Análisis de ADN mitocondrial en los restos humanos de la cueva de Santimamiñe (Kortezubi, Bizcaia)
- Cardoso Martín, Sergio
- Valverde, Laura
- Palencia Madrid, Leire
- Martínez de Pancorbo Gómez, Marian
- López Quintana, Juan Carlos
- Guenaga Lizasu, Amagoia
ISSN: 2341-3689
Year of publication: 2011
Issue: 1
Pages: 383-392
Type: Article
More publications in: Kobie .Bizkaiko Arkeologi Indusketak = Excavaciones Arqueológicas en Bizkaia
Abstract
The stratigraphical review of the cave of Santimamiñe carried out in the last years, as well as major advances in the field of Molecular Biology, allowed the analysis of mitochondrial DNA from the anthropological remains recovered from this emblematic site. To date, two dental pieces have been analysed belonging to a jawbone retaining eight mandibular teeth dated by C14 in 3.710 ± 40 BP, in non-calibrated chronology, at the end of the Calcolithic period and the beginning of the Bronze Age. Our results indicate that this individual harbored the mitochondrial linage T2b. This linage has been observed in autochthonous populations from northern Navarre and Pas Valley. Bearing in mind its frequency and its coalescence age in present day populations, it has been proposed that individuals harboring this maternal linage could have participated in the processes of postglacial recolonization of the continent happened after the youngest Dryas, approximately 10.000 years ago. Our results enable us to conclude that linage T2b already existed in the Basque Country in the Calcolithic.