurds, not Lurs, not Baloch, not Pashtuns, not Tajiks, not IVC, not Punjabis.
They are simply one ancient layer that later on gets mixed into different groups in totally different proportions and time frames.

The name is bad and creates confusion, and the fact is that the Modern Iranian peoples formed MUCH later.

Iranian Plateau people (Not necessarily Iranian-speaking people, but the Iranian Plateau region). They are a fusion of:
1)Iran_N ie, Iranian Neolithic
2)Iran_ChL ie, Chalcolithic Iran
3) Steppe_MLBA
4)BMAC/Oxus
5) Then you have regional inputs and variation depending on the area where you have Caucasus, Arabian, South Asian, etc. inputs.

This is very important because what happens later, especially for the Pashtuns and Tajiks, and Persians, is based on these later layers, NOT on the Neolithic layer.

Source: Genomic insights into the origin of farming in the ancient Near East


https://www.nature.com/articles/nature19310


2) AASI is NOT “Indian.”

AASI is Ancient Ancestral South Indian and it extremely ancient East Eurasian hunter-gatherers.

This ancestry is older than ANY “Indian” ethnic group. This is critical.

AASI split from East Asians + Australasian-related groups over 40,000 years ago.

Then this is key for the Pashtuns and the Eastern Iranian plateau region. They were present across the subcontinent and parts of the Himalayan/Hindu Kush rim between 30,000 and 10,000 BCE.

So AASI is not “Indian. Just like Iran_N is not “Iranian.”

Here is a list of things that need to be understood. Because they are myths.

AASI not Indian
Iran_N not Iranian
Iran_ChL not Persian
BMAC not Tajik
Steppe not Pashtun


Source::

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aat7487

https://www.science.org/action/downloadSupplement?doi=10.1126%2Fscience.aat7487&file=aat7487_Narasimhan_SM.pdf

3) Another important fact Skin color differences have NOTHING to do with climate on these time scales.

Afghans are not lighter than Indians because of the climate, or North Indians are not lighter than South INdian becuase of the climate, or Armenians are not lighter than Iranians, Lebanese lighter than Saudis because of the climate. This is a fallacy that is used on these forums. Why, because the climate effect on pigmentation does not act quickly in evolutionary terms, it takes 15,000 - 20,000 years, if not more, for Indian groups, Iranian groups, Chinese, etc, populations were formed mainly over the past 3,000-4,000 years. So this automatically is debunked. These populations have been formed by recent migration, and that has been the determining factor, not climate.

This whole “climate = skin color” argument is wrong as soon as you look at the time scale.

Colloquium paper: human skin pigmentation as an adaptation to UV radiation

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20445093/


4) Geography matters more because geography controls gene flow.

Climate is not what shaped modern populations. Migration shaped them.

And migration is controlled by geography:


Mountain ranges usually filters, semi-isolation
Frontiers lead to hybrid zones
Plateaus lead to fusion zones
Basins lead to genetic “endpoints”
River valleys are home to homogenization
Crossroads are places of massive mixing


5) Afghanistan is a crossroads; NW India is a frontier. Neither is a stable population center.

Afghanistan is NOT an endpoint population.
It is a convergence zone of the Iranian world, Central Asia, and the Indian Subcontinent:

On the other hand, NW India (Punjab/Sindh) is the frontier of the Subcontinent, not the core. That is the Ganges Plain.
Historically always open to Iranic, IVC, Steppe, AASI, and later Central Asian flows.

Both places share one trait: high genetic variation because both sit between major civilizational Zones.


6) @thisismyaccount Now I will focus on the real timeline of ancestral layers (correct dates + real sources). Let me know if you agree, but check these sources, and we can discuss each if you want.


a) Iran_N (Neolithic Iran)

10,000 to 7,500 BCE
The oldest layer of the Iranian Plateau farming ancestry.

Source:

Genomic insights into the origin of farming in the ancient Near East
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature19310



b) Iran_ChL Chalcolithic Iran

The date is 5000 to 3300 BCE
THIS is the ancestry that actually forms the backbone or scapfalding of Iranic peoples/Iranian Plateau.

Iran_ChL = Iran_N + Caucasus hunter-gatherer related ( CHG-related ) + some local Iranian elements.

This population is not Iran_N, but it is the real “ancestor” of later Iranians, Pashtuns, Tajiks, Kurds, Persians, Gilakis, Lurs, etc.

Quotes:
“Chalcolithic Iran cannot be modeled as Iran_N alone; CHG-related ancestry is required.”

Source:

[https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aat7487](https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aat7487)
Supplement (Tepe Hissar, Seh Gabi):
[https://www.science.org/action/downloadSupplement?doi=10.1126%2Fscience.aat7487&file=aat7487_Narasimhan_SM.pdf](https://www.science.org/action/downloadSupplement?doi=10.1126%2Fscience.aat7487&file=aat7487_Narasimhan_SM.pdf)

c) BMAC or Oxus Civilization

Date approximately 2300 to 1700 BCE

BMAC contributes heavily to later Iranic peoples / Iranian Plateau ( eastern and western):

This is what the Persians, Tajiks, Pashtuns, Lurs, Kurds, etc have.

BMAC is a mix of Iran_ChL- main ancestry + some Indus-periphery + minor Steppe outliers.

Sources:


[https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(21)01432-0](https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674%2821%2901432-0)

d) Steppe_MLBA, this is the Indo-Iranian Steppe

Time frame from 2000 to 1200 BCE

This is where Indo-Iranian languages come from.

Brings:

Indo-Iranian language family
R1a-Z93
Typical light pigmentation alleles
Classic Sintashta/Andronovo profile



This came to the Iranian Plateau in two waves, not one:

1. Wave one is 2000–1800 BCE the early contact through BMAC
2. Wave two is 1500–1200 BCE actual Indo-Iranian expansion into Iran + Hindu Kush--- foundation of East Iranic + Indo-Aryan branches ( the Indian Branch and Wave)

Source:
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aar7711

7) So here is the key for you two: when did Pashtuns get their AASI? (the key point everyone gets wrong)

This is central:


The most important point is that Pashtun AASI is old, not recent.

Came from Hindu Kush highland hunter-gatherers, not from Indians of the plains.

Dates: it covered 3000–1500 BCE (before Steppe arrival or Indo Iranians or Indians or Dardic).

Narasimhan 2019: Pashtuns show no recent Indo-Gangetic gene flow.



quote (supplement, section S3):

“The AASI ancestry in Hindu Kush groups reflects deep, pre-Bronze Age layers not attributable to recent South Asian admixture.”

This alone destroys the “Pashtuns mixed with Punjabis” theory.


8) Indian groups formed separately and differently.

Here are the facts:

IVC (3300–1700 BCE)
Mix of Iran_N-related farmers + lowland AASI.
This creates the ANI–ASI gradient that defines later Indians.


Here are the Key differences:


Indo-Aryan mixing (1500–1200 BCE)
Steppe_MLBA mixes with IVC-descended groups, NOT with Iran_ChL-heavy highlanders.



Completely different ancestry arc from Pashtuns.

Source:




9) Therefore, Pashtuns don't have Punjabis in their genetic formation

Pashtuns = Iran_ChL + BMAC + Steppe_MLBA + Highland AASI (3000–1500 BCE)

Punjabis and Sindhis = IVC (Iran_N-related) + lowland AASI + Steppe_MLBA

Difference:

Different inputs
Different dates
Different sources
Different geography
Different ancestry paths



Overlap exists, but it is ancient and not Indo-Gangetic or Indian. The genetic cf arc of the Pashtuns is with the Iranian Plateau, not the Indian subcontinent. The Punjabis are part of the Indian Subcontinent arc.

[Negah]

Don't bother. Apparently archeological sites belonging to pastoralist andronovo aryan ancestors of south, central and West asians today isn't good enough for him. Even if their haplogroups shows ancestry to the their own haplogroups, and they all show considerably amount of EHG and CHG while pre-aryans didn't. Even said aryan pastoralists samples are even found in Tajikistan and Afghanistan too.

I will respond to your other two posts from the other thread based on what I know if you like. But respond to the post above, and we can expand the discussion later.

[thisismyaccount]

I will respond to your other two posts from the other thread based on what I know if you like. But respond to the post above, and we can expand the discussion later.

You have a pretty simple idea of south asian admixture in Afghanistan.

I never said it ALL came recently to Afghanistan. Of course it's old, though it would had been brought by Indus pastoralists.
AASI has no proof of existing even in Hindukush 4000-8000 BCE or north of it. Example a Mesolithic sample from Tutkaul, Tajikistan lacks AASI. We can from there already see on lowland Bactria AASI was non-existent that long ago. There's no proof of it existing in Hindukush, without west eurasian pastoralists brining the admixture.


Of course perhaps 3000-2000 BCE you'll start seeing AASI admixture in hindukush mountains. West eurasian pastoralists brought that, even as far north into Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.


You're right about the indo-iranian intrusion to south of amu river, so I'm not gonna dwell much into that.

But claiming pashtuns never mixing with indics is very ignorant. Already by their haplogroups alone, we can see them pick up indic R1a's, L's, even AASI H clades and R2's too, the specific subclades that example doesn't exist much in hindukush populations that didnt historically mix with pashtuns (much). Those specific clades are also much closer to indic populations such as punjabi subgroups and brahuis (who are native to Suleiman mountains).


Of course pashtuns always had IVC admixture, even farmers all north in Bronze Age Uzbekistan were like 7-15% IVC before mixing with aryans. Pashtuns would seemingly been in north or central Afghanistan originally based on historical accounts, issues of linguistics. Seemingly around possibly this black circled part:

144854

Obviously they genetically would been akin to the people in that particular area, though without turkic ancestry. But the north hazarajat locals, especially northwestern ones, aren't exact the same as hindukush populations, such as kalash or nuristanis. Those locals probably plot between dards and north shifted populations such as yaghnobis and khorosan persians. Pashtuns would originally been akin to that.

At that time, pashtuns certainly wouldn't had any of these Suleiman mountain haplogroups they regularly pick today. Moving southeast for some reason towards Kabul, Nangarhar and then Suleiman mountains in 400-500 CE, they settled there. The inhabitants of the mountains were refered as indians, by both greeks, indirectly by chinese and directly by muslim writers from 300 BCE to 1000 CE. They would most likely had been just alike the punjabi inhabitants right east of the mountains, whom shares clades with pashtuns.

Given that fact, pashtuns would had mixed with the locals and increased their south asian admixture. How much exactly? I don't know, but I do know they mixed with indians. It's not a theory, haplogroups clearly shows this.


So you're completely wrong about pashtuns not having mixed with indics. They have. But pashtuns, alike balochs, are a special case. They're a group that immigrated from one place, not much near indians or near at all, to another, mixing with the indian locals. In case of pashtuns, from somewhere in north Afghanistan to Suleiman mountains. In case of balochs, from Mazandaran, through Kerman, to pakistani Makran (indian locals too, such as zutts and brahuis)




So what I'm saying:


-Pashtuns already had chunks of IVC prior mixing with indics
-Pashtuns increased IVC further, probably 30-50% in 500-1000 CE

[Wandal]

You are coming up with all sorts of theories when the blaring obvious fact is that Afghanistan is home to .

The word "Goth" being Sumerian is not a "theory." And I didn't say that Afghanistan wasn't one of the ancient "homes" of the Nordic race (if that is what you mean). See the works of L.A. Waddell.

[Oliver109]

You are coming up with all sorts of theories when the blaring obvious fact is that Afghanistan is home to Aryan descendants.

I think a lot of the light looks are also native from Neolithic sources.

[Negah]

You have a pretty simple idea of south asian admixture in Afghanistan.

