Russianness index

[Rumata]

Estonia at the first place doesn't imply that Yaroslavl or Tver or any other Russian oblast is "more Finnic than Slavic". While it's difficult to precisely quantify how much Slavic and Baltic ancestry modern Estonians have, they're definitely not some kind of 100% pure Finnic people.

Yaroslavl, Tver, Ryazan, Kaluga are all genetically very close Central Russians, and slight perturbations in admixture lead to a flipping/rotation between Estonia and Belarus as their closest pop. But for all of them Belarus is consistently closer than Finland (Finns also have a complex ancestry — a mix of Finnic, Saamic and pre-Germanic Battle Axe Scandinavian ancestries — which means that distance to Finns is not a reliable indicator of "Finnicness" either).

tl;dr this thread is about genetic similarity (or dissimilarity) of Central Russians to modern European countries, not to Iron Age.

I suppose the "Finnic" component should be dominant in both Finns and Estonians. If we agree it should, then Yaroslavl, having the "Slavic" predominant component would be closer to others who also have "Slavic" as predominant. Because small admixtures don't matter so much.

And what we see in that picture? Number 1 and 3 are Finnic and between them is number 2 - Slavo-Baltic Belarus. Looks like nonsense to me. I don't think Yaroslavl has such a significant Germanic or Saami ancestry that it influences that much.

[Marena]

I suppose the "Finnic" component should be dominant in both Finns and Estonians. If we agree it should, then Yaroslavl, having the "Slavic" predominant component would be closer to others who also have "Slavic" as predominant. Because small admixtures don't matter so much.

And what we see in that picture? Number 1 and 3 are Finnic and between them is number 2 - Slavo-Baltic Belarus. Looks like nonsense to me. I don't think Yaroslavl has such a significant Germanic or Saami ancestry that it influences that much.

Estonians and Finns are not each other's genetically closest populations despite speaking closely related languages. I can go on for a long tirade about how "Finnic" and "Slavic" are actually just Medieval concepts that can be further broken down into more ancient admixture components, but this is the simpliest way to explain why Estonia>Belarus>Finland order of closeness is not contradictionary.

[Rumata]

Estonians and Finns are not each other's genetically closest populations despite speaking closely related languages. I can go on for a long tirade about how "Finnic" and "Slavic" are actually just Medieval concepts that can be further broken down into more ancient admixture components, but this is the simpliest way to explain why Estonia>Belarus>Finland order of closeness is not contradictionary.

OK. I see that these matters are very ephemeral unless you have access to a genetic lab and the knowledge to operate it.

[AndreiDNA]

OK. I see that these matters are very ephemeral unless you have access to a genetic lab and the knowledge to operate it.

the cool thing is that there is no need for a "genetic lab" to settle these matters.
In qpAdm, the Finns are majority Germanic. That's their biggest component. Finnic ethnicities in russia (those close to the border with Finland) also as a general rule have 25%+ Germanic ancestry.
Estonians also have germanic ancestry, but less than the Finns.
Here's a 2D PCA that shows how these ethnicities related to each other.

Notice how Slavic seems to be situated between Estonia_BA and Denmark_IA? That is no coincidence. Denmark IA has higher EEF and lower HG relative to Early Slavs, while Estonia BA has lower EEF and higher HG. Estonians plot intermediate between Denmark IA and Estonia_BA due to the history of their admixture with Germanics. Finns also plot intermediate between these two groups, but even closer to Denmark_IA due to how overwhelming their Germanic ancestry is.
Russians plot on a cline from Szolad to Davydovskoye antiquity (which is one of the sources of Uralic ancestry in Russians), with Yaroslavl plotting a bit further to the left and Kaluga plotting closer to Szolad.


Russians are actually very Slavic genetically. The affinity to Finns/Estonians only shows up on G25, due to the overlap between Germanic + Baltic BA mixture and Slavic. Belarusians are very proximate to Estonians on G25 too. The only reason Russians are also proximate to Finns is due to how G25 handles Siberian/Intercontinental shifts. G25 overemphasizes Continental level shifts and underestimates local drift within Europe. G25 unscaled does the opposite.


