Ancient sheep genomes from Baltic islands
Sheep were domesticated 10-12 thousand years ago (kya) in western Asia. Sheep spread across Europe with the Neolithic expansion and had reached Scandinavia by around 5 kya. At the same time the first wool economies started to become established in the Near East, probably associated with a new type of sheep breeds which later expanded across Europe. Northern European short-tailed sheep are believed to be remnants of the first expansion of meat sheep. Very little is known about the genomics of early sheep in northern Europe with most studies to date focusing on uniparental markers or retrovirus genotypes. In this study we investigate the genomic history of sheep in the Baltic-sea area with a focus on Sweden and Finland. We present five new high quality ancient sheep genomes from two islands, Gotland and Åland, dating from the Late Neoltihic to the late Medieval/early Vasa. We compare these genomes to a large panel of modern breeds from across the world with a focus on northern European breeds. We investigate what happened genetically in Scandinavian sheep from their introduction up until modern times.