I never said it ALL came recently to Afghanistan. Of course it's old, though it would had been brought by Indus pastoralists.
AASI has no proof of existing even in Hindukush 4000-8000 BCE or north of it. Example a Mesolithic sample from Tutkaul, Tajikistan lacks AASI. We can from there already see on lowland Bactria AASI was non-existent that long ago. There's no proof of it existing in Hindukush, without west eurasian pastoralists brining the admixture.


Of course perhaps 3000-2000 BCE you'll start seeing AASI admixture in hindukush mountains. West eurasian pastoralists brought that, even as far north into Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.


You're right about the indo-iranian intrusion to south of amu river, so I'm not gonna dwell much into that.

But claiming pashtuns never mixing with indics is very ignorant. Already by their haplogroups alone, we can see them pick up indic R1a's, L's, even AASI H clades and R2's too, the specific subclades that example doesn't exist much in hindukush populations that didnt historically mix with pashtuns (much). Those specific clades are also much closer to indic populations such as punjabi subgroups and brahuis (who are native to Suleiman mountains).


Of course pashtuns always had IVC admixture, even farmers all north in Bronze Age Uzbekistan were like 7-15% IVC before mixing with aryans. Pashtuns would seemingly been in north or central Afghanistan originally based on historical accounts, issues of linguistics. Seemingly around possibly this black circled part:

144854

Obviously they genetically would been akin to the people in that particular area, though without turkic ancestry. But the north hazarajat locals, especially northwestern ones, aren't exact the same as hindukush populations, such as kalash or nuristanis. Those locals probably plot between dards and north shifted populations such as yaghnobis and khorosan persians. Pashtuns would originally been akin to that.

At that time, pashtuns certainly wouldn't had any of these Suleiman mountain haplogroups they regularly pick today. Moving southeast for some reason towards Kabul, Nangarhar and then Suleiman mountains in 400-500 CE, they settled there. The inhabitants of the mountains were refered as indians, by both greeks, indirectly by chinese and directly by muslim writers from 300 BCE to 1000 CE. They would most likely had been just alike the punjabi inhabitants right east of the mountains, whom shares clades with pashtuns.

Given that fact, pashtuns would had mixed with the locals and increased their south asian admixture. How much exactly? I don't know, but I do know they mixed with indians. It's not a theory, haplogroups clearly shows this.


So you're completely wrong about pashtuns not having mixed with indics. They have. But pashtuns, alike balochs, are a special case. They're a group that immigrated from one place, not much near indians or near at all, to another, mixing with the indian locals. In case of pashtuns, from somewhere in north Afghanistan to Suleiman mountains. In case of balochs, from Mazandaran, through Kerman, to pakistani Makran (indian locals too, such as zutts and brahuis)




So what I'm saying:


-Pashtuns already had chunks of IVC prior mixing with indics
-Pashtuns increased IVC further, probably 30-50% in 500-1000 CE

I’ll answer your points later, but I want to set one simple standard, please, before continuing: if you disagree, that’s fine, but you can’t build arguments on personal belief without sources. Genetics is not mythology, and it’s not based on impressions. It requires citations, data, and direct quotes, the same way I provided

So before we go further, I’m asking you to provide actual references or published data for the claims you’re making. You can’t dismiss my point just because you dont agree, I won’t continue the discussion. I’ve respected your views; I expect the same level of rigor in return. I also ask you to read my sources before responding to me. That way we are both mutually respecting each other.

[Wandal]

What is your take? Really just curious.

What it all comes down to is, there were catastrophes which interrupted the timeline, and calendars have been manipulated, and most information is controlled by "scholars" and "universities," (and corporations).

The confusion means we have to be very sceptical. "heliocentric theory" "evolution theory" "paleolithic age" "Yamnaya theory"

Archaeology and clay tablets are good because we can see those today (but even some of those are fake and most of it is not made available).

A good question would be, do the R1A Afghans also have recessive traits like those found in the North Sea area, in Britain, Norway, Sweden and even Finland?

[thisismyaccount]

I’ll answer your points later, but I want to set one simple standard, please, before continuing: if you disagree, that’s fine, but you can’t build arguments on personal belief without sources. Genetics is not mythology, and it’s not based on impressions. It requires citations, data, and direct quotes, the same way I provided

So before we go further, I’m asking you to provide actual references or published data for the claims you’re making. You can’t dismiss my point just because you dont agree, I won’t continue the discussion. I’ve respected your views; I expect the same level of rigor in return. I also ask you to read my sources before responding to me. That way we are both mutually respecting each other.

You just kind of said the same thing as before, which I replied to before. My comment is almost entirely about the south asian in pashtuns.

"quote (supplement, section S3):

“The AASI ancestry in Hindu Kush groups reflects deep, pre-Bronze Age layers not attributable to recent South Asian admixture.”


I can't find him saying that in section S3 at all? Where did you get that from? Mind refering me page? This is pretty weird too, because even the swat samples he modeled, the Iron Age samples differed from the historic samples, clearly showing additional admixture of increased south asian from around 400-200 BCE?


https://x.com/Afghan_DNA/status/1789785032179012078

https://x.com/Afghan_DNA/status/1946508818470547604

https://x.com/Afghan_DNA/status/1944146672407523671


These are private and study DNA samples of pashtun haplogroups. If you look at their clades on yfull, the Z2123, L1c, R2 and H subclades, you can see they're rather closest to brahuis, jatts and split from them latest. Not anyone in hindukush mountains. That's not for no reason. Those subclades especially don't exist in kalash, who are very inbred. Pashtuns shows clear evidence of mixing with Suleiman mountains indics. This can be further supported based on linguistics, with the significant lahnda punjabi dialect influence on pashto language. Lahnda is spoken in parts of Suleiman mountains too. All pashto dialects shows this linguistical influence.



Arrian in his Anabasis refers to the Suleiman mountain locals, using sources from greeks in 300-200 BCE, as "indian mountaineers"

https://archive.org/details/cu31924026460752/page/n175/mode/2up?q=Arachosia

This is considering the fact that Arachosia included the Suleiman mountains.



Hsuen Tsang in 630 CE refers to the local languages spoken in much of Suleiman mountains to been "indian languages", except in the areas where pashtun lived at the time (they only had a small part of the mountains)


Even in 1030 CE, Biruni refered the locals of northern Balochistan as "savage hindus", despite mentioning pashtuns living north of those indics


https://archive.org/details/alberunisindia_201612/alberunisindia-color_001/page/198/mode/2up


Eventually pashtuns took over half of the mountains, even Waziristan. This isn't based on impressions or mythology, this is based on historical attestations. The locals in the mountains, prior pashtuns arriving, were simply indics. And clearly akin to lahnda speakers, such as saraikis, who still lives in eastern parts of the mountains. Those are just regular punjabis.



https://archive.org/details/Shahpur/page/412/mode/2up (inscription about pashtuns is from 270 CE)

https://archive.org/details/626176584-sims-williams-bactrian-documents-part-2/page/n43/mode/1up?q=afghans (letters are from 480 CE)



As we can see here, pashtuns, originally called afghans, were living right next to white huns, who lived right north of Hindukush and Hazajarat. The sassanid inscription simply makes it clear that greek "Abgan" is actually awghan, comparing it to Middle Persian inscription. There's just no w or gh letter in greek script, so we can luckily compare it to non-greek inscriptions. Awghan is how pashtuns natively says afghan



https://astrofoxx.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/jyotish_brihat-samhita_m-r-bhat_part-1-of-2_1981.pdf (540 CE)

Varahamihira, a brahmin of magian descent (likely from north Afghanistan originally), refered white huns and afghans (pashtuns) twice in his book, showing them geographically connected to each other. This helps further to strengthen the fact that pashtuns were in North Afghanistan before moving to Suleiman mountains, and very much the same as the "abgans" refered in bactrian letters. Pashtuns were most rather likely in Hazarajat, as pashtuns are clearly yaz iranic descended since their R1a pashtun specific clade split from kurds in 1200-1100 BCE. Hazarajat lies closer to the yaz split area.


144856


144857


On top of that, Varahamihira separates pashtuns from cavemen. That's refering to borderlands, as shown in the page, since we had indics living in the mountains. The mountains in question would be the Suleiman mountains, which has for 1000s of years been considered a frontier between India and Khorosan, unlike the hindukush mountains. That means pashtuns according to Varahamihira, werent in Suleiman mountains yet. And unlike with greek and Middle Persian, the indic script Varahamihira used had both a b and a v letter. He used the v letter, and wrote afghans in plural as "Avagana". There's no gh letter in indic scripts though at the time. Again, an attestation, not myth.





It's only in 630 CE we see pashtuns in Suleiman mountains, seemingly only in Khost, parts of Paktya and Logar, they were in. Hsuen Tsang passed much of the mountains, and only came across the nation of "O-Po-kin", rendered to "Avakan" (closest rendition of Awghan)


https://dn790003.ca.archive.org/0/items/ajf4729.0001.001.umich.edu/ajf4729.0001.001.umich.edu.pdf



144858


But prior Hsuen Tsang, we never hear of anything about pashtuns in the mountains historically.



Even linguistics support this from north to south migration. Pashto shares several cognates with other iranic languages, which has turned the D letters into L, which is also called lambdacism. This is a trait in some hindukush and pamiri languages, along with bactrian, which is actually a bactrian feature. Such feature only took place within hindukush and seemingly hazarajat:



https://www.academia.edu/49862012/Lambdacism_and_the_development_of_Old_Iranian_t_in _Pashto


144859

144860



And even then also, we see pashtuns in the bactrian letters and sassanid inscription with iranic names, which would be out of character for non-muslim hindu indians. Even Hudud al alam also separates non-muslim pashtuns from hindus, buddhists (idolators) and muslims. This proves pashtuns weren't hindus before islam, but rather iranic pagans/zoroastrians. The actual locals of Suleiman mountains, as even Babur refered the remaining ones, would been hindus. So pashtuns came from outside Suleiman mountains, settling amongst the local indic hindus


https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.281514/page/n109/mode/2up?q=afghan

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The haplogroups, along with the history and linguistics, clearly shows pashtuns came from outside Suleiman mountains, most likely northwestern hazarajat (lies closer to yaz descended populations, as hindukush locals dont have yaz clades), possibly brought or forced out of the mountains into Nangarhar, Kabul by turk shahis in 550s, and then finally settled into the Suleiman mountains for 80 years prior Hsuen Tsang.

They would 100% not have such Suleiman local indic subclades.


So no, it isn't crazy to say pashtuns mixed with indics in Suleiman mountains and increased their IVC. Even tajikistanis in another study shows per DATES, going through a late event of significant south asian admixture in 1000 CE, most likely indian slaves brought in the towns


https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-04144-4


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So what's crazy about pashtuns mixing with local indians in the mountains? Their haplogroup and language shows mixing?

[Negah]

You have a pretty simple idea of south asian admixture in Afghanistan.


-Pashtuns increased IVC further, probably 30-50% in 500-1000 CE

@thisismyaccount thanks for responding, but I need to be very clear with you.

Your entire argument, it seems to me, is based on the idea that Pashtuns picked up 30–50% “Indian” ancestry recently (500–1000 CE). IMO that claim collapses the moment you look at actual genome-wide data. I ask you to do it objectively.

Again, I’m not asking you to agree with me. I’m asking you to read the sources and then bring sources of your own. Otherwise we’re just trading personal beliefs. Genetics does not work like that.

1) BMAC already had Indus-related ancestry 2500–2000 BCE. I ask you to please read my previous post, item 6c)

This is not my opinion. This is ancient DNA.

Narasimhan et al. 2019 (Science):
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aat7487

“Three BMAC individuals dated 2500–2000 BCE from Gonur show elevated proportions of AHG/Indus Periphery ancestry.”

So the IVC-related ancestry that Pashtuns have was already flowing north into the Iranian Plateau and Central Asia thousands of years before the medieval period.
This is the prehistoric source of the South Asian-related ancestry in Pashtuns and certainly not medieval Punjabis.

