Caucasus hunter-gatherer

[6][7] Ancestry that is closely related to CHG-Iranian Neolithic farmers is also known from further east, including from the Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex and the Harappan/Indus Valley Civilisation.

The CHG lineage is suggested to have diverged from the ancestor of Western Hunter-Gatherers (WHGs) probably during the Last Glacial Maximum (sometime between 45,000 to 26,000 years ago).

[11] They further separated from the Anatolian hunter-gatherer (AHG) lineage later, suggested to around 25,000 years ago during the late LGM period.

The CHG displayed an additional ANE-like component (c. 10%) than the Neolithic Iranians do, suggesting they may have stood in continuous contact with Eastern Hunter-Gatherers to their North.

al (2024) models CHG as being derived from an Out of Africa population that split into basal Northern Europeans and West Asians.

The WSHs formed the Yamnaya culture and subsequently expanded massively throughout Europe during the Late Neolithic and Early Bronze Age c. 3000—2000 BC.

[21] Their genomes showed that a continued mixture of the Caucasians with Middle Eastern populations took place up to 25,000 years ago, when the coldest period in the last Ice Age started.

[3] Margaryan et al. (2017) analysing South Caucasian ancient mitochondrial DNA found a rapid increase of the population at the end of the Last Glacial Maximum, about 18,000 years ago.

[27] As well as an overwhelming WSH ancestry, Yamnaya also have additional admixture from Anatolian and Levantine farmers, and the Western Hunter-gatherers (WHGs).

CHG left their imprint on modern populations from the Caucasus and also Central and South Asia possibly correlating with the arrival of Indo-Aryan languages.

[35] Collected data from Iron Age individuals dating from 900 to 200 BCE (including the Republican period) group shows a clear ancestry shift from the Copper Age, interpreted by ADMIXTURE as the addition of a Steppe-related ancestry component, and an increase in the Neolithic-Iranian component.