Siberian Princess reveals her 2,500 year old tattoos

[Hweinlant]

Princess Ukok's shoulder, tattoo of fantastic animal, and a drawing of it made by Siberian scientists

This motif is called "Cosmic deer" or "Cosmic reindeer". There is plenty of information available by googling: cosmic + deer + scythian.

[Hweinlant]

I found some bright spark's article that said HER haplogroup is R1a.

Her mtdna is U4 .

[Plague Doctor]

Archaic Iranian/Iranic?

[Peterski]

Archaic Iranian/Iranic?

Yes. This "Princess" was one of Scytho-Siberians of the Pazyryk culture, in the Altai region.

The Scythian civilization at its peak covered most of the Eurasian steppe - from Crimea to Altai:

http://www.researchgate.net/profile/...ce940db5b5.pdf

The elite Siberian Scythians in the remote outskirts of the Eurasian Steppe had access to fine Chinese silk, Persian rugs, and Greek pottery [Rudenko, 1970; Polosmak, 2001; Parzinger, 2006]. Their prosperity allowed them to have slaves, possess lavish golden outfits weighing many kilograms, and elaborate their burials with mummified bodies, dozens of horses, and wooden chambers replicating dwellings. (...) The archaeological artifacts decorated with distinctive animal-style art of Scythians found in burial sites remain the best evidence confirming the existence of interconnected cultural communities across the Eurasian Steppe. Mobility associated with horseback riding was the key element to the wealth and social development of these tribes [Levine et al., 2003]. The Scythian economy heavily depended on livestock breeding (horses, cattle, sheep, and goats). The Siberian Scythians inhabited mountainous landscapes that offered diverse seasonally used vertical pastures. Multiple lines of archaeological evidence demonstrate vertical seasonal migration of Scythian horse breeders in central Asia based on settlement pattern.

In the Altai region there are more Scythian sites than from other periods combined:

The total number of Scythian structures surveyed within Altai's river basins varies between 64% and 45% of total registered archaeological and historical structures. This is strong evidence for high occupational density of Siberian Scythians in the studied area. Burial grounds of Siberian Scythians follow a common landscape pattern: rows of kurgans and stone enclosures associated with them were established on grasslands overlooking rivers (Figure 7A). A typical cemetery would have over a dozen kurgans organized in a single row, extended family assembly (Figure 7). Each kurgan has a dualor group burial (three to four human skeletons); single burials are a less common feature of the cemeteries [Kubarev, 1991; Derevyanko and Molodin, 2000]. Besides kurgans of commoners, this part of the Russian Altai has large kurgans of Pazyryk warriors (Ak-Alakha-3) and higher noble elite (Pazyryk-5).

During Scythian times population density in the region was high:

Overall, the burial grounds of Siberian Scythians are more spatially dense than burials of any other groups inhabiting Altai from 5000 B.C. to the present day. The high number of Scythian kurgans suggests a large population size. The modern rural population of the Russian Altai [RF-FSSS Statistics, 2011] is 149,409 people with 2.2 per km2 population density (Russian Census 2002). This is 50,000 people (one third) more than a century ago (Russian Census 1923) near the end of the Little Ice Age and long before modern technological impact on the Altaic nomadic population. If we assume that settlement patterns of the historic Altai population are similar to the Scythian pastoralists, as was demonstrated in studies on Bronze-Iron Age pastoralists of Kazakhstan and Mongolia [Frachetti, 2008; Houle, 2010], a feasible approximation of the lower bounds of Siberian Scythian population size is roughly 100,000 people (comparable to Altai nomadic population in the early twentieth century). However, because the Scythian burials far outnumber the modern and historical nomadic cemeteries, the upper bounds are more realistic in this case: ~260,000 people and higher (100,000 multiplied by 2.6, the average number of people buried in Scythian kurgans).

Scythians were descendants of speakers of Indo-European languages and people of Europoid (Caucasoid) anthropological type, who settled the previously uninhabited (or very sparsely inhabited) Altai region by the end of the 3rd millennium BC:

In the steppe region of central Asia and the Altai Mountains, the first food production began towards the end of the 3rd millennium BC. The peoples who entered this region were Europoids of the Afanasiev culture who came from the Aral Sea area (Kel’teminar culture).

Indo-European eastward migrations which led to Indo-European settlement of the Altai Mountains:



First Proto-Indo-Europeans came to the Altai Mountains during the Copper Age and formed the Afanasiev Culture:

End of the 3rd millennium BC. Afanasiev Culture (Neolithic). The Afanasiev people were stockbreeders of cattle, sheep, horses, but also hunted wild game. The sites of this period are burial places under low mounds (kurgans) surrounded by circular stonewalls. Associated with burials were dentate stamped pots. Stone and bone tools were common although there were some copper ornaments.

