Challenging the long-held beliefs about the skin colour of Europeans, a recent study, published in the preprint bioRxiv database, has revealed that the majority of them had dark skin as recently as 3,000 years ago. The study, led by Guido Barbujani of the University of Ferrara in Italy examined the genomes of 348 individuals who lived between 1,700 and 45,000 years ago which showed that 63 per cent of them had dark skin while eight per cent had pale skin.
The findings suggest that light-skinned individuals became more common in Europe only about 3,000 years ago. Even during the Copper and Iron Ages, approximately 5,000 to 3,000 years ago, half of the analysed individuals still had dark or medium skin colour.
“The shift towards lighter pigmentations turned out to be all but linear in time and place, and slower than expected, with half of the individuals showing dark or intermediate skin colors well into the Copper and Iron ages,” the study highlighted.
Notably, the researchers investigated the pigmentation traits in ancient Europeans by extracting DNA from their bones and teeth.
“We also observed a peak of light eye pigmentation in Mesolithic times, and an accelerated change during the spread of Neolithic farmers over Western Eurasia, although localized processes of gene flow and admixture, or lack thereof, also played a significant role,” the study added.
Previous theories suggested that modern humans arrived in Europe about 45,000 years ago and developed lighter skin to adapt to low sunlight levels. As populations grew and farming became widespread, diets may have provided less vitamin D, making the ability to synthesise it through the skin more advantageous.
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Cheddar Man
However, this is not the first time that such a theory has been posited. As per London’s Natural History Museum and University College London, a man named Cheddar Man who lived 10,0000 years ago had brown hair, blue eyes and dark to black skin. He is believed to have been the first modern Briton.
Based on DNA results, it was revealed that Cheddar Man’s ancestors arrived in Britain via the Middle East after leaving Africa. Notably, the skeleton of Cheddar Man was discovered in 1903 in a cave in south-west England where it had been lying for 10,000 years.
Despite the results by Mr Barbujani’s team, experts warn that they should be treated with caution as there is no way to check whether the predictions based on maiden European populations stand accurate for ancient people.