With robust academic tools Russians plot very distant to the Finns, even showing up closer to Bulgarians than Finns. Keep in mind that Fst and F2 measure genetic drift at every level, literally comparing allelic frequencies between populations, rather than comparing affinity to various anchors like G25.

[Gannicus]

No Russki for me

Distance to: Gannicus_Mergedfile_NewIllustrativecoords_G25like
0.02124891 British
0.02196788 Dutch
0.02430191 Irish
0.02560870 German
0.02703864 Danish
0.02892056 French
0.02929305 Icelander
0.02955044 Austrian
0.02992126 Norwegian
0.03717539 Swedish
0.04204217 Hungarian
0.04404515 Czech
0.04529709 Slovenian
0.04655753 Croat
0.04772290 Slovakian
0.04913531 Bosniak
0.05319703 Serb
0.05391743 Moldovan
0.05461360 Montenegrin
0.05547511 Romanian
0.05774371 North_Macedonian
0.05874151 Ukrainian
0.05879033 Spanish
0.05945109 Polish
0.06365748 Bulgarian

Target: Gannicus_Mergedfile_NewIllustrativecoords_G25like
Distance: 0.0211% / 0.02109528 | ADC: 1x RC
70.6 British
29.4 Dutch

Target: Gannicus_Mergedfile_NewIllustrativecoords_G25like
Distance: 0.0205% / 0.02049318 | ADC: 0.5x RC
54.8 British
25.5 Dutch
19.7 French

Target: Gannicus_Mergedfile_NewIllustrativecoords_G25like
Distance: 0.0196% / 0.01961410 | ADC: 0.25x RC
47.4 Icelander
42.8 French
8.0 British
1.8 Georgian


Target: Gannicus_Mergedfile_NewIllustrativecoords_G25like
Distance: 0.0196% / 0.01960483
43.3 French
40.8 Icelander
8.6 Irish
5.4 Danish
1.9 Georgian


Distance to: Gannicus_Mergedfile_NewIllustrativecoords_G25like
0.01973848 50.60% French + 49.40% Icelander
0.02011255 53.40% Danish + 46.60% French
0.02030161 96.20% British + 3.80% Georgian
0.02031697 3.60% Armenian + 96.40% British
0.02042875 51.60% French + 48.40% Norwegian
0.02044503 94.20% British + 5.80% Greek
0.02048060 39.00% French + 61.00% Irish
0.02048645 3.40% Azerbaijani + 96.60% British
0.02050609 93.40% British + 6.60% Italian
0.02058345 96.60% British + 3.40% Turkish
0.02058517 86.00% Irish + 14.00% Italian
0.02061221 79.80% British + 20.20% French
0.02061765 12.00% Greek + 88.00% Irish
0.02062116 6.20% Albanian + 93.80% British
0.02065802 6.40% Albanian_Kosovo + 93.60% British
0.02067492 72.60% Icelander + 27.40% Spanish
0.02069460 82.00% Danish + 18.00% Italian
0.02073642 92.80% British + 7.20% Bulgarian
0.02079044 14.20% Albanian + 85.80% Irish
0.02079486 92.40% British + 7.60% North_Macedonian
0.02083822 92.60% British + 7.40% Romanian
0.02084937 79.40% Icelander + 20.60% Italian
0.02089639 93.40% British + 6.60% Spanish
0.02090004 14.40% Albanian_Kosovo + 85.60% Irish
0.02090610 93.00% British + 7.00% Montenegrin

[Geba]

Closer to Croats than to Russians

[Rumata]

AndreiDNA, thank you for the attempt to explain it to me but my proficiency in genetics is next to zero so it was mostly "Chinese" to me.

