THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC GENOGRAPHIC PROJECT ON THE EGYPTIAN GENETIC MAKE-UP – PART III: THE EGYPTIAN RESULTS

IN THE NEXT PART, PART IV, I SHALL PRESENT A CRITIQUE ABOUT THE GP’S FINDINGS ON EGYPT

YOU ARE STRONGLY ADVISED TO READ PART I AND PART II OF THIS SERIES

In Part I and Part II of this series, I spoke about how the Egyptian media misunderstood and misinterpreted the Genographic Project’s results on Egypt and said that to understand the results one has to know about the project and the science behind it. In this Part III I shall present the Egyptian results and explain them.

The whole Genographic Project (GP) was an exercise in genetic anthropology. This is an emerging branch of science that combines DNA testing with archaeological, historical and linguistic evidence to reveal the history of ancient human migration, and to answer the questions, “Where did we come from, and how did we get here?”[1] What we are about here in our Egyptian context is to find out where did the “modern Egyptians”, that’s the individuals described as “indigenous Egyptians” or “native Egyptians” come from, and how they get into Egypt of today. The term Indigenous or native Egyptians in this context must not be taken to mean the indigenous or native Egyptians who have their linear descent from Ancient Egypt: it simply means the citizens of Egypt of today. The role of DNA testing of modern Egyptians in this must be complementary to what we know from Egyptian archaeology, history and linguistic evidence if we are to get an accurate picture. Therefore, it’s mandatory that the genetic scientist knows these before to choose his research methodology and to be able to interpret his genetic results.

Genetic anthropology is concerned about determining biogeographical regions, or ancestry regions. These are found by looking at mutations in the Y chromosome, mtDNA and autosomal chromosomes worldwide, and seeing where they are concentrated in the world. As we have seen before, mutations occur once and once appeared, they are permanent, being passed from the individual in whom they first appeared to all his or her descendants. Thus, scientists are able to divide the world into specific regions – ancestry regions – that possess particular genetic makeup. By analysing the genomes of individuals, they are further able to tell us of our specific migration journey of our ancestors throughout history and across the world. Then by the aid of historical, archaeological and linguistic knowledge, they are able to suggest the timing and the triggering events that prompted our ancestors to move from one ancestry region to the other until we came to our current place, which will all leave a trace in our own genetic makeup as we inherit mutations from all the regions our ancestors had passed through in their long journey.

Our specific genetic blend is therefore the product of our ancestors’ DNA as it altered through history by developing new mutations, or picking up through new mutations through interbreeding with other peoples as they through different ancestry regions. Scientists are thus able to tell us as individuals that our genetic blend is made of proportions of ancestry regions. For example, the New York-based writer Molly McLaughlin had the following proportions of DNA blends that are particular to three ancestry regions in her own DNA makeup:  44% Northern European, 35% Mediterranean, and 19% Southwest Asian (Geno 2.0 result).[2] She does not know any of her known ancestors who got married to anyone from Asia, and her result does not say that – what it says is that, sometime in the past, there was a mixture through inbreeding in her ancestral line between people from these three regions.

Genetic anthropologists do not only determine ancestry regions and analyse the DNA of individuals to tell them of their ancestry migration history. They provide us also with what is called reference populations. This is determined by looking at all the DNA analysis results of individuals in their database who were born in a certain country (state) or belonged to a specific ethnic group, e.g., Britain and Egypt, as examples of reference populations based on a country (British and Egyptian), and  Luhya (tribes in Kenya) and Yoruba people (in Nigeria), as examples of reference populations based on an ethnic group. Then by taking the average of all these for a particular country or ethnic group, the scientists come with the genetic makeup of that country or ethnic group – this then becomes the reference population. It is called reference because the individuals who have analysed their DNA can then be referenced to one or two of these reference populations whatever is closest to him or her in terms of the number, kind and percentage of ancestry regions revealed in their results. In the case of Molly McLaughlin, the reference populations she most resembled genetically were British (United Kingdom) and German.

