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Re: Haplogroup X being introduced by Solutreans

Since I'm not a genetic scientist I just wanted to ask for some clarification on how DNA is carried on for future generations.

In the Solutrean Hypothesis, it argues that the Haplogroup X (mtDNA) marker may have been contributed by a population of Solutreans who intermixed with Asian travelers into North America. If this intermixing did happen, wouldn't MORE DNA markers from the Paleo-European population be found in the modern day North/South American populations with genetic heritage from ancient Amerinds? Or is it safe to argue that over time, European genetic markers like I, J, K, T, W, etc got "washed-out" over time? Is the argument that a number of Solutreans intermixed with a number of Amerinds or just one Solutrean male did the job and founded the legacy that is X found in both North and South America? --71.189.120.175 (talk) 19:18, 25 September 2009 (UTC)

I don't know the answer to most of your questions, but it definitely was not 'one European male', because mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) only comes from one's mother.Tlhslobus (talk) 07:47, 26 November 2013 (UTC)

Minoan copper miners revisited

Two considerations occur which run contrary to considering the haplogroup X distribution map as indicative of Minoan presence in the Great Lakes 3 to 5 thousand years ago:

1) As noted in the article, Native Americans almost exclusively have the X2a variant, which is almost unknown in the eastern hemisphere, including the Minoan trading region. X2a appears to have branched away from other X2 variants between 11,000 and 25,000 years ago, well before any evidence of extensive Lake Superior copper mining. Refer to Ref 13 in the article (Reidla et al, 2003).

2) X Haplogroups are from mitochondrial DNA and transmitted via the maternal lineage. A naïve expectation would be that any putative Minoan copper miners would have been mostly male. Therefore, a map of Y-chromosomal variance distributions would better address this issue, probably in some other Wiki article.

Note that the article at upublish.info, The Enigmas of Maternal Haplogroup X by Robert Henvell (8/2013) speaks of a newly discovered (@2009) X2 variant (X2j) from North Africa, which shares a mutation with X2a. However making a derivative connection between the 2 would be highly speculative at this point.

Jwilsonjwilson (talk) 08:13, 30 December 2013 (UTC)

Minoan copper miners?

Your lead line reads "In human mitochondrial genetics, Haplogroup X is a human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) haplogroup. It has a widespread global distribution but no major regions of distinct localization."

Just to the right you display a picture which appears to contradict that statement, showing significant localization in the area of the eastern Mediterranean Sea and in the area surrounding the Great Lakes in North America. This is an observation which proponents of the notion that Michigan copper drove the European Bronze Age like to use in support of their thesis, as it shows haplogroup X concentrated in the known trading area of the Minoans and including the copper producing region of Lake Superior. Likewise it fails to show any enhancement along the land route which led across Beringia along which the first Americans are thought to have come. The main thing left unsettled for the Minoan hypothesis is a convincing demonstration of their capacity for trans-Atlantic voyaging. Jwilsonjwilson (talk) 22:58, 20 November 2013 (UTC)

