Talk:Tarim mummies/Archive 1

Archive 1

Cultural Exchange

And what kind of writing system do you suppose ancient nomads had? As far as I know, nomads typically don't have a written language system. And if any of the nomadic people located between the Caspian Sea and Xinjiang did not have a writing system pre-1000 BC, then I seriously doubt these Caucasians in the Tarim Basin did and most likely they didn't care for them. 216.2.193.1 (talk) 16:15, 9 June 2005 (UTC)

Here we go again, "white" aryans invade bringing civilisation bla, bla, bla. News Headlines "Indian Marries White Girl Produces Blond, or is it Brown or Mousey Haired offspring. However, children are found to be Europoid, or is it Caucasoid, Oh no they're Finnish." 213.48.46.141 (talk) 17:30, 10 June 2005 (UTC)

It really goes both ways. Japan created the earliest polished stone tools in the world, by 30.000 BCE, and the earliest pottery by 10.000 BCE (see Japanese Paleolithic). China was ahead of the west by millenia in many technologies, which were later transmitted to the West (shipping as in Junk (sailing), paper making, gunpowder etc...). The domestication of the dog probably originated in China, as revealed by genetic analysis. And charriot and bronze-making were probably western invention somehow transmitted to China, in which these Tarim mummies are probably the missing link. PHG 21:59, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The stuff about the supposed fair-haired people having no real language and just making nonsense sounds, then "trading" by leaving or picking up stuff on riverbanks, thats completely typical of ancient arrogants. Lots of ancient people thought any language they didn't understand, even the people who spoke it couldn't understand it! Like the Greeks thought Greek was the only real language and anyone who didn't speak it just went "bar bar bar" like a retarded dog, and that's where the word "barbarian" comes from. 75.40.139.244 (talk) 17:14, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

So, what's up! The WW2 is gone for decades. Stop screaming aryan, nazi and stuff! Get real and handle the truth. However, white europeans will be extint in 200 hundred years... It's incredible how people always atack Europe and no European has the gutts to defend Her (Europa and her daughters). Have a good new year! 89.181.3.169 (talk) 17:36, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Where is the evidence

Looking at the mummies they could be Turkman,Pakistani, Iranian or Indians (not all Indians look like Gandi).What does the word europoid mean, are they slavs, finns. I`ve read Mallory's book and he only describes one as blond, then later describes it as brunnete. He also, in my opinion, uses the words Europoid, caucasoid and caucasian as meaning the same, or is he sitting on the fench. What evidence is there that there are Indo-European (2500 years is along time, are White/Black Ammerican descended from the Apache, they have both been found in the same area in the last 2500 years). I think the Beauty of Kroran looks like by mum (yes she looks that bad), David looks like my dad (but fater). Oh yes, Im not white, I'm light reddish brown caucasoid, except when I ended up in A&E,the doctors said I looked very pale, something to the lack of blood to the skin, thankfully I got my color (US spelling) back. Ur david looks very pale to me, lost some blood over the past 4000 years I expect, you'd expect he would be darker considering the time he has spent in the sun, must have got bleached by the sand blasting. Quick, hide the pictures its the Police. 172.202.13.238 (talk) 15:50, 12 June 2005 (UTC)

Just to be factual, Mallory mentions several blond-haired mummies (p176-205). For example, "Baby blue", who was located nearby "Ur David" is said to be blond or light brown. I happen to have seen this baby-mummy in Tokyo last week (momentarily displayed at Silk Road exhibition at the Tokyo Edogawa Museum), and the hair is indeed plain yellow. Hair is remarkably stable in time and is considered an excellent marker for ancient forensic analysis. Together with the Tocharian languages, Chinese historical reports etc... that's quite a web of evidence which few people doubt today. PHG 22:17, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Except the Mummies were preserved in salt, or at least salty ground, which may have had a bleaching effect on the hair. Hair is not remarkably stable really. Tocharian is classed as related to Celtic on the basis of how they said "hundred". Birds and bats have wings. That does not make them related. There is evidence these Mummies are Europiod, but not European. Lao Wai 30 June 2005 17:53 (UTC)

I have edited the salt nonsense comment probably from Lao Wai in the article, about the hair color bleached by salt, first today most of the hairs of these mummies have analyzed by the pharmaceutic group like L'Oreal (they take the roots of the hairs)so we can't do mistakes about their hairs colors; also that have been proven these Tarim mummies have been very well buried (unlike "the Iranian salt mummies")under bricks and have been put in shroud according the Discovery documentary:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tr5Kq56heIs — Preceding unsigned comment added by Snwobird (talk • contribs) 23:45, 2 December 2014 (UTC) Snwobird (talk) 23:48, 2 December 2014 (UTC)

All else aside, the status of Tocharian as an Indo-European language is not in any credible dispute. The lexical and grammatical relationship there is quite clear—more solid, perhaps, than Albanian.

Whether this is material to the question of the ethnic identity of the Tarim mummies or not, I just wanted to clear up the facts regarding Tocharian (which from my interpretation of Lao Wai's comment, appear to have been questioned). —Ryanaxp 16:28, August 31, 2005 (UTC)

Why does one assume that the presence of "europeans?" gave civilisation to whoever, they could have just been economic migrants; the largest civilisation in ancient times just happened to be over the mountains eg the indus valley ,and don't forget the BMAC. Does one assume that the chinese, africans, south asian in britain/america gave english to the local population, if 4000 years from now we found negroid skulls in London. The age of these skulls would coincide with a massive production of english writing ,massive industrial and economic growth. It is also possible the the middle east had more `blondes` than it does now, since the arab invasion probably affected local appearance. Why do we assume all blondes came from europe. The Irish and Basques are paleolithic europeans, yet most have dark hair.

Here is a picture of a kalash girl who live Pakistan [1]. The Kalash are unique in that the male genes are no different from other pakistanis,but they female dna consists almost completly of haplogroup J. J originates from the middle east and is wide spread in europe (supposed have spread with farming). 172.214.219.86 (talk) 03:16, 14 June 2005 (UTC)

Just as a side note, the Kalash usually claim themselves to be descendants of Alexander the Great in the East.PHG 22:47, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Yeah,and the Pastun think they are one of the lost tribes of Israel;and I`m from Mars .[2].We all like to associate with the last great tribe eg english with anglo-saxons,welsh with celts,europeans with aryans and any other historical figures. 213.48.46.141 (talk) 16:40, 23 June 2005 (UTC)

The presence of Jewish people in Central Asia from the 1st millenium BCE is actually quite documented, and is usually associated with Persian expansion. The connection of the Kalash to Alexander the Great settlers is also quite generally supported. As for your affiliation to Mars, well, if you say so... PHG 22:12, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Indeed, there's evidence that several ethnic/cultural groups who believe themselves to be descended from the "lost" tribes of Israel are, despite significant phenotype drift since the end of the "Kingdom" period of Jewish history, in fact closely genetically related to other known descendants of the ancient Hebrews. I'm not familiar with the Pashtun evidence, but the DNA evidence linking the Lemba of southern Africa to a Judaean origin is fairly solid, and even meets the "unlikely to be mere coincidence" standard, particularly when considered with the Lemba oral history of their migration south, and their apparently Torah-based customs. While I'm here, the Welsh probably don't speak Gaelic by accident; and there was never any great civilization of "white people" called (by themselves or others) the Aryans, that's just a white-supremacist fantasy. Those Martian microbes are looking pretty smart by comparison... 75.40.139.244 (talk) 17:14, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

