Early European Farmers

Early European Farmers (EEF)^[a] were a group of the Anatolian Neolithic Farmers (ANF) who brought agriculture to Europe and Northwest Africa. The Anatolian Neolithic Farmers were an ancestral component, first identified in farmers from Anatolia (also known as Asia Minor) in the Neolithic, and outside in Europe and Northwest Africa, they also existed in Iranian Plateau, South Caucasus, Mesopotamia and Levant. Although the spread of agriculture from the Middle East to Europe has long been recognised through archaeology, it is only recent advances in archaeogenetics that have confirmed that this spread was strongly correlated with a migration of these farmers, and was not just a cultural exchange.

The earliest farmers in Anatolia derived most (80–90%) of their ancestry from the region's local hunter-gatherers, with minor Levantine and Caucasus-related ancestry.^[1] The Early European Farmers moved into Europe from Anatolia through Southeast Europe from around 7,000 BC, gradually spread north and westwards, and reached Northwest Africa via the Iberian Peninsula. Genetic studies have confirmed that the later Farmers of Europe generally have also a minor contribution from Western Hunter-Gatherers (WHGs), with significant regional variation. European farmer and hunter-gatherer populations coexisted and traded in some locales, although evidence suggests that the relationship was not always peaceful. Over the course of the next 4,000 years or so, Europe was transformed into agricultural communities, with WHGs being effectively replaced across Europe. During the Chalcolithic and early Bronze Age, people who had Western Steppe Herder (WSH) ancestry moved into Europe and mingled with the EEF population; these WSH, originating from the Yamnaya culture of the Pontic steppe of Eastern Europe, probably spoke Indo-European languages. EEF ancestry is common in modern European and Northwest African populations, with EEF ancestry highest in Southern Europeans, especially Sardinians and Basque people.

A distinct group of the Anatolian Neolithic Farmers spread into the east of Anatolia, and left a considerable genetic legacy in Iranian Plateau, South Caucasus, Levant (during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B) and Mesopotamia. They also have a minor role in the ethnogenesis of WSHs of Yamnaya culture.

The ANF ancestry is found in substantial levels in contemporary European, West Asian and North African populations, and also found in Central and South Asian populations (through Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex and Corded Ware Culture) with lower levels.

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