The Afanasiev Culture was most likely the home of Proto-Tocharians (among others):

http://www.theapricity.com/forum/sho...uistic-data%29





The Bronze Age Andronovo Culture was also Indo-European and most certainly the first homeland of speakers of Proto-Indo-Iranian (Aryans) - possibly also ancestors of some other Indo-European branches could be part of that culture. The most famous site is Arkaim:

Mid 2nd millennium BC Andronovo Culture (Bronze Age). The Altai Mt. region was an important source of metallic ores. Mining was actively conducted from the 14th to 3rd century BC. The Andronovo culture made use of metal tools and this represents a departure from the stone tools of the earlier Neolithic society. The Andronovo culture is very similar across the vast steppe region from the Don River in southern Russia to the Yeneissei River although there are some local features. In the western steppe, the Andronovo culture is known as the Timber Grave Culture (ancestor of the Scythians). Andronovo people lived in permanent settlements with up to 10 semi-subterranean houses built of logs (20 x 30 to 30 x 60 m). They grew wheat and millet and raised cattle, sheep, horses, and pigs. The diet seems to have been composed largely of dairy products and cereal grains. The most common remains are the stone enclosures with underground log tombs having jointed corners and gabled roofs or stone cists.

In Arkaim the oldest known to date representations of Swastika have been found, a symbol few thousand years later adopted by a certain German political party. Sintashta-Arkaim also contains the oldest evidence of chariots:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sintashta_culture

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkaim

Among successors of the Andronovo Culture was the Karasuk Culture:

1200 - 700 BC Karasuk Culture (Bronze Age). The Karasuk culture developed out of the Andronoo culture and contains evidence of contact with Asiatic Mongoloid cultures. There was a shift from settled agriculture to patterns of seasonal transhumance and a semi-nomadic life style. The primary emphasis was on sheep rearing. Burials were in stone cists covered over by a low mound surrounded by square stone enclosures. The dead were buried with a sheep, a steer or a horse. The large cemeteries indicate a larger population. In the Karasuk culture there were a large amount of bronze artifacts, woolen textiles as well as garments of skins and furs. The remains of bridles towards the end of the period suggest the beginning of horse riding on the steppe.

That culture led to development of the Scythian Pazyryk Culture, as well as other - such as Tagar Culture and later Tachtyk Culture.

The Scythian civilization had a global impact - they facilitated trade across Eurasia. Now Chinese goods could reach Europe and European goods could reach China for the first time (among Western Eurasian imports to China from that period - or rather from the earlier Andronovo-Karasuk period -, was chariot):

The term "Siberian Scythians" refers to seminomadic tribes occupying the heart of Eurasia: Altai-Sayan Mountains during the first millennium B.C. Broadly, these tribes were a part of the Scythian world reaching from the Black Sea region to Lake Baykal over 4000 km and thriving for about 800 years. It was a very dynamic time across this vast geographical region designated the Eurasian Steppe and dominated by the economic strategies of mobile pastoralism. Royal families and local elites controlled and facilitated south-north and west-east trading routes on a truly global scale [Jacobson, 1995]. (...) Three distinctive episodes of Altai climate change appear to be tracking three major cultural phases of the Siberian Scythians advancement: (1) 700 – 480 B.C., coldand highly variable climate; (2) 480 – 360 B.C., mild warm climate and stable environmental conditions; and (3) 360 – 250 B.C., turbulent cold climate with amplified decadal variability.

Area where chariot was invented over 4000 years ago (oldest chariots found so far) and the spread of chariot (China acquired chariot ca. 1600 BC):



But in period 280 - 240 BC the eastern part of the Scythian world - the Scytho-Siberians in the Altai - disappeared. The population emigrated:

High adaptation to climate combined with high mobility may have motivated dispersal of the Pazyryk people to explore and conquer new environments. Overall, climate variability reliably tracks Pazyryk population growth between 750 and 520 B.C. and then again from 340 to 275 B.C. Enhanced climate variance leads to dispersal of the population and southward migration across the Altai. A brief cold episode at 360 - 350 B.C. resulted in relocation and concentration of the Pazyryk population in the south-eastern Altai. The last contraction of Pazyryk populationoccurred in warm decades before 250 B.C., after which mortuary evidence of Pazyryk population disappeared from the Altai landscape. The decrease in density of kurgans datedwith tree rings may point to the dispersal of the Pazyryk population from the Altai, which began during warm decades of the first millennium B.C. (280 - 240 B.C.). There may be more than one plausible scenario of Scythian routes for withdrawal from the Altai.

