Re: [tied] Re: Sardinian.

----- Original Message -----
From: John Croft <jdcroft@...>
To: <cybalist@egroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, 13 August, 2000 9:25 AM
Subject: [tied] Re: Sardinian.


>
> > As for the Sardinian genetic pool, well, this is an island, and
> islands, especially isolated islands, tend to be genetically
> homogeneous. It's the founder effect. The few people who get their
> first will reproduce, fill all the available space, and perpetuate
> their genetic group. Such groups do not take part in the genetic
> mixing you get on a mainland. I gather that the Sardinian gene pool
> is
> quite distant from the rest of the peoples surrounding it in Europe
> and Africa.
>
> Yes Mark you are totally correct with the founder effect. It has
> been
> demonstrated elsewhere (particularly in the Americas). There is also
> a "founder effect" operating in the "out of Africa" hypothesis too.
>

It should be borne in mind that the Romans conducted a particularly savage
punitive expedition in Sardinia in 177BC, when it was claimed that 80,000
Sardinians were killed or captured, and the Roman slave markets were glutted
with cheap Sardinian slaves.
So maybe there was a genetic bottleneck and this homogeneity only stems from
this time. Or has C-S taken this into account?
It seems that following this disaster for the Sardinians, the remaining
natives adopted Latin so completely that in the modern Romance of Sardinia
the surviving elements of pre-Roman speech are far less than in, say, French
or Spanish.


Cheers
Dennis