Hardly. We can identify sources of copper, so you'd have to show Lake Superior copper in Minoan contexts, and Minoan artefacts at Lake superior. In any case, see [1] which says "These findings may explain the presence of mitochondrial lineage X in Native Americans." and "the study concludes that two distinct Old World populations led to the formation of the First American gene pool: one related to modern-day East Asians, and the other a Siberian Upper Palaeolithic population related to modern-day western Eurasians." and "The presence of a population related to western Eurasians further into northeast Eurasia provides a more likely explanation for the presence of non-East Asian cranial characteristics in the First Americans, rather than the Solutrean hypothesis that proposes an Atlantic route from Iberia." Dougweller (talk) 06:55, 21 November 2013 (UTC)
Um...Gosh, I think I was pointing to the disconnect between statement and picture. As to my last statement, I agree it sounds more positive than I had intended. That being said, have you or "we" in fact identified sources of copper for a representative range of Eurasian Bronze Age artifacts? Have the characteristics of Lake Superior native coppers likewise been identified and excluded as a possible source? Does the presence of .GT. 99.5% pure copper in the "oxhide" ingots recovered from the shipwreck at Uluburun admit of a source, given metallurgical smelting methods thought to exist prior to 1200BC, other than Lake Superior copper, particularly as they are lacking in the sulfur and arsenic typical of known European copper, and have been declared to be "non-Aegean metal..."? Is there a plausible explanation for small silver inclusions in a few European copper artifacts other than an origin in the deposits at Lake Superior? Have you a plausible explanation for the great disparity between apparent copper usage in the Americas prior to 1200BC and the amount of effort which seems to have gone into digging some 5 to 10 thousand pits to extract at least half a billion pounds of copper on Isle Royale and the Keweenaw Peninsula also before 1200BC? (And no, I don't buy the argument that the amount of copper is greatly inflated. Assays of adjacent ore-bearing rocks done in the 1800's found from 4% to 15% native copper. The half-billion pounds took the amount of rock removed from about 5000 of the ancient pits multiplied by 5%.) As regards the putative populations suggested as an alternative source of the haplogroup x distribution, and given no evidence of long distance ocean voyaging, how does your reference explain the lack of any evident x enhancement along the only apparent (land) migration route? The article makes a blue sky guess based on little beyond the DNA of one or 2 ancients. If the purport is that the trait came over the land bridge, where is any evidence of that, or even that the trait existed that long ago? There is no mention that haplogroup x was part of the examined DNA. I hadn't intended to make any arguments vis-a-vis Solutreans at all, the Cinmar blade notwithstanding. I understand this to be a touchy subject in contemporary American anthropology/archaeology. There seems little reason to suppose that any putative Minoan involvement resulted in much cultural diffusion other than perhaps via intermarriage which would have left its mark in a regional haplogroup x enhancement, as the picture seems to purport. I would then naively suppose that Minoan copper mining would fall more into the same category as the now acceptable (per recent excavations at L'ans en Meadows) notion of some tentative pre-Columbian Norse involvement in the Americas. As for possible evidences of European presence, I recommend "Prehistoric Copper Mining in the Lake Superior Region" by Drier & Du Temple (1961). It seems to have been fashionable at the time to declare unexpected artifacts to be hoaxes. (talk) 23:54, 4 December 2013 (UTC)
Susan Martin is considered to be the expert on this. She kindly gave me permission to host her article on the subject - she doesn't think much of Drier & Du Temple.[2] The Cinmar blade - more differences than similarities to Solutrean I understand, and coming up in the same dredge obviously proves nothing. You might want to read this discussion[3] also as it discusses the genetic arguments with more current information. Dougweller (talk) 12:08, 5 December 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for the pointer to Ms. Martin. I will certainly have a look. As for what is a proof or not, as you may know they are rather different beasts between science and mathematics. Preponderance of evidence is about as well as one can do in science, and all scientific conclusions are forever at the mercy of the next bit of evidence or experiment. As I noted above, I don't really have a dog in the Solutrean hunt, however, it does annoy me when possible evidence is tossed away on some pretext. Science shouldn't behave like Judge Judy's courtroom. A rather substantial amount of evidence seems to be building up behind the Minoan hypothesis, any part of which can certainly be questioned, but to really slay the notion is becoming increasingly difficult. I wouldn't doubt that Ms. Martin doesn't much care for the authors of "Rocks and Rows" either. But I think they're onto something. Another tome would be "World Trade and Biological Exchanges Before 1492" which traces food and medicinal plants/animals & diseases found in both east and west hemispheres. This strikes a body blow to the notion that Europeans invented deliberate trans-oceanic voyaging (excepting Vikings) in late 1400's. As to Drier and Du Temple book, it takes a bit of getting past differences in scholarly and mundane writing styles from past times, as the book is a compendium of old papers just sort of lumped together. One frustration is that a paper will refer to some source which is not referenced by the compilers at all. You have to go back and dig it out yourself (sort of appropo in a book about mines, I suppose). Contrary to practice at Wikipedia, I have come to like early/first-person accounts, as the vetting process (which I suppose is the reason to prefer secondary sources) seems as likely to toss out useful information as to reject questionable stuff. Again, thanks for your feedback. Jwilsonjwilson (talk) 22:22, 6 December 2013 (UTC)
I have had a cursory look at Ms. Martins' site and your hosting. I can certainly see why she dislikes Drier & Du Temple. I also note that she teaches American Indian Political Issues and Heritage management at Michigan Tech. This is not the resume of an impartial observer when applied to questions of pre-Columbian cultural diffusion between Europe and North America. A glance at her FAQ on ancient copper page suggests that she just rejects outright much putative evidence that supports non-native American involvement in the prehistoric mines at Lake Superior. I see there some flat-out denials of statements made in Drier & Du Temple, as for instance:
Drier & Du Temple: PRE-HISTORIC MINING IN THE COPPER COUNTRY (Roy W. Drier): "Father Allouez said that the Indian Legends contained no reference to mining or to the miners. In fact the Indians did not know where the mines were. A report of a Chippewa legend says that an old one states that their forefathers drove out a white race who might have been the miners."
Susan Martin FAQ: "Some people argue that native Americans were not aware of the mines or of mining, and that the mining was done by a lost tribe of unknown people. Is this true?
No. There is no evidence of any lost tribe. Copper materials are found in association with native sites and artifacts throughout the Upper Great Lakes. There are many early accounts of Europeans who depended on native people to show them where the copper was. However, in general many of the native people did not want the Europeans to occupy their lands, and were reluctant to show the places where the copper was for fear the newcomers would take it. Time proved them right about this. After the Treaty of LaPointe (1842-3), the Lake Superior basin was the scene of the first American mineral rush, which pushed many native peoples away from their original lands."
Sooo, maybe the indigenous were just lying to Father Allouez. However, the reported conversation took place before 1660, well before the Treaty of LaPointe. As to "A report of a Chippewa legend says that an old one states that" which sounds kind of lame until you recall that the event in question probably happened, if at all, at least 1000 years before that and maybe 2500 years before. Jwilsonjwilson (talk) 23:23, 6 December 2013 (UTC)
This is way off topic, I'm sorry I got involved. All I can say is that she is the recognised expert in the field of ancient copper mining. You think she's biased, that's your privilege. Dougweller (talk) 09:06, 7 December 2013 (UTC)
I apologize! Guess when I get going I have trouble shutting down. You've been most patient and helpful and I'm sure Susan Martin has much to offer. Thanks again for your help and inputs. In fact, as I look at the last post, it seems rather unkind and rude. So I am cancelling it. Again my sincere apologies. I guess this is a learning experience for me. Jwilsonjwilson (talk) 22:40, 7 December 2013 (UTC)
Just by the by, I grew up near Butte Montana, which at one time was the most productive copper mine in the world. So I guess the mention of copper mining triggers things for me. Jwilsonjwilson (talk) 23:06, 7 December 2013 (UTC)
Just ran across this analysis of Wolter's show on this claim[4] Dougweller (talk) 15:59, 15 March 2015 (UTC)

