Transformations marked the DNA of people from Eastern Europe – 12/09/2023 – Reinaldo José Lopes

Imagine a time when the most powerful men in the world were often born not in New York, London or Beijing, but in military villages in modern-day Serbia and Croatia. Well, that was the 3rd century AD, when a succession of Roman emperors (including Diocletian, the greatest persecutor of Christians, and Constantine, who adopted faith in Jesus) came precisely from this region of Eastern Europe.

From our point of view, in fact, it is strange to imagine how deeply “Romanized” this area and the neighboring regions were. Everyone there spoke a popular variant of Latin, for example — proof of this is the existence of the current Romanian language, whose similarity to the word “Roman” is far from casual, of course. Today, however, Romanian is an island surrounded by very different languages ​​on all sides, among which Slavic languages ​​stand out, such as Serbian-Croatian itself (strictly speaking, Serbs and Croats speak dialects of the same language), Bulgarian and the Ukrainian.

Which, of course, leaves a series of mysteries in the air. How did the homeland of Constantine and Diocletian leave Latin aside? And, while the Roman Empire lasted, what exactly was Rome’s impact on the people who lived there?

A new genomic study brings some fascinating and complicated answers to these and other questions. The research, led by Iñigo Olalde, from the University of the Basque Country, Carles Lalueza-Fox, from Pompeu Fabra University (both in Spain), and David Reich, from Harvard University (USA), has just been published in the specialized journal Cell. The trio and their colleagues analyzed the DNA of 136 people who lived in the region between the height of Rome’s power (from the time of Christ’s birth) and the post-Roman period (starting around 550 AD, when the area leaves the control of the Eastern Roman Empire, based in Constantinople – present-day Istanbul).

A basic question that archaeologists and historians always ask themselves is: to what extent do major political changes – such as the conquest of a territory by a large empire, say, or the fall of that empire – end up being reflected in the composition of a population? In the case in question, did the Romans move en masse to Eastern Europe after the conquest, or was it the process by which the local population became culturally Roman that predominated?

Well, ancient DNA shows a number of interesting things. First, Rome’s rule appears not to have brought immigrants from Italy to present-day Serbia and Croatia. But people from present-day Turkey and Syria (also dominated by the Romans) appear to have come to the region in considerable numbers. There is more modest evidence of immigrants from present-day North Africa (another area conquered by the empire) and, interestingly, even from East Africa (from regions such as Ethiopia and Eritrea). Rome therefore genetically “globalized” the region, but not with its own people.

Around the time of Constantine and in the following decades, we see the arrival of a genetic component typical of northern and central Europe, possibly associated with Germanic tribes, such as the Goths, who were warring and also allied with Rome at this time. But this contribution was practically erased after 700 AD, with the arrival of groups speaking Slavic languages, in a migration that included both men and women in similar proportions.

It is estimated that half or more of the genetic heritage of the countries in the region that today speak Slavic languages ​​came from this population movement. And the impulse reached even Greece and its islands, where the genetic contribution of these people appears to have been between 30% and 20%.

It is difficult to imagine such a huge transformation in a world that seemed as powerful and solid as the empire ruled by Constantine. With the distance of centuries, however, what remains is an inescapable fact: “pure” and “eternal” nations are an illusion – in our species, mixtures of genes, languages ​​and cultures always prevail.

LINK PRESENT: Did you like this text? Subscribers can access five free accesses from any link per day. Just click the blue F below.