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Monday, 1 January 2024

Ancient Greek skulls from Attica compared to modern populations

Related posts to read (click to open): 

  1. Ancient Greek ancestry in Greeks and Italians through G25 and qpAdm Analysis
  2. Phenotypes of Turkey according to Carleton S. Coon.

I will keep updating this post based on new information i learn about. I will also add more context and details.

This post will be less scientific than the other ones because the skull studies are old and i didn't compare the actual measurements my self, i'm just basing this on their conclusions. In the future i will gather all the skull measurements and compare them with some algorithm.

Summary:

According to many studies, the skulls of modern Southern Greeks, South Italians, and Greek islanders including Cypriot Greeks, show a striking resemblance to the ancient Southern Greeks. The ancient Greeks were characterized by a variety of phenotypes, which over time "homogenized", resulting in a spectrum of intermediate phenotypes observed in the modern Greek population. 

Ancient Ionians such as the Athenians (Attica) and Mycenaeans from Attica seem to look most similar to Cretans, Aegean islanders and Cypriots because Coon says that the Mediterranid types are most similar to Cretan types while the Dinarid/Dinaric-Mediterranean types which consist of 20% of the Mycenaean skulls from Attica are most similar to Cypriots. This makes sense DNA wise because Greek islanders received less Slavic admix than mainland Greeks.

Basic Whites (East-Mediterranean/Pontid) and Gracile Mediterraneans dominate the ancient Greek series as a whole. Dinaric-Mediterranean, Nordic-Iranian, and Basic White types are nearest to the average metrically, with the small-headed Mediterraneans (Gracile-Med) particularly close in proportions.

Ancient Ionian Greeks not only had phenotypes typical of modern Greeks and South Italians but also shared similarities with other Mediterranean populations, such as the Iberians and the Lebanese. This reflects a broader trend of shared physical characteristics among various groups along the Mediterranean basin.

Chart comparing ancient Greek vs modern population skull results:

Pay attention to the explanations on top to see how the phenotypes formed.

It's important to remember that phenotypes are influenced by more than just genetic mixing; they also evolve over time through selective pressures. This evolution can lead to certain phenotypes becoming more or less common due to factors like sexual preferences and environmental adaptations, even in the absence of genetic mixing.

Extra Sources: 
Compilation of many sources: http://humanphenotypes.net/index-2.html

This chart is showing their Autosomal DNA ancestry for more context.

More info here: Ancient Greek ancestry in Greeks and Italians through G25 and qpAdm Analysis

These are the main phenotypes found in ancient Athens:

According to Coon they had the Cretan types of Mediterranean and Cypriot types of Dinaric-Mediterranid, so the ancient Greek Gracile-Mediterranid and Pontid skulls looked very similar to Cretan Mediterranids and the Dinaric-Mediterranid skulls looked very similar to Cypriot Dinaric-Mediterranids:
"The Greeks of the great period of Athenian civilization were thus the product of much mixture from diverse ethnic sources, as the study of the origin of the Greek language also reveals.

The skeletal record can, in part, supplement the evidence of reconstructed history. Six skulls from Hagias Kosrnas near Athens represent the period of amalgamation of Neolithic Mediterranean, Danubian, and Cycladic elements, between 2500 and 2200 B.C.21 Three are dolichocephalic, one mesocephalic, and two br achy cephalic. The faces of all are narrow, the noses leptorrhine, the orbits high. One may conclude that a Cretan type of Mediterranean and the Cypriote Dinaric form were both present.
 
Forty-one Late Helladic skulls, dated between 1500 and 1200 B.C., and coming likewise from Argolis, may include those of some of the "divine-born" invaders. Among these, one-fifth are brachycephalic, and apparently largely of the Cypriote Dinaric type. Of the long-headed skulls, a large number belongs now to the larger, more heavily marked varieties, and fewer to the smaller Mediterranean. The similarity to the northern types, and especially to the Corded, is even stronger than before. This increase in a non-Minoan direction may perhaps be attributed to the arrival of the ancestors of Homer's heroes."

Source: The Races Of Europe by Stevens Coon Carleton page 144-145 https://archive.org/details/racesofeurope031695mbp/page/144/mode/2up?q=dinaric&view=theater

"The evidence of the racial composition of the Copper Age sailors who reached Italy and the Italian islands is simple and direct. The moderately tall, long-headed, and narrow-nosed Megalithic people who were implanted, during the Late Neolithic, upon the smaller Mediterranean type which had preceded them, were followed, during the Aeneolithic, by others of the same kind, in the company of equally tall brachycephals. The latter resembled the people of the same Dinaric head form in Cyprus, Crete, and the Aegean, and without doubt formed a westward extension of the same movement." 

