title: The Greeks in the West: genetic signatures of the Hellenic colonisation in southern Italy and Sicily.
abstract: Greek colonisation of South Italy and Sicily (Magna Graecia) was a defining event in European cultural history, although the demographic processes and genetic impacts involved have not been systematically investigated. Here, we combine high-resolution surveys of the variability at the uni-parentally inherited Y chromosome and mitochondrial DNA in selected samples of putative source and recipient populations with forward-in-time simulations of alternative demographic models to detect signatures of that impact. Using a subset of haplotypes chosen to represent historical sources, we recover a clear signature of Greek ancestry in East Sicily compatible with the settlement from Euboea during the Archaic Period (eighth to fifth century BCE). We inferred moderate sex-bias in the numbers of individuals involved in the colonisation: a few thousand breeding men and a few hundred breeding women were the estimated number of migrants. Last, we demonstrate that studies aimed at quantifying Hellenic genetic flow by the proportion of specific lineages surviving in present-day populations may be misleading.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Biologia, Università di Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
authors.forename: Sergio
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tofanelli
authors.affiliation: Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.|Sezione di Medicina Legale-Istituto di Sanità Pubblica, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Roma, Italia.
authors.forename: Francesca
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Brisighelli
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Biologia Ambientale, Università "La Sapienza", Roma, Italy.|Istituto Italiano di Antropologia, Roma, Italy.
authors.forename: Paolo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Anagnostou
authors.affiliation: Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.|Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics, Oxford, UK.
authors.forename: George B J
authors.initials: GB
authors.lastname: Busby
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento ad Attività Integrata di Laboratori, Anatomia Patologica, Medicina Legale, U.O. Struttura Complessa di Medicina Legale, Università di Modena e Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy.
authors.forename: Gianmarco
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Ferri
authors.affiliation: Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment, University College London, London, UK.
authors.forename: Mark G
authors.initials: MG
authors.lastname: Thomas
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Biologia, Università di Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
authors.forename: Luca
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Taglioli
authors.affiliation: Centre for Population Health Sciences, The University of Edinburgh Medical School, Scotland, UK.
authors.forename: Igor
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Rudan
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Biology, University of Split, School of Medicine, Split, Croatia.
authors.forename: Tatijana
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Zemunik
authors.affiliation: MRC Human Genetics Unit, Institute of Genetics and Molecular Medicine (IGMM), University of Edinburgh, Western General Hospital, Edinburgh, UK.
authors.forename: Caroline
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Hayward
authors.affiliation: MRC Human Genetics Unit, Institute of Genetics and Molecular Medicine (IGMM), University of Edinburgh, Western General Hospital, Edinburgh, UK.
authors.forename: Deborah
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Bolnick
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Fisica e Chimica, Università di Palermo, Palermo, Italy.|Laboratorio di Genetica Molecolare, I.R.C.C.S. Associazione Oasi Maria SS., Troina, Italy.
authors.forename: Valentino
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Romano
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Fisica e Chimica, Università di Palermo, Palermo, Italy.
authors.forename: Francesco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Cali
authors.affiliation: Laboratorio di Antropologia Molecolare, Dipartimento di Scienze Biologiche, Geologiche e Ambientali, Università di Bologna, Bologna, Italy.
authors.forename: Donata
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Luiselli
authors.affiliation: A.D. Trendall Research Centre for Ancient Mediterranean Studies, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.
authors.forename: Gillian B
authors.initials: GB
authors.lastname: Shepherd
authors.affiliation: Sopraintendenza del mare, Palermo, Italy.
authors.forename: Sebastiano
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tusa
authors.affiliation: Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici della Calabria, Reggio Calabria, Italy.
authors.forename: Antonino
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Facella
authors.affiliation: Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.
authors.forename: Cristian
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9348-9084
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Capelli
mesh_terms: D003710:Demography; D005260:Female; D005828:Genetics, Population; D005843:Geography; D006115:Greece; D006239:Haplotypes / Q000235:genetics; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009154:Mutation / Q000235:genetics; D010802:Phylogeny; D012802:Sicily