2) AASI in the Hindu Kush is ancient, not recent

You completely misinterpreted Narasimhan. Please read him and if you don't agree, don't state your opinion. Your opinion has value if it is backed by reputable sources.

He literally says the opposite of your point:

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aat7487

“The AASI ancestry in Hindu Kush groups reflects deep, pre-Bronze Age layers not attributable to recent South Asian admixture.”

This is the key line.
If your model were correct, Narasimhan’s qpAdm runs would show a recent Indo-Gangetic signal. They do not. They show ancient ANE+AASI highland ancestry. You do realize this is the stuff that predates Indo-Iranians themselves. Again, check the timelines that I provided.

So again: you need a source that models Pashtuns with recent Punjabi/Sindhi input. Without that, this remains a belief.

3) Y-DNA clades do NOT measure % ancestry

You keep using haplogroups (L, H, certain R1a branches) to argue 30–50% “Indic.”
That isn’t how population genetics works.

Hellenthal et al. 2014 (Science):

“Y-chromosome admixture proportions are typically very different from autosomal ancestry proportions.”

Y-DNA tracks one male line, not full ancestry.
Autosomal qpAdm is what counts, and those models reject recent Indo-Gangetic ancestry in Pashtuns.

4) Your interpretation of AASI is historically incorrect

AASI is not “Indian.”
It is 30,000–10,000 years old, predating Indo-Aryans, Indo-Iranians, and even early IVC. It existed across the Hindu Kush before any of these populations formed.

Pashtun AASI = Bronze Age Hindu Kush AASI
Punjabi/Sindhi AASI = Indus Valley AASI

They are not the same layer.
Pashtuns do not carry the Indus Valley ancestry that Punjabis/Sindhis have. Their AASI mixed with Iran_N/Chalcolithic in the highlands, not in the Indus plains.


Here’s what the data, not opinion, actually shows based on these sources:

1) Pashtun “South Asian” ancestry is ancient, Bronze Age, premixed with Iran_N long before Pashtun ethnogenesis.
2) Pashtuns show no recent Indo-Gangetic admixture.
3) Pakistani Pashtuns are among the most endogamous in the region.

Read Narasimhan et al. 2019 (Science):

Y-DNA does not prove 30–50% recent Indian mixing at all because autosomal DNA disproves it directly.

If you still want to argue otherwise, that’s fine, but I ask for one thing:

Bring a source. A paper, a study, A qpAdm model anything.
Something that explicitly says:
“Pashtuns derive 30–50% of their ancestry from recent Indo-Gangetic populations.”

I’ll leave it here until you bring a source.

[Negah]

You just kind of said the same thing as before, which I replied to before. My comment is almost entirely about the south asian in pashtuns.

Pashtuns can't be compared with hindukush kalash, the study samples Naramsinhan has access to. Kalash are inbred, pashtuns aren't.

There's not a study for every single thing, so I can't provide a study making this kind of specific comments about example pashtun haplogroups. If there were, I would had posted them.


https://x.com/Afghan_DNA/status/1789785032179012078

https://x.com/Afghan_DNA/status/1946508818470547604

https://x.com/Afghan_DNA/status/1944146672407523671


These are private and study DNA samples of pashtun haplogroups. If you look at their clades on yfull, the Z2123, L1c, R2 and H subclades, you can see they're rather closest to brahuis, jatts and split from them latest. Not anyone in hindukush mountains. That's not for no reason. Those subclades especially don't exist in kalash, who are very inbred. Pashtuns shows clear evidence of mixing with Suleiman mountains indics. This can be further supported based on linguistics, with the significant lahnda punjabi dialect influence on pashto language. Lahnda is spoken in parts of Suleiman mountains too. All pashto dialects shows this linguistical influence.



Arrian in his Anabasis refers to the Suleiman mountain locals, using sources from greeks in 300-200 BCE, as "indian mountaineers"

https://archive.org/details/cu31924026460752/page/n175/mode/2up?q=Arachosia

This is considering the fact that Arachosia included the Suleiman mountains.



Hsuen Tsang in 630 CE refers to the local languages spoken in much of Suleiman mountains to been "indian languages", except in the areas where pashtun lived at the time (they only had a small part of the mountains)


Even in 1030 CE, Biruni refered the locals of northern Balochistan as "savage hindus", despite mentioning pashtuns living north of those indics


https://archive.org/details/alberunisindia_201612/alberunisindia-color_001/page/198/mode/2up


Eventually pashtuns took over half of the mountains, even Waziristan. This isn't based on impressions or mythology, this is based on historical attestations. The locals in the mountains, prior pashtuns arriving, were simply indics. And clearly akin to lahnda speakers, such as saraikis, who still lives in eastern parts of the mountains. Those are just regular punjabis.



https://archive.org/details/Shahpur/page/412/mode/2up (inscription about pashtuns is from 270 CE)

https://archive.org/details/626176584-sims-williams-bactrian-documents-part-2/page/n43/mode/1up?q=afghans (letters are from 480 CE)



As we can see here, pashtuns, originally called afghans, were living right next to white huns, who lived right north of Hindukush and Hazajarat. The sassanid inscription simply makes it clear that greek "Abgan" is actually awghan, comparing it to Middle Persian inscription. There's just no w or gh letter in greek script, so we can luckily compare it to non-greek inscriptions. Awghan is how pashtuns natively says afghan



https://astrofoxx.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/jyotish_brihat-samhita_m-r-bhat_part-1-of-2_1981.pdf (540 CE)

Varahamihira, a brahmin of magian descent (likely from north Afghanistan originally), refered white huns and afghans (pashtuns) twice in his book, showing them geographically connected to each other. This helps further to strengthen the fact that pashtuns were in North Afghanistan before moving to Suleiman mountains, and very much the same as the "abgans" refered in bactrian letters. Pashtuns were most rather likely in Hazarajat, as pashtuns are clearly yaz iranic descended since their R1a pashtun specific clade split from kurds in 1200-1100 BCE. Hazarajat lies closer to the yaz split area.


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On top of that, Varahamihira separates pashtuns from cavemen. That's refering to borderlands, as shown in the page, since we had indics living in the mountains. The mountains in question would be the Suleiman mountains, which has for 1000s of years been considered a frontier between India and Khorosan, unlike the hindukush mountains. That means pashtuns according to Varahamihira, werent in Suleiman mountains yet. And unlike with greek and Middle Persian, the indic script Varahamihira used had both a b and a v letter. He used the v letter, and wrote afghans in plural as "Avagana". There's no gh letter in indic scripts though at the time. Again, an attestation, not myth.





It's only in 630 CE we see pashtuns in Suleiman mountains, seemingly only in Khost, parts of Paktya and Logar, they were in. Hsuen Tsang passed much of the mountains, and only came across the nation of "O-Po-kin", rendered to "Avakan" (closest rendition of Awghan)


https://dn790003.ca.archive.org/0/items/ajf4729.0001.001.umich.edu/ajf4729.0001.001.umich.edu.pdf



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But prior Hsuen Tsang, we never hear of anything about pashtuns in the mountains historically.



Even linguistics support this from north to south migration. Pashto shares several cognates with other iranic languages, which has turned the D letters into L, which is also called lambdacism. This is a trait in some hindukush and pamiri languages, along with bactrian, which is actually a bactrian feature. Such feature only took place within hindukush and seemingly hazarajat:



https://www.academia.edu/49862012/Lambdacism_and_the_development_of_Old_Iranian_t_in _Pashto


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And even then also, we see pashtuns in the bactrian letters and sassanid inscription with iranic names, which would be out of character for non-muslim hindu indians. Even Hudud al alam also separates non-muslim pashtuns from hindus, buddhists (idolators) and muslims. This proves pashtuns weren't hindus before islam, but rather iranic pagans/zoroastrians. The actual locals of Suleiman mountains, as even Babur refered the remaining ones, would been hindus. So pashtuns came from outside Suleiman mountains, settling amongst the local indic hindus


https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.281514/page/n109/mode/2up?q=afghan

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The haplogroups, along with the history and linguistics, clearly shows pashtuns came from outside Suleiman mountains, most likely northwestern hazarajat (lies closer to yaz descended populations, as hindukush locals dont have yaz clades), possibly brought or forced out of the mountains into Nangarhar, Kabul by turk shahis in 550s, and then finally settled into the Suleiman mountains for 80 years prior Hsuen Tsang.

They would 100% not have such Suleiman local indic subclades.


So no, it isn't crazy to say pashtuns mixed with indics in Suleiman mountains and increased their IVC. Even tajikistanis in another study shows per DATES, going through a late event of significant south asian admixture in 1000 CE, most likely indian slaves brought in the towns


https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-04144-4


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So what's crazy about pashtuns mixing with local indians in the mountains? Their haplogroup and language shows mixing?

Thanks. I will read this carefully and respond.

[thisismyaccount]

@thisismyaccount thanks for responding, but I need to be very clear with you.

Your entire argument, it seems to me, is based on the idea that Pashtuns picked up 30–50% “Indian” ancestry recently (500–1000 CE). IMO that claim collapses the moment you look at actual genome-wide data. I ask you to do it objectively.

Again, I’m not asking you to agree with me. I’m asking you to read the sources and then bring sources of your own. Otherwise we’re just trading personal beliefs. Genetics does not work like that.

1) BMAC already had Indus-related ancestry 2500–2000 BCE. I ask you to please read my previous post, item 6c)

This is not my opinion. This is ancient DNA.

Narasimhan et al. 2019 (Science):
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aat7487

“Three BMAC individuals dated 2500–2000 BCE from Gonur show elevated proportions of AHG/Indus Periphery ancestry.”

So the IVC-related ancestry that Pashtuns have was already flowing north into the Iranian Plateau and Central Asia thousands of years before the medieval period.
This is the prehistoric source of the South Asian-related ancestry in Pashtuns and certainly not medieval Punjabis.

2) AASI in the Hindu Kush is ancient, not recent

You completely misinterpreted Narasimhan. Please read him and if you don't agree, don't state your opinion. Your opinion has value if it is backed by reputable sources.

He literally says the opposite of your point:

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aat7487

“The AASI ancestry in Hindu Kush groups reflects deep, pre-Bronze Age layers not attributable to recent South Asian admixture.”

This is the key line.
If your model were correct, Narasimhan’s qpAdm runs would show a recent Indo-Gangetic signal. They do not. They show ancient ANE+AASI highland ancestry. You do realize this is the stuff that predates Indo-Iranians themselves. Again, check the timelines that I provided.

So again: you need a source that models Pashtuns with recent Punjabi/Sindhi input. Without that, this remains a belief.

3) Y-DNA clades do NOT measure % ancestry

You keep using haplogroups (L, H, certain R1a branches) to argue 30–50% “Indic.”
That isn’t how population genetics works.

Hellenthal et al. 2014 (Science):

“Y-chromosome admixture proportions are typically very different from autosomal ancestry proportions.”

Y-DNA tracks one male line, not full ancestry.
Autosomal qpAdm is what counts, and those models reject recent Indo-Gangetic ancestry in Pashtuns.

4) Your interpretation of AASI is historically incorrect

AASI is not “Indian.”
It is 30,000–10,000 years old, predating Indo-Aryans, Indo-Iranians, and even early IVC. It existed across the Hindu Kush before any of these populations formed.

Pashtun AASI = Bronze Age Hindu Kush AASI
Punjabi/Sindhi AASI = Indus Valley AASI

They are not the same layer.
Pashtuns do not carry the Indus Valley ancestry that Punjabis/Sindhis have. Their AASI mixed with Iran_N/Chalcolithic in the highlands, not in the Indus plains.


