Its possible that you are a descendant from King Tut: A study reveals what country Pharaoh Tutankhamun’s descendants come from.
Are you male and come from Spain, UK or France? If so there is a chance you might be related to one of Egypt’s most enigmatic Pharaohs: Tutankhamun. Pharaoh Tutankhamun became the ruler of Egypt at the age of nine, something that remains a mystery for most historians. The enigmatic boy-king lived from approximately 1341BC to 1323BC ruling over the land of the Pharaohs from 1333BC until 1323BC. According to scholars his name, Tutankhamun roughly translates to “Living Image of Amun”.
It is one of the most interesting studies we have seen in a while. A group of Swiss scientists, experts in genetics have found out that seventy percent of Pharaoh Tutankhamun’s descendants would not be found in Egypt, but elsewhere. The team of experts at Zurich based iGENEA, one of the most renowned centers for genetics in the world, managed to rebuild the genetic profile of Tutankhamun, the boy king who ruled Egypt more than 3000 years ago, discovering that he belonged to the haplogroup R1b1a2 which is the same group that share more than half of European men in Western Europe. It remains a mystery for geneticists how Tutankhamun’s paternal lineage came to Egypt from its region of origin.
How cool is that?
According to the Swiss genetics company, it is believed that the earliest migration of haplogroup R1b1a2 into Europe began sometime around 7000BC with the spread of agriculture. According to writings at iGENEA’s website, in Egypt the contingent of this haplogroup is below 1% and partially caused by european immigration during the last 2.000 years.
As if that wasn’t enough, researchers have more curious details. They suggest the most curious case was that of the Spanish and British whose proportion of men that share the same haplogroup rises to a staggering seventy percent.
‘It was very interesting to discover that he belonged to a genetic group in Europe – there were many possible groups in Egypt that the DNA could have belonged to,’ said Roman Scholz, director of the iGENEA Centre. Interestingly around 70 % of Spanish and a 60 % of French men belong to the genetic group of King Tut, one of the most enigmatic rulers of ancient Egypt.
‘We think the common ancestor lived in the Caucasus about 9,500 years ago,’ said Scholz.
However, the results from the Swiss company have been criticized by numerous scientists around the world, among them Carsten Push who is a geneticist at Germany’s Tubingen University. Push was part of the team that actually constructed King Tut’s DNA from samples of mummified remains and his relatives.
Push claims that iGENEA’s claims are anything but possible since they failed to publish the data belonging to Tut’s Y-Chromosome, found only in males. This is of extreme importance since said chromosome would reveal his male descendants.
iGENEA reconstructed the DNA profile of Tutankhamun based on a film produced by the Discovery Channel.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-l6DkOaqBI
Source: igenea.com Featured image credit: History