But reference populations have another purpose: they tell us of the particular genetic makeup of the specific countries or ethnic groups; and in this sense it is relevant not only to those who have had their DNA analysed but also to all who want to find about their country’s or ethnic group’s genetic blend. It is this which tells us of where peoples of countries or ethnicities came from. And it is this which has become a hotbed of energetic debate.

OTHER REFERENCE POPULATIONS’ RESULTS TO HELP IN UNDERSTANDING THE EGYPTIAN REFERENCE POPULATION:

In the previous part (Part II), we have seen that the GP passed through three phases, Geno 1.0 did not give any reference population; Geno 2.0 gave ancestry regions and reference populations; and Geno 2.0 gave more sophisticated and expanded number of both.

I will use a few examples to help eventually in understanding the Egyptian reference population.

First: The British reference population

In Geno 2.0 its breakdown into regional ancestry proportions is as follows:

• Northern European – 50%
• Mediterranean – 33%
• Southwest Asian – 17%

It does not need a genius to know that this is not representative of all the British or the UK since the UK is composed of many different ethnicities and nations, and although there is a certain commonality between them through inbreeding they stiff significantly differ in their genetic makeup. GP recognised this, and therefore in its more advanced Geno 2.0 Next Generation phase it divided the UK populations into British, which mainly means English since 85% of the UK is English, Irish and Scottish. As I said before, the Welsh were simply excluded, which the Welsh must be feeling strongly about. At this stage the ancestry regions have also been further divided. The results are as shown in the following table:

Ancestry region	Reference population and % of ancestry regions
	British	Irish	Scottish
Great Britain & Ireland	69%	79%	71%
Scandinavia	12%	11%	17%
Western & Central Europe	9%	4%	8%
Southern Europe	5%	6%	–
Eastern Europe	2%	–	–
Jewish Diaspora	2%	–	–
Finland & Northern Siberia	–	–	2%

 

You can see how the result of Geno 2.0 wasn’t as accurate or representative as the results of Geno 2.0 Next Generation which divided the United Kingdom into its constituent nationalities, though incomplete. The Irish, Scottish and English have different genetic makeup although they greatly share in the Great Britain and Ireland ancestry region genetic blend.

Second: The Eastern Indian reference population

Geno 2.0 categorises the Indian subcontinent into four reference populations: Northern Indian, Southern Indian, Western Indian, and Eastern Indian. It obviously recognised that the Indian subcontinent is a huge area with many ethno-religio-linguistic groups; however, the four reference groups it set up were inadequate as each of these groups is further divided into more ethnicities with different histories. I shall take only the Eastern India reference group. Its Geno 2.0 results are as follows:

• Southeast Asian – 50%
• Southwest Asian – 43%
• Northern European – 2%
• Mediterranean – 2%

But Eastern India includes part of India, Nepal and Bangladesh; and there is overflow of the different nationalities between the three countries. The above result cannot be expected to represent all. In the Geno 2.0 Next Generation stage, The Bengali reference group appears besides the Eastern Indian (minus Bengali), and the results greatly alter (note that the ancestry regions were more). The following table shows that:

Ancestry region	Reference population and % of ancestry regions
	Eastern India	Bengali
Southern Asia	71%	43%
Southeast Asia & Oceania	13%	36%
Central Asia	10%	8%
Eastern Asia	3%	11%

 

Third: The Lebanese reference population

Lebanon is a special case, and very relevant to the Egyptian situation. It is composed of a wide variety of ethnicities and religions, just like in Egypt, including Muslim, Christian and Druze. They were all included in one reference population by the GP. The case of Lebanon proves that the results of Geno 2.0 are inaccurate, and also throws a shadow of doubt on those of Geno 2.0 Next Generation.

The following table shows the results of the two in regard to the Lebanese reference population:

Geno 2.0		Geno 2.0 Next Generation
Ancestry region	% of ancestry region	Ancestry region	% of ancestry region
Mediterranean	66%	Southwest Asia & Persian Gulf	44%
Southwest Asia	26%	Jewish Diaspora	14%
Northern European	5%	Northern Africa	11%
Sub-Saharan Africa	2%	Asia Minor	10%
		Southern Europe	5%
		Eastern Africa	2%

 

The idea of taking averages of all participants who were born in a country to determine the genetic blend of that country when the country is made of different ethnicities and nationalities is ridiculous – it ends up by representing no ethnicity or nationality. Lebanon is a good example to demonstrate this absurdity. In Lebanon, the religious line between Christians and Muslims is also largely genetics: the Maronites are different in their genetic makeup from the Muslims. This is shown beyond doubt by Pierre A. Zalloua et al in a large study published in The American Journal of Human Genetics in 2008, Y-Chromosomal Diversity in Lebanon Is Structured by Recent Historical Events. The study included 926 Lebanese men, and these were types with Y chromosome genetic markers. The researchers found that male genetic variation within Lebanon was more strongly structured by religious affiliation than by geography. Two migrations resulted in this: the first – the Islamic expansion from the Arabian Peninsula beginning in the 7^th century – introduced lineage typical of this area (Y haplogroup J* [xJ2]) into those who subsequently became Lebanese Muslims; the second – the Crusader activity in the 11^th – 13^th centuries – introduced western European lineages (Y haplogroup R1b) into Lebanese Christians.[3] There is no doubt that the Christians and Muslims of Lebanon are genetically different. The study, in the words of Pierre Zalloua, has put some science to the history of Lebanon.[4]

THE EGYPTIAN REFERENCE POPULATION:

We are now in a position to review the reference group called “Egyptian” – based as stated by GP on “native Egyptians”. GP published two results for the Egyptian reference population, one based on the Geno 2.0 findings and the other on the findings of the more refined Geno 2.0 Next Generation.

First: The Egyptian reference population based on Geno 2.0

According to GP, the Egyptians have the following genetic blend of the following ancestry regions:

• Mediterranean – 65%
• Southwest Asian – 18%
• Sub-Saharan African 14%

This means that:

1. 65% of the modern-day Egyptians’ genetic pool comes from the Mediterranean ancestry region.

The GP says that this component is “found at highest frequencies in southern Europe and the Levant – people of Sardinia, Italy, Greece, Lebanon, Egypt and Tunisia in the GP reference populations”.  It adds: “This component is likely the signal of the Neolithic population expansion from the Middle East, beginning around 8,000 years ago, likely from the western part of the Fertile Crescent.” The Neolithic Age (also called New Stone Age) began around 10,000  BC, when humans first developed farming, transitioning themselves in the parts where agriculture first appeared from hunting and gathering to agriculture, which allowed settlement in huts and houses in villages and towns, and led to the establishment of organised societies that used polished stone tools that could govern themselves, and were able to domesticate animals and make pottery. This Neolithic Revolution first appeared in the geographical area called the Fertile Crescent – a term first coined in 1918 by the American archaeologist and Egyptologist, James Henry Breasted (1865 – 1935), in his Ancient Times, A History of the Early World. Breasted describes it as a borderland between the desert and the mountains – a kind of cultivable fringe of the desert, having the mountains on one side and the desert on the other, and forming “roughly a semicircle with the open side toward the south. Its western end is at the southeastern corner of the Mediterranean, the center lies directly north of Arabia, and the eastern end is at the northern end of the Persian Gulf”.[5] The favourable conditions created by the agricultural revolution led to expansion in population and migration towards Egypt and other Mediterranean locations.

Map showing the Fertile Crescent and Egypt, from Breasted A History of the Early World[6]

2. 18% of the modern-day Egyptians’ genetic pool comes from the Southwest Asia ancestry region.

The GP says that the Southwest Asian component is found at highest frequencies in India and the neighbouring populations, including Tajikistan and Iran in their reference dataset.  It postulates that this component, as with the Mediterranean component, spread during the Neolithic expansion, perhaps from the eastern part of the Fertile Crescent.

3. 14% of the modern-day Egyptians’ genetic pool comes from the Sub-Saharan African ancestry region.

GP says that this component is found at highest frequency in the people of Sub-Saharan Africa, particularly among the Bantu languages such as the Yoruba and Luhya in its reference populations. It adds that it likely represents a signal of the original inhabitants of eastern and central Africa, and was spread in part due to the migrations of the Bantu speakers throughout Africa in the past 2,500 years. It is also found at lower frequencies north of the Sahara, in populations such as the Tunisians and Egyptians. GP forgets to mention that it is largely the effect of the slave trade up the Nile where millions were captured in slave raids (razzias, from Arabic ghāzīa/ غَزْيَّة) by Arab slave hunters from east and central Africa and transferred down the Egypt to Egypt and North Africa among other places.

Map showing the African slave trade[7]

Second: The Egyptian reference population based on Geno 2.0 Next Generation

We have seen in Geno 2.0 that the Egyptian genetic blend was found to be composed of three components representing ancestry regions: Mediterranean, Southwestern Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. They exist in the Egyptians genetic pool in the proportions stated above, namely 65%, 18% and 14%, respectively.

Geno 2.0 Next Generation gives further detail, and identify six refined ancestral regions, represented in the graph below:

From this graph, it is clear that the Egyptian genetic makeup is made mainly by two components: Northern African (68%) and Southwest Asia & Persian Gulf (17%); four other components had their contribution but minimally: 4% Jewish Diaspora and 3% for each of Asia Minor, East Africa and Sothern Europe.

1. 68% of the modern-day Egyptians’ genetic pool comes from the Northern Africa ancestry region.

 GP Geno 2.0 Next Generation describes this Northern Africa ancestry region as the regions north of Africa’s Sahara Desert that make up the southern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. They have divided the previous Mediterranean ancestry region of Geno 2.0 into North Africa and Southern Europe (the northern Mediterranean coast). They obviously found that these two ancestry regions are different genetically (the Southern European includes people of Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and Greek descent; while North Africa includes people of Moroccan, Tunisian, Algerian, Libyan, ant Egyptian descent). Both of these ancestry regions, GP describes as having been for millennia areas of the most travelled parts of the world. North Africa saw constant movement and mixing of peoples and cultures.

GP writes: “Prehistorically, the earliest people to settle northern Africa came from the south, the more fertile birthplace of humanity. For thousands of years this region saw the rise and fall of cultures and empires, including the Carthaginians, the Romans, and eventually the spread of Islam originating further east. Despite the constant movement of peoples across the Mediterranean, North Africa maintained a biological connection to groups further south, which is evident in the remnants of old lineage associated with West and Central Africa”.

2. 17% of the modern-day Egyptians’ genetic pool comes from the Southwest Asia & Persian Gulf ancestry region.

Although in its graph, GP Geno 2.0 Next Generation describes this ancestry region as Southwest Asia & Persian Gulf, in its Biogeographical Regions it calls it Arabia. Another ancestry region that appears at this phase is Asia Minor. These two obviously partially replace the previous Geno 2.0’s “Southwest Asian” ancestry region: the other two are: Central Asia and Southern Asia. It’s beyond anyone’s better understanding how GP previously grouped all these vast areas in one ancestry region.

Anyway, these being separated, GP Geno 2.0 Next Generation says that 17% of the modern Egyptians’ genetic pool is made of Arabian genetic blend. GP says that this Arabian component “is associated with the region around the eastern Mediterranean Sea, Red Sea, Persian Gulf, and Caspian Sea… Historically, the region saw continuous movement of groups for tens of millennia. One of the largest was the growth of Islam, centred in modern-day Saudi Arabia.”

It adds: “Today, this ancestral component occurs at highest frequency in people from Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Oman, Yemen, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait, and Iraq.”

3. 4% of the modern-day Egyptians’ genetic pool comes from the Jewish Diaspora ancestry region.

The GP says that, “This component is associated with the exodus of the Jewish group from the Middle East to various regions of Europe.” However, it does not say how they then migrated from Europe to Egypt. There is no suggestion that they migrated directly from Palestine to Egypt, as we know there was a large Jewish presence in Roman and Byzantine Egypt in both Alexandria and Aswan. Of all the components revealed by the GP, this Jewish Diaspora component in the Egyptian genetic makeup – forming 4% of it, more so than the percentage of the Asia Minor, East Africa and Sothern Europe components (which contribute by 3% each) – is the most surprising. Compare with, e.g., the British reference group: the British genetic pool has only 3% of the Jewish component.

