Modern day Afghans today mostly speak Indo-European languages of the Indo-Iranian branch, with a significant minority speaking Turkic. Of these speakers of Indo-Iranian languages, almost all tend to speak the Iranian languages of Persian, Pashto, or to a much lesser extent Balochi. Some also speak Indo-Aryan languages like Pashayi and Gawar-Bati. Also worth mentioning are the Nuristani languages, who represent a third very old branch of Indo-Iranian languages together with Iranic (Farsi, Kurdish, Saka, Balochi, Pashto, etc.) and Indo-Aryan (Hindi-Urdu, Punjabi, Bengali, Pashayi, etc.).
All of the mentioned languages were spoken by people who ultimately come from so-called Western Steppe Herders of the Pontic-Caspian Steppe and Forest-Steppe. But also around 15-30% of modern-day Afghan autosomal DNA and around 25-60% of Afghan Y-DNA (frequency varies strongly depending on the region and ethnic group) derives from this ancient population.
In archaeogenetics, the term Western Steppe Herders (WSH) or Western Steppe Pastoralists, is the name given to a distinct ancient population first identified in individuals from the Eneolithic Pontic-Caspian Steppe around the turn of the 5th millennium BC (Haak et al. 2015), which likely formed multiple millennia before in the Mesolithic. WSH ancestry was subsequently detected in several genetically similar or directly related ancient populations of Bronze Age East Europe, including the Sredny Stog, Yamnaya and Corded Ware cultures. Today, it is found in significant levels among European, Caucasian, Central Asian and South Asian populations. This ancestry is often referred to as Yamnaya or Steppe ancestry.
Western Steppe Herders are mainly descended from Neolithic Hunter Gathers of the Pontic-Caspian Steppe, who had old and strong affinities to Hunter Gathers further north in the forested regions of Northeast Europe (EHG), and to Hunter Gathers of the Caucasus (CHG). Still, a minor part of their ancestry likely came from European Farmers in the Balkans and Ukraine, ultimately deriving from Neolithic Anatolia. Among Western Steppe Herders and other Neolithic Steppe people of Central Asia, we see also the first evidence for horse domestication around 3500 BC with bio-anthropological evidence for early horsemanship in the Sredny Stog and Yamnaya cultures (Trautmann et al. 2023, Anthony 2008).
The Y-DNA haplogroups of Western Steppe Herder males are not uniform, with the Yamnaya, Poltavka and Catacomb cultures individuals mainly belonging to R1b-Z2103 with a minority of I2a2, and the Corded Ware males mainly belonging to R1a-M417 and R1b-L51. Both R1a and R1b are likely linked to the EHG-like component in Western Steppe Herders (both R1a and R1b were found in Hunter Gathers of North Russia).
At around 3,000 BC, Western Steppe Herders from the Pontic-Caspian Steppe started to expand deeper into Europe and dialects ancestral to many Indo-European branches like Indo-Iranian, Balto-Slavic, Celto-Italic, Germanic, etc. would thus spread. Western Steppe Herder ancestry from this period is often referred to as Steppe Early and Middle Bronze Age (Steppe EMBA) ancestry.
This migration is linked to the formation of the Corded Ware culture in North Europe, which showed quite a uniform genetic and cultural profile ranging from the Netherlands to the Urals. Owing it its namesake, a typical feature of the Corded Ware culture was the use of cord impressed decoration on their pottery. Their material culture often includes perforated stone battleaxes and single grave burial under a small round barrow or kurgan. It was mainly descended from the Western Steppe Herders of the Eneolithic Steppe, especially on the male side, but during the migrations into the forest-steppe and forest regions of Central-East Europe (Poland, Belarus, West Ukraine), it absorbed Early European Farmer admix from ancient cultures like the Globular Amphora, Funnelbeaker and Cucuteni–Trypillia cultures. During the Bronze Age, Corded Ware people with admixture from these EEF-rich people migrated into Central Russia forming the Fatyanovo culture around 2600 B.C. Fatyanovo represented a subgroup of Corded Ware, which in all aspects was typical for Corded Ware and differed only in terms of uniparental markers because it carried R1a-Z93 unlike other Corded Ware subgroups.
Later at around 2200 BC, the Abashovo culture emerged from the Fatyanovo culture in the Middle Volga region. Here, we can likely also place the formation of the Indo-Iranian branch of Indo-European languages. Before in Fatyanovo and Corded Ware, the ancestors of Indo-Iranians likely spoke dialects very close to late common Proto-Indo-European. Abashevo, despite being a direct descendant of Fatyanovo, shows a remarkable cultural transition from flat graves to kurgans. Metalworking becomes more sophisticated and stone weapons get replaced by metal weapons. Horses become important and play a central role in religion and warfare. Many of the Indo-Iranian horse rituals best preserved in Vedic and Indic traditions have their origin in this period.
In Abashevo, we also see cheekpieces (for early archaic wagons and chariots). We also see a lot of archaeological evidence of intense conflicts and bloody battles during the Abashevo period. So it’s not surprising that settlements often became fortified, something we also see in the later Sintashta culture (famous Arkaim site). Most of the battles in Abashevo likely happened between competing tribes and often had hundreds of tribesmen participating in it (Mednikova et al. 2020), which would be considered huge battles for the Early and Middle Bronze Ages.
This transition and militarization were likely caused by southern steppe influences and by the 4.2 kiloyear event had also brought sharp aridification to the steppes and forest-steppes of East Europe (Aleshinskaya and Spiridonova 2000). This ultimately caused a massive migration and military expansion of (Post)-Abashevo tribes to almost all of the Eurasian Steppes and into Central Asia (Andronovo culture). With its migrations, early Proto-Indo-Iranian dialects/languages would spread. The vector of dispersal of Steppe MLBA ancestry and Indo-Iranian languages in Asia were the Andronovo and Sintashta cultures, which directly descended from the Abashevo culture.
From the Abasehvo culture, the Sintashta culture in the southern Urals and the Andronovo culture in western Siberia and Central Asia would finally emerge (Nordqvist and Heyd 2020). All these ancient Bronze Age cultures from Fatyanovo to Sintashta were dominated by R1a-Z93 and had the same autosomal DNA profile with the exception of some outliers of mainly low social status. This type of WSH ancestry found in these cultures included around 20-30% EEF admixture and is often referred to as Steppe Middle and Late Bronze Age (Steppe MLBA) or Sintashta-related ancestry. This kind of Steppe/WSH ancestry is also most relevant for Afghans, who derive almost all of their Proto-Indo-European and Western Steppe Herder ancestry from Steppe MLBA groups.
The Andronovo culture lasted from around 2000 BC to 900 BC. Together with the closely related highly militarized Sintashta culture, it was responsible for the massive diffusion of chariot technology, horse domestication, and new weapon technologies like socketed spearheads, which revolutionized ancient warfare. With the arrival of Andronovo in Asia, we see the adoption of the chariot in the Near East, China, Egypt, South Asia, and Europe. Andronovo tribes adapted quickly to very different habitats. The Yenisei River Valley in Siberia, the Indian Subcontinent, and the Near East would soon be populated by Andronovo tribes. Indo-Iranians did not have a long-lasting linguistic and genetic impact in all of these regions though, and Andronovo-origin tribes would often represent a small elite or only populate small pockets along river valleys in a wide region.
Steppe ancestry in modern Afghans:
Modern-day Afghans can carry around 15-40% Steppe (more specifically Steppe_MLBA) ancestry with the great majority of Pashtuns, Pashayi, and Tajiks having around 25% of it. Hazara and Balochs tend to have lower Steppe ancestry with around 15-20%. On the other side some populations in Badakshan and around have around 35-40% and in many cases even bit more Steppe ancestry .
Sources
- Saag, Lehti, et al. “Genetic ancestry changes in Stone to Bronze Age transition in the East European plain.” Science advances 7.4 (2021): eabd6535.
- YFull (Februar 2023)
- Aleshinskaya, A. S., and E. A. Spiridonova. “Periodization of the Bronze Age of the forest belt of European Russia (according to palynological data).” Tver archaeological collection. 2001. (In Russian)
- Nordqvist, Kerkko, and Volker Heyd. “The forgotten child of the wider Corded Ware family: Russian Fatyanovo culture in context.” Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society. Vol. 86. Cambridge University Press, 2020.
- Mednikova, Maria, et al. “The reconstruction of a bronze battle axe and comparison of inflicted damage injuries using neutron tomography, manufacturing modeling, and X-ray microtomography data.” Journal of Imaging 6.6 (2020): 45.
- Haak, Wolfgang, et al. “Massive migration from the steppe was a source for Indo-European languages in Europe.” Nature 522.7555 (2015): 207-211.
- Chintalapati, Manjusha, Nick Patterson, and Priya Moorjani. “Reconstructing the spatiotemporal patterns of admixture during the European Holocene using a novel genomic dating method.” bioRxiv (2022): 2022-01.
- Anthony, David W. The horse, the wheel, and language: how Bronze-Age riders from the Eurasian steppes shaped the modern world. Princeton University Press, 2008.
- Trautmann, Martin, et al. “First bioanthropological evidence for Yamnaya horsemanship.” Science Advances 9.9 (2023): eade2451.
Further reading
Genetics
- The formation of Human populations in South and Central Asia
- The phylogenetic and geographic structure of Y-chromosome haplogroup R1a
- The Genomic Formation of South and Central Asia
- (PDF) 137 ancient human genomes from across the Eurasian steppes
- Population genomics of Bronze Age Eurasia
- Genetic ancestry changes in Stone to Bronze Age transition in the East European plain
- When did western steppe herder genetic form? (Blog post)
Archaelogy
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