Why do Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews cluster with Greeks and Southern Italians?

[Sikeliot]

I don't mean to make yet another thread about Jewish genetics. But I'm legitimately curious.

I used to just say "All four groups are a similar mixture of Neolithic/West Asian/Levantine and European genetics."

But I no longer think this. What is the chance that Sephardi and Ashkenazis, both with different histories and regions of settlement (Sephardis in Southern Europe, Ashkenazis in Central-Eastern Europe) would somehow coincidentally acquire not only very similar genetics to one another, but to Greeks and south Italians/Sicilians/Maltese?

I'm wondering if before spreading out to the rest of Europe, Jews expelled from Israel ended up in SE Europe and mixed significantly with the populations of the region (I know that there had historically been significant Jewish populations in Calabria, Sicily, parts of Greece, and much of Italy during the Roman Empire). Might these people be the ancestors of the majority of today's Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews?

[Mercury]

I saw a documentary once on Hebrews that voluntarily moved to Greece soon after their exodus from Egypt. Combine that with the amount of Jews that mixed with Greeks in the Hellenic Judaism culture. Also ancient Phoenicians, close cousins of the Jews and in many time Hebrews themselves, migrating heavily to places like Southern Greece and Sicily. Finally, Christianized Hebrews who have accepted Christ and mixed with the host gentile populations.

[Sikeliot]

I saw a documentary once on Hebrews that voluntarily moved to Greece soon after their exodus from Egypt. Combine that with the amount of Jews that mixed with Greeks in the Hellenic Judaism culture. Also ancient Phoenicians, close cousins of the Jews and in many time Hebrews themselves, migrating heavily to places like Southern Greece and Sicily. Finally, Christianized Hebrews who have accepted Christ and mixed with the host gentile populations.

Then the other confusing part is why Jews are genetically closer to Sicilian/Calabrese/Maltese people than to Greeks, which means one of two things must be true;

1) today's Jews in "Greece" were in Magna Graecia and not Greece proper
2) Today's Greeks have more Slavic influence than the Greeks these Jews are descended from.

[brunette]

Because Ashkenazi Jews have 20-30 European blood. They are genetically closer to each other ( and Yemeni Jews ) than anything European.

[Sikeliot]

Because Ashkenazi Jews have 20-30 European blood. They are genetically closer to each other ( and Yemeni Jews ) than anything European.

But what was the chance they would develop a genome almost exactly like a Greek or a southern Italian? Close to none unless they are descended from them.

[brunette]

Because they spread out and broke apart so they're related to a type of Jew or two types whatever + some other European country they settled in.

[StonyArabia]

Sephardim and Ashkenazim appear to have a very weak Levantine base. It does seem that Judaism in the past was rather an open religion that encouraged conversions. The Sephardim and Ashkenazim seem to have absorbed large amounts of Greco-Roman blood, and their Levantine blood was diluted to a very non-signifcant element and in fact has become. Yemenite Jews don't cluster with Sephardim and Ashkenazim and are basically Arabian converts. Judaism was never an ethnic exclusive religion, like how it appears. Conversion were far more common than it's often believed.

[Mercury]

Sephardim and Ashkenazim appear to have a very weak Levantine base. It does seem that Judaism in the past was rather an open religion that encouraged conversions. The Sephardim and Ashkenazim seem to have absorbed large amounts of Greco-Roman blood, and their Levantine blood was diluted to a very non-signifcant element and in fact has become. Yemenite Jews don't cluster with Sephardim and Ashkenazim and are basically Arabian converts. Judaism was never an ethnic exclusive religion, like how it appears. Conversion were far more common than it's often believed.

There were hints of a "spiritual Israel" in the Old Testament. There were some accounts of gentiles converting and becoming one with the children of Abraham.

[Racial Observer 1814]

I can understand Sephardim, but the others clustering with Greeks & Southern Italians makes less sense.