Here’s what the data, not opinion, actually shows based on these sources:

1) Pashtun “South Asian” ancestry is ancient, Bronze Age, premixed with Iran_N long before Pashtun ethnogenesis.
2) Pashtuns show no recent Indo-Gangetic admixture.
3) Pakistani Pashtuns are among the most endogamous in the region.

Read Narasimhan et al. 2019 (Science):

Y-DNA does not prove 30–50% recent Indian mixing at all because autosomal DNA disproves it directly.

If you still want to argue otherwise, that’s fine, but I ask for one thing:

Bring a source. A paper, a study, A qpAdm model anything.
Something that explicitly says:
“Pashtuns derive 30–50% of their ancestry from recent Indo-Gangetic populations.”

I’ll leave it here until you bring a source.



Are you even reading what I'm saying? You misunderstood me, it's too frustrating.

I ALREADY SAID BEFORE IVC EXISTED IN CENTRAL ASIA BEFORE ARYANS ARRIVED, SUCH AS UZBEKISTAN. READ MY COMMENTS:


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When I say 30-50% IVC, I MEAN THAT 30-50% OF THEIR CURRENT IVC VERY LIKELY COMES FROM INDICS. NOT ALL OF THEIR IVC COMES FROM THEM.
Example if pashtuns are 8% AASI, or 24% IVC. Then likely 7-12% of IVC that comes from indics, and their remaining were ALREADY PRESENT IN PASHTUNS. PASHTUNS ALWAYS HAD A CHUNK OF IVC, THEY LIKELY WERE MORE WEST EURASIAN BEFORE MIXING WITH INDICS.



"“The AASI ancestry in Hindu Kush groups reflects deep, pre-Bronze Age layers not attributable to recent South Asian admixture.”


Can you show me this quote? I didn't find it in section S3, nor in your link. Can you take a screenshot of that?

I even tried to look for you quote in the supplementary, I didn't ever see it. Nor did I see it in the link paper. Quite on the contrary, Narasimhan rather shown the AASI to been a subcontinental component that was rather spread by iranian neolithic pastoralists.

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Yes, y-dna is different from autosomal. That doesn't mean now pashtuns have 0% indic ancestry at all, your study never claimed that either.



I never said ALL OF THE AASI IN CENTRAL ASIA WAS BROUGHT BY "ETHNIC INDIANS", I SAID THAT AASI IN BRONZE AGE CENTRAL ASIA WAS BROUGHT BY IVC OR OTHER WEST EURASIAN PASTORALISTS MOVING NORTH. WE DON'T SEE TUTKAUL HAVE ANY AASI, WHICH IS MUCH OLDER THAN BRONZE AGE. I SAID THAT PASHTUNS MOVED TO SULEIMAN MOUNTAINS, AND ADDED EVEN MORE IVC. I ALSO POSTED A STUDY OF TAJIKISTANIS ACCORDING TO DATES ADDING MORE SOUTH ASIAN IN 1000 CE. EVEN THE HISTORIC SWAT SAMPLES SHOWS INCREASED SOUTH ASIAN, COMPARED TO IRON AGE SWAT LOCALS. WHY IS THIS SO IMPOSSIBLE????


Swat Pashtuns already have a large amount of additional IVC compared to Suleiman mountains pashtuns, when they historically moved from Kabul to Swat. That happened in 1500s. That itself already destroys YOUR CLAIM that pashtuns never mixed additionally with indics "recently", when clearly can see THEY DID. The historic swat samples would been what pashtuns mixed with, and theyre closest to punjabis. Pashtuns in khyber often have local ghandaran haplogroups too not found in Suleiman mountains, but I guess that wouldn't mean they mixed with local indics at all, huh?

[Negah]

Are you even reading what I'm saying? You misunderstood me, it's too frustrating.

I ALREADY SAID BEFORE IVC EXISTED IN CENTRAL ASIA BEFORE ARYANS ARRIVED, SUCH AS UZBEKISTAN. READ MY COMMENTS:


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When I say 30-50% IVC, I MEAN THAT 30-50% OF THEIR CURRENT IVC VERY LIKELY COMES FROM INDICS. NOT ALL OF THEIR IVC COMES FROM THEM.
Example if pashtuns are 8% AASI, or 24% IVC. Then likely 7-12% of IVC that comes from indics, and their remaining were ALREADY PRESENT IN PASHTUNS. PASHTUNS ALWAYS HAD A CHUNK OF IVC, THEY LIKELY WERE MORE WEST EURASIAN BEFORE MIXING WITH INDICS.



"“The AASI ancestry in Hindu Kush groups reflects deep, pre-Bronze Age layers not attributable to recent South Asian admixture.”


Can you show me this quote? I didn't find it in section S3, nor in your link. Can you take a screenshot of that?

I even tried to look for you quote in the supplementary, I didn't ever see it. Nor did I see it in the link paper. Quite on the contrary, Narasimhan rather shown the AASI to been a subcontinental component that was rather spread by iranian neolithic pastoralists.

144864


Yes, y-dna is different from autosomal. That doesn't mean now pashtuns have 0% indic ancestry at all, your study never claimed that either.



I never said ALL OF THE AASI IN CENTRAL ASIA WAS BROUGHT BY "ETHNIC INDIANS", I SAID THAT AASI IN BRONZE AGE CENTRAL ASIA WAS BROUGHT BY IVC OR OTHER WEST EURASIAN PASTORALISTS MOVING NORTH. WE DON'T SEE TUTKAUL HAVE ANY AASI, WHICH IS MUCH OLDER THAN BRONZE AGE. I SAID THAT PASHTUNS MOVED TO SULEIMAN MOUNTAINS, AND ADDED EVEN MORE IVC. I ALSO POSTED A STUDY OF TAJIKISTANIS ACCORDING TO DATES ADDING MORE SOUTH ASIAN IN 1000 CE. EVEN THE HISTORIC SWAT SAMPLES SHOWS INCREASED SOUTH ASIAN, COMPARED TO IRON AGE SWAT LOCALS. WHY IS THIS SO IMPOSSIBLE????


Swat Pashtuns already have a large amount of additional IVC compared to Suleiman mountains pashtuns, when they historically moved from Kabul to Swat. That happened in 1500s. That itself already destroys YOUR CLAIM that pashtuns never mixed additionally with indics "recently", when clearly can see THEY DID. The historic swat samples would been what pashtuns mixed with, and theyre closest to punjabis. Pashtuns in khyber often have local ghandaran haplogroups too not found in Suleiman mountains, but I guess that wouldn't mean they mixed with local indics at all, huh?




My friend, you’re still arguing with a version of my position that I’ve never actually held. What is going on, my man? You are a very articulate person. Not sure what is going on here. I really thought we were about to have a great exchange of ideas and something profound and enlightening.

You keep repeating that “Pashtuns always had AASI, but then added 30–50% IVC from Indics recently” and you’re treating that as if it’s just obviously true because of some haplogroups and historical presence of Indians in the Suleiman mountains. Genetics is a science based on facts, not speculation based on historical narrative.

You have two problems:

1) You’re not engaging with the autosomal models. You need to.
2) You’re using Y-DNA + history to argue for quantitative autosomal claim of $\text{30–50\%}$ that the genome-wide data simply do not support and reject.

You need to have an autosomal model that shows Pashtuns = [Iran Plateau / Steppe / Ancient AASI] + big chunk of recent Indo-Gangetic source
With decent fit (qpAdm, DATES, etc.).

You wrote: “He only said the AASI in Hindukush is native there, and didn't come recently from example Pakistan like 1000–2000 years ago? Not that it's different.”

That is the whole point, my man.
That’s exactly the point.

Narasimhan’s whole setup is:
Ancient AASI (not recent) + Iran\_N/ChL mixed in the highlands. Then Steppe\_MLBA arrives and fuses with that.

Present-day Pashtuns, i.e., your people, are modeled as Iran-related + Steppe\_MLBA + that ancient AASI highland component (not from India)

When he tries to test recent Indo-Gangetic sources, those qpAdm fits break or are unnecessary. That is the key. If your “30–50% from Indics” story was right, then what do you think he should see? cause it's not there.

Here models Pashtuns as Iran-related + Steppe\_MLBA + ancient AASI-like South Asian hunter-gatherer component.

Then you say: “Swat Pashtuns already have a large amount of additional IVC compared to Suleiman Pashtuns … That itself already destroys YOUR CLAIM that Pashtuns never mixed additionally with Indics ‘recently’…”

No, that shows something much more modest and completely compatible with what I said, specially to Aviccena, which is that Different Pashtun groups on different frontiers picked up local shifts (Swat, some KPK zones, etc.). That does not imply a pan-Pashtun 30–50% Indic acquisition in the medieval period. Regional drift and local admixture absolutely. Pashtuns occupy a vast region, and I said they are diverse and not stable. Finally, your “huge segment of their IVC is late Indic from Suleiman” it is not demonstrated.

The real disagreement between us seems to be this.

You: A big chunk of Pashtun IVC / AASI comes from recent Indic mixing in the Suleiman mountains, which has 30–50% of their South Asian component; this is inferred from Y-DNA + linguistics + textual history.

Me: The bulk of Pashtun South Asian ancestry is ancient, formed via highland AASI + Iran\_N/ChL + Steppe\_MLBA, as modeled in Narasimhan-style qpAdm. Later Indian contacts may add local shifts, but not a massive, pan-ethnic 30–50% Indo-Gangetic input.

What I need for proof is to see a paper that says something like “Pashtuns derive a substantial portion of their ancestry from recent Indo-Gangetic groups (e.g., Punjabis/Sindhis) in the last 1–2 millennia.”

Otherwise, let's change the conversation and explore other things. You know where I stand, and I know yours. We can discuss other things.

[thisismyaccount]

My friend, you’re still arguing with a version of my position that I’ve never actually held. What is going on, my man? You are a very articulate person. Not sure what is going on here. I really thought we were about to have a great exchange of ideas and something profound and enlightening.

You keep repeating that “Pashtuns always had AASI, but then added 30–50% IVC from Indics recently” and you’re treating that as if it’s just obviously true because of some haplogroups and historical presence of Indians in the Suleiman mountains. Genetics is a science based on facts, not speculation based on historical narrative.

You have two problems:

1) You’re not engaging with the autosomal models. You need to.
2) You’re using Y-DNA + history to argue for quantitative autosomal claim of $\text{30–50\%}$ that the genome-wide data simply do not support and reject.

You need to have an autosomal model that shows Pashtuns = [Iran Plateau / Steppe / Ancient AASI] + big chunk of recent Indo-Gangetic source
With decent fit (qpAdm, DATES, etc.).

You wrote: “He only said the AASI in Hindukush is native there, and didn't come recently from example Pakistan like 1000–2000 years ago? Not that it's different.”

That is the whole point, my man.
That’s exactly the point.

Narasimhan’s whole setup is:
Ancient AASI (not recent) + Iran\_N/ChL mixed in the highlands. Then Steppe\_MLBA arrives and fuses with that.

Present-day Pashtuns, i.e., your people, are modeled as Iran-related + Steppe\_MLBA + that ancient AASI highland component (not from India)

When he tries to test recent Indo-Gangetic sources, those qpAdm fits break or are unnecessary. That is the key. If your “30–50% from Indics” story was right, then what do you think he should see? cause it's not there.

Here models Pashtuns as Iran-related + Steppe\_MLBA + ancient AASI-like South Asian hunter-gatherer component.

Then you say: “Swat Pashtuns already have a large amount of additional IVC compared to Suleiman Pashtuns … That itself already destroys YOUR CLAIM that Pashtuns never mixed additionally with Indics ‘recently’…”

No, that shows something much more modest and completely compatible with what I said, speicallay Aviccena, which is that Different Pashtun groups on different frontiers picked up local shifts (Swat, some KPK zones, etc.). That does not imply a pan-Pashtun 30–50% Indic acquisition in the medieval period. Regional drift and local admixture absolutely. Pashtuns occupy a vast region, and I said they are diverse and not stable. Finally, your “huge segment of their IVC is late Indic from Suleiman” it is not demonstrated.