A Russian museum allowed the locals to re-bury the mummy of the "Siberian Ice Maiden", whom they consider to be their mythical ancestor.

Another famous Scytho-Siberian female mummy is the "Ukok Princess" with beautiful tatoos. There are also well-equipped graves of warriors and chieftains.

"The Ukok plateau, Altai, Siberia, where Princess and two warriors were discovered. Their bodies were surrounded by six horses fully bridles, various offering of food and a pouch of cannabis":



The mummy of the "Ukok Princess" (died aged 25) with tatoos:




Reconstruction:



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencete...#ixzz3S3EcEDS6

The Siberian Times said: "The tattoos on the left shoulder of the 'princess' show a mythological animal - a deer with a griffon's beak and a Capricorn's antlers. 'The antlers are decorated with the heads of griffons.

'And the same griffon's head is shown on the back of the animal.

The mouth of a spotted panther with a long tail is seen at the legs of a sheep.

'She also has a dear's head on her wrist, with big antlers.

'There is a drawing on the animal's body on a thumb on her left hand.

'On the man found close to the 'princess', the tattoos include the same fantastical creature, this time covering the right side of his body, across his right shoulder and stretching from his chest to his back.

'The patterns mirror the tattoos on a much more elaborately covered male body dug from the ice in 1929 whose highly decorated torso in reconstructed in our drawing here.

'His chest, arms, part of the back and the lower leg are covered with tattoos. There is an argali - a mountain sheep - along with the same dear with griffon's vulture-like beak, with horns and the back of its head which has griffon's head and an onager drawn on it.'

And here is the "Siberian Ice Maiden" (also known as the "Amazon from Ak-Alach"):

https://twitter.com/praeparator

"Bone structure showed she was a skilled rider and bow woman, hence the Greek legends of the Amazones seem to be real. The 'Amazon' was buried together with a man and with horses in a big double grave in a Kurgan":

[Peterski]

Her mtdna is U4 .

Thanks! Added to the chart of Bronze Age and Iron Age Indo-European steppe DNA:

http://s4.postimg.org/5gjpqzz31/Steppe_Phenotypes.png

[Peterski]

Most of Bronze Age and Early Iron Age Indo-Iranians from the Eurasian steppe later either migrated south (to India, Iran, the Middle East and Asia Minor - where they established their realms) or stayed in the steppe and were eventually overwhelmed and assimilated into Turkic and Tatar peoples. The easternmost groups which preserved their IE language until today are the Iranian-speaking Tajiks and Sarikoli of Western China. They are still in 45% people of R1a haplogroup today (Wells, Spencer et al. 2001). Their 2nd most common hg is probably J:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarikoli_language

A video showing these people:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAQpdNEWpng

[noricum]

Documentary about the dig in 4 parts:

[Arhat]

Most of Bronze Age and Early Iron Age Indo-Iranians from the Eurasian steppe later either migrated south (to India, Iran, the Middle East and Asia Minor - where they established their realms) or stayed in the steppe and were eventually overwhelmed and assimilated into Turkic and Tatar peoples. The easternmost groups which preserved their IE language until today are the Iranian-speaking Tajiks and Sarikoli of Western China. They are still in 45% people of R1a haplogroup today (Wells, Spencer et al. 2001). Their 2nd most common hg is probably J:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarikoli_language

A video showing these people:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iAQpdNEWpng

Pamiri Tajiks are on overall genetics closest to Old Indo-Iranians among modern Indo-Iranian people and have much R1a (mostly around 40% but some isolated "tribes" have more than 60%) but R1a peaks today among Pashtuns and Northwest Indians. If you remove the east asian ancestry from Kazakh and Kyrgyz you get probably almost pure Indo-Iranians and the non-east asian part of them looks like 50% Pamiri Tajik/Pashtun and 50% Russian/Finno-Ugrian.

[Peterski]

Pamiri Tajiks are on overall genetics closest to Old Indo-Iranians among modern Indo-Iranian people and have much R1a (mostly around 40% but some isolated "tribes" have more than 60%) but R1a peaks today among Pashtuns and Northwest Indians. If you remove the east asian ancestry from Kazakh and Kyrgyz you get probably almost pure Indo-Iranians and the non-east asian part of them looks like 50% Pamiri Tajik/Pashtun and 50% Russian/Finno-Ugrian.

