Sunday, June 30, 2024

Patrilocality in early Gaul

A week ago (drink!) I read Inequality: A Genetic History, a book from a couple years back. The author may want to add one more example.

Here is a reconstruction of a 70%-R1b1a1b1a1a grandfather. We have genomes for his purely Neolithic farmer spouse, who lived to her 60s and was buried in a grave in Champagne (the département), and their son and grandson.

The paper's opening summary would have animal traction... starting at the end of the fourth millennium BCE (sic), south and east. The Campagne area, northwest, remained more stayathome. The Globular Amphora culture (GAC) will kickstart the changes. The claim is, in three waves 3100-2450 BC: Yamnaya nomads, Corded Ware, finally them Bellbeakers. None of this would involve the horse which will come at the end of this third millennium.

These new Champagnards practiced patrilocality. If they had daughters, as statistics would suggest, they're buried elsewhere. The place was taken by the "BBC" not all that long before this 2500 BC burial. All the action had happened before all this. The men once they got there went scouting for farmers' daughters.

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