Because the genetics of inherited blood types was rather straightforward, the attempt to classify racial groups by blood types was soon underway. On the basis of the transfusion data collected during World War I, it was soon discovered that Europeans were made up of about 15 percent blood type B and 40 percent blood type A. But these proportions changed the further East into Russia that one went, where blood type B was proportionally higher in soldiers drawn from Russia and Africa, with the proportion peaking to about 50 percent in soldiers from India serving with the British. This led some researchers to conclude that there were two basic or early “bio-chemical racial groups,” A and B, based on blood typing.435
But problems with this method quickly arose. For example, one result showed almost identical blood type frequencies occurring in soldiers from Russia as soldiers from Madagascar! As Sykes quips, was this “genetic evidence for a hitherto unrecorded Russian invasion of Madagascar, or even the reverse, an overwhelming Malagasy colonization of Russia?”436 Other results showed frequencies nearly identical between the English and the Greeks. These types of problems grew so acute that the American physician William Boyd eventually issued a warning to anthropologists to disregard blood types as any reliable indicator of the genetic history of humanity and its different races.437
2. The Basques, Rh Positive and Rh Negative Blood, and the “Problem of Europe”
At this juncture, there was another genetic monkey wrench thrown into the works: the Basques. I have always been fascinated by the Basques, because, being part Basque myself on my mother’s side of the family, their strange relationship to the rest of Europe is somehow part of my own personal ancestry and story. The Basques inhabit the area of the now long-defunct Kingdom of Navarre in the corner of the Bay of Biscay in the area where the modern borders of France and Spain touch.
The problem for anthropology that they pose is twofold, for on the one hand, the Basques are the European continent’s “most influential genetic population,” and on the other, their language, Euskara, “is unique in Europe in that it has no linguistic connection with any other living language.”438 But they also provide Sykes and his research team “with an invaluable clue to the genetic history of the whole of Europe...”439
The clue comes through the different Rh positive and Rh negative blood types. Most people are aware of the severe complications that can occur for a newborn baby born of an Rh positive and an Rh negative pair of parents. “Blue baby syndrome” was a common occurrence of births for European peoples until this distinction was discovered, and Rh negative mothers married to Rh positive husbands were given injections of antigens that neutralized the mother’s immune system reaction to it and hence protected her child from accidental circulations of both kinds of blood in her baby.440
The problem was that while most of the rest of the world was overwhelmingly Rh positive, in Europe alone there was a nearly equal mixture of both Rh positive and Rh negative types. And this “did not make any evolutionary sense.”441
It is at this juncture that the Basques assumed a crucial role in the story, for in 1947 the English physician Arthur Mourant decided to study the problem posed by the Basques more closely. The results were somewhat astonishing, as Sykes explains:It was already known that Basques had by far the lowest frequency of blood group B of all the population groups in Europe. Could they be the ancient reservoir of (Rh) negative as well? In 1947 Mourant arranged to meet with two Basques who were in London attempting to form a provisional government and were keen to support any attempts to prove their genetic uniqueness. Like most Basques, they were supporters of the French Resistance and totally opposed to the fascist Franco regime in Spain. Both men provided blood samples and both were (Rh) negative. Through these contacts, Mourant typed a panel of French and Spanish Basques who turned out, as he had hoped, to have a very high frequency of (Rh) negatives, in fact, the highest in the world. Mourant concluded from this that the Basques were descended from the original inhabitants of Europe, whereas all other Europeans were a mixture of originals and more recent arrivals, which he thought were the first farmers from the Near East.
From that moment, the Basques assumed the status of the population against which all ideas about European genetic prehistory were to be — and to a large extent still are — judged. The fact that they alone of all the west Europeans spoke a language which was unique in Europe, and did not belong to the Indo-European family which embraces all other languages of western Europe, only enhanced their special position.442
In other words, of all the population groups in Europe, the evidence appeared quite strong that the Basques were somehow “original” to the continent, or, better put, the group that had been there the longest and had arrived before the others.
The next step forward came, of course, with the discovery of the double helix structure of DNA itself, and with the technologies associated with genetic sequencing. Here at last was a technique that would allow scientists to stare down the long spiral and peer into the histories of various human groups. By comparing massive amounts of DNA and statistically quantifying certain clusters or sequences in the DNA, geneticists could derive an idea of the “genetic distance” between groups. The farther apart two groups were genetically, the more distant in the past any common ancestry was likely to be.443
Doing so, however, threw yet another monkey wrench into the works, for over and over again, in different racial groups, individuals would appear in one group whose closest genetic relatives were in an entirely different group.444 Genetics, in other words, had blurred the traditional anthropological classifications based on race, and yet was also showing the emergence of distinctive groups within races such as Caucasians. Nonetheless, the concept of “genetic distance” did lead to one very interesting conclusion when all human groups were considered, for it meant that “the whole of the human race was much younger and more closely related than many people thought.”445 In fact, it meant that modern Homo sapiens sapiens has only been around for approximately the last 150,000 years!446
Here we encounter the most significant problem of them all, and Sykes zeros in on it with his customary eloquence, for what was the relationship genetically between modern Homo sapiens sapiens and the earlier precursor species assembled from fossil records by paleontologists?Their names — Homo habilis, Homo erectus, Homo heidelbergensis, Homo neanderthalensis — reflect the to and fro of the attempts to pigeon-hole them into different species. However, these are species defined on the basis of anatomical features preserved in skeletons, particularly the skulls, and not in the biological sense of different, genetically isolated, species who are incapable of breeding with any other. It is an operational classification with no evolutionary consequences. From the shapes of the bones alone there is simply no way of knowing whether humans (I use the term ‘human’ to include everything in the genus Homo) from different parts of the world were capable of successful interbreeding. If they could interbreed, then this opens up the possibility of their exchanging genes and spreading mutations around....
