Average Indo-European Ancestry in Modern Groups

Most people today have heard about the Indo-European language group. However, what few people realize is that the Indo-European languages were spread by several groups that split off of a Chalcolithic population that archaeologists call the Proto-Indo-Europeans or Western-Steppe Herders. They originated in the Pontic-Caspian Steppe of Eastern Europe. Colloquially, these people are often called “Indo-Europeans“ or simply “Aryans“ and their DNA can be found in many different modern ethnicities around Eurasia (and Eurasian diaspora around the world). This video showcases most of the modern-day ethnic groups that have a significant amount of Indo-European heritage, organized by their estimated average amount of Western Steppe Herder ancestry from least to most. Starting off with the Sardinians at 5.3%, to the Icelandic at 52.9%. In the pictures I included of each group, I tried to find images of people from these regions in their traditional clothing, so I can not only showcase various phenotypes, but parts of their regional culture as well. It should go without saying that most of these groups do not dress like this on a daily basis, and their clothing is usually apart of some festival or event of theirs. All of the photographs I used are from the early 20th century, to the 21st century. I attempted to get some diversity of sex and age as well. Also, I have heard someone say that the WSH estimates in some of the Balkan countries are overinflated. Not sure how accurate this claim is, but I do know that some admixture from other hunter-gatherer and pastoralist groups can be wrongly signaled as WSH/Yamnaya, genetics are tricky. So, proceed with caution in the parts with Albania, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, etc. Music: By Lotus- “Leaf Edge“ Sources: 1. The map as seen at the end of the video, created by Thuletide, which included the sources of; :// et al. Nature, 2016.
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