European Genes are a subset of those found in Central Asia and Middle East, hence the first blondes would have originated from these areas with positve selection in europe increasing the frequency of blonds. 172.213.57.240 (talk) 02:23, 18 June 2005 (UTC)

--The presence of certain Europid features in modern Middle Eastern and Central Asian populations is due to the fact that at numerous points in history, Europids populated those regions, thus genetic assimilation occurred at various times during invasions and migrations. European genes are not a subset of any modern ME/CA peoples, as it is actually the other way around. 69.251.123.168 (talk) 03:24, 20 June 2005 (UTC)

Europeans are a subset of west/central asian and ME see Indo-aryan invasion theory for refs.Yes there has been recent european contribution eg Romans,slavs ,female slave trade,but that can not be said to apply to these mummies unless we have more evidence. 213.48.46.141 (talk) 13:08, 22 June 2005 (UTC)

It is no surprise that in a province next to Afghanistan and Pakistan you find people who look like Afghans and Pakistanis. There is a distinction between people who are Europoid, as these Mummies are, and European. Who cares what contributions Europeans have made to the gene pool of central asia? Lao Wai 30 June 2005 17:53 (UTC)

"neolithic clothing techniques." This is news to me,should it not be Iron age clothing.I don't think clothing from the european neolithic has survived,I could be wrong.

I hope they publish the genetics tests on these mummies soon. I'll be a monkey's uncle and eat my hat (pointed or otherwise) if they find Haplogroup I or AMH. (Just in case, where's that alka seltzer) 172.213.57.240 (talk) 02:34, 18 June 2005 (UTC)

Two of the last three images are of the same female. 213.48.46.141 (talk) 16:22, 23 June 2005 (UTC)

Most of these images date from 1000bce-500bce(Mallory). 213.48.46.141 (talk) 15:12, 28 June 2005 (UTC)

They could be finns (Or from Bengal)

I've read a number of papers on the genetics of the Uralic finnish groups.They suggest that these groups originate from the Volga basin and spread after the end of the last Ice Age. However this is the same area from where some have argued that the Indo-European languages originate (Kurgan).Hence could these mummies be Finno-Uralic not Indo-European and pre-kurgans are originally FU (Finno-Uralic) not IE. There has always been the problem of find steppe culture as far south into bactria and India (the Indo-Iranian problem); Mallory books states that not only are these Proto-europids present in the tarim but so are Indo-afghan types dated 1800bce. Could these Indo-Afhgan types be Indo-Iranian spreading from west asia Iran (Or even India), displacing FU forcing them further north. FU are spread west to east across the same range as supposed early IE steppe cultures,but today are displaced further north. Archaeogenetics of Finno-Ugric speaking populations [3] 213.48.46.141 (talk) 14:21, 1 July 2005 (UTC)

A craniometric investigation of the Bronze Age settlement of Xinjiang American Journal of Physical Anthropology (Early View)

Horse-mounted invaders from the Russo-Kazakh steppe or agricultural colonists from western Central Asia? A craniometric investigation of the Bronze Age settlement of Xinjiang

Brian E. Hemphill, J.P. Mallory

Numerous Bronze Age cemeteries in the oases surrounding the Täklamakan Desert of the Tarim Basin in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, western China, have yielded both mummified and skeletal human remains. A dearth of local antecedents, coupled with woolen textiles and the apparent Western physical appearance of the population, raised questions as to where these people came from. Two hypotheses have been offered by archaeologists to account for the origins of Bronze Age populations of the Tarim Basin. These are the steppe hypothesis and the Bactrian oasis hypothesis. Eight craniometric variables from 25 Aeneolithic and Bronze Age samples, comprising 1,353 adults from the Tarim Basin, the Russo-Kazakh steppe, southern China, Central Asia, Iran, and the Indus Valley, are compared to test which, if either, of these hypotheses are supported by the pattern of phenetic affinities possessed by Bronze Age inhabitants of the Tarim Basin. Craniometric differences between samples are compared with Mahalanobis generalized distance (d2), and patterns of phenetic affinity are assessed with two types of cluster analysis (the weighted pair average linkage method and the neighbor-joining method), multidimensional scaling, and principal coordinates analysis. Results obtained by this analysis provide little support for either the steppe hypothesis or the Bactrian oasis hypothesis. Rather, the pattern of phenetic affinities manifested by Bronze Age inhabitants of the Tarim Basin suggests the presence of a population of unknown origin within the Tarim Basin during the early Bronze Age. After 1200 B.C., this population experienced significant gene flow from highland populations of the Pamirs and Ferghana Valley. These highland populations may include those who later became known as the Saka and who may have served as middlemen facilitating contacts between East (Tarim Basin, China) and West (Bactria, Uzbekistan) along what later became known as the Great Silk Road.

...

It appears that neither Han Chinese nor steppe populations played any detectable role in the initial establishment or subsequent interregional biological interactions of Bronze Age Tarim Basin populations.

...

This research confirms that populations from the urban centers of the Oxus civilization of Bactria played a role in the population history of the Bronze Age inhabitants of the Tarim Basin. Yet these Bactrian populations were not the direct, early colonizers envisioned by advocates of the Bactrian oasis hypothesis (Barber, [1999]). None of the analyses document the immediate and profoundly close affinities between colonizers and the colonized expected if the Tarim Basin experienced substantial direct settlement by Bactrian agriculturalists.

...

This study confirms the assertion of Han ([1998]) that the occupants of Alwighul and Krorän are not derived from proto-European steppe populations, but share closest affinities with Eastern Mediterranean populations. Further, the results demonstrate that such Eastern Mediterraneans may also be found at the urban centers of the Oxus civilization located in the north Bactrian oasis to the west. Affinities are especially close between Krorän, the latest of the Xinjiang samples, and Sapalli, the earliest of the Bactrian samples, while Alwighul and later samples from Bactria exhibit more distant phenetic affinities. This pattern may reflect a possible major shift in interregional contacts in Central Asia in the early centuries of the second millennium B.C. 213.48.46.141 (talk) 10:28, 2 July 2005 (UTC)

....

Eastern Meditteranean or Mesopotamia is unlikely ... they are wearing plaid woollen twill, dyed in bright tartans, which has simply never been found associated with any of these groups. 72.38.150.110 (talk) 02:13, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

um, completely wrong! mesopotamia is one of the earliest known places where wool was woven, and yes tartan patterns were found around there, infact many 100s of years before the scots tartan plaids which are not nearly as old as people think 75.40.139.244 (talk) 17:14, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Untitled

This article is TOTAL BIASED ONE SIDED CRAP... remove it please.