The real disagreement between us seems to be this.

You: A big chunk of Pashtun IVC / AASI comes from recent Indic mixing in the Suleiman mountains, which has 30–50% of their South Asian component; this is inferred from Y-DNA + linguistics + textual history.

Me: The bulk of Pashtun South Asian ancestry is ancient, formed via highland AASI + Iran\_N/ChL + Steppe\_MLBA, as modeled in Narasimhan-style qpAdm. Later Indian contacts may add local shifts, but not a massive, pan-ethnic 30–50% Indo-Gangetic input.

What I need for proof is to see a paper that says something like “Pashtuns derive a substantial portion of their ancestry from recent Indo-Gangetic groups (e.g., Punjabis/Sindhis) in the last 1–2 millennia.”

Otherwise, let's change the conversation and explore other things. You know where I stand, and I know yours. We can discuss other things.


"Ancient AASI (not recent) + Iran\_N/ChL mixed in the highlands. Then Steppe\_MLBA arrives and fuses with that"

When does he say that? I never heard him say anywhere that AASI existed In the mountains prior iranian Neolithics arriving. Show me.




"Here models Pashtuns as Iran-related + Steppe\_MLBA + ancient AASI-like South Asian hunter-gatherer component."


If you meant "here" as he, why do you mention that? Narasimhan never mentioned pashtuns specifically or modelled them?



"No, that shows something much more modest and completely compatible with what I said, speicallay Aviccena, which is that Different Pashtun groups on different frontiers picked up local shifts (Swat, some KPK zones, etc.). That does not imply a pan-Pashtun 30–50% Indic acquisition in the medieval period. Regional drift and local admixture absolutely. Pashtuns occupy a vast region, and I said they are diverse and not stable. Finally, your “huge segment of their IVC is late Indic from Suleiman” it is not demonstrated."



Pashtuns are diverse, because they moved from Suleiman mountains to elsewhere. Otherwise mountain pashtuns have a small cluster.

When I say 30-50%, I mean just their IVC being 30-50% from indics. Not being actually 30-50% indic. Indics just have far more IVC admix than pashtuns do. So pashtuns being example 24% IVC and receiving example 8% from indics, means this 8% IVC translates to 12,5% Indic ancestry. Even though 8 out of 24 makes up to 33%. That's what I meant.


Dude, swat pashtuns very clearly shows founder effect in KPK. They do that, because a group of yusufzai pashtuns moved from Zabul, through Kabul, into Swat. Swat yusufzais had no significant presence prior the 1500s.

https://x.com/Afghan_DNA/status/1941795639488061806



Theyre the pashtun tribes with THE MOST IRANIC YAZ PASHTUN R1A CLADE. While this clade existing in other sarban tribes in Suleiman mountains, not equally as high amongst them. Yusufzais also have little amount of L clades. YES, they moved into KPK recently, the founder effect is clearly showing.


Yes, all pashtuns were in Suleiman mountains and perhaps part of Ghazni in 600-1000 CE, as WE SEE BY HISTORY. You can't deny historical accounts.



I keep saying VERY LIKELY (not 100%) mountain pashtuns have mixed with indics, because they would come from a region that rather resemble eastern shifted herat tajiks in north hazarajat. The locals in Suleiman mountains, based on the pre-aryan archeological sites rather related more to Indus than sistan, found in the mountains + the fact we know the pre-pashtun locals were indians and that some still live there today and near the mountains (they score like punjabis), they would been like Indus indics. Similiar to some of the swat Iron Age samples in the slopes of hindukush, who also are very close to punjabis.

Then compare modern pashtuns with those punjabis. Pashtuns are by far closer to tajiks than punjabis/indics, who would been the natives of Suleiman mountains. Pashtuns are slightly more south asian shifted compared to these tajiks, so it's obvious as day and night they mixed with them significant (probably derives 20% of their ancestry from them) based on the haplogroups. Watch, 2 mehsuds from Waziristan and another pashtun from Chaman, Balochistan. All 3 from Suleiman mountains.



144866

144867

https://x.com/vicayana/status/1916221824356004180. (9% AASI + 38% andronovo and rest BMAC + iran N)



The seraikis and other local indians haven't been modelled on qpadm, only seen them on g25. But I can see from their models, theyre just like other south punjabis and sindhis, such as sindhi hindus.

So I can compare these pashtuns with Sindhi hindus and aroras:


https://x.com/vicayana/status/1745406260433076589

https://gujjarancestry.substack.com/p/are-gujjars-and-sindhis-genetically

144868


Add khatris too:

https://www.reddit.com/r/SouthAsianAncestry/comments/18b10du/punjabi_khatri_qpadm_runs/


The sindhis and punjabis are on average 22% AASI, while mountain pashtuns are 8-10% AASI.



There can't be such a big difference between what would been locals of Suleiman mountains, and present mountain pashtuns, if pashtuns didn't come from elsewhere. And as I've already shown, pashtuns by historical account, even seemingly linguistics, and by DNA, migrated to the mountains more than 1000 years ago. But since theyre slightly south asian shifted compared to Khorosan tajiks, it's not crazy to say at all they mixed with the locals THEY ASSIMILATED.


Man, i WOULD LOVED to post ancient DNA samples, but we have literally almost none in Afghanistan. Only 2-3 in the north. We can only go by guesswork, which at this point doesn't seem unreliable. We have haplogroups, the stark difference between pashtuns and mountain indics, compared to tajiks far north in northwest Afghanistan, the historical attestations. I don't think that's nothing?



Dude, there's not a paper FOR EVERY DAMN THING. You can use formal tools, use historical attestations to MAKE YOUR OWN CONCLUSIONS. However you can't keep ignoring how pashtuns have Suleiman mountain indic clades.




"Narasimhan’s whole setup is:
Ancient AASI (not recent) + Iran\_N/ChL mixed in the highlands. Then Steppe\_MLBA arrives and fuses with that.

Present-day Pashtuns, i.e., your people, are modeled as Iran-related + Steppe\_MLBA + that ancient AASI highland component (not from India)"


He modelled swat samples like that. Pashtuns are irrelevant to swat samples, man. Idk how this argument is negating anything at all?

Pashtuns being modeled as BMAC + indian tribal + andronovo means nothing, everyone is a mix of iran N, Anatolian, EHG, CHG, AASI in South Asia and Central Asia before arrival of turks. They can be modeled like that, and still have indic ancestry. It just means pashtuns were slightly more ANF shifted, before mixing with indics.


How much indic admix exactly? Idk, but definitely some admixture, since they have Suleiman mountain indic clades. They literally live in Indian territory, man, they would have absorbed a good chunk. We see the same for yusufzai pashtuns, compared to mountain pashtuns. Although probably not as much indic ancestry in mountain pashtuns.

Unfortunately we have no actual pre-turkic sample from anywhere in north Afghanistan, so I can't model pashtuns with said sample without any turkic ancestry + indic



Yes, no study support my theories. No studies reject them either, as they don't make much comment on it. Not every single damn thing is covered by a study paper.

[Peterski]

What it all comes down to is, there were catastrophes which interrupted the timeline, and calendars have been manipulated, and most information is controlled by "scholars" and "universities," (and corporations).

The confusion means we have to be very sceptical. "heliocentric theory" "evolution theory" "paleolithic age" "Yamnaya theory"

Wandal is simply a "flat-Earther" who writes utter nonsense which is against all of modern science.

[Avicenna]

"Ancient AASI (not recent) + Iran\_N/ChL mixed in the highlands. Then Steppe\_MLBA arrives and fuses with that"

When does he say that? I never heard him say anywhere that AASI existed In the mountains prior iranian Neolithics arriving. Show me.




"Here models Pashtuns as Iran-related + Steppe\_MLBA + ancient AASI-like South Asian hunter-gatherer component."


If you meant "here" as he, why do you mention that? Narasimhan never mentioned pashtuns specifically or modelled them?



"No, that shows something much more modest and completely compatible with what I said, speicallay Aviccena, which is that Different Pashtun groups on different frontiers picked up local shifts (Swat, some KPK zones, etc.). That does not imply a pan-Pashtun 30–50% Indic acquisition in the medieval period. Regional drift and local admixture absolutely. Pashtuns occupy a vast region, and I said they are diverse and not stable. Finally, your “huge segment of their IVC is late Indic from Suleiman” it is not demonstrated."



Pashtuns are diverse, because they moved from Suleiman mountains to elsewhere. Otherwise mountain pashtuns have a small cluster.

When I say 30-50%, I mean just their IVC being 30-50% from indics. Not being actually 30-50% indic. Indics just have far more IVC admix than pashtuns do. So pashtuns being example 24% IVC and receiving example 8% from indics, means this 8% IVC translates to 12,5% Indic ancestry. Even though 8 out of 24 makes up to 33%. That's what I meant.


Dude, swat pashtuns very clearly shows founder effect in KPK. They do that, because a group of yusufzai pashtuns moved from Zabul, through Kabul, into Swat. Swat yusufzais had no significant presence prior the 1500s.

https://x.com/Afghan_DNA/status/1941795639488061806



Theyre the pashtun tribes with THE MOST IRANIC YAZ PASHTUN R1A CLADE. While this clade existing in other sarban tribes in Suleiman mountains, not equally as high amongst them. Yusufzais also have little amount of L clades. YES, they moved into KPK recently, the founder effect is clearly showing.


Yes, all pashtuns were in Suleiman mountains and perhaps part of Ghazni in 600-1000 CE, as WE SEE BY HISTORY. You can't deny historical accounts.



I keep saying VERY LIKELY (not 100%) mountain pashtuns have mixed with indics, because they would come from a region that rather resemble eastern shifted herat tajiks in north hazarajat. The locals in Suleiman mountains, based on the pre-aryan archeological sites rather related more to Indus than sistan, found in the mountains + the fact we know the pre-pashtun locals were indians and that some still live there today and near the mountains (they score like punjabis), they would been like Indus indics. Similiar to some of the swat Iron Age samples in the slopes of hindukush, who also are very close to punjabis.

Then compare modern pashtuns with those punjabis. Pashtuns are by far closer to tajiks than punjabis/indics, who would been the natives of Suleiman mountains. Pashtuns are slightly more south asian shifted compared to these tajiks, so it's obvious as day and night they mixed with them significant (probably derives 20% of their ancestry from them) based on the haplogroups. Watch, 2 mehsuds from Waziristan and another pashtun from Chaman, Balochistan. All 3 from Suleiman mountains.



144866

144867

https://x.com/vicayana/status/1916221824356004180. (9% AASI + 38% andronovo and rest BMAC + iran N)



The seraikis and other local indians haven't been modelled on qpadm, only seen them on g25. But I can see from their models, theyre just like other south punjabis and sindhis, such as sindhi hindus.

So I can compare these pashtuns with Sindhi hindus and aroras:


https://x.com/vicayana/status/1745406260433076589

https://gujjarancestry.substack.com/p/are-gujjars-and-sindhis-genetically

144868


Add khatris too:

https://www.reddit.com/r/SouthAsianAncestry/comments/18b10du/punjabi_khatri_qpadm_runs/


The sindhis and punjabis are on average 22% AASI, while mountain pashtuns are 8-10% AASI.



There can't be such a big difference between what would been locals of Suleiman mountains, and present mountain pashtuns, if pashtuns didn't come from elsewhere. And as I've already shown, pashtuns by historical account, even seemingly linguistics, and by DNA, migrated to the mountains more than 1000 years ago. But since theyre slightly south asian shifted compared to Khorosan tajiks, it's not crazy to say at all they mixed with the locals THEY ASSIMILATED.


