The Origins of West African and Bantu Peoples! ❌

Finally, can't wait to share some information here, coming fam, as well as some civilization overviews and data of niger-congo peoples

Population Data from Linguistics:
The origin or “homeland” of this process is generally believed to be near the border of Nigeria and Cameroon.
🔗Phylogeographic analysis of the Bantu language expansion supports a rainforest route - PMC (nih.gov)

Population Data from Anthropology:
In 2008, the 7 Gobero fossils showed similarities with mid-Holocene inhabitants of the Southern Sahara, as well as late Pleistocene and early Holocene inhabitants of the Maghreb. They were by their skeletal analysis deemed robust akin to "Mechtoids" of Mali and Mauretania, Iberomarusians and Capsians of the Maghreb.
🔗Lakeside Cemeteries in the Sahara: 5000 Years of Holocene Population and Environmental Change | PLOS ONE

🔗Archaeology of the Green Sahara - NigerHeritage
Based on dental evidence, Irish (2016) concluded: Proto-Bantu peoples may have originated in the western region of the Sahara, amid the Kiffian period at Gobero, and may have migrated southward, from the Sahara into various parts of West Africa as a result of the desertification of the Green Sahara. Analysis of Kiffians and  Tenerians suggests sub-Saharan West African affinities, in turn suggesting that the common ancestors of West African and Proto-Bantu peoples may have originated in the southwestern region of the Sahara.
🔗(PDF) Tracing the “Bantu Expansion” from its source: Dental nonmetric affinities among West African and neighboring populations (researchgate.net)
A
2021 study found that the skulls of African Americans are intermediate between White Europeans and West Africans like the Gold Coast and Ashanti.
🔗What Are We Really Estimating in Forensic Anthropological Practice, Population Affinity or Ancestry? | Forensic Anthropology (ufl.edu)

Population Data from Genetics:
Y-DNA
The E1b1a marker in southern central and eastern africa was said to spread with Bantu farmers around 3 kya.
🔗The Y-Chromosome Tree Bursts into Leaf: 13,000 High-Confidence SNPs Covering the Majority of Known Clades - PMC (nih.gov)

In 2014 https://etd.uwc.ac.za/handle/11394/5326

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259153827_Lemba_origins_revisited_Tracing_the_ancestry_of_Y_chromosomes_in_South_African_and_Zimbabwean_Lemba

https://academic.oup.com/mbe/article/28/3/1255/994848


mtDNA

A study from 2019 that genotyped 218 unrelated males from the Igbo, Hausa and Yoruba tribes using X-STR analysis, found that when studying the genetic affinity, no significant differences were detected. It supported a homogeneity of Nigerian ethnic groups for X-chromosome markers.
🔗Genetic insight into Nigerian population groups using an X-chromosome decaplex system - ScienceDirect

auDNA

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29103098/

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3890430/

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-22207-y?fromPaywallRec=false

https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rspb.2014.1448

2014

🔗https://www.science.org/content/article/genetic-study-reveals-surprising-ancestry-many-americans
2017
https://www.pasteur.fr/en/home/research-journal/press-documents/migration-history-bantu-speaking-people-genomics-reveals-benefits-admixture-and-sheds-new-light

https://www.science.org/doi/pdf/10.1126/science.aal1988
A study infered that the migration of Niger-Congo populations from the Sahel into Western Africa was caused by movements of Nilo-Saharan speaking herders
🔗Ref32390239302
A genetic study in 2020 found evidence of 8.6% West-Eurasian ancestry being found among modern Yoruba samples. This admixture may have been introduced 7,500–10,500 years ago from North Africa during the Green Saharan period.
🔗Insights into human genetic variation and population history from 929 diverse genomes - PMC (nih.gov)
Iberomarusians were found to contributed 12.5% in Yoruba populations. Yoruba and Mande 15% Iberomarusian. Neaderthal admix
🔗(PDF) Paleolithic DNA from the Caucasus reveals core of West Eurasian ancestry (researchgate.net)
Iwo Eleru 2-19% ghost hominid
🔗Ref434423231121
In 2023, using 1,487 Bantu speakers sampled from 143 populations across 14 African countries, revealed that the expansion occurred ~4,000 years ago in Western Africa. The results showed that Bantu speakers received significant gene-flow from local groups in regions they expanded into. Generally, the movements of Bantu language-speaking peoples from the Cameroon/Nigeria border region throughout much of sub-Saharan Africa radically reshaped the genetic structure of the continent and led to extensive admixture between migrants and local populations.
🔗The genetic legacy of the expansion of Bantu-speaking peoples in Africa | Nature

In 2023
🔗Dense sampling of ethnic groups within African countries reveals fine-scale genetic structure and extensive historical admixture - PMC (nih.gov)

