Pompeii's Mystery Horse Is a Donkey

Softpedia ^ | Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010 | Smaranda Biliuti

[SunkenCiv]

Back in 2004, when academics unearthed skeletons found at a house in the ancient Roman town that was covered in ashes in 79 AD, they thought it belonged to an extinct breed of horse... What happened really was that there seems to have been a mix-up in the lab, which led to horse DNA being combined with donkey DNA, creating an artificial hybrid that actually never existed.

Six years ago, the skeletons of equids having belonged to a rich Roman household in Pompeii were analyzed. There were found in the stables of a probably wealthy politician, and all five of them were very well preserved by the volcanic ash that covered Pompeii and Herculaneum, when Mount Vesuvius erupted. The team then analyzed the mitochondrial DNA sequences (mtDNA) of each of the horses, and found that one of them had a mysterious type of DNA, that was no longer found today, probably an unknown breed of horse, which had disappeared.

Susan Gurney examined the research and found... that the first 177 nucleotides matched existing patterns of donkey, and the next 193 nucleotides matched those of an existing breed of horse... "In addition, the horse DNA that appears to have been inadvertently mixed in with the donkey's genetic information is the same type as that found in another Herculaneum horse, which might be the source of the mistake."

This research could still have its importance, because apparently the DNA of this newly identified donkey finds its closest match with the DNA of domestic donkeys related to the Somali wild ass that lives in Italy today.

This might be evidence that the 'Somali' ass lineage dates back to at least Roman times, whereas in other European countries, asses are often descended from the Nubian lineage.

[SunkenCiv]

most of Pompeii keyword (dumped the irrelevant):

• Herculean task for modern scholars -- More on the Discovered Roman Literature being unearthed.
• Archaeoligists: Iraqi Dam Threatens City
• Viking 'Town' Is Ireland's Equivalent Of Pompeii
• Pompeii Find Shows Secrets Of The Samnites
• Latin Course Stage 6 (Pompeii Slave Girl)
• Move Over, Pompeii
• Etruscan Engineering and Agricultural Achievements: The Ancient City of Spina
• Early volcano victims discovered
• The Pacific's Pompeii
• Pompeii Pottery May Rewrite History
• Pompeii's Burial Not Its First Disaster
• Archaeologists offer tastes of Pompeii
• Archaeologists Unveil Pompeii Treasure
• Villa Buried By Pompeii Eruption Is Unearthed
• Think Pompeii Got Hit Hard? Worse Eruptions Lurk
• Brooklyn College Anthropologist Identifies New Prehistoric Monkey
• Italians Dig Deep to Reveal Forgotten Roman City
• Fossil "Pompeii" of Prehistoric Animals Named U.S. Landmark
• First Pompeii Uncovered (3rd Century BC)
• "Korean Pompeii" Discovered on Jeju Island
• Ground Rises Near Ancient Italian Volcano
• Ancient tannery in Pompeii to undergo restoration this year
• In search of Western civilisation's lost classics
• In search of Western civilisation's lost classics (Herculaneum)
• Beyond Pompeii: Places swallowed by Vesuvius
• Fish Sauce Used to Date Pompeii Eruption [ garum / liquamen]
• Prehistoric Disaster: An Alpine Pompeii from the Stone Age
• Pompeii Family's Final Hours Reconstructed
• ISIS Examines Origins Of Pompeii-Style Artifacts
• Digital images reveal the secrets of Roman painting
• UK to 'unroll' papyrus scrolls buried by Vesuvius [Kentucky prof has non-invasive scanning technique
• Digging deeper: Archaeologists race to show Pompeii daily life
• UQ archaeology digs into the life behind Pompeii [latrines]
• Ancient city of Pompeii added to Google Street View
• Lethal Thermal Impact at Periphery of Pyroclastic Surges: Evidences at Pompeii
• Reading the Writing on Pompeii's Walls
• Walk the Streets of Roman Pompeii On Google Maps/Earth
• Archaeologists find 'mini-Pompeii' [ Norway, 3500 BC ]

[SunkenCiv]

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[freedumb2003]

>>What happened really was that there seems to have been a mix-up in the lab, which led to horse DNA being combined with donkey DNA, creating an artificial hybrid that actually never existed. <<

The result was, of course, the democrat party. It is the perfect combination of donkey brains and horses’ asses.

[JoeProBono]

[GeronL]

So, who at the lab is going to be the mule for this one?

[BenLurkin]

Fortunately a recently uncovered mosaic shows what it looked like before the eruption...

[FlingWingFlyer]

LOL!

[calex59]

The real asses, of course, are the stupid scientists who did the original work.

[Hegemony Cricket]

"This research could still have its importance, because apparently the DNA of this newly identified donkey finds its closest match with the DNA of domestic donkeys related to the Somali wild ass that lives in Italy today."

Hmmm. Sounds like this could be a SWAG - Somali Wild Ass Guess...

[colorado tanker]

Somali wild ass

Not to be confused with the American Wild Ass:

[SunkenCiv]

Somali better figure this out.

[SunkenCiv]

Equid be anybody.

[SunkenCiv]

:’D

[SunkenCiv]