DNA Consultants Home of the DNA Fingerprint

In what a December 22 report in RawStory describes as possibly "the most important archeological discovery in recent times," the ruins of a stone city believed to be at least 1,100 years old have come to light in the mountains of North Georgia. Interest in the Kenimer Mound, a large, five-sided pyramid in the foothills of Georgia's tallest mountain, Brasstown Bald, near Blairsville in the Chattahoochee National Forest go back to a 1999 University of Georgia dig led by archeologist Mark Williams.

At least 154 stone masonry walls for agricultural terraces were exposed, plus evidence of a sophisticated irrigation system, prompting Richard Thornton to speculate that the site corresponds to Yupaha, a town explorer Hernando de Soto searched for unsuccessfully in 1540. Thornton relates the site to other Maya-like ruins in the Southeast and believes the people who build it were the Itza Maya, a word that carried over into the Cherokee language of the region.

Traditional oral histories such as those recorded by Constantine Rafinesque have always traced the origins of the Natchez and other pre-Muskoghean Native Americans in the Southeastern U.S. to Mexico. Rafinesque thus distinguishes between the Itzcans (or Aztec) and the Oguzhians (Algonquians).

The site is called Archaeological zone 9UN367 at Track Rock Gap and is a half mile (800 m) square and rises 700 feet (213 m) in elevation up a steep mountainside.

Photo above:  Blue Rock, a scene nearby.

Recent genetic studies have tended to throw cold water on the size and decimation of American Indian populations on European contact after 1492. A new study shows the falsehood of this thinking, and perhaps we are back to using the word "conquest" instead of the euphemistic term "contact." The conqueror of the Americas was not Europeans, though, but the diseases they unleashed on Indians.

According to Science magazine, "a study published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences pushes the pendulum back toward dramatic population declines. Using both modern and ancient mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) from Native Americans, an international team concludes that about 500 years ago, the number of reproductively active Native American women quickly plunged by half, indicating a 'widespread and severe' contraction in population size."

The study summarized is:  Brendan O'Fallon and Lars Fehren-Schmitz, "Native Americans Experienced a Strong Population Bottleneck Coincident with European Contact," Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (Dec. 5, 2011);  doi:  10.1073/pnas.1112563108.

Critics of the study say that the conclusions may be illusory since we do not have a lot of ancient Native American DNA. But we will never have a lot of Native American DNA. That objection seems lame, and we applaud the new study as at least a step in the right direction of rectifying the true story of the Americas and escaping the apologist blinkers of colonial "Smithsonian-styled" methodologies and mindsets.

 

Geneticists seized the opportunity provided by an international Basque cultural event held in Idaho in 2010 to sample volunteers and study Basque DNA. The result was two studies, including "The Y-STR Genetic Diversity of an Idaho Basque population, published in Human Biology.

It was the first DNA study to document the spread of the Basque male chromosome overseas. The Basque people were renowned seafarers.

"The idea is to better understand health risks for Basque people, including an increased incidence of both Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases," said Josu Zubizarreta, a Boise State graduate who conducted research with the lead author, Greg Hampikian.

Mitochondrial DNA, which reflects a deeper history, was also studied.

Basques are credited with the invention of the rudder. They provided the crew and navigators for Magellan. Basque names are common on antique maps. The Bay of Biscayne is named for them, and many harbors, points and landfalls on the Atlantic Coast of North America are thought to come from the Basque language, which is known as an isolate and is unrelated to other European languages.

Sculpture of Basque sailor, Victorio Macho, Toledo. Travelpod.

Citation
Zubizarreta, Josu; Davis, Michael C.; and Hampikian, Greg (2011) "The Y-STR genetic diversity of an Idaho Basque population, with comparison to European Basques and US Caucasians," Human Biology: Vol. 83: Iss. 6, Article 2.
Available at: http://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/humbiol/vol83/iss6/2