A 2023 study, 
🔗Whole genomes from Angola and Mozambique inform about the origins and dispersals of major African migrations | Nature Communications

Razib Khan 
Bantu über alles: three millennia of unstoppable African farmers repeopling the vast continent (razibkhan.com)
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666979X23001751
Data
The emergence and maintenance of sickle cell hotspots in the Mediterranean - PMC (nih.gov)

'Tracing the "Bantu Expansion" from its Source: Dental Nonmetric Affinities among West African and Neighboring Populations' - 2016 (Research) 
'Phylogeographic Analysis of the Bantu Language Expansion Supports a Rainforest Route' - 2022 (Study)
'The Genetic Legacy of the Expansion of Bantu-Speaking Peoples in Africa' - 2023 (Study) 


Population Data from Civilizations:

Historic West African and Bantu Societies and Cultures
🔴Dhar Tichitt (~2,500 BCE)
Ghana Empire (~100 CE)
Mali Empire (~1,000 CE)
Ashanti  (~1,700 CE)
🔴Nok Culture
 (~1,500 BCE)
Ife (~1,000 CE)
Benin (~1,500 CE)
Sao Culture
🔴Swahili Culture (~1,000 CE)
In 2022, DNA was extracted, analyzed and compared in 80 samples taken from people buried between 1250 and 1800 CE in towns that were mostly along the Swahili Coast in modern Kenya and Tanzania. It is believed that these people were Swahili elites because they were buried in cemeteries near the main mosques. Before 1500 CE, the inhabitants carried both African, as well as Asia/Near East ancestry, which was mainly Persian-related (with more than half of their DNA originating from African ancestors and another large proportion of DNA coming from Asian ancestors). The male ancestors of elite Swahili people were a mix of approximately 83% Asian and 17% African; about 90% of the Asian DNA was Persian, and the rest was Indian. The female ancestors of Swahili elites were about 97% African and 3% Asian. This is consistent with the narrative of the Kilwa Chronicle of a Persian origin. After this time, Arabian ancestry becomes more prevalent, which correlates with the archaeological and historical record of interactions with Southern Arabia (Oman).
🔗Entwined African and Asian genetic roots of medieval peoples of the Swahili coast - PMC (nih.gov)
🔗https://hms.harvard.edu/news/ancient-dna-reveals-asian-ancestry-introduced-east-africa-early-modern-times

🔴Kingdom of Kongo (~1,200 CE)
🔴Monomotapa and Mapungubwe (~1,500 CE)

Population Data from Ancient DNA:
In 4000 BP (or even earlier during the Mesolithic), there may have been a population that traversed from African through the Strait of Gibraltar, where admixing between Africans and Iberians occurred. Based on a small trace presence (0.02%) of sub-Saharan African components in select samples from early Neolithic Iberia, and the discovery of a mitogenome L2a1 found in one individual, while all others belonged to European mitochondrial haplogroups.
🔗A western route of prehistoric human migration from Africa into the Iberian Peninsula - PMC (nih.gov)
In 2022, mtDNA found in North Africa and Europe was attributed to various periods, with some like L3f1b6 being a Sub-Saharan mitochondrial lineages which reached Iberia during the Mesolithic period according to the author 🔗Fernando Sanchez. They discovered that when it came to the distribution of mtDNA: "The analysis confirms that such lineages in the Americas date to recent centuries-the time of the Atlantic slave trade-thereby validating the approach. By contrast, in North Africa, Southwestern Asia and Europe, roughly half of the dispersal signal dates to the early Holocene, during the “greening” of the Sahara. We elaborate these results by showing that the main source regions for the two main dispersal episodes are distinct. For the recent dispersal, the major source was West Africa, but with two exceptions: South America, where the fraction from Southern Africa was greater, and Southwest Asia, where Eastern Africa was the primary source."

🔗IJMS | Free Full-Text | Phylogeography of Sub-Saharan Mitochondrial Lineages Outside Africa Highlights the Roles of the Holocene Climate Changes and the Atlantic Slave Trade (mdpi.com)

Other Related Groups!
Malagasy

'Genomic Landscape of Human Diversity Across Madagascar' - 2017 (Study) 

🔗From the CoverPNAS Plus: Genomic landscape of human diversity across Madagascar - PMC (nih.gov)
🔗Genome-wide evidence of Austronesian–Bantu admixture and cultural reversion in a hunter-gatherer group of Madagascar - PMC (nih.gov)

Cape Verdeans
🔗The Admixture Structure and Genetic Variation of the Archipelago of Cape Verde and Its Implications for Admixture Mapping Studies - PMC (nih.gov)
Admixture between Iberians and Senegambia populations
🔗The admixture histories of Cabo Verde | bioRxiv

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4308437/


https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4915815/

Other: https://genoplot.com/shared/admix/?share=base%2Fjkmm%2F1891a04c49f

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