Comments on migrations over Caucasus
Ancient DNA permitted to uncover migrations over Caucasus in deep past. Some were expected and some unexpected. Despite this we still know very little about more recent migrations.
The small number of data we have give us the possibility to predict two younger migrations.
The first one is the rise of Koban culture in North Caucasus which apparently was triggered by influences from south western regions of Caucasus around 1400+1200BCE.. More specifically the Colchian archaeological culture in Western Georgia. Scholars were suspecting this for long time and there were proposals to unite Koban and Colchian cultures. However a migration from south do not mean that all Koban culture was exclusively southern. It had a population of local origin also. Thus in most likelihood it was multiethnic, while the southern component seems to be Kartvelian. Later at 600BCE Scythians conquered Koban culture and Iranian Alans started to form there. Scythians also crossed Caucasus. But till now we don't have any ancient sample from South Caucasus that can be linked securely to Scythians.
The second possible migration over Caucasus started from more southern regions. Apparently from historic Armenia. Based on data from east Georgia it started in Late Antiquity at 1-4 century AD and was associated with the increase of Anatolian ancestry. Now we have ancient DNA from so called Alan period in North Caucasus and quite surprisingly they have Y DNA that in most likelihood originated in historic Armenia. [[ Read the update: For instance the J2-Z6065>P81. We can't fully rule out it's old presence but the current data do not give evidence of that. ]] Also two cases of L584. From Damgaard 2018 one medieval sample from North Caucasus Saltovo Mayaki was quite Near Eastern shifted.. At this stage we don't know what caused this migration and what was the ethnic composition of those migrants. But the few data from north Caucasian Early Medieval period suggests that the migration didn't stopped in East Georgia and continued further north also.
Links in the comments.
An important update about the J2-P81
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