Sep 23, 2025 11:33 PM
European colonizers altered the genetic ancestry of Indigenous peoples in southern Africa
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1098908
INTRO: A genomic analysis of over 1,200 people from across South Africa reveals how colonial-era European, Indigenous Khoe-San peoples, and enslaved people contributed to the modern-day gene pool in South Africa. Publishing September 23 in the Cell Press journal The American Journal of Human Genetics, the study found that genes inherited from both colonial Europeans and enslaved people are most common in Cape Town and become less frequent with distance from the colony’s epicenter. The results also show that European ancestors were more likely to be male, whereas Indigenous Khoe-San ancestors were more likely to be female.
“These genetic data show the direct impact of European colonialism on population structure in southern Africa,” says first author Austin Reynolds, human geneticist at UNT Health Fort Worth. “The patterns we found are more similar to what we see in Mexico and South America, where Indigenous communities were variously incorporated into the colonial way of life, compared to the US, where there was less incorporation of Indigenous communities.”
In 1652, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) opened a small trading station in what is now Cape Town, and European colonizers continued to settle in the area for the next 250 years. Between 1652 and 1808, the VOC enslaved around 63,000 people from equatorial Africa, South and South-East Asia, and Madagascar and brought them to the region. The VOC also hired laborers from the local Indigenous Khoe-San communities. Sexual interactions between these groups—which were sometimes violent, the authors note—resulted in communities of people with multiple ancestries.
“We have historical records of the names of men and women that were brought into Cape Town, but we don't always know who survived, or who was allowed to actually reproduce, which is why the genetics is so powerful here,” says senior author Brenna Henn, anthropologist at the University of California, Davis... (MORE - details, no ads)
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1098908
INTRO: A genomic analysis of over 1,200 people from across South Africa reveals how colonial-era European, Indigenous Khoe-San peoples, and enslaved people contributed to the modern-day gene pool in South Africa. Publishing September 23 in the Cell Press journal The American Journal of Human Genetics, the study found that genes inherited from both colonial Europeans and enslaved people are most common in Cape Town and become less frequent with distance from the colony’s epicenter. The results also show that European ancestors were more likely to be male, whereas Indigenous Khoe-San ancestors were more likely to be female.
“These genetic data show the direct impact of European colonialism on population structure in southern Africa,” says first author Austin Reynolds, human geneticist at UNT Health Fort Worth. “The patterns we found are more similar to what we see in Mexico and South America, where Indigenous communities were variously incorporated into the colonial way of life, compared to the US, where there was less incorporation of Indigenous communities.”
In 1652, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) opened a small trading station in what is now Cape Town, and European colonizers continued to settle in the area for the next 250 years. Between 1652 and 1808, the VOC enslaved around 63,000 people from equatorial Africa, South and South-East Asia, and Madagascar and brought them to the region. The VOC also hired laborers from the local Indigenous Khoe-San communities. Sexual interactions between these groups—which were sometimes violent, the authors note—resulted in communities of people with multiple ancestries.
“We have historical records of the names of men and women that were brought into Cape Town, but we don't always know who survived, or who was allowed to actually reproduce, which is why the genetics is so powerful here,” says senior author Brenna Henn, anthropologist at the University of California, Davis... (MORE - details, no ads)