Saw this post about the Genetics of Turks in Turkey, I was wondering if the contents of it were correct in anyway, being from Turkey I am curious myself?

by Akrl3

many of them are Native Anatolian, and in the coastal regions many are just islamised Greeks in places like Thrace, Izmir, etc, Turkic linage is complicated, the reason they call themselves "Turks" has little to do with genetics and more to do with language, and cultural identity. the more east you go in turkey, the more Asian looking people you will find, if you go to the coastal regions in the west you will see many white looking people, remember that Anatolia was inhabited by Native Anatolians including Greeks, and when the Turks moved in those people just adopted the culture, language, religion etc, just because a culture changes, doesn't mean genetics do. This is why many people today will say some Greeks and Turks look alike remember all of Turkeys major cities, were Greek at one point, Izmir, Antalya, Istanbul, etc. Many of the people in these regions did flee, but many stayed and over time just adopted the Turkish identity, which mostly meant adopting Islam I wouldn't say they are "Eourpean" tough, most Turks themselves wouldn't say that or ever want to say that, but it is a Eurasian country with many white people, islamized Greeks, and other Balkan populations, including white Native Anatolians people, such as the Lydians even looking at Ataturk he had blonde hair and blue eyes. You're Italian, think of it like Magna Graecia, many people in southern Italy were Greeks at one point, had Greek culture, etc and were later "Italianized" during the middle ages, but genetically they are still close to Greeks, what makes them "Italian" is language, and culture they adopted.

EvanRWT

Right.

"Turkey" is derived more from the linguistic connection to Turkic languages than through the Turkic people or their origins or genetics.

Much of Anatolia was Greek even before Alexander, going back as far as 500 BC. After the decline of Hellenistic influence, Lydia became a province of Rome, and continued to have a strong Greek influence. During Byzantine rule, many Europeans settled in the area, including Swedes, Rus, Slavic tribes, and orthodox Christians from many parts of Europe. These people also absorbed the Greek culture and language, which remained an important part of society.

It was not until the 11th century that Turkic languages arrived in Turkey via the Oghuz nomads from Mongolia and western China. Their language was not universally adopted until the Ottomans in 1390.

In terms of the Turkish people, the vast majority are the same Europeans who lived there since ancient times. The population of Turkey was about 12 million when the Turkic migrations began, which was huge in comparison to the numbers of the Turkic speaking tribes from the east. As a result, the ancestry of the vast majority of people in modern Turkey remains unchanged from ancient times. The contribution of Turkic tribes to modern Turkish genetics is somewhere between 4.6% - 8.5%, a pretty small number.

If you're interested in Turkish ancestry, here are a couple references to recent genetic studies:

  • Wells RS et al. (2001) The Eurasian heartland: a continental perspective on Y-chromosome diversity. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 98:10244–10249.
  • Underhill PA et al. (2000) Y chromosome sequence variation and the history of human populations. Nat Genet 26:358–361.
  • Cinnioğlu, C et al. (2004). Excavating Y-chromosome haplotype strata in Anatolia. Human Genetics, 114(2), 127–48.