Afontova Gora

Afontova Gora (Russian: Афонтова гора, "Afont Mountain") is a Late Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic Siberian complex of archaeological sites located on the left bank of the Yenisey River near the city of Krasnoyarsk, Russia.

[3] The human fossils discovered at Afontova Gora, a male and a girl dated to 17,000~15,000 years BP, were stored in the Hermitage Museum.

[2] Afontova Gora I is situated on the western bank of the Yenisey River and has yielded the remains from horse, mammoth, reindeer, steppe bison, and large canids.

[9] The fossils of two distinct individuals were discovered in the initial excavations: the upper premolar of an 11-15 year-old child and the left radius, ulna, humerus, phalanx, and frontal bone of an adult.

[11] The remains of hare, pika, cave lion, horse, reindeer, bison, and partridge were discovered at the site.

[15] Afontova Gora 2 belong to the Y-DNA haplogroup Q1a1-F746, an uniparental genetic marker that is infrequently observed in modern populations.

[18] In 2014, more human fossil remains were discovered at Afontova Gora II during salvage excavation before the construction of a new bridge over the Yenesei River.

[22] Researchers analyzing the dental morphology of Afontova Gora 3 concluded that the teeth showed distinct characteristics with most similarities to another fossil (the Listvenka child) from the Altai-Sayan region and were neither western nor eastern.

[23] Afontova Gora 3 and Listvenka showed distinct dental characteristics that were also different from other Siberian fossils, including those from Mal'ta.

[15] When compared to Mal'ta 1, the Afontova Gora 3 lineage apparently contributed more to modern humans and is genetically closer to Native Americans.

[26] The hundreds of millions of copies of this mutated alelle (a single-nucleotide polymorphism) are at the root of the classic European blond hair mutation, as massive population migrations from the Eurasian steppe, by a people who had substantial Ancient North Eurasian ancestry, entered continental Europe.

Tools from Afontova Gora in the Krasnoyarsk Regional Museum
The mandibule, teeth and atlas from Afontova Gora, discovered in 2014. [ 13 ]
Genetic proximity of Afontova Gora with other Ancient North Eurasian populations ( Mal'ta and Yana ), within a principal component analysis of ancient and present-day individuals from worldwide populations. [ 19 ]
One of the five Afontova Gora teeth of individual Afontova Gora 3 (AG3), dated circa 16,090 cal BC. [ 20 ]
The mutation for blond hair is thought to have originated among the Afontova Gora population of the Ancient North Eurasian (ANE) cline of south-central Siberia