Interbreeding between farmers and hunter-gatherers along the inland and Mediterranean routes of Neolithic spread in Europe.

ABSTRACT: The Neolithic (i.e., farming and stockbreeding) spread from the Near East across Europe since about 9000 years before the common era (BCE) until about 4000 yr BCE. It followed two main routes, namely a sea route along the northern Mediterranean coast and an inland one across the Balkans and central Europe. It is known that the dispersive behavior of farmers depended on geography, with longer movements along the Mediterranean coast than along the inland route. In sharp contrast, here we show that for both routes the percentage of farmers who interbred with hunter-gatherers and/or acculturated one of them was strikingly the same (about 3.6%). Therefore, whereas the dispersive behavior depended on the proximity to the Mediterranean sea, the interaction behavior (incorporation of hunter-gather

SUBMITTER: Fort J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11327347 | biostudies-literature | 2024 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature