Sahara: Barrier or corridor? Nonmetric cranial traits and biological affinities of North African late holocene populations

Abstract

The Garamantes flourished in southwestern Libya, in the core of the Sahara Desert ~3,000 years ago and largely controlled trans-Saharan trade. Their biological affinities to other North African populations, including the Egyptian, Algerian, Tunisian and Sudanese, roughly contemporary to them, are examined by means of cranial nonmetric traits using the Mean Measure of Divergence and Mahalanobis D(2) distance. The aim is to shed light on the extent to which the Sahara Desert inhibited extensive population movements and gene flow. Our results show that the Garamantes possess distant affinities to their neighbors. This relationship may be due to the Central Sahara forming a barrier among groups, despite the archaeological evidence for extended networks of contact. The role of the Sahara as a barrier is further corroborated by the significant correlation between the Mahalanobis D(2) distance and geographic distance between the Garamantes and the other populations under study. In contrast, no clear pattern was observed when all North African populations were examined, indicating that there was no uniform gene flow in the region.

Three-dimensional cranial shape analyses and gene flow in North Africa during the Middle to Late Holocene

“…The first consists of the Garamantes alone, the second includes the Kerma and Gizeh, the third comprises the Badari and Naqada and, finally, the fourth includes the Carthagenians, Soleb and Alexandrians. The above results are in agreement to those obtained from the recent study based on non-metric cranial traits (Nikita et al, 2012). That study examined the Garamantes, Alexandrians, Gizeh, Kerma, Soleb, Algerians and Carthagenians.…”

“…The above archaeological evidence for extensive contacts between the Garamantes and their neighbors can converge with the results from the analysis of cranial non-metric traits if we accept that population contacts took place mainly through trade networks which involved a subset of male merchants and local traders (Nikita et al, 2012). However, this conclusion also presumes that cranial non-metric traits are an accurate tool for studying population biodistances.…”

“…The populations under study are largely the same as in the nonmetric traits study (Nikita et al, 2012). The nine North African populations analyzed for their biological affinities, including the Garamantes, are given in Table 1, their geographic location is depicted in Fig.…”

“…Recent research using non-metric cranial traits and focusing on the biological affinities of North African Late Holocene populations and the role of the Sahara Desert in the formation of these relationships has shown that the Central Sahara restricted population contacts (Nikita et al, 2012). The focus of that study was the Garamantes, a population that flourished in southwestern Libya, in the core of the Sahara Desert, approximately 3000 years ago and who controlled a significant portion of trans-Saharan trade.…”

Nonmetric cranial trait variation and the origins of the Scythians

“…This study is based on nonmetric cranial traits, which have been widely used as phenetic markers to evaluate the genetic relationships among ancient populations (e.g., Berry & Berry, ; Buikstra, ; Dodo, Doi, & Kondo, ; González Jose, Dahinten, & Hernandez, ; Hanihara et al, ; Lahr, ; Movsesian, ; Movsesian, Bakholdina, & Pezhemsky, ; Nikita, Mattingly, & Lahr, ; Ossenberg, ; Ricaut & Waelkens, ; Stefan & Chapman, ; Stojanowski & Schillaci, ; Sutter & Mertz, ). Indirect evidence suggests that observable variations in skull structure are largely determined by genetic factors and that many cranial traits are highly heritable (Carson, ; Rösing, ; Sjøvold, ;Veleminský & Dobisíková, ).…”