This article is completely biased and one sided. Instead of reporting simply on what the Tarim mummies are and some possible implications of their existence could be, it instead "debunks" theories that aren't even discussed at length in the books that it attacks. This is not an encyclopedia entry, but one person's blind and moronic attack on something that they obviously don't understand or have any background in. 24.210.79.14 (talk) 12:28, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Where's the problem? It isn't politically correct but it is true, what a surprise! 84.149.215.65 (talk) 16:43, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

Recent Edits

Ack! I should probably have read over the discussion page before doing my edits - it seems this isn't a really friendly place to do edits. Nonetheless, both Washington times and Al Jazeera reported on the results of the DNA test/Genetic mapping study proving them to be of Europoid origin. I contributed these edits for three reasons, they are interesting, they are recent and they confirm an earlier theory suggested on textile arguments and superficial observations that there was a link between Central Asia and Europe. --LinuxDude 19:13, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

So why do Uygurs claim genetic link with the mummies. And what do you understand from a Caucasian i am an abkhaz (north caucasian, have light skin , dark hair ,dolikosephal skull but the nearest relatives of us (circassians and chechens) have a brakisephal skull (?Turkic) light skin light hair) none of caucasian people speak indo-european (but ossets from central asia) even not close to come from same ancestor Turkish(couple of simmilar basic words like water,big,me) or even negroid semitic languages are closer to indo european than caucasian languages. So is there any caucasian in west Europe...NO so what are you searching for in Tarim Basin, Some bloodthirst roman or german barbarian or perhaps achileus himself dont be fools the only white nation inhabitted there are Turks and they have no connection to arians after Andronovo times 88.240.112.156 (talk) 11:20, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Nobody is searching for anything. This article deals with what has been found, whether it hurts your national/racial/ethnic pride or not. 204.83.191.12 20:03, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Dating

The authors of this article were too enthusiastic about pinpointing connections of the mummies to various ethnic groups. Could they state clearly to which period the mummies date? Do they predate or postdate the burials at Pazyryk? Thanks, Ghirla ^-трёп- 14:13, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Ephedra

Re the "Ephedra" claim - as presented by Rosof (1997), this obviously refers to Ephedra distachya, but I would not take this at face value. There are at least 3 Chinese species (called ma huang) of the genus, and to say "oh, there's some Ephedra in a bag, they must be "Indo-Aryan"!" is... well, whatever it is, it's not science. So is there any attempt to find out what species it was? If so, it should be linked. If not, it should be remarked. The stuff grows all over the semiarid areas of the N Hemisphere, with the species being only distinct in minute detail (which shouldn't have interested nomads, because it just works regardless of what species it is), and basically everywhere where it grows people use it as a natural amphetamine. That it was used in Zoroastrian ritual is also entirely conjectural and there are much better candidates for soma, such as fly agaric or Datura metel. Dysmorodrepanis 13:29, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Indo-Europeans?

Where is the evidence that these are mummies of indo-european people ? Do mummies talk ? Are there any scriptures made by these people so their language can be connected to IE-languages ? IE in this article is used like it is some kind of race, which it's not. Whitout a solid proof of indo-europeanism of these mummies I think the article should be removed or atleast heavily edited. 62.78.252.58 (talk) 22:00, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Did you miss the part about the Tocharians? There is evidence for Indo-European speakers in the area in the early centuries AD. Given that Indo-Europeans originated somewhere in central asia is it all that astonishing that some elected to move east instead of west into Europe or south into India? 216.120.218.46 (talk) 22:41, 27 April 2009 (UTC) Roxana

Indo-Europeans originated somewhere in Central Asia? They almost certainly did not! Do you have any evidence for that assertion or do you uncritically accept whatever bullshit hypothesis an arbitrary number of "scholars" prefer? Indo-Europeans almost certainly originated in Anatolia. The oldest evidence for Indo-European language comes from the Hittites (Anatolia) and the Hellenic Mycenaeans (Aegean). Proto-Indo-European language was the language of a farming people according to the latest reconstructions. And the fact that Indo-European languages covered ALL of Europe leaving only isolated Basque and Uralic languages alone refutes the notion that some steppe nomads from Central Asia "swept into" Europe and sprinkled their language here and there. Whoever the original Indo-Europeans were they left a tremendous impact on Anatolia, Europe, and Northern India. The oldest evidence for Indo-European languages in the Tarim area consists of Tocharian scripts, and even that is rather shaky as Tocharian language is poorly understood and is reliably believed to be Indo-European but not confirmed. Regardless, the Tocharian script dates to around the first centuries while the mummies of the Tarim basin are centuries older. The only thing that we know about the Tarim people is that they were of 'Europoid' morphology and that they might have spoken an Indo-European language. (They could have just as well spoken a Turkic or Uralic language or some isolate.)

-Daqs —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.167.235.201 (talk) 03:15, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

.

Yes, and it's been proved that central Asia was mostly populated by west eurasian population during bronze/iron age (90 % during bronze age)

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http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1691686 (Unravelling migrations in the steppe: mitochondrial DNA sequences from ancient central Asians)

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http://www.springerlink.com/content/4462755368m322k8/ (Ancient DNA provides new insights into the history of south Siberian Kurgan people - the full article is mentionning the mtDNA haplogroups as well)

.

Gho (talk) 13:01, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

The assertion that the Indo-Europeans "almost certainly originated in Anatolia" is clearly overly confident. The Kurgan hypothesis remains the preferred explanation, at least among linguists, as the Anatolian hypothesis has shortcomings that are more serious than those of the Kurgan hypothesis. However, the KH does not actually place the Indo-European origins in Central Asia, but in Eastern Europe, so you are likely both wrong. The arguments listed above are incorrect, misleading, unconvincing or red herrings; the Indo-European affiliation of Tocharian is not questioned by any linguist these days, thanks to the overwhelming evidence available due to the great strides made in Tocharian studies, and to suggest that the Tocharian languages are "poorly understood" is amazingly ignorant. Hundreds of texts and fragments of texts have been studied, including translations, typically Buddhist literature translated from Sanskrit especially, so Tocharian is attested well enough to analyse and translate it. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 19:32, 14 December 2012 (UTC)

"Caucasoid genes"

"Some tests[1] have found the mummies to contain Caucasoid genes" - there is no such thing as a "Caucasoid gene". There are alleles predominantly found in W European populations, and there may be some alleles which hitherto have not been found elsewhere (but this is always preliminary).
What the article seems to mean is that a mtDNA haplotype typical of W Eurasia was found. Corr accordingly, but needs further clarification. Dysmorodrepanis 03:28, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Unneeded Polemic?

Excuse me, but I think I speak for a large fraction of this articles visitors. I came here because I was curious about the mummies themselves, how well preserved they are, how the mummification was accomplished, etc. This questions are pretty much being skipped in the article, which then derails into a lenghty description of an ongoing scientific debate, which is also ideologically charged (accusations of eurocentrism). Few people will find this debate interesting, and even fewer of them would consider Wikipedia the right place for it. Please don't feel offended, I'm just trying to give you a more objective, detached point of view on what the normal Wikipedia reader would like to know.

--84.176.111.49 16:35, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Nordic mummies ?

Tarim basin lies below see levels.If Asian skin color is due to selection,partly due to the fact that asia is higher above sea level than europe and hence is closer to the sun,then could these mummies still be blonde, blued eyed but not form Europe. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 212.85.12.211 (talk) 15:53, 8 January 2007 (UTC).

The above comment has to be, by and large, one of the stupidest things I have ever read...ever!

-Daq 67.167.235.201 (talk) 03:26, 26 March 2010 (UTC)

Yup. He also stereotypes thinking ALL Asian people have a certain skin color. As a general rule North Chinese can be as white as a white person, southern Chinese can be dark brown. Thais can have almost black looking skin etc. 107.222.205.242 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 19:03, 10 February 2014 (UTC)

NOVA Documentary

The current article is not about mummies but about their racial identity. If such is the intention of its authors, I suggest renaming it Tarim mummies controversy. I removed a lengthy philippic against some obscure documentary:

The documentary treats present-day local Uyghurs as primitives whose history and cultural changes are immaterial: Only their origins matter. Apparently knowing nothing about their culture, the filmmakers and researchers visit a poor Uyghur home only to compare their way of life with that of the mummies from thousands of years before. To persuade us that the Uyghurs are descended from the Tokharians, they are described as if they have preserved their sheep breeds, craft technologies and dietary habits for 2,000 years, never mentioning that Islamic cultural influences have been strong here for nearly a millenium. The film denies modern Uyghurs membership in the present, suggesting instead that their way of life harbors "living relics, fragments of an ancient time preserved like the mummies themselves." Such talk reflects 19th century ideologies of cultural evolution, in which past agricultural civilizations became objects of fascination, while the impoverished farmers of the present were condemned as backwards relics.

It further concludes that modern Tarim villagers are the remnants of mummies who breached China's fabled isolation 1,000 years earlier than previously thought. But fragmentary evidence from archaeological discoveries, paintings, and manuscripts thousands of years and many miles apart can provide no such "startling conclusion." And China's "fabled isolation" is exactly that ––– a fable. The belief in an isolated China and the idea that a European ethnic group could migrate to the Tarim without extensive cultural and genetic exchange along the way are both rooted in European myths about racial distinctiveness. Add to this the idea that contact between Chinese and Europeans 3000 years ago represents encounters between "two of the greatest civilizations on earth," and racial mythologies are clearly overshadowing fact. --Ghirla^-трёп- 20:22, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

I had no idea what did you meant by politics, this current article is about tarim mummies and their related topics not just racial identity, and for your infomation this documentary had also aired in discovery channel before, and even I myself had watched it, so its not obscure. Tarim mummies controversy suggest is good, but I suppose, we needs a much lengthy section for that, you might also wanna added another piece of controversy over there.Eiorgiomugini 17:20, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

I suggest you start an article about the documentary (if it is notable as you claim) and move your text there. If you don't agree to such solution, I will seek mediation. Not that I were particularly interested in the article, I just consider expressing one's own views, without any sources to back them up, a gross violation of WP:NOR. --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:38, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

You're right that it might be undue to point out every factors, but you can't simply removed them all. By simply stated distorted, reader won't knows what's going on. And those are not without any sources, its all sourced for your informations. I had no violation of anythings. I still had no idea what did you meant by politics, if there's no excuses for your politics reason maybe you should changed the section title that we're discussing at. Eiorgiomugini 17:41, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

I consider it unseemly that the article says next to nothing about the mummies (even the dating is obfuscated), yet it concentrates in such detail on their presumed racial identity. This is WP:UNDUE at its worst. Perhaps we should start the page Tarim mummies controversies or Racial identity of Tarim mummies and its criticism, or something along these lines? --Ghirla^-трёп- 17:52, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Your consideration would not be taken as a reason, the date is not obfuscated, and is roughly between 2nd and 1st millennium BC, what's wrong with that? The Tarim mummies controversies seemed O.K to me, but "Racial identity of Tarim mummies and its criticism" doesn't seemed to be what Light trying to said at all. For an article we needs a much lengthy section for that. Eiorgiomugini 17:55, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

References

Request for more specific citations for verification

Citations like "a study by Jilin University" or "Mair etc al, 2006" are not specific enough to verify. JFD 15:47, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, and Ephedra reloaded

A crucial issue is the Ephedra bit. I have outcommented it and it needs to be clarified before it's made visible again, because the Libby Rosof (1997) section is hair-raising nonsense to a trained biologist like me. Namely,

“The ephedra indicates that some of these people were almost certainly speaking an Iranian language,” [Mair] said."

While I am equivocal about Mair's claim, the statement as given patently does not allow such a conclusion. A person who was buried with a bag of Ephedra might have spoken Ancient Greek, a Semitic language, an East Asian language, any Indoeuropean language, an Uralic language or even an Uto-Aztecan(!) language (if the plant was Ephedra nevadensis), and this list is probably incomplete.

I'm not suggesting that any of the above possibilities is correct or incorrect (except the Uto-Aztecan one... ;D ). But from a scientific standpoint, the identification to genus Ephedra is insufficient. As the psychoactive species of Ephedra occur in circumscribed regions however and almost everywhere in semiarid continental Asia at least one of these species is found, an identification of the Ephedra to a particular species would certainly constrain the possibilities where the stuff had originated a fair bit: since the "potent" species of Ephedra are effectively identical from the user's point of view, it is not expected that one species would be traded into another species' range. Rather, the local crop would be used.

(Actually, I expect the plants to be one of the Chinese species (má huáng, e.g. Ephedra sinica), which would prove nothing. If it were a SW Asian species... But I seriously doubt they had the stuff imported across the Alpide belt when there was a ready supply of má huáng around. It is also problematic that Ephedra distachya, the Zoroastrian ephedra, grows widespread in Central Asia. So even if it were that species a connection beyond that region cannot be proven.) Dysmorodrepanis 15:31, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

---

In the section titled "Genetic links," I suspect that the following unsourced quote --

About the controversy Mair has stated that:

The new finds are also forcing a reexamination of old Chinese books that describe historical or legendary figures of great height, with deep-set blue or green eyes, long noses, full beards, and red or blond hair. Scholars have traditionally scoffed at these accounts, but it now seems that they may be accurate.[cite this quote]

-- is from:

Mair, Victor H., "Mummies of the Tarim Basin," Archaeology, 48 (2): 28-35 (March/April 1995). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cwkmail (talk • contribs) 04:53, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

I think those were ancestors of Turks, when Turks move west they can easily seems like european, such as Finns, Maygars and Anatolian Turks, when they move east their apperance becomes easily Chinese and mongolians. If anyone making research about those red / blond haired but east faced people you have to consider this. Also you have to consider some of Chinise historical sources claiming Kırgiz people are red haired and green eyed, you can easily find similar people even today especially in Russia Tataristan blond but east faced people. Here everything targetting us Turkic tribes, Huns, Maygars, Slavized Bulgars, Finns, Caucasian Turks, Tatars, Turkestan Turks, Uyghur Turks & Anatolian Turks ... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.96.233.68 (talk) 12:06, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Anyone know which "old Chinese books" Mair is referring to? Hanfresco (talk) 11:03, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Name the studies

No study referenced to as indicating European origins for the Tarim mummies was named. Only the name of one of the authors, or the University to which at least one of them belonged, were exposed. We need verifiable references on what the studies supposedly found and say. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.70.111.138 (talk) 01:15, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Lead Section

