Long-term hunter-gatherer continuity in the Rhine-Meuse region was disrupted by local formation of expansive Bell Beaker groups.

ABSTRACT: The first phase of the ancient DNA revolution painted a broad-brush picture of European Holocene prehistory, whereby 6500-4000 BCE, farmers descending from western Anatolians mixed with local hunter-gatherers resulting in 70-100% ancestry turnover, then 3000-2500 BCE people associated with the Corded Ware complex spread steppe ancestry into north-central Europe. We document an exception to this pattern in the wider Rhine-Meuse area in communities in the wetlands, riverine areas, and coastal areas of the western and central Netherlands, Belgium and western Germany, where we assembled genome-wide data for 109 people 8500-1700 BCE. Here, a distinctive population with high hunter-gatherer ancestry (∼50%) persisted up to three thousand years later than in continental European regions, reflectin

SUBMITTER: Olalde I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11974744 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature