ArticleNature communications2024
Patrilineal segmentary systems provide a peaceful explanation for the post-Neolithic Y-chromosome bottleneck.
Article in Nature communications, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers.
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Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed.
- Article
- Contrasting ancestry patterns inferred from Y chromosome and mitochondrial DNA in Nanjing people from southwestern China.Human genetics · 2026Article
- Complex peopling history and expansion events inferred from large-scale modern and ancient Y chromosome sequences.Science advances · 2026Article
- Genomes of the Golden Horde elites and their implications for the rulers of the Mongol Empire.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Multiple southward migrations of Neolithic Chinese farmers into Southeast Asia revealed from large-scale Y-chromosome sequences.Science advances · 2026Article
- Article
- Patrilineages of ethnolinguistically diverse populations reveal multifactorial influences on Chinese paternal population stratification.BMC biology · 2025Article
- Was descent in Neolithic and Bronze Age Europe patrilineal or bilateral?Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Not by Selection Alone: Expanding the Scope of Gene-Culture Coevolution.Evolutionary anthropology · 2025Review
- Genomic diversity and structure of prehistoric alpine individuals from the Tyrolean Iceman's territory.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Measuring the Efficiency of Purging by non-random Mating in Human Populations.Molecular biology and evolution · 2024Article
- Patrilineal segmentary systems provide a peaceful explanation for the post-Neolithic Y-chromosome bottleneck.Nature communications · 2024Article
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5 authors.
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Abstract
Studies have found a pronounced decline in male effective population sizes worldwide around 3000-5000 years ago. This bottleneck was not observed for female effective population sizes, which continued to increase over time. Until now, this remarkable genetic pattern was interpreted as the result of an ancient structuring of human populations into patrilineal groups (gathering closely related males) violently competing with each other. In this scenario, violence is responsible for the repeated extinctions of patrilineal groups, leading to a significant reduction in male effective population size. Here, we propose an alternative hypothesis by modelling a segmentary patrilineal system based on anthropological literature. We show that variance in reproductive success between patrilineal groups, combined with lineal fission (i.e., the splitting of a group into two new groups of patrilineally related individuals), can lead to a substantial reduction in the male effective population size without resorting to the violence hypothesis. Thus, a peaceful explanation involving ancient changes in social structures, linked to global changes in subsistence systems, may be sufficient to explain the reported decline in Y-chromosome diversity.
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