At the risk of going off into Pseudoscience Land

William Penn might have been onto something when he speculated that the Lenape of the Philadelphia area were remnants of the Ten Lost Tribes, although he might not have been accurate. If X haplotype is most diverse among peoples of the Near East, and if it shows up among Algonquins, which the Lenape are, then something might have happened. He described the Lenape as having something more of a European appearance than an Asian appearance, although they had dark skin, their noses and faces were more of a European appearance.

The geographical distribution of the X haplotype suggests that it might have come over the north Atlantic with the Vikings and begun spreading among Native Americans when "skraelings" intermixed with the Northmen. I wonder if Jews or Arabs or traders might have sailed with those Vikings...

Of course, the Phoenicians might have beaten the Vikings to the punch. They sailed around Africa, after all, and so someone might have fled the Punic Wars. But that is, also, speculation.

Unfortunately, another problem is that this doesn't seem to be reflected in Algonquin/ Lenape language. (Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong; I'm no linguistic expert.) Shouldn't there be some sort of Viking/Punic /other Semitic remnants in the Lenape/Algonquin languages, if Vikings or Phoenicians (or Jews or Arabs) settled among the skraelings? If so, where are they? 198.151.130.45 (talk) 15:59, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Ignore the above commentary, as it appears that the haplogroup X2A seems to have emerged from founders 11,000 years ago, well before any Phoenicians or Vikings existed. Oops. 198.151.130.45 (talk) 16:04, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Unless you have a different interpretation of the Scientific Evidence and don't thin the world is even 11,000 years old.--JaredMithrandir (talk) 10:02, 5 September 2015 (UTC)

Comments by the authors of "Does Mitochondrial Haplogroup X Indicate Ancient Trans-Atlantic Migration to the Americas?"

See [5] Doug Weller talk 15:35, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

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Obsolete.

@Doug Weller: Which one is later? --Yomal Sidoroff-Biarmskii (talk) 18:25, 29 May 2018 (UTC)

"Origin and diffusion of mtDNA haplogroup X" which is dated 2003, the one just before it is dated 2001. Doug Weller talk 18:28, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
@Doug Weller: I kept it here: https://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/Haplogroup_X_(mtDNA)#cite_note-Reidla-10 --Yomal Sidoroff-Biarmskii (talk) 18:31, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
Actually I think the main thing is to keep it chronological, and we might want to use more of the Raff article. We should say something in the lead about it also, the lead is much too short. Doug Weller talk 18:39, 29 May 2018 (UTC)
@Doug Weller: Agree. --Yomal Sidoroff-Biarmskii (talk) 12:18, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
@Sidoroff-B: Thanks. But I'm drafting an ArbCom case and may not have time to work on this. Doug Weller talk 16:42, 30 May 2018 (UTC)
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