Free Republic

From: Bobo Huang Date: Wed, 22 Dec 2004 02:19:50 -0600 To:

Forward Forward Attached Reply Reply To All Move To: Drafts Sent Trash in_box Delete Message

<< Previous Full Headers | Printable View Next >>

This message was sent from: Chinese Culture Forum at Asiawind. ----------------------------------------------------------------

I think all these arguments on (Han) Chinese origin are avoidable. Historical records, including ethnic demographic history, are likely to be some times imprecise and inconclusive. This leads to much controversy and speculations. Paleoanthropology offers some insight and genealogy can contribute. But, as genetics and paleo-genetics can provide more accurate answers, these should be the main focus. This is not to negate others as mentioned. They are still relevant to compliment the genetic analysis. For example, in appearance or morphologically, most of the Brazillians don’t look like the Native American (Indian). Genetic analysis reveals something quite different. The indigenous mitrochrondial DNA (female lineage) contribution to the Brazillian population varies from 11% to 59%. Even in some of the upper echelon of the supposedly more homogenous Whites, it reaches as high as 33%. (Ref.1). A corollary study with DNA from the Y chromosome (male lineage) of Columbian Mestizos pointed to a figure of about 2 %.(Ref 2) This means historically it was mainly the European and to a much smaller extent African males who mated with the indigenous women to produce the current Brazillian population. It strongly indicated that, in consistent with history, large numbers of the indigenous males were enslaved and worked to death/killed. And the excess native women were taken advantage by the predominantly male European immigrants/invaders. It was also possible that the native women preferred male European for survival reasons. This contradicts the current academic apology that depopulation of the natives was the result of diseases or lack of immunity to introduced diseases. Diseases do not discriminate (whether you are male or female).

This aside, there are now enough genetic studies to answer this question about (Han) Chinese origin. Perhaps, if all the Chinese ethnic groups are to be considered, more comprehensive and representative data are needed. However, over the past few years, the Chinese genome project set up by Stanford University and several Chinese Universities (Fudan University, etc.) has done enough research to yield some results. (Ref 3) Basically, genetic studies on Chinese, inclusive of many main ethnic groups, conclude that there are no European/Caucasoid genes in the Han Chinese. It is easier and more definite to disprove substantial Caucasoid genetic component in all Han Chinese. Also if there is any truth that there is Caucasoid origin to Chinese, then significant amount of Caucasoid mitochrondia DNA (female line) and Y chromosomal DNA (male line) has to be present in all the Han Chinese. Even in the Uyghurs, the population only possesses about 25 % identifiable Central Asian (more Turkish, not exactly European) genetic markers.( Ref 3). The rest of their genetic markers are more related to Northern Chinese/East Asian. This demonstrates that it is more plausible to make a case that there were migrations outward from central/north China rather than Central Asian infusion.(Ref 4,5)

In reality, the analysis of the genetic component of the Han and its mainly Asian minorities is more complex. This is because genetically, the Asian minorities (eg Tibetan) are more related to the Han than the Caucasian or other minorities (eg.Kazaks) that have significant amount of Central Asian genes. To track down the more closely related ethnic groups, more samples (larger number of people from each group) and genetic markers have to be analysed to reveal the minor differences. This is simply because it is harder to differentiate individuals who are more alike genetically. Besides, interbreeding over the years further compromised the differences and so complicated the picture. (Ref 4,5)

The following references used for this posting are available from website like www.genetics.org Reasonable knowledge in genetics is required to read and understand them.

Ref 1. Am. J. Hum. Genet., 67:444-461, 2000 The Ancestry of Brazilian mtDNA Lineages Juliana Alves-Silva,1 Magda da Silva Santos,1 Pedro E. M. Guimarães,1 Alessandro C. S. Ferreira,1 Hans-Jürgen Bandelt,2 Sérgio D. J. Pena,1 and Vania Ferreira Prado1 1Departamento de Bioquímica e Imunologia, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte-MG, Brazil; and 2 Fachbereich Mathematik, Universität Hamburg, Hamburg

Ref 2. Strong Amerind/white sex bias and a possible Sephardic contribution among the founders of a population in northwest Colombia. Carvajal-Carmona LG, Soto ID, Pineda N, Ortiz-Barrientos D, Duque C, Ospina-Duque J, McCarthy M, Montoya P, Alvarez VM, Bedoya G, Ruiz-Linares A. Laboratorio de Genetica Molecular, Universidad de Antioquia, Medellin, Colombia.

Ref 3. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA Vol. 95, pp. 11501–11503, September 1998 Commentary The Chinese Human Genome Diversity Project L. Luca Cavalli-Sforza Department of Genetics, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA 94305

Ref 4. Y-Chromosome Evidence for a Northward Migration of Modern Humans into Eastern Asia during the Last Ice Age Bing Su,1 Junhua Xiao,2 Peter Underhill,5 Ranjan Deka,7 Weiling Zhang,2 Joshua Akey,1 Wei Huang,3,4 Di Shen,1 Daru Lu,2 Jingchun Luo,2 Jiayou Chu,8 Jiazhen Tan,2 Peidong Shen,5 Ron Davis,5,6 Luca Cavalli-Sforza,5 Ranajit Chakraborty,1 Momiao Xiong,1 Ruofu Du,9 Peter Oefner,5,6 Zhu Chen,3,4 and Li Jin1,2,3 1Human Genetics Center, University of Texas-Houston, Houston; 2Morgan-Tan International Center for Life Sciences and Institute of Genetics, Fudan University, 3National Human Genome Center at Shanghai, and 4Rui-Jin Hospital, Shanghai Second Medical University, Shanghai; 5Department of Genetics, Stanford University, and 6Stanford DNA Sequencing and Technology Center, Palo Alto; 7Department of Environmental Health, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati; 8Institute of Medical Biology, The Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Kunming, Yunnan, China; and 9Institute of Genetics, The Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing

Ref 5. Genetic Structure of the Chinese Populations 1,2Lin He, 1,2YongYong Shi, 1,2XinZhi Zhao, 1,2Lan Yu, 1,2Ran Tao, 1,2JunXia Tang, 1,2Changshun Zhang, 1,2Bo Gao, 1,2Gang Chen, 1,2GuoYin Feng, 1,2YuJuan La 1Bio-X Life Science Research Center, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, 1954 Hua Shan Road, Shanghai 200030, China, 2Shanghai Research Center of Life Sciences, 320 Yue Yang Road, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China

There is no trace of 'White men' whatsoever in ancient China. Any sculpture showing some features of different people could only be exceptions. Do note that Indian buddhists, who possesseed high nose bridge, had come to China continuously throughout 2300 years.

The territory of Xinjiang, i.e., New Dominion Province, is a disputable area. Sima Qian could be wrong in assuming that Yuezhi people had lived around Dunhuang-Qilian. The mummies were found near Turpan or Urumqi.

In history, true, Ran Min had killed 200,000 Jiehu for their high nose bridge in 3-4th century time frame. Jiehu was merely one branch of the Huns, but the rest of Huns were just like us Chinese. That's why history said Jiehu was sorted out by high nose bridge. High nose bridge was not equal to White men. You had seen Indians, Pakistani, and Afghanistani. They all have high nose bridge, but they are not White men. People in Xinjiang, Afghanistan and Pakistan have relatively darker skin, the same way as Tibetans: Because they live on higher grounds, and because they live next to the desert. Similarly, hairy skin was not equal to White men. I had pasted a picture of the Ainu on my website at http://www.uglychinese.org/japanese.htm Once you see who the Ainu are, you understand what I mean.

I had a discourse on Tanguts, Qiangs [Tibetans], and today's Yi-zu minority. There were extrapolations about them. Epics claimed they pasted red color onto dark face. Should they have high nose bridge, that's because they, either relatives or ancestors of Tibetans, had historically lived in between Chinese and Xinjiang [New Dominion Province].

In the following, I will paste some of my studies

Rong's Possible Link To Qiangic People

Shallow-minded and opportunist Chinese, who never hesitated to be a traitor since the Opium War of 1839-42, had speculated a purported link to non-Mongoloid on basis of incomplete analysis of Linzi DNA on the tomb remains of people living in Shandong Peninsula 2500-3000 years ago. Such racial demeaning approach led to claims that ancient Rong-di people were non-Mongoloid or that ancient Chang-di barbarian & Zhongshan-guo people were non-Mongoloid. A thorough perusal of ancient history only leads to one conclusion, i.e., ancient Rong-di people and their offsprings were ancestors of today's Tibetans. http://mbe.oupjournals.org/cgi/cont...stract/20/2/214 carried an article about the new research paper by Society for Molecular Biology and Evolution, claiming that "The reanalysis of two previously published ancient mtDNA population data sets from Linzi (same province) then indicates that the ancient populations had features in common with the modern populations from south China rather than any specific affinity to the European mtDNA pool". (Prof Wei Chu-Hsien, in China & America, had research into 'bat cave' drawings on Taiwan Island and concluded that ancient Taiwan aboriginals had migrated there from coastal China.)

http://www.uglychinese.org/hun.htm#White-yi

Emperor Fu Jian of Anterior Qin Dynasty (AD 351-394) called the Xianbei rebels 'Bai Lu', namely, "light"-skinned enemies [as commonly perceived]. Historians, including Cai Dongfan, speculated that Xianbei, whose ancestors fled to Manchuria under the Hunnic attack, MIGHT have possessed lighter skin; and a Japanese historian, who compiled China's 25 chronicles into commonly-readable series, had also pointed out that Jinn Dynasty wealthy in northern China liked to buy Xianbei women as concubines for the height. Having interpreted "Huangxu-nu of Xianbei" as "yellow-haired slave of the Xianbei nomads", I would conclude that Xianbei 'Bai Lu' could merely mean white-colored clothing people by adopting Scholar Wang Zhonghan's linkage of ancient Bai-yi [White Yi] subgroup of Dong-yi [Eastern Yi] barbarians to the tribal custom of wearing white-colored clothes. In deed, today's Koreans, i.e., kinsmen of the Tungunzic Dong Hu, still had a tradition of wearing white robe.