Man, i WOULD LOVED to post ancient DNA samples, but we have literally almost none in Afghanistan. Only 2-3 in the north. We can only go by guesswork, which at this point doesn't seem unreliable. We have haplogroups, the stark difference between pashtuns and mountain indics, compared to tajiks far north in northwest Afghanistan, the historical attestations. I don't think that's nothing?



Dude, there's not a paper FOR EVERY DAMN THING. You can use formal tools, use historical attestations to MAKE YOUR OWN CONCLUSIONS. However you can't keep ignoring how pashtuns have Suleiman mountain indic clades.




"Narasimhan’s whole setup is:
Ancient AASI (not recent) + Iran\_N/ChL mixed in the highlands. Then Steppe\_MLBA arrives and fuses with that.

Present-day Pashtuns, i.e., your people, are modeled as Iran-related + Steppe\_MLBA + that ancient AASI highland component (not from India)"


He modelled swat samples like that. Pashtuns are irrelevant to swat samples, man. Idk how this argument is negating anything at all?

Pashtuns being modeled as BMAC + indian tribal + andronovo means nothing, everyone is a mix of iran N, Anatolian, EHG, CHG, AASI in South Asia and Central Asia before arrival of turks. They can be modeled like that, and still have indic ancestry. It just means pashtuns were slightly more ANF shifted, before mixing with indics.


How much indic admix exactly? Idk, but definitely some admixture, since they have Suleiman mountain indic clades. They literally live in Indian territory, man, they would have absorbed a good chunk. We see the same for yusufzai pashtuns, compared to mountain pashtuns. Although probably not as much indic ancestry in mountain pashtuns.

Unfortunately we have no actual pre-turkic sample from anywhere in north Afghanistan, so I can't model pashtuns with said sample without any turkic ancestry + indic



Yes, no study support my theories. No studies reject them either, as they don't make much comment on it. Not every single damn thing is covered by a study paper.

Would you propose they mixed with these types of people?

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DO8nblmjEO4/?igsh=MTBwcGxpMWNsdDczZg==

[thisismyaccount]

Would you propose they mixed with these types of people?

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DO8nblmjEO4/?igsh=MTBwcGxpMWNsdDczZg==

Yes, I would assume so. Pashtuns would been seemingly more northern shifted, with probably far less south asian looking individuals prior

[Avicenna]

Yes, I would assume so. Pashtuns would been seemingly more northern shifted, with probably far less south asian looking individuals prior

This does actually make sense tbh, I would have imagined OG pashtuns to have looked like those darwaz badakshi Tajiks, absolutely zero south Asian or zagros heavy phenotypes among them, but moving towards the suleiman mountains caused them too assimilate the local hill populations ( partially obviously ) and increasing their IVC ancestry and absorbing some phenotypes from them. I think the way you phrased it to Negah made it seem like they are a hybrid between the two when in reality they only partially assimilated these folks.

Edit: even those darwaz badakshi Tajiks with zero south Asian looking people still genetically have some IVC and as a result AASI in their genome, so OG pashtuns would have probably been about 2-4% AASI, with assimilation of these local suleiman populations increasing their AASI to around 6-8%.

[Negah]

@thisismyaccount

My friend, before I go point-by-point, I need to lay out something very simple to you. After reading all your replies several times, I’ve identified three major weaknesses in your argument, and unless we fix these, the conversation will be painful for both of us.

I ask you kindly, please read this post, and please address all 3 issues I have identified; otherwise, the conversation will keep going in circles.

1) You keep treating my posts as “my personal views.”

None of what I wrote is “my opinion.”
Everything I posted comes from peer-reviewed genetic papers; they are from Narasimhan, Lazaridis, Skoglund, Reich lab, etc. I even quoted them directly with links to make it easy. So when you tell me “you’re wrong,” you’re actually disagreeing with the current scientific consensus that I am sharing with you, not me. I am not a geneticist, same as you. I am just stating what these professionals say.

If you think these scientists are wrong, then you need to show scientific counter-evidence. Telling me I’m wrong while ignoring the sources I posted is not a scientific argument.

2) You’re relying on tools that are not scientific (G25, HarappaWorld, GEDmatch, etc).

You cannot use G25, GEDmatch, HarappaWorld, 23andMe, Ancestry, MyHeritage “2% Chinese, 3% Samurai, 1% Swedish” type reports or PCA screenshots to talk about ancient ancestry.

Why? Because these are hobby tools. They are entertainment. Not science.
They cannot detect deep admixture, migration direction, or timing. They are not used in any peer-reviewed work.

Professional population genetics uses qpAdm, qpGraph, DATES, and f-statistics.
These are the only tools that detect ancient ancestry properly.

This is the same mistake our Kurdish friend (parents from Turkey, born in Germany) made years ago when he tried to show Kurds had “no South Asian ancestry” by misusing these calculators. Back then you told me he didn’t know what he was doing. You even laughed at how he was twisting hobby tools to fit his agenda.

Now you’re repeating the exact same error.

Please cite peer-reviewed papers where real geneticists use the right tools. Genetics is a science. It is based on fact, not assumption, not inference, not hobby calculators, not spreadsheets.

3) You use history to prove genetics, for instance, you’re using Hindu Shahi / Kabul Shahi history as if genetics uses medieval dynasties as data.

Geneticists do not use dynasties, chronicles, Biruni quotes, or medieval political history to reconstruct deep ancestry.
They use DNA and scientific toolkits. By its very nature, genetics (and archaeology) is conservative because they soley and only rely on evidence and facts. They cannot make historical inferences. Historians can, because they have multiple tools—texts, archaeology, linguistics, Genetics, numismatics, etc. Geneticists cannot.

We can talk history, but you cannot use history to prove genetic conclusions. That is simply not a correct or proper methodology.

And historically, the Hindu Shahi / Kabul Shahi dynasty has nothing to do with Pashtuns.
The Shahi domains were a mixture of:


Bactrian elements
Indo-Aryan / Prakrit-speaking elements
Central Asian elements



none of that = “Pashtuns.”

Modern Kabul has zero linguistic, cultural, or genealogical continuity with the Shahi court.
Kabul’s population was replaced many times: Ghaznavids, Ghurids, Mongols, Timurids, Mughals, Durranis, plus modern-era shifts. If you want, we can discuss it. But Today, Kabul is a Tajik-majority city with Hazara and Pashtun among many minority groups; it is nothing like medieval Kabul.

You cannot use “Hindu Shahi” as a genetic category. That is not how genetics works.

4) Stop misquoting me. I never said Pastun had no AASI. You do, and you have a lot of it. It is a foundational part of your ancestry. That is a fact. What I said one more time and please only discuss this and stop misconstruing it. It is very simple, based on the studies that cite not my view but the studies that are reputable, peer-reviewed, and based on solid scientific foundations, not myth, folklore, nationalistic narratives, colorism, or political persuasion.

Pashtuns do have AASI — and quite a lot of it.
So do Tajiks.
So do Iranians.
So do Central Asians around the old BMAC zone.

This is not controversial.
This is basic population genetics.

The real question is:
Is that AASI recent (medieval Indian) or ancient (pre-IVC highlander AASI)?

The peer-reviewed papers say it very clearly:

Pashtun AASI = ancient highland South Asian ancestry
Not medieval Punjabi/Sindhi input.

This is exactly what Narasimhan et al. show. I quoted the line before:

“The AASI ancestry in Hindu Kush groups reflects deep, pre-Bronze Age layers not attributable to recent South Asian admixture.”

Narasimhan et al., 2019, Supplement S3

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6822619/

https://reich.hms.harvard.edu/sites/reich.hms.harvard.edu/files/inline-files/2019_Science_NarasimhanPatterson_CentralSouthAsia_ Supplement.pdf

So Avicenna is wrong when he uses “steppe” to explain being lighter and uses “Indians” to explain being darker. That’s not science. That’s phenotype guessing.

And you are wrong when you say Pashtuns got 30–50% AASI from medieval Punjabis.
The real data simply do not support that.

Pashtuns have AASI, yes.
But the source of most it ( not all of it) is ancient — older than “India” as a concept, older than Indo-Aryans, older than the Shahi dynasties, older than the modern ethnic map.

This is why Pashtuns sit genetically:

closer to Iranians, Kurds, Tajiks
not
Punjab/Sindh.

The reality is that you and I are cousins of Punjabis, but mainly an ancient cousin, not a medieval one.

The Pashtuns drift south on PCA because of their ancient AASI, not because of a massive medieval Indian mixture.

That’s all I’ve been saying from the beginning.

[Negah]

Yes, I would assume so. Pashtuns would been seemingly more northern shifted, with probably far less south asian looking individuals prior

Genetics is not phenotype. That is voodoo science. Skin color is determined by a relatively small number of genes. The genes for light skin like the SLC24A5 allele associated with Steppe populations.

[Negah]

===

[thisismyaccount]

@thisismyaccount

My friend, before I go point-by-point, I need to lay out something very simple to you. After reading all your replies several times, I’ve identified three major weaknesses in your argument, and unless we fix these, the conversation will be painful for both of us.

I ask you kindly, please read this post, and please address all 3 issues I have identified; otherwise, the conversation will keep going in circles.

1) You keep treating my posts as “my personal views.”

None of what I wrote is “my opinion.”
Everything I posted comes from peer-reviewed genetic papers; they are from Narasimhan, Lazaridis, Skoglund, Reich lab, etc. I even quoted them directly with links to make it easy. So when you tell me “you’re wrong,” you’re actually disagreeing with the current scientific consensus that I am sharing with you, not me. I am not a geneticist, same as you. I am just stating what these professionals say.

If you think these scientists are wrong, then you need to show scientific counter-evidence. Telling me I’m wrong while ignoring the sources I posted is not a scientific argument.

2) You’re relying on tools that are not scientific (G25, HarappaWorld, GEDmatch, etc).

You cannot use G25, GEDmatch, HarappaWorld, 23andMe, Ancestry, MyHeritage “2% Chinese, 3% Samurai, 1% Swedish” type reports or PCA screenshots to talk about ancient ancestry.

Why? Because these are hobby tools. They are entertainment. Not science.
They cannot detect deep admixture, migration direction, or timing. They are not used in any peer-reviewed work.

Professional population genetics uses qpAdm, qpGraph, DATES, and f-statistics.
These are the only tools that detect ancient ancestry properly.

This is the same mistake our Kurdish friend (parents from Turkey, born in Germany) made years ago when he tried to show Kurds had “no South Asian ancestry” by misusing these calculators. Back then you told me he didn’t know what he was doing. You even laughed at how he was twisting hobby tools to fit his agenda.

Now you’re repeating the exact same error.

Please cite peer-reviewed papers where real geneticists use the right tools. Genetics is a science. It is based on fact, not assumption, not inference, not hobby calculators, not spreadsheets.

3) You use history to prove genetics, for instance, you’re using Hindu Shahi / Kabul Shahi history as if genetics uses medieval dynasties as data.

Geneticists do not use dynasties, chronicles, Biruni quotes, or medieval political history to reconstruct deep ancestry.
They use DNA and scientific toolkits. By its very nature, genetics (and archaeology) is conservative because they soley and only rely on evidence and facts. They cannot make historical inferences. Historians can, because they have multiple tools—texts, archaeology, linguistics, Genetics, numismatics, etc. Geneticists cannot.

We can talk history, but you cannot use history to prove genetic conclusions. That is simply not a correct or proper methodology.

And historically, the Hindu Shahi / Kabul Shahi dynasty has nothing to do with Pashtuns.
The Shahi domains were a mixture of:


Bactrian elements
Indo-Aryan / Prakrit-speaking elements
Central Asian elements



none of that = “Pashtuns.”