The second paragraph of the lead section seems to contain information that is not nearly notable enough to warrant placement in the introduction of this article. Additionally, it seems like it is misleadingly comparing two studies from two separate burial sites as though they represent the same bodies. One discusses Yanbulaq (mummies dating 1800 - 500 BCE), while the other discusses Sampula (a cemetery used from 217 BCE - 283 AD). Are the latter remains even considered part of the Tarim Mummies? I don't know. I vote for ditching the paragraph altogether, and starting fresh. Any takers? Steamroller Assault (talk) 03:28, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

NYT Times article Nov 19/08

I don't think the article will display without subscription (free) so will post it here for reference use; citable tidbits in it are there's a Uighur-nationalist pop song about the Loulan Beauty and some particulars about certain other mummmies; the article is essentially about the efforts of both Uighur nationalists and Han imperialists to use the mummmies for political purposes (or in the case of China, to control access to study of them, particularly limitations on DNA study, although I see from this article there's more than I got the impression from in teh NYT Times article....Skookum1 (talk) 14:28, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

Too bad there aren't any citable tidbits on how the entire thing has been hijacked by White Supremacist loons, who think "allowing researchers from Western universities full access to the remains" is equivalent to "limitations on DNA study" and that the fiction of "Han Imperialism" can be used as a pre-emptive cover for real imperialism, largely by your favorite tribe. Huaxia (talk) 19:03, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Sadly, this article has been modified with incorrect information

As the original text of the article, based on information given in the references, has been changed, vandalized essentially, to make it look as though the Tarim mummies were by definition 'Caucasoid', with only an afterthought given to 'Mongoloid' characteristics, as shown in this statement: "The cemetery at Yanbulaq contained 29 mummies which date from 1800–500 BCE, 21 of which are Caucasoid—the earliest Caucasoid mummies found in the Tarim Basin—and eight of which are of the same Caucasoid physical type found at Qäwrighul." In fact this information has been deliberately falsified, whereas the truth is as follows: "The majority of Yanbulake crania are considered ‘Mongoloid’ (21 of 29), with the rest being ‘Caucasoid’ (Han 1998, 561; Chen and Hiebert 1995, 263)" This is reported in the article "Genes, Language, and Culture: an Example from the Tarim Basin", by Thornton and Schurr, Oxford Journal of Arch. 23,1. http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/fulltext/118772737/PDFSTART It is also mentioned in the original Wikipedia article, as shown below: http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Tarim-mummies I suggest Wikipedia editors keep better track of this kind of vandalism, which is bringing Wikipedia into serious disrepute. 205.68.95.65 (talk) 00:52, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Over-used of extreme invective - "white supremacist" - is very un-wikipedian; "assume good faith" and don't call other people extremist names; you are double-guessing their motives with severe perjoratives, rather than trying to add balance to the article yourself, or post a POV template. That there's a body of evidence in the one direction that the Chinese government doesn't like doesn't automatically qualify those people as "white supremacists". I'd say Han supremacism is a much more serious issue in the Tarim Basin, both in modern political terms as well as in the state of the historical/archaeological record/debate. Knee-jerk invocation of extreme derisive comments like you've just done, instead of efforts to balance content directly is just......to me, evidence of standard propaganda techniques. "If you can't win a point, accuse your (perceived) opponent with personality or moral flaws". To me, that seems to be what you are doing......Skookum1 (talk) 02:02, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

The points I raised have nothing to do with Chinese government policy, but with facts derived from Western scholary publications, facts which were present in the original Wikipedia article and which were changed into something false. Fact: 21 out of the 29 mummies found in the Yanbulake cemetery were Mongoloid, and only 8 Caucasoid.

—Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.68.95.65 (talk) 15:31, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Fine - put it in the article then, and re-add stuff that you maintain was deleted. But don't go throwing around terms like "white supremacist" unwarrantedly; it makes you sound like a loon and/or a People's Republic propagandist. While you're at it, you might want to add some of the material from the NYT article I linked above, which also talks about the number of "Europoid"/Caucasoid mummies found at various locations, and how the PRC suppresses research because of the political controversies. As I will say again, Han supremacism is more of an issue with research in the Tarim; pointing fingers at imaginary "white supremacists" just smacks of, well, paraonia and also propaganda. Tone down the name-calling and bring balance to the article; if you can't contribute positively, shut up and don't call people stupid names.Skookum1 (talk) 15:55, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Very well, then. I changed the title of my original post, deleting any reference to 'white supremacists'. Jacob Davidson 205.68.95.65 (talk) 17:33, 21 November 2008 (UTC)

Han Supremacism doesn't even exist. The fact that you even fabricate such historically illiterate and race-baiting nonsense speaks volumes of the general agenda this article serves, as if the general Nordicist qualities of the writing do not make it so blatantly apparent. 71.163.8.54 (talk) 07:49, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

I'm guessing your new to Wikipedia and so let me explain a little of our terminology. When people on Wikipedia use the word delete they mean no article on this topic should ever exist, not now and not in the future either. The term delete doesn't mean remove the text, it means remove the entire topic. It doesn't mean temporary, it means forever.

Rewriting the article is encouraged. If you can see areas that need improving, then improve them. If parts are incorrect, remove them. If references are poor, provide better ones. Even if you have to change absolutely every single character in the article, you can do so. Please see WP:BOLD and be bold. However, don't feel you have to rewrite it all yourself. Write what you have time to write, when you have time, and submit your work even if incomplete, even if short. Others will contribute too and help build on your work. Rincewind42 (talk) 14:16, 17 February 2016 (UTC)

We are talking about "mummies" found along a TRADE ROUTE

It's fairly obvious that the presence of Caucasoid remains in this area could be indicative of nothing more than that people from the western end of the Silk Road traveled east in order to engage in trade. The article as it currently stands even confirms that there's evidence of items being traded from the Tarim basin "mummy" area eastward as well as between different cultural groups along the trade route further west through Persia, Parthia, the Black Sea area and so on. It's largely the inclusion of all those biased phrases drawing the exact opposite of logical conclusions that make this article fall so short of Wikipedia standards.

Thanks to whoever included that one line in this severely problematic article pointing out that there's no evidence one way or the other as to whether the "mummies" were fair-haired when alive or whether their hair was simply bleached by the "mummification" process. With all the genetic testing that's allegedly been done, it's suspicious that there's been no confirmation (or at least none cited here) of the existence -- or lack -- of genes for fair hair in the "mummies". We know that there were red-haired Neanderthals, for crying out loud (and that their red-hair gene was different from modern humans').

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence -- the fact that there are no mummified remains of people of East or Central Asian Phenotypes from the same period as the "mummies" could just as well mean simply that the Asian travelers or residents who died in the area had funerary customs such as cremation or platform "burial" which left no remains to be mummified. Asserting that the existence of only Caucasoid "mummies" means that there were no Asian/"Mongoloid" peoples in that area either during the "mummification" period or before goes beyond specious and suspect to ridiculously unscientific... and clearly failing the NPOV test.

Is it possible that there was a Prester-John-fantasy-like nation of fair-haired Caucasian giants in north central Asia 3000 to 4000 years ago, and that they were the first and only humans in that region up until and during that time? Sure. It's possible. But it's barely plausible, and far less plausible than several alternative explanations. We don't dig up the remains of Scythian traders from Roman Empire times and conclude that the Roman Emperors were Asian, or the remains of Ferdinand Magellan and declare that the Philippines were originally settled by Iberians.

And just in case anyone thinks I'm Han Chinese and just trying to discredit Uighur movements toward self-government (or vice versa), sorry: I'm American-born, of Native Canadian (mainly Micmaq/Metis), French, Italian, Silesian and Finnish descent, with dual American and Italian citizenship. Biased scholarship just pisses me off. I'd love to fix the whole article myself, but since much of even off-site information about these mummies shows bias (in one direction or another) and I'm neither an anthropologist nor an archaeologist, much less a geneticist, I don't feel qualified to winnow out the reliable facts from deliberate (or merely wishful) falsifications.

75.40.139.244 (talk) 17:14, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

Mair's drivel about China being founded by blonde aryans in spaceships

I deleted Mair's useless, dated conjecture about China being founded by blondes. Being tall has nothing to do with Caucasoids- Sino-Tibetans have long limbs on their own. Neolithic Chinese near the Yellow River Valley measured around 5'5" for males, that is the height of Roman legionnaires at the peak of Western Roman power. Huaxia (talk) 22:55, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, duh, last time I looked Classical Romans weren't blond; some in the later ages of the Empire were Germanic and Celtic but if you're meaning Roman-Romans and Italians as they were before invaded/occupied by the Cimbri or Ostrogoths you might as well be comparing Arabs and Japanese; Nordic and Celtic warriors were very large, and "giant" skeletons abound from the Norse era back through the Celtic one in northern Europe. You're making an equation European=Roman=European and it's irrelevant to blond=Scandic (the mummies have reddish hair, suggestive partly of Celtic links but Celts are/were tall too). In East Asian terms, you're comparing Manchurians to Vietnamese, or Mongolians to Indonesians etc. There are ancient myths in the Nordic peoples that they came from Central Asia, and some old speculations equate Asgard with Kashgar; not that there's any etymological substance to that (though there is with Agartha, which is suppose to have been in the Altai or the Tien Shan).Skookum1 (talk) 03:09, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Celtic people are tall, eh? Then how do you explain Ireland? 67.171.217.252 (talk) 05:08, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

This is a total misrepresentation of Victor Mair's theories! User Huaxia's heading: "Mair's drivel about China being founded by blonde aryans in spaceships" really shows how bizarre User Huaxia's position is. Unless he can quickly show where Mair made such a weird claim, he cannot granted any credibility, and he should publically apologise for so grossly and unfairly misrepresenting Mair's extensve and important research on early Central Asian history. Spaceships, indeed! What a stupid, and unmerited attack on a fine scholar! I will immediately reverse this uncalled-for edit. John Hill (talk) 10:36, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Derision of opponents and invocation of white supremacism, aryanism, spaceships etc is typical of anti-Western invective from CCP propagandists; or from people indoctrinated/hypnotized by their ravings, which will use any convoluted logic and distorted evidence in order to refute any suggestion that dirty white people have any place on the planet at all (note his boast about how we'll be extinct in 200 years, and the implication of primitive white people being incapable of a writing system if the Chinese didn't already have one). It's not just a Han problem, it's very common in Russian hyperbole too - any issue of http://english.pravda.ru is full of this kind of bunk. Sometimes I wonder if the Cultural Revolution's legacy is simply that of a bunch of half-wits incapable of logic or truth.....certainly there's an element of "if you shout it loudly enough lies will always drown out the truth, and truth-telling people will get bored and give up arguing with you" (and, of course, "if your opponents are making too much sense, round them up and shoot them" as has been done with Falun Dafa and others before them...). Misrepresenting what others have said, or concocting it outright, is stock-in-trade of materials by most public relations departments in any country; but the Chinese Public Security Bureau and its bastard offspring excel at it - excel, that is, at ridiculous nonsense, and in "who me?" denials.Skookum1 (talk) 13:03, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Derision of opponents and invocation of CCP propagandism, "Han Chauvinism", spaceships etc is typical of anti-non-white invective from insecure Nordicist ravers. It's been four years. The shrieking macaque you invoked above I hope has long been treated with proper research as per wiki standards - are you still posting "anti-racist is codeword for anti-white", while pointing your shaking finger and screaming "CCP/NATIONAL SECURITY BUREAU" at any and all who dare you challenge your paranoid Nordicist agenda and screeds? Time to clean up this garbage article. "any suggestion that dirty white people have any place on the planet at all" indeed, from the genius who can't discern my writing style from "Mr. Europa" above and generalizes all dissent to his private, fictional bogeyman. Huaxia (talk) 19:07, 19 October 2013 (UTC)

Genetics section with no mention of haplogroups

This interesting piece has some discussion of the genetics of the mummies, but no mention of a single haplgroup, which seems a glaring oversight. This may be a controversial topic, but that is no reason to shy away from clinical results from the lab. MarmadukePercy (talk) 04:43, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Chunxiang Li et al 2010

Come on ... no mention of the DNA tests of the Xiaohe population? All the males were Y-DNA R1a1a and while most of the females had east asian haplogroups, 2 of them had west eurasian haplogroup K and H. The mtDNA H signature matches European individuals :

http://www.biomedcentral.com/1741-7007/8/15

Evidence that a West-East admixed population lived in the Tarim Basin as early as the early Bronze Age

"Mitochondrial DNA analysis showed that the Xiaohe people carried both the East Eurasian haplogroup (C) and the West Eurasian haplogroups (H and K), whereas Y chromosomal DNA analysis revealed only the West Eurasian haplogroup R1a1a in the male individuals."

" Besides the East Eurasian lineage, two West Eurasian mtDNA haplogroups H and K were found among the Xiaohe people. H lineage is the most common mtDNA haplogroup in West Eurasia [20], but haplogroup H with a 16260T was shared by only nine modern people in Genbank, including one Italian, one German, one Hungarian, one Portuguese, one Icelander and four English people. "

jkl (talk) 20:43, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

is this mean most chinese has european ancestry? 69.230.17.59 (talk) 11:59, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

No, it means that some "West Eurasians" mixed with some Asians who were in vicinity of Tarim Basin thousands of years ago. It had no genetic impact on the whole population of China.AlecTrevelyan402(Click Here to leave a message) 15:06, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

Here's an easy one: a very, very long sentence

Can someone do something about this very, very long sentence? It looks to have been edited one too many times and by someone with less than stellar grammar skills: "The presence of speakers of Indo-European languages in the Tarim Basin in the third or early second millennium BCE has been interpreted as evidence that cultural exchanges occurred among Indo-European and Chinese populations at a very early date, but the culture and technology in the northwest region was less advanced[citation needed] than that in the Yellow River-Erlitou (2070BCE~1600BCE) or Majiayao culture (3100BCE~2600BCE), which is earliest bronze using culture in China, shows on the region of northwest didn't use copper or any metal until the technology of bronze making was introduced by Shang Dynasty in China about 1600BC to this region."