[Prince Carlo]

They don't form a cluster with S.Italians and Greeks. Jews are closer to Cypriots btw.

[brunette]

They don't cluster with S.Italians and Greeks. Jews are closer to Cypriots btw.

People from Cyprus descend from the Hellenic Greeks. Ashkenazi Jews descend from Sephardic Jews Yemeni Jews and Eastern Europeans. How is that the same? :eek:

[Prince Carlo]

People from Cyprus descend from the Hellenic Greeks. Ashkenazi Jews descend from Sephardic Jews Yemeni Jews and Eastern Europeans. How is that the same? :eek:

Jews and Cypriots have similar admixture proportions. They look obviously different because of different evolutionary processes.

[brunette]

Jews and Cypriots have similar admixture proportions. They look obviously different because of different evolutionary processes.

Even swarthy types of Cypriots like Peter Andre etc still look Caucasian and are so. :coffee:

Ashkenazis look so blatently Jewish the nose and forehead shape give it away.

[Libertas]

So in your book Jews are not as Caucasoid as Cypiriots?

[brunette]

They have less European blood on average than Greek Cypriots way less. Btw, I hope a Greek Cypriot joins this forum. They must get sick of people ripping into them and saying they're somehow ''less racially Greek'' than normal Greeks or people from Crete.

If it's not that it'll be ''are Greeks White'' ''how did the ancient Greeks look, were they White'' and ''are Southern Europeans White'' i've seen those types of threads on Stormfront Anthroscape here Illyrian world ( Albanian propagandists ) etc.

[Arch Hades]

Clementina, what exactly are you trying to figure out about Ashkenazi Jewish genetics?

Ashkenazi Jews are a combination of "Hebrew"/Levantine, Southeastern European, and Central-East European....the genetic predominance goes in that order as well and most their European ancestry is in fact Southeastern European. They are maybe 10 percent Central-East European at best.

It does seem that on a lot of these genome plots....at least more of these genome blogger genetic maps and stuff I've seen recently, they cluster a little further South than Greeks, and right around or below Southern Italians.

There are also multiple peer reviewed genome wide association studies showing Southeastern Europeans including Greeks and Italians to be closer to them than to Northern, Central, and Eastern Europeans.

[Sikeliot]

What I was trying to figure out is if they are close to these groups by coincidence or because European Jews were somehow descended from them. It just seemed odd they'd coincidentally cluster where they do.

[Arch Hades]

Yeah European Jews are descended in partial from them [South Eastern Europeans]...but they still have a significant portion of their ancestry going back to ancient Israel..perhaps 1/2 to 2/3rds of it. [A study in 2010 estimate the European ancestry in Ashkenazi to be between 35 and 55 percent so that means between 65 and 45 percent of it goes back to ancient Israel]


When you add the fact that a large chunk of Southeastern European ancestry itself comes from the Fertile crescent region dating back to the Neolithic....more than likely this genetic component in Southeastern Europeans was pretty similar to the ancient Levantines/Canaanite groups [ie ancient jews].

So the Jews that would become the Ashkenazism already had a degree of similarity and common ancestry [within say 5-6,000 years] with southeastern Europeans.....then they picked up a big chunk of Southeastern European ancestry itself on their way North to Central Europe.

So when you look at it like that, it's not surprising they are coming out pretty close to East Mediterranean European groups like Southern Italians or Greeks.

[YeshAtid]

What I was trying to figure out is if they are close to these groups by coincidence or because European Jews were somehow descended from them. It just seemed odd they'd coincidentally cluster where they do.

It's probably a combination of the two

[Myth]

My dads family was European Jewish from Romania and we seem to cluster with romanians and tuscans or northern Italians. Some tests I score Sephardic Bulgarian and sometimes mesopotamian. 23andme lists me as mainly German and ashkenazi jewish and seems to think I am russian or ukranian which doesn't make sense. A lot of people think we look Greek, Turkish, Italian or hispanic