[Marena]

With robust academic tools Russians plot very distant to the Finns, even showing up closer to Bulgarians than Finns.

That's because Finns are a heavily bottlenecked population and their FST index is extremely elevated towards all Europeans. To a lesser extent this happens to Estonians too, that's why FST-based Yaroslavl is closer to Belarusians, while PCA-based Yaroslavl is closer to Estonians, but with Estonians this bottleneck effect is nowhere as severe as with the Finns. FST measures every allele, and many alleles in Finland are highly specific instead of a more typical European diversity due to a bottleneck and inbreeding that had led to a reduction of allele variation.

PCA-based calculators are admixture-focused and don't run through a full allele diversity and in terms of overall ancestral admixture Finns are very proximate to Northeastern Russians - Vologda oblast, Southern and Western parts of Arkhangelsk oblast, Eastern part of Kostroma oblast, Kirov oblast, Perm krai, some parts of Leningrad oblast and old Russian communities in Karelia are very close to Finns in terms of raw admixture (ignoring the Finnish-specific drift). There is nothing contradictory about Finns being more proximate to NE Russians than to NW ones, there is literally not enough Siberian admixture in NW Russians to be a good match for the Finns. And finally, in terms of raw admixture all Russians and even other Northern Slavs are closer to Finns than to Bulgarians in terms of raw admixture components. That's because Northern Slavs and Finns are broadly Northern European while Bulgarians are broadly Southern European — that's a very simplified but a totally correct explanation that captures the broad trends about higher EEF ancestry in the South than in the North.

FST-based and PCA-based genetic distance interpretations are not meant to contradict each other, they're meant to complement each other. No one in the academic field is arguing that one is superior to another — that's a category error, like apples to oranges comparison. They're operating in different domains, and both are valid in their own ways. Illustrative DNA deserves a huge credit for being the first commercial company to integrate both PCA-based and FST-based methods of calculation of genetic distances on their website.

the cool thing is that there is no need for a "genetic lab" to settle these matters.
In qpAdm, the Finns are majority Germanic. That's their biggest component. Finnic ethnicities in russia (those close to the border with Finland) also as a general rule have 25%+ Germanic ancestry.
Estonians also have germanic ancestry, but less than the Finns.
Here's a 2D PCA that shows how these ethnicities related to each other.

Notice how Slavic seems to be situated between Estonia_BA and Denmark_IA? That is no coincidence. Denmark IA has higher EEF and lower HG relative to Early Slavs, while Estonia BA has lower EEF and higher HG. Estonians plot intermediate between Denmark IA and Estonia_BA due to the history of their admixture with Germanics. Finns also plot intermediate between these two groups, but even closer to Denmark_IA due to how overwhelming their Germanic ancestry is.
Russians plot on a cline from Szolad to Davydovskoye antiquity (which is one of the sources of Uralic ancestry in Russians), with Yaroslavl plotting a bit further to the left and Kaluga plotting closer to Szolad.


Russians are actually very Slavic genetically. The affinity to Finns/Estonians only shows up on G25, due to the overlap between Germanic + Baltic BA mixture and Slavic. Belarusians are very proximate to Estonians on G25 too. The only reason Russians are also proximate to Finns is due to how G25 handles Siberian/Intercontinental shifts. G25 overemphasizes Continental level shifts and underestimates local drift within Europe. G25 unscaled does the opposite.

Regarding the Northwestern-shifted admixture that is very high in Finland, and to a lesser extent present in Estonia and Northern Russia, there is a very high probability that it's BAC-related (Battle Axe Culture) and there is a very high probability that the Battle Axe Culture is a linguistic dead end, not ancestral to Germanic languages linguistically. Regardless, it's a Northwestern-shifted admixture (alongside Germanic, Insular Celtic, Proto-Indo-Iranian) that lacks the distinct Baltic (Eastern) genetic drift. But very likely not specifically Germanic and very likely not shared with West Germanic populations due to lack of the Battle Axe ancestry in those populations.