I'd do it myself but someone would probably key my car for it. Goateeki (talk) 20:36, 10 June 2011 (UTC)

The real problem with the above sentence

"The presence of speakers of Indo-European languages in the Tarim Basin in the third or early second millennium BCE" seems to be inferred entirely from Mair's speculations elsewhere in the article, something that should be reflected in the verbiage. Besides this, the quotes are of Mair claiming that two cultures were present in the Basin by that time, and reference no similar claims about language. So I'm adding the word "possible" before "presence." Hopefully nobody will start claiming that language and culture are the same thing or that Mair is uncontested fact. 67.171.217.252 (talk) 05:28, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

Problems with File:QizilDonors.jpg

Hallo, I recognized that the data which was given to this picture is based on wrong information:

• 1.:The term "Sassanian style" was used in the wrong context.

What have been described is the wrong picture. The right one is Fig.1 on page 8 in this document: http://www.sino-platonic.org/complete/spp084_mummies_central_asia.pdf

The "Tocharian" Colour Plate on page 9 is not fiting to the description of Fig.1. So, the description is wrong. We need a correction of the information given in this document. I've informed the User Per_Honor_et_Gloria about this problem.

- Maikolaser (talk) 11:36, 15 March 2012 (CET)

The image is described as Tocharian in the colour plate (Four Tocharian knight-donors). Fig.1 description is for the black and white outlines. Other figures from the same cave are also described as Tocharian in many places, for example here, and apparently by the museum itself here. Hzh (talk) 12:32, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

Discussion at [4], so it won't be fragmented. - Maikolaser (talk) 01:07, 16 March 2012 (CET)

genetic data

I have reverted it here [5] , some other user has reverted the the same thing at Tocharians [6] . Implied is that there is a certain genetic connection with Uygurs (edit summary leaves no doubt either), not backed up by the sources. The sources dont mention Tarim mummies or Tocharians. It's all very misleading from the ip user to do since the beginning of 2012.--Cold Season (talk) 18:16, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

IT'S NOT MISLEADING. Please read this study which explains their Tocharian and Uyghur connection. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2790568/

" Historical records indicate that the present Uyghurs were formed by admixture between Tocharians from the west and Orkhon Uyghurs (Wugusi-Huihu, according to present Chinese pronunciation) from the east in the 8th century CE. "

Uighur partial western eurasian connection is undeniable. 28.6% had R1a1 (the most common haplogroup in the uyghurs which is clear connection with Tocharians which means that they have aboriginal connections to their territory. I know this is out of topuc but denying this connections which they have would also mean that Uighur have no right to claim to their territory of East Turkistan.--- 94.175.118.39 19:25, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

I do not care if you pull out a 1000 Uygur articles as reference, there is no mention of the Tarim mummies in the two sources in your earlier edit, neither in the distinct link you gave above. Your first reference in your edit does not mention the Tarim mummies or Tocharians, your second reference (besides being not reliable) does not mention it either. Your info for the connection is original research, misleading.

Feel free to put your Li, Cho, Kidd, Kidd (2009). Genetic Landscape of Eurasia and “Admixture” in Uyghurs" reference from that pubmed link above properly in the Tocharian article, it does not belong here, which by the way states "historical records indicate" and does not refer to genetic research (WP:SYN). Also, I see you made another edit without paraphrasing (WP:COPYVIO). --Cold Season (talk) 05:56, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Maybe I should posted this as an possible connection. My first article mentions Uyghurs have R1a which is an Indo-European marker DNA found in Tarim Basin mummies and should prove their genetic connection with Indo-European speakers like Tocharian. If the Tarim mummies were tested to be R1a and Tocharian language is Indo-European than that must means they must have an connection. The fact that Uyghurs also have high frequencies of R1a and historical records showed they intermixed and assimilated with Tocharian should support this theory, at least DNA and historical connection shows this, the only problem is nobody knows what language those Tarim mummies spoke since there is no evidence but it could because they had nothing to write on. --- 94.175.118.39 12:18, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

No, that is still your personal original research, not backed up by your sources. Those are articles about Uygurs, not Tarim mummies. And don't come with one claim then this or that or "if", because you are now making random claims, not credible and unverifiable. Provide reliable sources that explicit back it up. --Cold Season (talk) 17:01, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I like to proceed the talk at Talk:Tocharians as not to fragment it.--Cold Season (talk) 17:01, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Sory but as far as i see the most of comments are drawn with chinese point of wiev or from a mentality who prefers to believe and use chinese claims in a way with covering that.Its neighter neutral point of wiev nor polite approach!--78.189.170.134 (talk) 18:41, 13 December 2012 (UTC)

Slavic subclade R1a1a

"while the paternal lines were all West Eurasian R1a1a. The geographic location of where this admixing took place is unknown, although south Siberia is likely"

The highest percentage of this male (paternal) line is presented among current Russians, Slovak, Slovenian and Polish populations. So the claim it represent "western eurasians" like celts, english, french is unlikely and I would consider it as an occult nonsense and lie. It belongs mainly to Slavic diasphora.

Here is the further study: Haplogroup R1a, Its Subclades and Branches in Europe During the Last 9,000 Years

www.scirp.org/journal/PaperInformation.aspx?paperID=21698 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.182.65.157 (talk) 10:15, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

re new section

re this, there are two issues that come to mind; one is new research indicating that all blue-eyed people share a common ancestor. Another is the Chinese theory that the Han are descended from homo erectus, not homo sapiens. You can't butter both sides of the bread at once, and though it's in the cited author the "implicit assumption that valuable techniques came from the West" is really only conjecture and also an implicit assumption about western biases, commonly heard from sinophiles in fact, and from the Chinese themselves, I don't recall reading anything like that in the news items that I saw about this. A third component is a tradition in the Norse histories I grew up with, published in the 1890s and perhaps a bit cheesy, suggesting that "Asgard" was Kashgar, and that Indo-European roots lay in Central Asia.......Skookum1 (talk) 06:45, 25 June 2013 (UTC)

Yeah. There are now various strands of argument supporting the old (19th century) idea that the early Indo-Europeans were "Nordic" in appearance, just like many Eastern Europeans (not least Ukrainians) still today; not only old arguments such as the descriptions of ancient historians (and other literature) suggesting the presence of (at least) aristocratic and warrior elites of a "Nordic" type in almost all ancient (and some medieval) Indo-European peoples (even the ancient Romans: the patricians, and even after them, many upper class individuals, notably including emperors, are described as light-haired – blond or reddish – or light-eyed, or both), with the apparent exception of the Anatolians (about whom we seem to have no real evidence either way, or I might just not know about it) and Indo-Aryans (but conspicuously not the Iranians and indirectly, the Nuristani), where evidence is either lacking or admixture too strong and early (with Mediterranean-looking – in the Middle East and Northern India – and – in Southern India – Australoid/Melanesian/Negrito-type populations), depictions and – more vestigially – in surviving modern (especially) isolated populations particularly in Central Asia (such as the Nuristani), and notably, evidence that the scholars of yore could not know about: archaeological (mummies of the – probably Scythian or otherwise Iranian – Pazyryk culture, the Tarim mummies and other finds) and genetic (analyses of genomes of both mummies with Europoid features and skeletons with no obvious features but association with Indo-European-speaking cultures, which find genes for light skin/hair/eyes and support the hypothesis of (Eastern) European origin) evidence for an old idea that many scholars probably still find attractive (but don't like talking about in public because it is easily misunderstood or wilfully misrepresented and maliciously caricatured as "blond Aryans in spaceships"). There are also some obviously non-Indo-European-speaking groups (Yenisei Kirghiz) and individuals (Ramses II.) which seem to have been of Nordic appearance, but in those cases I'm aware of there are plausible explanations (Iranian or Para-Tocharian groups adopting Turkic languages in Kazakhstan or Southern Siberia, Mitanni ancestry for the pharaoh – the aristocracy of the Mitanni had Indo-Aryan names so was most probably of Indo-Iranian ancestry, even if they spoke Hurrian like the people they ruled). Even if some arguments rely on some amount of circularity and degrees of probability and plausiblity rather than certainty, the association and correlation of Indo-European languages and individuals of "Nordic" appearance is so strong, and the pattern so suggestive, that the conclusion cannot be easily dismissed: the assumption follows naturally from the evidence and explains it quite obviously. No spaceships but an ancient, proto-urban, (proto-)civilisation (no writing yet, but then, nobody had writing before 3200 BC anywhere in the world) in Eastern Europe, which was as technologically advanced as any contemporary Bronze Age culture (or even more so), with horse-drawn carts and (among the Indo-Iranians = Aryans) chariots. (By virtue of sheer historical luck, of course, not genetic or moral superiority.) The facts speak for themselves, regardless of the amounts of denial and wishful thinking which nationalists of various stripes indulge in. See also Geocurrents for the contradictory ways various ideologues try to paint science as ideology just because it doesn't fit their own. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 15:29, 23 November 2013 (UTC)