It is this question that lies behind one of the longest-running and most deep-seated controversies in human evolution. Are the different species defined by paleontologists — Homo erectus, Homo neanderthalensis and ourselves, Homo sapiens — all part of the same gene pool or not? Or, to put it another way, are modern humans directly descended from the fossils found in their part of the world, or are many of these the remains of now extinct genetically separate human species?447
Bear in mind that point about the paleontological classification of different species within the genus Homo, for it will become very important later in this chapter.
These paleontological classification schemes emerged, as Sykes has indicated, by careful comparison of fossilized remains, most of which come from Africa. This important point led paleontologists and anthropologists to propose an origin for modern man “out of Africa,” yet the presence of such remains in other parts of the world have led to a long-running debate. O
n the one hand, there are those who propose that modern Homo sapiens sapiens migrated out of Africa some 100,000 years ago. The opposite school, on the other hand, proposed a kind of “regionalism” wherein the species evolved, more or less simultaneously and spontaneously, in different parts of the world for similar reasons.448
But for Sykes, the fossil record, “incomplete and patchy though it is, consistently points to Africa as the ultimate origin of all humans.”449 And if the species paleontologists had classified on the basis of that fossil record were in the evolutionary phylogenetic tree of modern man — that is, if modern man evolved from these other species — then could genetics resolve the debates? Was there, for example, any evidence that Neanderthal man and Cro-Magnon man had any genetic commonality, and thus possibly some deeper common origin?450
Indeed it could.
When mitochondrial DNA from Neanderthal remains were sequenced and compared to that of approximately six thousand modern Europeans, it led to the conclusion that modern man and Neanderthal man could not be related any later than a quarter of a million years ago. Indeed, the sequencing led to the conclusion that not only were modern Europeans not survivors of Neanderthal man, Neanderthal was not an ancestor.451 There was a complete absence of Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA in modern Europeans.452
But that wasn’t the only story that mitochondrial DNA told...
3. Mitochondrial DNA and the Y Chromosome: Mitochondrial “Eve” and Chromosomic “Adam” a. Mitochondrial DNA and the Seven Clans
...that story, the story of “mitochondrial Eve” and her seven European “daughters,” all clan mothers to all Europeans, told quite a story, but to see how, we must know a bit more about genetics.
All genes are inherited from both sets of parents, with but two exceptions: (1) mitochondrial DNA, and (2) the male Y chromosome. Within the mitochondria of every cell of every animal, including humans, there is a small amount of “mitochondrial DNA,” which in the case of humans comprises a mere 16,000 base pairs out of the three billion pairs in human DNA. Surprisingly, this mitochondrial DNA is also coiled in upon itself in a circle.453 What is unique about mitochondrial DNA is that each human receives it only from his or her mother. The reason is that when the male sperm fertilizes an egg, the sperm’s mitochondrial DNA is ejected along with its tail, and only the sperm’s nuclear DNA is paired with the mother’s DNA; the mother’s mitochondrial DNA, however, enters every mitochondrion of the new human being.454 Thus, while both men and women possess the mitochondrial DNA of their mothers, only women pass it on to their offspring.
We may pause here and note that among the ancient Egyptians and Hebrews, lineage was always traced through the mother, a legacy, perhaps, of a scientific culture which preceded them.
But this is only half the story. Mitochondrial DNA also mutates much more quickly than ordinary DNA, and thus, “the ‘molecular clock’ by which we can calculate the passage of time through DNA is ticking much faster” within mitochondrial DNA versus nuclear DNA.455 This allows geneticists to calculate the approximate times or periods when significant divergences within “clans” of mitochrondrial DNA emerged.
But there’s still more...
