The presence of nuclear families in prehistoric collective burials revisited: The bronze age burial of montanissell cave (Spain) in the light of aDNA

Abstract

Ancient populations have commonly been thought to have lived in small groups where extreme endogamy was the norm. To contribute to this debate, a genetic analysis has been carried out on a collective burial with eight primary inhumations from Montanissell Cave in the Catalan pre-Pyrenees. Radiocarbon dating clearly placed the burial in the Bronze Age, around 3200 BP. The composition of the group-two adults (one male, one female), one young woman, and five children from both sexes-seemed to represent the structure of a typical nuclear family. The genetic evidence proves this assumption to be wrong. In fact, at least five out of the eight mitochondrial haplotypes were different, denying the possibility of a common maternal ancestor for all of them. Nevertheless, 50% of the inhumations shared haplogroup J, so the possibility of a maternal relationship cannot be ruled out. Actually, combining different analyses performed using ancient and living populations, the probability of having four related J individuals in Montanissell Cave would range from 0.9884 to 0.9999. Owing to the particularities of this singular collective burial (small number of bodies placed altogether in a hidden cave, the evidence of non-simultaneous interments, close dating and unusual grave goods), we suggest that it might represent a small group with a patrilocal mating system.

Tracing the Origin of the East-West Population Admixture in the Altai Region (Central Asia)

“…Each PCR reaction consisted of an initial denaturation step (5 min at 94°C) followed by 39 cycles of PCR (50 s at 94°C, 1 min at annealing temperature depending on the region to be amplified, and 1 min at 72°C) and a final extension step of 5 min at 72°C, or of 10 min if the amplified segment was to be cloned. Amplified fragments were then visualized with Ethidium Bromide staining in a 3% agarose gel [23]. To analyse the HVRI, four overlapping fragments were used (Table S1).…”

Bioarchaeology and Kinship: Integrating Theory, Social Relatedness, and Biology in Ancient Family Research

“…Criteria for positively identifying probable nuclear families vary widely between studies; the most effective efforts establish (and sometimes meet) rigorous criteria that yield more nuanced interpretations of social aspects of family organization in the past (e.g., Bentley 2013; Grumbkow et al 2013;Mata-Míguez et al 2014;Meyer et al 2012;Simón et al 2011). Initial excitement about the potential of ancient DNA (aDNA) to directly test hypotheses regarding systems of inheritance, postmarital residence patterns, and kinship systems (Kaestle and Horsburgh 2002;Shinoda and Kanai 1999;Stoneking 1995;Usher et al 2003;Williams et al 2002) have been tempered in recent years.…”

The maternal genetic make-up of the Iberian Peninsula between the Neolithic and the Early Bronze Age

“…From the Iberian Peninsula we used all published mtDNA data [39][40][41][42]44,[46][47][48]50,51,61 , and combined them with our results. The dataset from Cova de Montanissel was only used in haplogroup based tests, due to insufficiently reproduced HVS-I results 101 . We divided the ancient Iberian dataset into the Where the chronology could not be defined precisely, we classified the samples into Neolithic (Neo) and Chalcolithic (CHA) periods.…”