4. 3% of the modern-day Egyptians’ genetic pool comes from the Asia Minor ancestry region.

The GP says that, “This component is associated with the border regions that separate southeastern Europe and southwestern Asia around the Mediterranean, Black, and Caspian Seas… Today, this component is found at its highest frequency in people from Turkey, Lebanon, Iraq, and the Caucasus countries.”

This component was probably introduced into Egypt by the Persians, Turks and the Mamelukes (mostly from Turkey and the Caucasus) who ruled Egypt either before Islam or after it, but more after it.

5. 3% of the modern-day Egyptians’ genetic pool comes from Eastern Africa ancestry region.

The GP says that, “This component is associated with the birthplace of modern humans, as well as the departure point of all humankind’s first migrations out of Africa. The region includes the area south of the Sahara Desert, east of the Congo rain forests and Africa’s Great Rift Valley and west of the Indian Ocean… Historically, this region saw an influx of Bantu speakers and the eventual conversion to pastoralists [sheep or cattle farmers], a population well adapted to the wide-open savannas.

Today, the ancestral component occurs at highest frequency in people from Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalis, Uganda, and Tanzania.”

6. 3% of the modern-day Egyptians’ genetic pool comes from Sothern Europe ancestry region.

The GP says, “This component originates along the southern Mediterranean coast… [Ancestors from this region] may have been some of the first farmers to migrate to Europe from the Middle East thousands of years ago. Historically, this region was the home to the vast Roman Empire, which brought with it great infrastructure, cities, and cultural development, but consequently led to homogenisation of its peoples.

Today, this ancestral component is most common in people of Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, and Greek descent, among other Mediterranean groups.”

HOW DOES THE GENOGRAPHIC PROJECT GENO 2.0 NEXT GENERATION EXPLAIN THESE SIX COMONENTS IN THE MODERN EGYPTIAN’S GENETIC POOL?

The GP explains the presence of the genetic components from the above six ancestral regions in the modern Egyptian populations in the following way:

“As ancient populations first migrated from Africa, they passed first through northeast Africa to southwest Asia. The Northern Africa and Arabian components in Egypt are representative of that ancient migratory route, as well as later migrations from the Fertile Crescent back into Africa with the spread of agriculture over the past 10,000 years, and migrations in the seventh century with the spread of Islam from the Arabian Peninsula. The East African component likely reflects localized movement up the navigable Nile River, while the Southern Europe and Asia Minor components reflect the geographic and historical role of Egypt as a historical player in the economic and cultural growth across the Mediterranean region.”

This is inadequate explanation to say the least. But my criticism of the GP’s results on Egypt are more about its research methodology. It failed to account for Egypt’s complex ethnic map; and it shows poor understanding of Egypt’s historical migration history. All these contributed to the inadequate results presented by the GP on Egypt – a result that fails to be representative of any of Egypt’s several ethnicities. But I shall talk about this in a separate article.

References

1. Genographic Project (Wikipedia).
2. A guide to Exploring Your Journey (Genographic Project).
3. FAQ: About the Project (Genographic Project).
4. January 2020 Update (Genographic Project).
5. Your Regional Ancestry: Regions (Geno 2.0)
6. Biogeographical Regions (Geno 2.0 Next Generation).
7. Reference Populations (Geno 2.0 Next Generation).
8. Molly McLaughlin and Molly K. McLaughlin, National Geographic Geno 2.0 (PCMag, 31 December 2018).

______________________________

[1] Definition by the International Society of Genetic Geneaology.

[2] National Geographic Geno 2.0 by Molly McLaughlin in PCMag (31 December 2018).

[3] Pierre A. Zalloua et al, Y-Chromosomal Diversity in Lebanon Is Structured by Recent Historical Events. The American Journal of Human Genetics 82, 873-882, April 2008.

[4] Paul Rincon, Crusaders ‘left genetic legacy’ (BBC News, 27 March 2008).

[5] James Henry Breasted, A History of the Early World (Boston, New York, 2^nd ed. 1944), p. 135.

[6] Ibid, map between pp. 146 and 147.

[7] From Geography.name.