These phenotypes are also the most common phenotypes in modern Southern Greeks, South Italians and Greek islanders including Cypriot Greeks. 

Colorized with AI

Picture rows: 1) Alpine
2) Mixed Alpine
3) Dinaric-Mediterranean
4) Nordic-Iranian
5) Mediterranean (Gracile-Med)
6) Basic white (Pontid aka robust East Mediterranean)

These modern Greeks were classified by J. Lawrence Angel as belonging to each of the six morphological types of the Ancient Greeks.

More ancient Greek phenotype examples

incomplete

Gracile Mediterranid

Raffaele Palladino


José Saramago

Dinaric-Mediterranid / Litorid:

Christopher Lee
Michelangelo Antonioni 
Adrien Brody


i will add more examples...
 

Main phenotypes of modern Greeks:

Southern Greeks are mostly Mediterranid (Gracile-Med, Pontid(East-Med, Dinaric-Med) and Alpinid
They are more Gracile-Med and Pontid than Dinaric-Med.
They are more Mediterranid than Alpinid.

Cretans are mostly Mediterranid (Gracile-Med, Pontid(East-Med), Dinaric-Med)
Cretans are more Pontid and Dinaric-Med than Gracile-Med

Cypriots are mostly Mediterranid (Dinaric-Med, Gracile-Med)
Cypriots are more Dinaric-Med than Gracile-Med

Pontid is more common in Southern Greece and Crete than Cyprus.

Dinaric-Med is more common in Cyprus than Crete and more common in Crete than Southern Greece.

Alpinid is more common in Southern Greece than Crete and Cyprus.
The important discovery about Crete, however, is the fact that its population is mostly Atlanto-Mediterranean (Robust East Mediterranid version); this race seems to be almost equally important in most of Greece. It has also appeared in the Dinaric area, and in Serbia; we shall see more of it in the eastern Balkans. 
It is inaccurate to say that the modern Greeks are different physically from the ancient Greeks; such a statement is based on an ignorance of the Greek ethnic character. In classical times the Greeks included many kinds of people living in different places, as they do today. If one refers to the inhabitants of Attica during the sixth century, or to the Spartans of Leonidas, then the changes in these localities have probably not been nearly as great as that between the Germans of Tacitus and the living South Germans, to cite but a single example. 

https://archive.org/details/racesofeurope031695mbp/page/604 

The Greeks, in short, are a blend of racial types, of which two are most important; the Atlanto-Mediterranean and the Alpine. Dinaricism here is present, but not all pervading; true Alpines are commoner than complete Binaries. The Nordic element is weak, as it probably has been since the days of Homer. The racial type to which Socrates belonged is today the most important, while the Atlanto-Mediterranean, prominent in Greece since the Bronze Age, is still a major factor. It is my personal reaction to the living Greeks that their continuity with their ancestors of the ancient world is remarkable, rather than the opposite.

https://archive.org/details/racesofeurope031695mbp/page/607 

Videos and pictures of various modern Greeks and other Mediterraneans:


Maniot Greeks (Southern Peloponnese Greeks who have 14% Slavic, while the average Peloponnesian has 25%:
https://youtu.be/R2cPmglt02Y?t=391


Cypriot Greeks from social media: https://imgur.com/a/55tgrYK 
Cypriot Greek interviews: https://imgur.com/a/NxqRI3H 
Cypriot Greek weddings pictures: https://imgur.com/gallery/LojVCNM 
Cypriot Greek wedding: https://youtu.be/DUlJs-1F5nw?t=43 

Video of the Cypriots i posted on imgur + Cypriot folk music:

Thessalian Greeks from social media: https://imgur.com/a/sZTZLLZ 

Peloponnese: to be added...



Iranian phenotypes + Tasnif Iranian music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUGC7Xc4tdk

I will add more

External influences on the phenotype of modern Greeks:

External genetic influences, notably from the Slavs, introduced occasional North Pontid and East Europid phenotypes in Southern Greeks. These phenotypes are similar to Pontid/Aegean Mediterranean/ Robust East Mediteranean but lean towards a Nordid + East Europid appearance. North Pontid phenos are most common in Poland and Belarus. 

The occasional Armenoids found in Cyprus, Crete and South Italy are a bit more frequent than mainland Greece and ancient Greece.

Ancient Greek skulls from various periods:

From attica

From other regions

Basic white is either Pontid (East-Med) or Atlanto-Med, not sure.

Source: https://www.ascsa.edu.gr/uploads/media/hesperia/146687.pdf

About if Cypriots have more Dinarid or Armenoid phenotypes:

According to the paper, Cypriots have mainly Dinarid and not Armenoid phenotypes. I think his version of Dinaric here is actually Dinaric-Mediterranid.

"The living Cypriots are, like their Dinaric forebears, moderately tall, with a mean stature of 169 cm.; they are moderately brachycephalic, with a mean cephalic index of 82.5, and their anthropometric character in general is fully Dinaric. Slightly more than half of the Cypriots have brown eyes, and of the others the majority are greenish-brown. Thirty-five per cent have black hair, most of the others, dark brown. On the basis of available information, it is possible to admit both Greek and Turkish influences in a physical sense, while the major inheritance must be from the Cypriots of the Bronze Age.

The position of the Cypriotes in the modern racial scheme falls into the brachycephalic group of moderate vault size, including Alpines, Armenoids, and Dinarics; the most notable feature is the small face, notable for its narrowness, and the light jaw. It is more like the modern Dinarics than anything else, since it diverges from the Armenian standard in the same way as do modern Albanians. The stature 12 was tall, as with modern Dinarics, and the long bones slender. The brachycephalic people who entered the Anatolian — Eastern Mediterranean region in the latter part of the third millennium B.C. were, therefore, ari early form of Dinaric; as, one suspects, were the so-called "Armenoids" who came into Mesopotamia at the same time. This is our first meeting with the Dinaric race. Its appearance in western Asia seems quite abrupt, but was probably the result of a gradual development, followed by an overflow or evacuation from the seat of its characterization. Where this may have been is still unknown." 

Source:  https://archive.org/details/racesofeurope031695mbp/page/144/mode/2up?q=dinaric&view=theater 

Comment on the "Turkish influences" part: Modern Turks derive approximately 50% of their ancestry from Greek origins. Coon also acknowledges that from the Turks he studied, only 5% of them showed some Mongoloid phenotypical traits that the  Turks are for the most part Gappadocian Mediterraneans Dinaricized through Alpine mixture and not Turkic phenotypically. Modern Anatolian Cappadocian Greeks are also Cappadocian Mediterranean phenotypically, Cypriots and Cappadocians have no Turkic ancestry. Therefore there is no Turkish influence on Cypriot phenotypes.

Phenotypical changes in Attica over time 


IATE HELLADI1C III 


In this period absorption of Nordic-Iranian and Alpine types is complete enough for striking dominance of Mediterraneans and Basic Whites in Attica. Individual Alpines, like 1 Sp (Cat. No. 45) or 16 Ma (Cat. No. 43), Nordic-Iranians like 28AA (Cat. No. 37), or Dinaroids, like 8 Ma (Cat. No. 38) emphasize persistence of Nordic-Iranian and Alpine single traits in basically Mediterranean skulls.103 And the average Mycenaean inhabitant of Attica, with slightly smaller vault and longer and more orthognathous face than the average Mycenaean Greek, shows a definite Dinaroid trend within the limits of dominance by the old pre-Greek racial combination

SUBMYCENAEAN 

Athenians of this date are as varied as the name Pamphyloi implies, though they inhabited a city which a generation or more earlier had resisted siege by the first wave of Dorians.104 The average Submycenaean is close to the average Early Iron Age Greek male. And increase in European Alpine, Dinaric-Mediterranean, and Nordic-Iranian types over their frequencies in Late Helladic III suggests that the amazing Submycenaean type diversity obvious in Plates XLVII to L is a result of the arrival of invaders.105 Except for too definite an Iranian element the new tendencies in Attica approximate the Alpine and Dinaric (-Nordic) combination which present material suggests as typical of the Dorians,106 though such a combination was probably typical of many North or West Greek and Illyrian-speaking peoples at this time. MVediterraneans maintain themselves well in Attica 107 and a minor Basic White element continues. Emigration to Asia Minor or elsewhere might be a factor in racial change at this time, and might tend to reduce variability through selective effect.108

GEOMETRIC 


The average Athenian of this period is similar to the average Early Iron Age Greek male, but with a subtly more Dinaroid total impression. Both Mediterraneans and intermediate individuals are frequent. Subjectively the group appears less heterogeneous than in the Submycenaean period,`9 and blending begins to approach the smooth interlocking of types characteristic of the Classical period. Thus two racial processes were going on in Attica at this time: qualitatively the absorption of Alpines and Dinaroids by the dominantly Mediterranean type leftovers from the full 1\/Iycenaean period (L. H. III) or Early Bronze Age; quantitatively the gradual fusion of the variable types formed and admitted in the short period of invasion, local isolation and piracy which intervened between L. H. III and Classical periods of relative prosperity

CLASSICAL 


This period sees the re-created dominance of Mediterraneans and Basic Whites so combined with the Early Iron Age intruders as to form Mixed Alpines like 11 AA(Cat. No. 105) and to continue the Nordic-Iranian minority generally with one or two Basic White, Mediterranean, or Alpine traits apparent in individuals, as 66 AK (Cat. No. 102). A very probable increase in Athenian stature and body size occurs, perhaps as a result of improved diet and public health conditions. A stature of 5' 5?/4", based on only three individuals (though consonant with that of Greece as a whole at this date), is half way between that of the Early Iron Age and modern Greece and equivalent to that of modern France or North Italy.1"0 The Classical culture climax (like the Mycenaean) follows a period when individuals of both rugged and gracile Mediterranean type, of Alpine, and of Nordic-Iranian type were freshly interacting and were crossing to produce a normally variable, or " homogeneous " blend. Athenian skulls definitely appear more evenly blended than those of the Early Iron Age in spite of addition of large numbers of metics and slaves. Apparently outbreeding and population increase were sufficiently marked to allow considerable absorption of foreigners."' The average Classical Athenian has a lower skull than the average Greek of the period, a broader forehead, a higher face with bigger, less salient, and leptorrhine nose, and bigger jaws. This agrees with the tendency among the males for more Mixed Alpine and Mediterranean-Iranian strains, the former apparent in vault form and in nonsaliency of nose, and the latter in face characters."1' In these very slight differences the classical Athenian approximates more closely the artistic ideal. Athenians now appear to be somewhat closer in average measurements to Anatolian coast Greeks of mostly Hlellenistic date than to contemporary Egyptians, Etruscans, Illyrians, or even Macedonians."3 This may indicate parallel development rather than effects of earlier colonisation. It might mask Aeolian or Ionian additions to Athenian inheritance also. A slight degree of local heterogeneity in Classical times may be illustrated by the few Kouvara skulls listed in Table VII.

HELLENISTIC AND ROMAN  


Certainly the scanty data from Attica suggest less blending of racial elements than in Classical times. Poor dentition as seen in overbites, shallow and projecting chins, crowding and suppression of wisdom teeth may be linked with dietary and cultural factors. The average Athenian now has a slightly smaller and shorter vault than the average contemporary Greek, with big and salient nose.114 Attica is more Dinaric-Alpine than Greece as a whole, but with a Mediterranean minority. Iranian traits occur in both contexts. And the racial change from Classical times may result from absorption of Mediterranean and Eastern Alpine immigrants as well as the more obvious Dinarics and Alpines.1"5 Selective effects of warfare and starvation on a decreasing population as suggested by the infant slaughter shown in Figure 12, must also be a cause of racial change at this time.

IS THERE AN ATHENIAN "TYPE"? 


The second problem also cannot be answered definitely with small samples. Athenian averages in Table VII differ fairly consistently from those of period groups of Greek males "' in the following directions: Athenians tend to be longer-nosed, slightly longer-faced, and slightly bigger-jawed than Greeks as a whole. Possibly Athenians had broader foreheads with lower and relatively broader heads. The probable reality of differences of this nature is reinforced by Athenian excesses of Dinaric-Mediterranean and Alpine types, though allowance must be made for overweighting of the Athenian total series by the Early Iron Age group, with its Alpine-Dinaric type dominance. In any case it is quite clear that there is no clearcut Athenian type. 

How close to reality are the artistic representations of Athenians? Classical sculpture portrays in general a central type with a well-filled, mesocephalic, and perhaps rather low head, with broad and low forehead; a face notable for its standardized, beak-like, high-rooted, and long nose, an orthognathous face, not small in size, intermediate in proportions, with prominent chin, and with a definite suggestion of lateral strength of jowls and cheekbones. The body build is dominantly lateral, " mesomorphic," often with disharmonic elongation of extremities. Classical Athenian skeletal material does not disagree with this, and tends to confirm it, so far as it can. Lack of continuity of nose-forehead profile in the majority of skulls might be changed among the living by fleshy bridging of the nasion depression. But it seems likely that this nasal hallmark of Greek drawing and sculpture is dominantly an exaggerated convention.
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