Pashtuns have probably ca. 40% - 45% of their autosomal DNA derived from Sintashta culture (in case of Y-DNA even more, ca. 50% - 70%):

http://www.eupedia.com/forum/threads...l=1#post461363

More here:

http://www.anthrogenica.com/showthre...ll=1#post93441

I have used an input ancestral population with similar admixture as modern Armenians. This change from above results in repositioning of Population X. Under this scenario, Pashtuns can be modeled as 43% Sintashta + 38% BA [Bronze Age] population similar in admix to modern Armenians + 19% Pop X, with Pop X's position being shifted from above.

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

The Sintashta culture, also known as the Sintashta-Petrovka culture[1] or Sintashta-Arkaim culture,[2] is a Bronze Age archaeological culture of the northern Eurasian steppe on the borders of Eastern Europe and Central Asia, dated to the period 2100–1800 BCE.[3] The earliest known chariots have been found in Sintashta burials, and the culture is considered a strong candidate for the origin of the technology, which spread throughout the Old World and played an important role in ancient warfare.[4] Sintashta settlements are also remarkable for the intensity of copper mining and bronze metallurgy carried out there, which is unusual for a steppe culture.[5]

Because of the difficulty of identifying the remains of Sintashta sites beneath those of later settlements, the culture was only recently distinguished from the Andronovo culture.[2] It is now recognised as a separate entity forming part of the 'Andronovo horizon'.[1]

(...)

The people of the Sintashta culture are thought to have spoken Proto-Indo-Iranian, the ancestor of the Indo-Iranian language family. This identification is based primarily on similarities between sections of the Rig Veda, an Indian religious text which includes ancient Indo-Iranian hymns recorded in Vedic Sanskrit, with the funerary rituals of the Sintashta culture as revealed by archaeology.[11]

The Kalash and the Tajiks also speak Indo-Iranian languages, and share many genetic similarities with the Pashtuns. All these groups also show ancestral genetic similarities with various North-Eastern and Eastern Europeans, such as for example Lithuanians:

http://www.anthrogenica.com/showthre...ll=1#post93207

Also, the IBD links [of ancient Sintashta people and modern Pashtuns] are pretty strong, despite the fact that the samples aren't of ideal quality for IBD analysis, and despite the fact that it is very hard to detect IBD over the time scale which currently concerns us. I don't know where this notion stems from.

In addition, Sintashta have the right R1a1a subclades. We can be 100% certain that 50%-70% of Pashtun males are direct descendants of Sintashta and/or it's descendant/related steppe cultures. Even the mtDNA shows links. Taking this into consideration, it is of no real surprise that Pashtuns are predominantly steppe-derived in terms of genome-wide ancestry.

Edit: Also, Pashtuns came out as 66% Lithuanian-admixed in ALDER*, not qpAdm. This was more than a year ago. At the time, I dismissed the results. But now, it seems that Everest was on to something.

http://www.anthrogenica.com/showthre...ll=1#post93179

3) The Pashtun-Sintashta fits are always the best fits produced by this software, probably because Sintashta are directly ancestral to Pashtuns and company (a fact borne out by the presence of R1a1a lineages in Sintashta which are the exact same lineages found in anywhere from around 50% to 70% of Pashtun males. Also, Sintashta and Andronovo in Allentoft et al. have a hefty share of mtDNA U2 lineages, which constitute the largest share of the modern Pashtun mtDNA gene pool). If they were a broad proxy for general steppe admixture, the fits would be great, but not as amazingly excellent as they are now.

Just something to think about.

(...)

Edit: Everest once used ALDER (another piece in the ADMIXTOOLS package) on the HGDP Pashtuns. With Lithuanians, he got Pashtuns to be 66% Lithuanian-admixed. That is quite close to the Sintashta percentages. Here is what he wrote to me:

"Interesting. Alder can calculate admixture % using just 1 reference samples. I tried computer admixture % for Pashtuns using Georgians, Sindhis and then Lithuanians. The admixture using Lithuanian was a whopping 66%."

*ALDER is this software: http://groups.csail.mit.edu/cb/alder/

IBD = Identity By Descent:

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

A DNA segment is identical by state (IBS) in two or more individuals if they have identical nucleotide sequences in this segment. An IBS segment is identical by descent (IBD) in two or more individuals if they have inherited it from a common ancestor without recombination, that is, the segment has the same ancestral origin in these individuals.

"The IBD links are pretty strong" = they share a lot of common ancestors, or one is descended from the other one.

========================

On the left - modern ethnically Tajik, Iranian-speaking woman:

On the right - "Amazon of Ak-Alach", Pazyryk culture, died around year 450 BC:



Some more Tajiks:











Kalash people:



Pashtuns:

[Peterski]

As for the Kalash people - here is the most recent genetic study on them:

http://www.cell.com/ajhg/abstract/S0...2815%2900137-8