Divergent mtDNA lineages of goats in an Early Neolithic site, far from the initial domestication areas

doi:10.1073/pnas.0602753103

Divergent mtDNA lineages of goats in an Early Neolithic site, far from the initial domestication areas

*Laboratoire d’Écologie Alpine, Génomique des Populations et Biodiversité, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique Unité Mixte de Recherche 5553, Université Joseph Fourier, B.P. 53 F-38041 Grenoble Cedex 09, France;
^†Centre de Génétique Moléculaire et Cellulaire, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique Unité Mixte de Recherche 5534, Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1, Bâtiment G. Mendel, 16 Rue Raphael Dubois, 69622 Villeurbanne Cedex, France;
^‡Laboratoire d’Anthropologie des Populations du Passé, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique Unité Mixte de Recherche 5199-PACEA, Université Bordeaux 1, Bâtiment B8, Avenue des Facultés, 33405 Talence Cedex, France;
^¶Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Unité Mixte de Recherche 5197/Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, “Archéozoologie, Histoire des Sociétés Humaines et des Peuplements Animaux,” Département d’Écologie et Gestion de la Biodiversité, CP 56, 57 Rue Cuvier, 75231 Paris Cedex 05, France;
^‖Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée–Jean Pouilloux, Archéorient, 7 Rue Raullin F-69007 Lyon, France; and
**National Science Foundation–Arizona Accelerator Mass Spectrometry Facility, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721

Edited by Ofer Bar-Yosef, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, and approved August 23, 2006 (received for review April 4, 2006)

Abstract

Goats were among the first farm animals domesticated, ≈10,500 years ago, contributing to the rise of the “Neolithic revolution.” Previous genetic studies have revealed that contemporary domestic goats (Capra hircus) show far weaker intercontinental population structuring than other livestock species, suggesting that goats have been transported more extensively. However, the timing of these extensive movements in goats remains unknown. To address this question, we analyzed mtDNA sequences from 19 ancient goat bones (7,300–6,900 years old) from one of the earliest Neolithic sites in southwestern Europe. Phylogenetic analysis revealed that two highly divergent goat lineages coexisted in each of the two Early Neolithic layers of this site. This finding indicates that high mtDNA diversity was already present >7,000 years ago in European goats, far from their areas of initial domestication in the Near East. These results argue for substantial gene flow among goat populations dating back to the early neolithisation of Europe and for a dual domestication scenario in the Near East, with two independent but essentially contemporary origins (of both A and C domestic lineages) and several more remote and/or later origins.

Footnotes

^‡‡To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: pierre.taberlet{at}ujf-grenoble.fr
Author contributions: H.F., S.H., J.-D.V., C.H., G.L., and P.T. designed research; H.F., S.H., D.H., G.H., C.M., C.H., and P.T. performed research; H.F., S.H., J.-D.V., C.H., G.L., and P.T. analyzed data; and H.F., S.H., J.-D.V., D.H., C.H., G.L., and P.T. wrote the paper.
↵ ^§Present address: Paléogénétigue et Evolution Moléculaire, Laboratoire de Biologie Moléculaire de la Cellule, Unité Mixte de Recherche 5161, École Normale Supérieure de Lyon, 46 Allée d’Italie, 69364 Lyon Cedex 07, France.
↵ ^††Present address: Division of Biological Sciences, University of Montana, Missoula, MT 59812.
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
This article is a PNAS direct submission.
Data deposition: The sequences reported in this paper have been deposited in the GenBank database (accession nos. DQ847506–DQ847511).
Abbreviations:

AMS,

accelerator mass spectrometry;

cal. B.P.,

calibrated radiocarbon date B.P.;

ya,

years ago.