An international genetic study with the participation of Superior Council for Scientific Investigations (CSIC) determined that the horses from which all current domestic horses descend were domesticated in the steppes of the North Caucasus and from there they spread to other regions of Asia and Europe. Results are published in the magazine Nature.
This job is the biggest genetic study Done so far. Researchers from centers like the Milá and Fontanals Institution (IMF) and Institute of Archeology (IAM), from the CSIC, together with scientists from the Museum of Human Evolution (MEH), from the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Extremadura (UEx), among others.
This study puts an end to a long debate about the location and chronology in which the first evidence of the domestication of horses that gave rise to current populations is documented.
“This study ends a long debate on the location and chronology in which the first evidence of domestication of the horses that gave rise to current populations is documented”, according to the researchers, “as well as the questions about when this domestication the process began to spread to other regions of the planet, replacing other types of horses existing at the time”.
To reach this conclusion, a team formed by 114 institutions and 162 researchers specialized in archeology, paleogenetics and linguistics, led by Prof. ludovic orlando, researcher of the CNRS and Principal Investigator of the Project ERC-Pegasus, in conjunction with the France Genomique – Bucéphale project, responsible for funding the research.
The study included the genome sequencing of 273 horse remains that populated various regions of Eurasia in a chronological arc stretching between 50,000 and 200 BC
The study included sequencing the genome of 273 horse remains that populated various regions of Eurasia in a chronological arc that spans between 50,000 and 200 years BC.
All genetic information has been sequenced in the Toulouse Anthropobiology and Genomics Center, and Genoscope, before being compared with the genomes of modern domestic horses.
Thanks to the extensive battery of statistical analyzes carried out, it was found that between 2200 and 2000 BC there was a drastic change in which the existing genetic profile in the Pontic steppes it began to spread beyond its region of origin, replacing in a few centuries all wild horse populations from the Atlantic to Mongolia.
According to Orlando, “it was found that this substitution in the genetic composition of Eurasian populations is associated with significant genomic differences between this new type of horse and horses from the populations that disappeared. On the one hand, this new type of horse from the northern Caucasus steppes had a more docile behavior and, on the other hand, a more robust constitution in the vertebral skeleton”.
The horse of the North Caucasus steppe had a more docile behavior and, on the other hand, a sturdier constitution than the other types of horses.
Researchers have suggested that these characteristics were the trigger for successful selection of these animals, at a time when horseback riding was becoming more widespread in Eurasia.
According to Pablo Librado (CNRS), the first author of this research, this study “showed that the distribution of this new type of horse in Asia coincides with the appearance of light carriages and the spread of Indo-Iranian languages.”
On the contrary, the migration of Indo-European populations from the steppe area to the heart of Europe during the third millennium BC did not have this new type of horse as the vector of its expansion.
“This result demonstrates the importance of also incorporating the genetic history of animals when analyzing the dimension of human migrations and intercultural contacts”, concludes the researcher.
Deposits in the Iberian Peninsula
Among the individuals analyzed, there are horses from various sites in the Iberian Peninsula, among which stand out Turunuelo Houses (Guareña, Badajoz) and frosted pit (Alto Maestrazgo, Castelló).
Fosca pit was excavated by Francesc Gusi and Carmen Pottery. According to Olaria, professor of Prehistory at the UJI and co-author of this study, “Cova Fosca has a very rich Holocene archaeozoological record. We were able to identify traces of horses in ancient Neolithic levels, a very rare taxon to be found in Iberian sites at that time. This uniqueness allowed us to publish years ago together with Jaime Lira Garrido and Juan Luis Arsuaga the first mitochondrial sequences of horses from this place. “
Among the individuals analyzed, there are horses from various sites in the Iberian Peninsula, among which Casas del Turuñuelo and Cova Fosca stand out.
According to Arsuaga, scientific director of MEH, UCM Paleontology professor, director of the UCM-ISCIII Mixed Center and co-author of this study, “in Cova Fosca we found a unique and exclusive Iberian mitochondrial lineage that currently appears in very few horses, all of which are Iberian or of Iberian origin. In this new study we wanted to reveal the genomic secrets of Cova Fosca”.
One of the greatest sacrifices of the ancient Mediterranean
Casas del Turuñuelo is one of the most impressive discoveries of peninsular archeology in recent years.
Its excavations are developed under a project directed from the IAM-CSIC and are being co-led by Esther Rodriguez Gonzalez and sebastino celestino, also researchers from the IAM-CSIC.
“El Turuñuelo is an architectural complex from the middle of the first millennium BC. C. belonging to the Tartessian culture, where do we find the greatest documented catastrophe to this day in a site of Mediterranean protohistory. This enormous sacrifice stands out for the large number of horses that differentiated themselves in the courtyard of this place. For this study we selected Equid 4 ”, says Rodríguez, co-author of the study.
For your part, Celestino comments that “a multidisciplinary team of specialists in human sciences and biosciences was formed around Turuñuelo who are generating a constant exchange of information and ideas, offering a great multidisciplinary approach to the study of this site”.
Orlando and his team discovered that a genomic lineage now extinct and very different from the rest of the ancient and modern Eurasian horse lineages described so far developed in the Iberian Peninsula.
Lira Garrido (UEx / UCM -ISCIII)
Among the project’s research lines Building Tartessus, highlights the genetic study of these slaughtered horses, which is in charge of the Lira Garrido (UEx / Centro Mixto UCM-ISCIII) and who also participated in the study.
“This latest work directed by Professor Orlando also allowed us to delve into the evolutionary history of iberian horses. In a previous study, Orlando and his team discovered that an extinct genomic lineage developed in the Iberian Peninsula, which is very different from the other ancient and modern Eurasian horse lineages described to date”, stresses this researcher.
Lira Garrido adds that “the evolutionary origin of this lineage and the causes that led to its disappearance, we still don’t know. However, we were able to identify in the Neolithic sample from Cova Fosca the oldest evidence of this extinct lineage and that Equidae 4 del Turuñuelo was nevertheless a descendant of this new type of horse that spread so quickly throughout the known world some 4000 years”, he concludes.
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