AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY 132:278–284 (2007) No Signature of Y Chromosomal Resemblance Between Possible Descendants of the Cimbri in Denmark and Northern Italy Anders D. Børglum,1* Cristiano Vernesi,2 Peter K.A. Jensen,3 Bo Madsen,4 Annette Haagerup,1 and Guido Barbujani5 1Institute of Human Genetics, University of Aarhus, Denmark 2Centro di Ecologia Alpina, Viote del Monte Bondone, Trento, Italy 3Department of Clinical Genetics, University Hospital of Aarhus, Denmark 4Museum of Vesthimmerland, Aars, Denmark 5Department of Biology, University of Ferrara, Italy KEY WORDS Cimbri; population genetics; Y chromosome ABSTRACT Two European populations are believed to local population as Cimbri living in Terra dei Cimbri. They be related to the ancient Germanic tribe Cimbri: one living are considered the descendents of the Germanic combat- in Northern Italy, the other living in Jutland, Denmark. ants that fled the battlefield at Vercelli. As the defeated The people called Cimbri are documented in the ancient Cimbri that possibly fled to the mountains of Northern Roman historical record. Arriving from the far north their Italy most likely would have been male (warriors), the movements can be tracked from successive battles with present study investigated the possible Y chromosomal di- the Romans. The Cimbri finally entered Italy from the versity of the two present populations using microsatellite northeast and were defeated at Vercellae (present day Ver- markers and single nucleotide polymorphisms. While Cim- celli) in 101 BC by Gaius Marius and his professional bri from Himmerland resembled their geographical neigh- legions. Classical sources from the first centuries AD bors from Denmark for the Y-chromosome markers, Cim- relate the homeland of the Cimbri to the coasts around the bri from Italy were significantly differentiated both from Elb estuary (northern Germany) or specifically towards Cimbri from Himmerland and from Danes. Therefore, we the north (Himmerland in northern Jutland). In the alpine were not able to show any biological relationship for uni- parts of Veneto, northeast of the historical battlefield, local parentally transmitted markers. Am J Phys Anthropol traditions dating back to late medieval time, identify a 132:278–284, 2007. VC 2006 Wiley-Liss, Inc. The ancient Germanic tribe called Cimbri is documented the mouth of the Rhine to the territory of the Cimbri, a coun- in the Roman historical record. According to Roman sources, try which no Roman had visited before either by land or the Cimbri arrived from Northern Europe, reaching sea, and the Cimbri, Charydes, Semnones and other Ger- the Danube area and the fringes of the expanding Roman manic peoples of that region sent ambassadors and sought Empire. In 115 BC, the Cimbri and their allies defeated my friendship and that of the Roman people’’ (Brunt and consul Carbo’s Roman army at Noreia, situated at what is Moore, 1967). Later sources, including Strabon and a map today the Italian–Austrian border. Their movements can made by Klaudios Ptolemaios of Alexandria (see Fig. 2) also thereafter be tracked from successive battles with the suggest a Northern homeland of the Cimbri, either near Romans (see Fig. 1) until they were finally defeated by the Elb estuary, or on the top of the present Jutland, Den- Gaius Marius on the 29th of July 101 BC at Vercelli in the mark, in the area that might correspond to today’s Him- Po Valley. In Northern Italy, in the mountain area around merland. The landscape of Himmerland—in medieval time the town of Asiago, the local tradition claims that the called ‘‘Himber Syssel’’ (Syssel: Shire or District)—has by a inhabitants called I Cimbri are descendants of Nordic popular etymology been connected to a hypothetical Cimber people (Bonato, 1863). No archaeological evidence has yet Syssel and to Cimbri (Kimbroi) on the Ptolemaeian map. been found to document that current Cimbri are really The phonetic development from H to K is common and descended from the ancient Cimbri. However, that is not well-known in the Nordic language areas during Viking surprising, because it is difficult to discriminate migra- Age and Medieval time (Broholm, 1960). tions and cultural exchange from the ethnological, historical, Although both the written sources and the archaeologi- or archaeological records. However, recent DNA-based cal findings must be evaluated with sound scepticism, the techniques now allow one to test hypotheses on the con- sequences of ancient gene flow, by studying the genes of *Correspondence to: Anders D. Børglum, Institute of Human contemporary individuals. Genetics, The Bartholin Building, Aarhus University, 8000 Aarhus C, According to late Roman sources, the Cimbri came from Denmark. E-mail: [email protected] regions adjoining the North Sea coast, the Elb Estuary (northern Germany), or from other areas farther to the Received 22 March 2006; accepted 9 August 2006 north. On Monumentum Ancyranum in Ankara an inscrip- tion in Greek and in Latin is preserved, ‘‘The Achievements DOI 10.1002/ajpa.20509 of the divine to Augustus.’’ The Cimbri are mentioned as Published online 28 November 2006 in Wiley InterScience follows: ‘‘My fleet sailed through the Ocean eastwards from (www.interscience.wiley.com). VC 2006 WILEY-LISS, INC. ORIGIN OF CIMBRI POPULATION 279 Fig. 1. Theeasternrouteof the Cimbri *116 to 101 BC in rela- tion to Roman (lower shaded area) and Celtic areas (Kaul, 1995). Territories of Thracian and Kelto- thracian Scordisci tribes are indi- cated as are the homelands of the assumed ‘‘Cimbri’’ populations. possibility now exists to test the hypothesis of a biological complementing the information provided by archaeologi- relationship between Italian and Danish populations, cal, linguistic, and historical sources. Examples are in potentially related with the ancient Cimbri. Population Sokal et al. (1996), von Haeseler et al. (1996), and Ca- genetics is revealing aspects of population history that valli-Sforza (1998). In Europe, the analysis of genetic vari- previously proved hard to reconstruct, by integrating and ation has led to identification of the demographic conse- American Journal of Physical Anthropology—DOI 10.1002/ajpa 280 BØRGLUM ET AL. Fig. 2. The northernmost Germanic areas. From the Ptol- emaiean map of the world, cop- ied in Ulm 1482. Redrawn from photo (Broholm, 1960). quences of prehistoric population expansions, and of suc- TABLE 1. Absolute frequencies of SNP haplogroups based cessive population contacts, which often resulted in a on eleven binary markers higher-than-expected level of genetic relatedness between Cimbri/Denmark Cimbri/Italy Denmark populations (Sokal 1991; Sokal et al., 1996). To investigate whether the present Italian ‘‘Cimbri’’ pop- Hg1 0.36 0.54 0.46 ulation and the Danish population of Himmerland have Hg2 0.46 0.08 0.42 Hg3 0.06 0.06 some common ancestors, whom one would be tempted to Hg9 0.06 0.21 identify with the historical Cimbri, we have engaged in a Hg16 0.02 study describing the genetic diversity in the two popula- Hg21 0.06 0.04 tions and comparing them with other European groups. In Hg26 0.13 0.04 particular, we tested the hypothesis that levels of genetic resemblance between the present ‘‘Cimbri’’ communities The name of each haplogroup, Hg, is based on Rosser’s et al. exceed what would be expected between populations sepa- (2000) nomenclature. rated by that geographic distance. Previously, we have reported population comparisons based on sequence varia- been living there for at least two generations, and whose tion of mitochondrial (mt) DNA that did not support any surnames are recognized as typical of the communities. special relationship between the Danish and Italian groups All samples were collected with appropriate ethical ap- (Børglum et al., 2002). However, a maternally-transmitted proval and informed consent. marker such as mtDNA may not be optimal to keep trace of migration phenomena that are closely related with mili- Binary markers tary history (see e.g. Renfrew, 1992; Stumpf and Goldstein, 2001). If the historical Cimbri are indeed common ances- The following 11 binary markers were typed as de- tors to both the Danish and Italian groups, this hypotheti- scribed elsewhere: SRY-1532 originally called SRY10,831 cal relationship might very well be male biased and (Whitfield et al., 1995) was typed according to Kwok et al. mainly—or only—reflected in genetic resemblance at the Y (1996), SRY-8299 originally called SRY4,064 (Whitfield chromosome level. Therefore, the present study reports on et al., 1995) according to Santos et al. (1999), SRY-2627 population comparisons based on analyses of Y chromo- according to Veitia et al. (1997), LLY22g according to somal binary markers and microsatellite loci. Righetti and Tyler-Smith (unpublished), M9 (Underhill et al., 1997) according to Hurles et al. (1998), DYS257 according to Hammer et al. (1998), 92R7 (Mathias et al., SUBJECTS AND METHODS 1994) according to Hurles et al. (1999), Tat according to Subjects Zerjal et al. (1997), YAP according to Hammer and Horai (1995), sY81 according to Seielstad et al. (1994), and 12f2 Sixty-one unrelated males from Denmark were in- according to Rosser et al. (2000). The phylogenetic rela- cluded in the study, all belonging to families who have tionship of the haplogroups defined by these markers has been living in Himmerland for at least four generations, been defined by the Y Chromosome Consortium (2002). and several for more than 10 generations. The families were all well-known by the local genealogical associa- Microsatellite markers tions. In addition, 50 unrelated males from unspecified regions of Jutland were also included. From Italy we Typing of five Y specific microsatellites (DYS19, DYS390, sampled 49 unrelated males from three localities belong- DYS391, DYS392, and DYS393) was carried out as de- ing to the Cimbri communities of Giazza, Luserna, and scribed by Cooper et al. (1996) and De Knijff et al.