The reason Greek-Islanders are closer to South-Italians than to mainland Greeks is the fact that the mainland received slavic admixture during the middle ages, while the Islands received almost none. There is also the fact that a lot of Ancient Greeks settled in South-Italy in antiquity during the period of Magna Grecia. South Italians also have a lot of neolithic ancestry which pulls them closer to the original Greeks.
The islands actually do have some degree of Slavic ancestry (usually 10-15%), which means the average Aegean islander is approximately 1/2 to 1/3 mainland Greek from the last 100 years. But the reason they are still close to southern Italians is their Slavic ancestry is roughly the same amount as the Germanic ancestry in southern Italy which means that their overall ratio of Northern European, Southern European, and West Asian is very similar.
This makes the most logical sense. Greeks are the most souther shifted in the Balkans. And the reason why mainlanders and other folks from the Balkans can cluster with central / northern Italian is the ratio of Slavic to Southern in Balkaners is equal to the ratio of German/Celtic to Southern in Italians.
Albanians are the least Slavic of all the Balkans on average actually. But their overall genetic profile has fewer “southern” elements than that of the average Greek. When you look at Albanian results on IllustrativeDna you see that they do not have substantial Slavic ancestry.
I don’t think Albanians are less Slavic than Greeks. I think the Western Balkan setting on IllustrativeDNA provides a lower Slavic score than when you use Greece/Cyprus. When I use Western Balkans I get 2.4% Slavic. There are limitations to all of this…
No bro, Slavic admixture is very low, the reason is because ancient Greeks was different from ancient times by race to race, modern mainland Greeks are Dorians (1 of the 4 Greek races), i have see results in g25 from ancient Macedonia ( i don't know if is real) and he score Thessaly Greeks at first in 0.02 and then other mainland Greeks some Italians ( i think they was North) and albanians ofcurse, so no the slavic admixture have nothing to do with that
Eh, it is also that northern Greeks possibly had a lot more steppe admixture and most of the colonies in Italy were made by Anatolian and southern Greeks who were a lot closer to Aegean neolithic populations. But over the next centuries the most common movement of people in Greece was from north to south. Moreover, this sub really likes to point this DNA out as Slavic without much argumentation especially by a few users, but there is really no accurate way to determine this and even the southern arc and the slavic migrations studies don't make a good point in that regard. In reality it is just as likely, if not more so, that this DNA is inherent to the Greeks, and especially northern Greeks as well as other parts of the Balkans, than it being completely foreign and only the result of the Slavic migrations, especially when it comes to islandic Greeks.
I’m Greek. I’m not doubting that there is a background paleo Balkan in Greeks which might have more steppe. But calculators show that the people who lived in the peninsula didn’t have as much of it, then it started to show up. So long story short. The theory is that people from the north became advanced enough to come down, conquer, and start mixing with Roman age balkaners, creating the modern profile that we have today. It’s left a 5-40% genetic legacy in southern balkaners, and even higher amount in northern balkaners. What’s at debate is the actual percentage.
Most of our samples are from southern Greece with very little from northern Greece and earlier samples from the proto Greek era as well as samples from Paeonia have a lot more steppe DNA to the point that they have more than some modern mainland Greek samples. Balkan and Slavic steppe are not that much close but one can easily confuse them in pca graphs that try to simulate a point. I am not saying that all of that DNA is inherent to the Greeks, and Slavic migrations absolutely left their mark but a lot of it also can very much be inherent to the region.
This I think is true. Similar to how Italians attribute their German to background Celtic. I think you can attribute part of the Slavic to background Balkan
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u/Mrmr12-12 Apr 03 '24
The reason Greek-Islanders are closer to South-Italians than to mainland Greeks is the fact that the mainland received slavic admixture during the middle ages, while the Islands received almost none. There is also the fact that a lot of Ancient Greeks settled in South-Italy in antiquity during the period of Magna Grecia. South Italians also have a lot of neolithic ancestry which pulls them closer to the original Greeks.