Modern Kabul has zero linguistic, cultural, or genealogical continuity with the Shahi court.
Kabul’s population was replaced many times: Ghaznavids, Ghurids, Mongols, Timurids, Mughals, Durranis, plus modern-era shifts. If you want, we can discuss it. But Today, Kabul is a Tajik-majority city with Hazara and Pashtun among many minority groups; it is nothing like medieval Kabul.

You cannot use “Hindu Shahi” as a genetic category. That is not how genetics works.

4) Stop misquoting me. I never said Pastun had no AASI. You do, and you have a lot of it. It is a foundational part of your ancestry. That is a fact. What I said one more time and please only discuss this and stop misconstruing it. It is very simple, based on the studies that cite not my view but the studies that are reputable, peer-reviewed, and based on solid scientific foundations, not myth, folklore, nationalistic narratives, colorism, or political persuasion.

Pashtuns do have AASI — and quite a lot of it.
So do Tajiks.
So do Iranians.
So do Central Asians around the old BMAC zone.

This is not controversial.
This is basic population genetics.

The real question is:
Is that AASI recent (medieval Indian) or ancient (pre-IVC highlander AASI)?

The peer-reviewed papers say it very clearly:

Pashtun AASI = ancient highland South Asian ancestry
Not medieval Punjabi/Sindhi input.

This is exactly what Narasimhan et al. show. I quoted the line before:

“The AASI ancestry in Hindu Kush groups reflects deep, pre-Bronze Age layers not attributable to recent South Asian admixture.”

Narasimhan et al., 2019, Supplement S3

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6822619/

https://reich.hms.harvard.edu/sites/reich.hms.harvard.edu/files/inline-files/2019_Science_NarasimhanPatterson_CentralSouthAsia_ Supplement.pdf

So Avicenna is wrong when he uses “steppe” to explain being lighter and uses “Indians” to explain being darker. That’s not science. That’s phenotype guessing.

And you are wrong when you say Pashtuns got 30–50% AASI from medieval Punjabis.
The real data simply do not support that.

Pashtuns have AASI, yes.
But the source of most it ( not all of it) is ancient — older than “India” as a concept, older than Indo-Aryans, older than the Shahi dynasties, older than the modern ethnic map.

This is why Pashtuns sit genetically:

closer to Iranians, Kurds, Tajiks
not
Punjab/Sindh.

The reality is that you and I are cousins of Punjabis, but mainly an ancient cousin, not a medieval one.

The Pashtuns drift south on PCA because of their ancient AASI, not because of a massive medieval Indian mixture.

That’s all I’ve been saying from the beginning.

"Everything I posted comes from peer-reviewed genetic papers; they are from Narasimhan, Lazaridis, Skoglund, Reich lab, etc. I even quoted them directly with links to make it easy. So when you tell me “you’re wrong,” you’re actually disagreeing with the current scientific consensus that I am sharing with you, not me. I am not a geneticist, same as you. I am just stating what these professionals say."


Show me an actual screenshot of him saying that. I havent seen him say that at all


"This is exactly what Narasimhan et al. show. I quoted the line before:

“The AASI ancestry in Hindu Kush groups reflects deep, pre-Bronze Age layers not attributable to recent South Asian admixture.”

Narasimhan et al., 2019, Supplement S3
"


Show me a screenshot, because I couldnt find this quote anywhere in S3

[Avicenna]

We cannot do that, my friend, that is, use the Phenotype of a Pashtun to determine the Genotype. That is not science; it is guesswork and magic plus a lot of speculation.

Skin pigmentation is what geneticists call a polygenic trait. What that means is that it depends on many genes (and other factors), not just “AASI vs West-Eurasian.” So having “dark Pashtuns” does not imply a specific ancestral mix (or recent Indian input) as a rule.

https://www.genome.gov/genetics-glossary/Polygenic-Trait

Check the link below. This is a peer-reviewed study.

Analysis of Skin Pigmentation and Genetic Ancestry in Three Subpopulations from Pakistan: Punjabi, Pashtun, and Baloch

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34068188/

The study confirms that the Pashtuns are lighter because their ancestral mixture brings more European-related ancestry and specific pigmentation genes (SNPs), likely inherited from the Steppe_MLBA input.



Pashtuns have SNPs like SLC24A5 and SLC45A2. This is why Pashtuns are lighter on average.

Here is even more. They are distinct genetic clusters, even inside Pakistan. See below. This reaffirms and aligns with what I’ve been saying: Pashtuns sit on the Iranian Plateau with Persian and Kurds and Tajiks and Steppe arc, Punjabis sit on the Indo-Gangetic / IVC arc. They are related, but not the same structure.



Here is more.



So the average Pashtun in this study is lighter than both Punjabis and Baloch.

But here is the important part: You can't use the simple fact that Pashtuns are lighter to prove that the admixture happened 1,000 years ago instead of 4,000 years ago. Only DATES and qpAdm can do that

I know about that study bro, but pashtuns in Pakistan being lighter than balochis and Punjabis doesn't disprove they still assimilated Suleiman indics? What thisismyaccount is saying is that OG pashtuns completely lacked any south Asian phenotypes or very zagros/Baloch shifted individuals which can be easily found, if you look at Badakshi Tajiks from darwaz who possess very light phenotypes and continious iron age Turkmenistan( Yaz) related ancestry, it makes sense to assume OG pashtuns somewhat looked like them and then absorbed some indics which darkened them relatively speaking, still lighter than Punjabis and balochis no doubt, but we can all admit they are darker than Northern Tajiks ok average.

I don't get why it's such a taboo to equate phenotype with genotype on average, this is why we know for a fact sri Lankans are AASI heavy, or norweigans have loads of EHG/ANF or a random Afghan from Kabul who looks mexican will always have Alot of east Eurasian ancestry but somehow they always get surprised.

[thisismyaccount]

Negah, answer me first, not Avicenna. Show me an actual screenshot of Narasimhan claiming AASI been in hindukush before iran pastoralists, and also that ALL modern hindukush populations, including pashtuns, have none of their AASI from any later period.

Show me. Because you haven't shown me yet. Just shown me link to his article (even though he seemingly refer AASI as subcontinental instead) and how apparently S3 shows his quote, even though I couldn't find it anywhere there.


Name me page, and show me screenshot.

[thisismyaccount]

I know about that study bro, but pashtuns in Pakistan being lighter than balochis and Punjabis doesn't disprove they still assimilated Suleiman indics? What thisismyaccount is saying is that OG pashtuns completely lacked any south Asian phenotypes or very zagros/Baloch shifted individuals which can be easily found, if you look at Badakshi Tajiks from darwaz who possess very light phenotypes and continious iron age Turkmenistan( Yaz) related ancestry, it makes sense to assume OG pashtuns somewhat looked like them and then absorbed some indics which darkened them relatively speaking, still lighter than Punjabis and balochis no doubt, but we can all admit they are darker than Northern Tajiks ok average.

I don't get why it's such a taboo to equate phenotype with genotype on average, this is why we know for a fact sri Lankans are AASI heavy, or norweigans have loads of EHG/ANF or a random Afghan from Kabul who looks mexican will always have Alot of east Eurasian ancestry but somehow they always get surprised.

Badakhshan Tajiks dont have yaz ancestry. They have chust ancestry instead, another iranic culture. They lack yaz haplogroups.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chust_culture

[Avicenna]

Badakhshan Tajiks dont have yaz ancestry. They have chust ancestry instead, another iranic culture. They lack yaz haplogroups.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chust_culture

Everyday I'm hearing new cultures lol, chust? Wtf is chust? Did they score autosomally like Yaz?

[thisismyaccount]

Everyday I'm hearing new cultures lol, chust? Wtf is chust? Did they score autosomally like Yaz?

Even indo-aryan leaders of mitannis seemingly were alike yaz autosomally. Chust culture was probably just like yaz autosomally too, but probably more IVC shifted. Especially in Badakhshan even, moreso.

But pamiri haplogroups split earlier from pashtuns, than kurds did from pashtuns. So not yaz, and rather seemingly chust culture.

[thisismyaccount]

We cannot do that, my friend, that is, use the Phenotype of a Pashtun to determine the Genotype. That is not science; it is guesswork and magic plus a lot of speculation.




I'm waiting. Show me Narasimhan specifically claiming AASI was in hindukush 10000 years ago before iranian neolithic pastoralists. show me him saying EVERYONE from modern hindukush, and somehow even pashtuns, show that none of their AASI came from outside source "recently" (1000 years ago).

Show me a screenshot, or refer a page of S3 (even though I've checked all pages in S3, checked the non-supplementary paper too and never found him suggest anything you attributed to him. Rather he even implied AASI as subcontinental too). Show me he said that.

[thisismyaccount]

We cannot do that, my friend, that is, use the Phenotype of a Pashtun to determine the Genotype. That is not science; it is guesswork and magic plus a lot of speculation.

Skin pigmentation is what geneticists call a polygenic trait. What that means is that it depends on many genes (and other factors), not just “AASI vs West-Eurasian.” So having “dark Pashtuns” does not imply a specific ancestral mix (or recent Indian input) as a rule.

https://www.genome.gov/genetics-glossary/Polygenic-Trait

Check the link below. This is a peer-reviewed study.

Analysis of Skin Pigmentation and Genetic Ancestry in Three Subpopulations from Pakistan: Punjabi, Pashtun, and Baloch

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34068188/

The study confirms that the Pashtuns are lighter because their ancestral mixture brings more European-related ancestry and specific pigmentation genes (SNPs), likely inherited from the Steppe_MLBA input.



Pashtuns have SNPs like SLC24A5 and SLC45A2. This is why Pashtuns are lighter on average.

Here is even more. They are distinct genetic clusters, even inside Pakistan. See below. This reaffirms and aligns with what I’ve been saying: Pashtuns sit on the Iranian Plateau with Persian and Kurds and Tajiks and Steppe arc, Punjabis sit on the Indo-Gangetic / IVC arc. They are related, but not the same structure.



Here is more.



So the average Pashtun in this study is lighter than both Punjabis and Baloch.

But here is the important part: You can't use the simple fact that Pashtuns are lighter to prove that the admixture happened 1,000 years ago instead of 4,000 years ago. Only DATES and qpAdm can do that

Come on, man. You had several hours now. You been online multiple times. You posted that quote attributed to Narasimhan 3 times now, and still haven't shown me yet.

Can you now answer my request?

[Negah]

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[thisismyaccount]

@thisismyaccount

Before I lay out the evidence, I want to clear one thing up.

The one-line quote that I posted earlier (“AASI in Hindu Kush groups reflects deep pre-Bronze Age layers…”) was not a verbatim line from the paper. It was a summary my friend wrote for me when we were going through the supplement together. That’s on me. I took that off one of the emails he sent me. As I told you up front, this is what I learned from a friend who actually works for one of these labs, and he was kind enough to share this with me. As you are well aware on these forums, there is a great deal of misinformation, twisting of truth, and agendas. So I was for years so confused and did not know what and who to believe

Also to avoid any confusion moving forward, he and I sat down and went through the entire 400-page supplement again, and pulled out the actual, verifiable quotes, with page numbers. I hope you appreciate the effort and hopefully you will find the information useful and well worth the time.

Below is the complete, fully verifiable set of 8 quotes, each with the page number, the screenshot reference, and a short explanation of what the quote actually shows. You can check every single one yourself. Nothing here is opinion. Everything is straight out of the Narasimhan et al. 2019 supplement.

If, after reading these, you have counter-evidence, bring it. I’ll look at your questions. If not, then we should be honest about where the data actually points.

1.

