Ifri n'Amr Ou Moussa is an archaeological site discovered in 2005, located in the rural commune of Aït Siberne,

Khémisset Province Khémisset is a province in the Morocco, Moroccan economic region of Rabat-Salé-Kénitra. Its population in 2004 is 521,81This town was founded in 1924 on the site of a military outpost on the road from Rabat to Fes now a provincial capital Khemis ...

, in Western Morocco. This site has revealed burials associated with both Moroccan Early Neolithic and Bell Beaker culture.

Genetics

examined the remains of 7 seven individuals buried at Ifri N'Amr Ou Moussa c. 5325-4786 BC. The 2 samples of Y-DNA extracted belonged to the paternal haplogroup E-L19*, while the 5 samples of mtDNA extracted belonged to the maternal haplogroups M1b1*, U6a1b (two samples), U6a7b2 and U6a3. The paternal haplogroup E-L19* is very common in North Africa. The maternal haplogroups are associated with migrations from

Eurasia Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipelag ...

into North Africa during the Upper Paleolithic. They were found to be closely related to Stone Age people buried at Taforalt, Morocco c. 15000 BC. Both the Taforalt and Ifri N'Amr ou Moussa people were found to be related to people of the

Natufian culture The Natufian culture () is a Late Epipaleolithic archaeological culture of the Levant, dating to around 15,000 to 11,500 years ago. The culture was unusual in that it supported a sedentary or semi-sedentary population even before the introduct ...

(c. 9000 BC) and Pre-Pottery Neolithic (c. 6500 BC) of the

Levant The Levant () is an approximate historical geographical term referring to a large area in the Eastern Mediterranean region of Western Asia. In its narrowest sense, which is in use today in archaeology and other cultural contexts, it is ...

, with whom they appeared to share a common origine. Genetic continuity with the Taforalt suggested that the ancestors of the Ifri n'Amr ou Moussa people had adopted a Neolithic lifestyle without substantial migration. Among modern populations, the examined individuals were determined to be most closely related to the Mozabite people. Individuals examined at the Late Neolithic site of

Kelif el Boroud Kehf el Baroud, sometimes mistakenly spelled Kelif el Boroud, is an archaeological site in Morocco. It is located to the south of Rabat, near Dar es Soltan. Genetics examined the remains of 8 individuals buried at Kelif el Boroud c. 3780-3650 BC ...

, Morocco (c. 3000 BC), carried about 50% Early European Farmer (EEF) ancestry, suggesting substantial migration of Cardial Ware people from

Iberia The Iberian Peninsula (), ** * Aragonese language, Aragonese and Occitan language, Occitan: ''Peninsula Iberica'' ** ** * french: Péninsule Ibérique * mwl, Península Eibérica * eu, Iberiar penintsula also known as Iberia, is a pe ...

into North Africa during the Neolithic. People buried at Ifri n'Amr ou Moussa and Kelif el Boroud carried a much lower amount of

sub-Saharan Africa Sub-Saharan Africa is, geographically, the area and regions of the continent of Africa that lies south of the Sahara. These include West Africa, East Africa, Central Africa, and Southern Africa. Geopolitically, in addition to the List of sov ...

n admixture than modern North Africans, suggesting that trans-Saharan migrations occurred after Neolithic times. They carried lower sub-Saharan African admixture than Stone Age people of Taforalt as well. The Ifri n'Amr ou Moussa people were determined to have had

dark skin Dark skin is a type of human skin color that is rich in melanin pigments. People with very dark skin are often referred to as "black people", although this usage can be ambiguous in some countries where it is also used to specifically refer to ...

and dark eye color. The Guanches of the

Canary Islands The Canary Islands (; es, :es:Canarias, Canarias, ), also known informally as the Canaries, are a Spanish Autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community and archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, in Macaronesia. At their closest point to ...

were modeled as a mixture of ancestry from Ifri N'Amr ou Moussa and Kelif el Boroud.

References

Sources

* {{Navbox prehistoric caves 2005 archaeological discoveries Archaeological sites in Morocco 6th-millennium BC establishments

Genetics

See also

References

Sources