Overview
G2a2b1a62 is a downstream M406 clade whose demographic signature is centered in east-central Europe, particularly along the middle Danube and Carpathian basin. It appears to represent a comparatively late influx of M406 ancestry into this region, likely mediated by late Roman provincial movement, Byzantine contact networks, and subsequent medieval mobility linking the Balkans with the Pannonian plain.
Unlike early G2a farmer lineages that entered central Europe during the Neolithic, G2a2b1a62 belongs to a much younger historical layer. Its expansion mirrors the integration of Balkan- and Mediterranean-derived paternal lines into Slavicized and Latinized populations in Hungary, Romania, Slovakia and neighboring regions.
Geographic distribution
Modern observations place G2a2b1a62 in Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Croatia, Slovakia and, at lower frequencies, in Austria and western Ukraine. The lineage tends to appear in low percentages scattered across multiple groups rather than being concentrated in a single ethnic or linguistic unit, reflecting its incorporation into the common paternal pool of the middle Danube region.
Occasional instances in Germany and Poland likely represent later migrations from the Danube basin.
Ancient DNA
- Late Roman and early medieval cemeteries in the Carpathian basin show paternal profiles that include eastern Mediterranean and Balkan-derived G2a lineages consistent with ancestral G2a2b1a62.
- Genetic analyses of early Slavic and Avar-period burials sometimes reveal minority components best explained by Balkan or Anatolian male-line input, among which M406-derived branches like this one are candidates.
- Medieval individuals from the Hungarian plain and Transylvania show genome-wide evidence of admixture from southeastern Europe, providing a natural context for the establishment of G2a2b1a62.
Phylogeny & subclades
G2a2b1a62 is defined by FT150672 and its FT1506xx mutational cohort. Internally, the branch splits into a small number of regional subclusters roughly corresponding to the central Carpathian basin and its surrounding uplands. Branch lengths indicate relatively recent diversification, with much of the structure likely forming from the 1st millennium CE onward.
This clade sits in the M406 tree as an east-central European offshoot of prior Balkan and Anatolian expansions, complementing more westerly and southerly M406 branches.
- G2a2b1a62* (basal Danubian form)
- G2a2b1a62a (FT150689-linked Carpathian basin cluster)
- G2a2b1a62b (FT150701-linked western Transylvanian and Pannonian microbranch)
Notes & context
G2a2b1a62 is important for illustrating how M406-derived paternal lines did not stop at the Balkans but also penetrated into the Carpathian and Danubian macro-region during the historical period. In ancestry reconstruction, this lineage usually signals deep roots in east-central Europe with an ultimate paternal connection to southeastern European and Anatolian sources rather than to the original Neolithic farmer pulses.
References & external links