Quote from Page 313, Section 6.2.4.2:



https://images.pixta.gallery/preset:sharp/resize:fit:480/gravity:sm/plain/s3://pixta-prd/b417e2b9-673b-446a-927d-b589d235c764/i8yvsm96nwmdla9ht2dq5813/Image_1_Page_313.jpeg

What this shows us:
This is the timeframe or timestamp. The mixture that defines SPGT, ie Pashtun population, happened in the Middle to Late Bronze Age, around 3,500 years ago. Not 500–1000 CE. Not medieval. Not Indian subcontinent mixing. The date itself rules out the entire “recent Indian” model. But there is more.

2.

Quote on Page 263, Section 4.4.4.1:



https://images.pixta.gallery/preset:sharp/resize:fit:480/gravity:sm/plain/s3://pixta-prd/b417e2b9-673b-446a-927d-b589d235c764/i8yvsm96nwmdla9ht2dq5813/Image_2_Page_263.jpeg

What this shows us:
These ancient Swat/Steppe Cline individuals pull toward Iranian-related ancestry, not Indian, and the paper even goes further, and states that their genetic arc is west and north, not into the subcontinent. This directly contradicts any claim that their South Asian component came from medieval Punjabis.

3.

Quote from Page 281 Section 5.2.3):



https://images.pixta.gallery/preset:sharp/resize:fit:480/gravity:sm/plain/s3://pixta-prd/b417e2b9-673b-446a-927d-b589d235c764/i8yvsm96nwmdla9ht2dq5813/Image_3_Page_281.jpeg

What this shows us:
The Steppe-related ancestry in the Pashtun ancestral line was simply not present inside the IVC core before 2000 BCE. Pashtun ancestry formed on a separate cline, outside the IVC heartland. They could not find it in individuals from the Indus. That is also the key. Indus has the same cline as other people from the Subcontinent, and Pashutns don't. Therefore, Different admixtures. Different history.

4.

Quote from Page 281, Section 5.2.3:



https://images.pixta.gallery/preset:sharp/resize:fit:480/gravity:sm/plain/s3://pixta-prd/b417e2b9-673b-446a-927d-b589d235c764/i8yvsm96nwmdla9ht2dq5813/Image_4_Page_281.jpeg

What this shows us:

This is the ingredients or recipe here.
AHG + Indus-Periphery + Steppe MLBA (Bronze Age).

Not medieval Indians. Not anything recent. This is a Bronze Age formation cline. Pashtuns sit on this older cline, not on the later Indian-subcontinent cline. This is another reaffirmation from their findings.

5.

Quote from Page 320, Section 7.3 :



https://images.pixta.gallery/preset:sharp/resize:fit:480/gravity:sm/plain/s3://pixta-prd/b417e2b9-673b-446a-927d-b589d235c764/i8yvsm96nwmdla9ht2dq5813/Image_5_Page_320.jpeg

What this shows us:
The AASI among is local to ancient Northwest South Asia. It wasn’t brought by Central Asians or Steppe groups. This AASI mixed in place, thousands of years ago long before anything medieval or recent. Remember when IVC came into being. The dates don't match.

6. This is the Mathematical proof that Pashtuns are NOT on the Indian-subcontinent cline

Quote from Page 284, Section 5.2.3:



https://images.pixta.gallery/preset:sharp/resize:fit:480/gravity:sm/plain/s3://pixta-prd/b417e2b9-673b-446a-927d-b589d235c764/i8yvsm96nwmdla9ht2dq5813/Image_6_Page_284.jpeg

What this shows us:
This is the killer and the smoking gun.
You cannot just take a modern Indian population and “adjust” it to get Pashtuns. The two clines are mathematically distinct and different. This shuts down the idea that Pashtuns = Indians + Steppe.

7.

Quote from Page 306, Section 5.11:



https://images.pixta.gallery/preset:sharp/resize:fit:480/gravity:sm/plain/s3://pixta-prd/b417e2b9-673b-446a-927d-b589d235c764/i8yvsm96nwmdla9ht2dq5813/Image_7_Page_305_B.jpeg

https://images.pixta.gallery/preset:sharp/resize:fit:480/gravity:sm/plain/s3://pixta-prd/b417e2b9-673b-446a-927d-b589d235c764/i8yvsm96nwmdla9ht2dq5813/Image_7_Page_306_A.jpeg

What these two show us:
Two completely different demographic histories.
Pashtun-related ancestry shows female-biased Steppe admixture.
Indian ANI formation shows male-biased Steppe admixture.
This reaffirms and confirms that: So even at the level of sex-biased admixture, these are not the same historical process. Different events, different populations, different outcomes.


8. Unique Iranian-borderland ancestry in the Indus Periphery

Quote from Page 215, Section 5.2.2:


https://images.pixta.gallery/preset:sharp/resize:fit:480/gravity:sm/plain/s3://pixta-prd/b417e2b9-673b-446a-927d-b589d235c764/i8yvsm96nwmdla9ht2dq5813/Image_8_Page_215.jpeg

What this shows us:
The West Eurasian ancestry feeding the Indus Periphery Cline (which then feeds into the Steppe Cline and thus into Pashtun-related groups) is a distinct Iranian-borderland type of ancestry: low Anatolian, high Iran_N/ChL. It is not the same as the West Eurasian ancestry profile deeper in the subcontinent, and not the same as the full Turan mix. It’s a particular frontier Iranian-plateau signature that Pashtuns still carry.


So here is the Conclusion:

This is everything my friend and I could pull directly out of the 400-page supplement, the actual lines, with actual page numbers, all screenshottable.

Put simply:


The main admixture happened approximately 1800 to 1500 BCE
The ancestry is aligned with Iran and Central Asia
The Steppe Cline does not match the Indian-subcontinent Cline
The AASI is ancient and local, not medieval
The demographic histories of Pashtun ancestors and Indian ancestors are different
The West Eurasian ancestry in Pashtuns is Iran-related, not Gangetic
And mathematically, Pashtuns cannot be modeled as “recently mixed Indians”


Man, wtf. I didn't knew you were THAT clueless.

SPGT are neither ancestral to Suleiman mountain pashtuns, nor refering to pashtuns. SPGT is entirely and only refering to swat locals, who are a dead end to everyone, not ANYONE LOCAL AND FROM MODERN ERA. NOT EVEN NARASIMHAN HAS EVER CONNECTED SPGT WITH PASHTUNS, HE ONLY CONNECTED SPGT WITH KALASH WHO ARE VERY INBRED AND IRRELEVANT TO PASHTUNS TOO.

Pashtuns haplogroups from mountains are either dravidian L clades from Suleiman mountains, indic R1a unrelated to even the R1a clades found in swat samples. Sometimes H clades too, from local indians, and then local J clades too. Finally we have pashtun G2b subclades and yaz iranic R1a clades. If pashtuns even had a bit ancestry from them, they would had picked the Q subclades found amongst the SPGT samples. They don't.

I know you're about to bring up this BS "but clades doesn't equal admixture!".

Yes, I know it doesnt 100% equal admixture. BUT IF PASHTUNS HAVE 0 ACTUAL SHARED SUBCLADES WITH SPGT, A DEAD END IN SOUTH ASIA, THEN IT'S CLEAR AS DAY AND NIGHT, ALONG WITH HISTORY, THAT PASHTUNS ARE NEITHER SPGT OR DESCENDED FROM THEM. SPGT IA is unique to itself, and not relevant or should be used for people alike pashtuns. At least perhaps one can say pashtuns that migrated from Zabul, through Kabul, to Swat, have mixed with the pre-pashtun locals there in 1500s.


Pashtuns have no historical presence in Swat until first 1300s.



As for AASI in Swat. You obviously have 0 idea, but swat lies on the slopes connected to the indian subcontinent:


144906



Nowhere has Narasimhan even suggested AASI was present in hindukush prior iranian Neolithics. Nor did I claim central asians brought AASI, man, like wtf?

This is from his paper too, he rather refers all AASI indirectly as subcontinental:


144907


Steppe mixed with AASI through Indus Valley. IVC migrants moved towards hindukush slopes in Swat. Where did anything you post disprove otherwise?

Not that it matters much anyways.


But man, wtf? You're seriously using a complete irrelevant group in case for pashtuns?! You and your friend must be the ONLY ONES to connect mountain pashtuns with SPGT like that.


I didn't even reply your other comments prior, because I wanted to see what you could present to me. Even the major misunderstanding of history you have.

It's even funny you bring up SPGT and claim there could be no "recent mixing from india", when even the SPGT Iron Age samples differ from the swat H samples, that clearly have both elevated steppe and AASI admixture too, due to the rise of buddhism in the area. Indian additional admixture from 300 BCE to 100 AD increased the AASI in swat.


And btw, when I say indian continent, I mean BOTH PAKISTAN AND INDIA.


I actually thought you had something proper, man


Just keep to the stuff you do know about.

[Negah]

----

[thisismyaccount]

I know about that study bro, but pashtuns in Pakistan being lighter than balochis and Punjabis doesn't disprove they still assimilated Suleiman indics? What thisismyaccount is saying is that OG pashtuns completely lacked any south Asian phenotypes or very zagros/Baloch shifted individuals which can be easily found, if you look at Badakshi Tajiks from darwaz who possess very light phenotypes and continious iron age Turkmenistan( Yaz) related ancestry, it makes sense to assume OG pashtuns somewhat looked like them and then absorbed some indics which darkened them relatively speaking, still lighter than Punjabis and balochis no doubt, but we can all admit they are darker than Northern Tajiks ok average.

I don't get why it's such a taboo to equate phenotype with genotype on average, this is why we know for a fact sri Lankans are AASI heavy, or norweigans have loads of EHG/ANF or a random Afghan from Kabul who looks mexican will always have Alot of east Eurasian ancestry but somehow they always get surprised.

Don't even bother with this guy, he has only a little bit of clue about afghans.

[Negah]

---

[Negah]

Don't even bother with this guy, he has only a little bit of clue about afghans.



You cannot be serious. If you only knew who my friend is and the time I spent showing you this. It is your loss, not mine. The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge

[thisismyaccount]

You cannot be serious. If you only knew who my friend is and the time I spent showing you this. It is your loss, not mine. The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge

If your friend think it's a good idea to use SPGT in regard of pashtuns, especially the Iron Age ones, then I'm not impressed at all. Anyone that knows pashtun DNA and haplogroups, know connecting both this way is ridiculous.

"The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge"

Your quote fits both you and your friend more in this regard. You even right away denied the historical attestations I provided, and haplogroups too. And you did it for some silly conclusion, a kind only ever made up by you and your buddy. No one else. Not even the paper you provided.

I liked the analysis of pashtun skin color better, but I have too much prior knowledge of haplogroups and formal results already. Your friend isn't well aware of haplogroups, history or even looked properly at this paper. The SPGT region itself show increase of indian ancestry during Mauryan era , so this claim about no possibility of indic admix is very silly.


I could comment on your other prior arguments, but I'll stop here about this specific topic.


I'm more open about the other info you could share, as I've mentioned before, example about pashtun skin color and such.

[thisismyaccount]

This does actually make sense tbh, I would have imagined OG pashtuns to have looked like those darwaz badakshi Tajiks, absolutely zero south Asian or zagros heavy phenotypes among them, but moving towards the suleiman mountains caused them too assimilate the local hill populations ( partially obviously ) and increasing their IVC ancestry and absorbing some phenotypes from them. I think the way you phrased it to Negah made it seem like they are a hybrid between the two when in reality they only partially assimilated these folks.

Edit: even those darwaz badakshi Tajiks with zero south Asian looking people still genetically have some IVC and as a result AASI in their genome, so OG pashtuns would have probably been about 2-4% AASI, with assimilation of these local suleiman populations increasing their AASI to around 6-8%.

I didn't respond to this, but I don't think they would had looked like darwaz. I feel like they're too white.

Maybe more like this? Though some few additional darwazi looking people and of course excluding the hazaras

These are mainly tajiks from Chaghcharan, Ghor province. It's almost northwest hazarajat

144913