undergraded?

Should "undergraded" be undegraded? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:306:376D:9730:EDF5:6F6F:D0A1:F89B (talk) 01:42, 17 March 2015 (UTC)

Observation on mummies around the world.

If you google mummies in Peru and in Egypt the hair seems to naturally get lighter. There is definitely a correlation between mummies around the world with light hair that has absoltutely nothing with their original hair color or ethnicity. Thus you cannot possibly link them to being Caucasian by hair color alone post mortem. Europeans. Especially Northern Europeans where light hair is prevalent were not traveling the world 2000 years ago. Even in Rome light hair was rare. To suggest that these were red haired individuals is absurd. Only in Ireland today is red hair common place. Allanana79 (talk) 04:57, 5 January 2016 (UTC)

It would actually be really interesting if they were European though. I don't think they were naturally red haired that's certain. Red hair is way too rare for that too be true. But they very well could have been Caucasian. Allanana79 (talk) 03:36, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

Please don't use talk pages in this way. They are not here to discuss the subject of the article. See the bit in bold at the top of the page? "This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject." Doug Weller talk 20:27, 6 January 2016 (UTC)

You might all refer to the Tocharians. They were Caucasian, wore plaid clothing (similar to the Celts) and may have been an eastern branch of the Scythians who ruled over the vast steppes of Central Asia and into North-Eastern Asia. One of them became an emperor of China, and they converted to Buddhism and brought Buddhism to Japan. You will need to search the internet further about them as the related articles here on Wikipedia need serious updating. We should never assume that red hair began in Northern Europe simply because it is commonly found there now - we need to seek where the mutation started from originally and where it has travelled to. Regards, William Harris • talk • 04:46, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm aware of them. Our article on Red hair suggests multiple origins. Doug Weller talk 07:38, 14 January 2016 (UTC)

Apparently it seems like everyone has already assumed they were naturally red headed. I haven't found one article on the Internet that says otherwise. Even peer reviewed articles from google scholar speak of them as being natural gingers. Personally I love red heads. Julianne Moore is one of my favorite actresses. I just find it odd that people would automatically assume that they would be red headed simply because their mummies have red hair. When it's plainly obvious that there is something going on that doesn't meet the eye. Look for yourselves mummies in Egypt. Mummies in Peru. Plus I thought I read somewhere their DNA was mongoloid or something. Allanana79 (talk) 01:24, 27 January 2016 (UTC)

Anon IP 71.14.190.41 vandalism

To the anonymous user (apparently in St. Louis) who has deleted the above section of this Talk page three times: Please read WP:BLANKING. This particular case doesn't seem to meet one of the special exceptions to blanking. You could put strikethough on your comments if that's your intention. Best wishes, Keahapana (talk) 00:03, 6 February 2016 (UTC)

I no longer want to be involved in the idiocy of this article or the talk page. I'd like to erase my earlier input. Why is it so important to you that my earlier thoughts remain on this talk page? If those ideas are so important to you, why don't you let me erase my work and you can replace it with your own? WHY IS IT SO IMPORTANT TO YOU THAT MY WORDS REMAIN ON THE TALK PAGE? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.14.190.41 (talk) 11:02, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

No response, eh? You simply replaced my work without giving me any response. So, you don't actually have a valid reason for insisting that my prior input stays, other than that you simply want to win this war of wills. Well, guess what? YOU are the reason no one respects Wikipedia. You want to be this much of a little @#$%? Well, ok. You win. You've taught me my lesson. I'll make sure I never post anything to Wikipeia again. I'm well-known and respected within the anthropological/archaeological academic community. I have numerous credits in peer-reviewed journals. I've compiled years original research. And I promise, I'll never post to Wikipedia again. You've won this battle.

I'll go ahead and leave my words on this page since it's so important to you. And I'll make sure I never contribute anything to Wikipedia again. I'll let the idiots continue to post pseudo-scientific nonsense, and make sure I never add any legitimate academic content to the Wikipedia "community". Congratulations, you've won this battle, and Wikipedia will be worse off for it. YOU are the reason Wikipedia is not allowed to be accessed on classroom computers. YOU are the reason academics disdain Wikipedia. Because no reputable academic would ever deign to be associated with your BS. Congratulations, you've won. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.14.190.41 (talk) 21:49, 14 February 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

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External links modified (January 2018)

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified 2 external links on Tarim mummies. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20060920170441/http://homepages.utoledo.edu/nlight/discarch.txt to http://homepages.utoledo.edu/nlight/discarch.txt
• Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20080728125250/http://www.meshrep.com/PicOfDay/mummies/mummies.htm to http://www.meshrep.com/PicOfDay/mummies/mummies.htm

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Andronovo ethnics

"... the specifically Indo-Iranian-associated Andronovo culture (c. 2000–900 BCE)" - The two most modern glottochronological studies (Bouckaert et al. 2013, Holm 2017, 1019) put the split of Indo-Iranian into Indic and Iranian before the start of the Andronovo culture. Accepting this agreeing result, the sentence makes no sense. 2A02:8108:9640:AC3:A44E:60CD:2F77:D1E3 (talk) 07:07, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Images

I thought that the article could perhaps benefit from some more imagery showing well preserved facial detail, so, how about this one, for instance?

And/or this compilation which includes a drawn estimation of what the featured man looked like?

Okama-San (talk) 15:45, 16 December 2020 (UTC)

Draft:Loulan Beauty

There is a draft of a separate article on this mummy. Robert McClenon (talk) 07:20, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Genetics Z93 doubtful

Quiles (2021) doubts the alleged Z93 in Li et al. (2010) as "Z93- (false negative?) Unofficial report, unpublished data". Thus we should be careful.HJHolm (talk) 06:20, 15 September 2021 (UTC)

Dates

The "Archaeological record" section needs dates for particular discoveries and site excavations.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  18:03, 16 May 2023 (UTC)