GENETIC-EVIDENCE ON ORIGIN AND DISPERSAL OF HUMAN-POPULATIONS SPEAKING LANGUAGES OF THE NOSTRATIC MACROFAMILY

Contemporary patterns of allele frequencies allow inferences on past e volutionary processes. L. L. Cavalli-Sforza [(1988) Munibe 6, 129-137] and C. Renfrew [(1991) Cambridge Archaeol. J. 1, 3-23] proposed that neolithic farmers from the Near East propagated a group of related anc estral languages, from which three or four linguistic families develop ed. Here we show that genetic variation among Indo-European, Elamo-Dra vidian, and Altaic speakers (grouped by some linguists in the Nostrati c macrofamily) supports this hypothesis, whereas the evidence on Afro- Asiatic speakers is ambiguous. Gene-frequency clines within these ling uistic families suggest that language diffusion was largely associated with population movements rather than with purely cultural transmissi on. Archeological, linguistic, and genetic evidence can be reconciled by envisaging a process of population growth and multidirectional disp ersal from the Near East as the main factor shaping genetic and lingui stic diversity in Eurasia and perhaps in North Africa.