Genetic data from present-day populations ( 11– 13) suggests that North African ancestry has contributions from four main sources: ( i) an autochthonous Maghrebi component related to a back migration to Africa ∼12,000 y ago from Eurasia ( ii) a Middle Eastern component probably associated with the Arab conquest ( iii) a sub-Saharan component derived from trans-Saharan migrations and ( iv) a European component that has been linked to recent historic movements. However, other innovations, such as some pottery traditions and bone and lithic technical customs, could be the result of in situ development from Epipaleolithic communities, indicating a strong continuity in the local population since the Late Pleistocene ( 6– 10).

In fact, some of the Neolithic pottery recorded in North Africa strongly resembles that of European cultures, like the Cardial Early Neolithic (the Mediterranean early farmer culture located in Iberia ref. Archaeological evidence suggests that some of the major innovations associated with the Neolithic, such as farming and pottery production, could have been introduced into northern Morocco through sea voyaging by people from Iberia or the central Mediterranean as early as around 5,400 BCE ( 3, 4). Compared with the extensive genetic work done on Europe and the Near East, the Neolithic transition in North Africa, including the Maghreb, remains largely uncharacterized. Over the last decade, paleogenomics has been instrumental in settling long-disputed archaeological questions ( 1), including those surrounding the Neolithic revolution ( 2). Two models have been proposed: one involving the movement of people the other based on the transmission of ideas. How farming traditions expanded from their birthplace in the Fertile Crescent has been a matter of contention. One of the greatest transitions in human history was the transition from the hunter-gatherer lifestyle to farming. The cultural and genetic similarities between Iberian and North African Neolithic traditions further reinforce the model of an Iberian migration into the Maghreb. Lastly, the southern Iberian Early Neolithic samples share the same genetic composition as the Cardial Mediterranean Neolithic culture that reached Iberia ∼5,500 BCE. Late Neolithic (∼3,000 BCE) Moroccans, in contrast, share an Iberian component, supporting theories of trans-Gibraltar gene flow and indicating that Neolithization of North Africa involved both the movement of ideas and people. Among Eurasian ancient populations, Early Neolithic Moroccans are distantly related to Levantine Natufian hunter-gatherers (∼9,000 BCE) and Pre-Pottery Neolithic farmers (∼6,500 BCE). This scenario is consistent with Early Neolithic traditions in North Africa deriving from Epipaleolithic communities that adopted certain agricultural techniques from neighboring populations. We show that Early Neolithic Moroccans (∼5,000 BCE) are similar to Later Stone Age individuals from the same region and possess an endemic element retained in present-day Maghrebi populations, confirming a long-term genetic continuity in the region. Here, we present an analysis of individuals’ genome sequences from Early and Late Neolithic sites in Morocco and from Early Neolithic individuals from southern Iberia. Archaeological evidence suggests that the Neolithization process may have happened through the adoption of innovations by local Epipaleolithic communities or by demic diffusion from the Eastern Mediterranean shores or Iberia. The extent to which prehistoric migrations of farmers influenced the genetic pool of western North Africans remains unclear.

Rf online skin palmas set