When European mitochondrial DNA was sequenced and appropriate methods of applied mathematics were developed to determine the relative “clustering” of these results,456 the result was rather astonishing, and here, once again, the Basques enter the story, and again upset the applecart of what had been assumed up to that point. Prior to the development of sequencing techniques and the appropriate mathematical models, it had been assumed that an agricultural explosion in the Middle East had led to a gradual migration of people from that region into Europe, gradually replacing the sparser huntergatherer population that had been assumed to exist in Europe. But Sykes and his team found that only one of the seven “mitochondrial DNA clusters” that they had found fit that description.457
Sykes and his team were not initially convinced to abandon the standard view, until they once again checked with the sequencing results of the Basques. For the standard view to be true, the Basques should have shown up to be a unique group within the rest of Europe. But just exactly the opposite was the case. The Basques turned out to contain representatives from six of the seven European mitochondrial DNA clusters.458 Most Europeans, in other words, came from six clan mothers “indigenous” to Europe, while the seventh group came into the picture at a later point.
b. The Y Chromosome and the “Ten Fathers”
There was another story that was being told by genetic sequencing as well, and that story is locked up in the male Y chromosome. The Y chromosome has, as Sykes quips, but “one purpose in life: to create men.”459 In effect, it is a stunted gene which prevents human embryos from becoming girls.460 It literally programs other genes in human DNA to develop into males and not females. In other words, it is a “special program.”461
Its presence in males meant that a similar technique for tracing the paternal ancestry of men could be developed as for tracing everyone’s ancestry through mitochondrial DNA, with one very significant exception: it could only be done for men because — with a minor exception — it was found only in men.462 The problem with the Y chromosome, however, proved to be its extraordinary stability; they were not only “full of ‘junk’ DNA which had no obvious function,”463 but all over the world the amount of mutations was far below what was expected. Fortunately, however, there were “repeats” in short segments of the Y chromosome that allowed proper genetic fingerprinting of it to be done. When this was done on European and Middle Eastern males, it led to the identification of ten clusters, or, “clan fathers.”464
The bottom line is this: every European human comes from one of seven clan mothers, and every European male comes from one of ten clan fathers.
But there’s more...
4. The Seven Mothers of Europe and Their Clans
The seven mitochondrial DNA clusters identified by Sykes and his team allowed them to determine that all seven had emerged between 45,000 and 10,000 years ago.465 Determining their probable origin and migrations, however, was more difficult. For example, a clan predominant in Scotland now, and which shows origins from approximately 20,000 years ago, could not have originated in Scotland for the very simple reason that it was covered in ice 20,000 years ago.466 Sykes and his team, on the basis of their clustering findings and a process of reasoning, essentially modified the standard model.
a. Ursula’s Clan
“Ursula” was born 45,000 years ago,467 and her clan now constitutes approximately 11 percent of the European population. While spread all over Europe, there are concentrations in western Britain and Scandinavia.468
b. Xenia’s Clan
“Xenia” was born approximately 25,000 years ago,469 and her maternal descendents constitute about six percent of the European population, with three branches dispersed from Eastern Europe all the way into France and Britain.470
c. Helena’s Clan
“Helena’s” clan represents almost 47 percent of the European population, reaching into every corner of the continent.471 The clan is approximately 20,000 years old.472
d. Velda’s Clan
“Velda” lived approximately 16,000 years ago, most likely in northern Spain,473 and only about five percent of Europeans are her descendents. Surprisingly, many of them live in the very northern reaches of Norway and Finland.474
e. Tara’s Clan
One of the most interesting clans is “Tara’s,” who probably lived in the hills of Tuscany in northwestern Italy some 17,000 years ago.475 Her clan constitutes about nine percent of the European population, which is oddly concentrated along the Mediterranean, the western edges of Europe, and, of all places, Ireland.476
f. Katrine’s Clan
Another interesting clan is “Katrine’s,” who according to Sykes lived in the vicinity of modern Venice approximately 15,000 years ago. While only five percent of modern Europeans are her descendents, they remain concentrated
in the Mediterranean but her descendents can be found all over Europe.477
g. Jasmine’s Clan
“Jasmine” was the last and latest clan mother, living after the end of the last Ice Age in a permanent settlement.478 Like “Tara’s” and “Katrine’s” clans, her clan is concentrated in specific areas, having moved through the Iberian peninsula, ultimately ending in western Wales, Cornwall, and western Scotland, while another branch funnels into central Europe. Her clan constitutes about 17 percent of the European population.479
h. The Deeper Ancestry, the Beginnings of a Problem and Some Beginning Speculations
The seven European daughters of Eve pointed, however, to a much deeper ancestry, and it is here that we begin to encounter the themes of previous chapters, including that of ancient genetic engineering, and the problems for the standard views that they pose. The problem arises because Sykes and his team then took the same methods of analysis and reapplied them to the seven European clan mothers themselves, and came to the astonishing conclusion, based on mitochondrial DNA mutations,480 that they in turn had a common ancestor who most likely lived in the Middle East and long before humans settled Europe in significant numbers.481 Sykes comments that it is “through this woman, [that] the whole of Europe is joined to the rest of the world.”482
Genes, Giants, Monsters, and Men: The Surviving Elites of the Cosmic War and Their Hidden Agenda Page 24
