Department of Experimental Evolutionary Biology, University of Bologna, Italy.
Am J Hum Biol. 2011 Jan-Feb;23(1):89-99. doi: 10.1002/ajhb.21107.
The Titicaca basin was the cradle of some of the major complex societies of pre-Columbian South America and is today home to three surviving native languages: Quechua, Aymara, and Uro. This study seeks to contribute to reconstructing the population prehistory of the region, by providing a first genetic profile of its inhabitants, set also into the wider context of South American genetic background.
We report the first mitochondrial DNA first hypervariable segment sequences of native populations of the environs of Lake Titicaca: speakers of Aymara and Quechua, and the "Uros" of the Lake's floating islands. We sampled Aymara speakers from a locality where the Uro language was formerly documented, to check for possible language shift patterns. These data are compared with those for other Amerindian populations, collated from already published sources.
Our results uncover the genetic distinctiveness of our formerly Uro but now Aymara-speaking sample, in contrast with a relative homogeneity for all the other Central Andean samples.
The genetic affinities that characterize Central Andean populations are highly consistent with the succession of expansive polities in the region, culminating with the Incas. In the environs of Lake Titicaca, however, one subset of the present day Aymara-speaking population exhibits a peculiar position: perhaps a genetic correlate to their original Uro linguistic lineage (now extinct in the area), tallying with ethnohistorical claims for the distinctiveness of the Uro population. Our results emphasize the need for genetic descriptions to consider the widespread phenomenon of language shift.
的的喀喀湖流域是前哥伦布时期南美洲一些主要复杂社会的发源地，也是当今三种现存土著语言的家园：克丘亚语、艾玛拉语和乌鲁语。本研究旨在通过提供该地区居民的第一个遗传特征谱，为重建该地区的人口史前史做出贡献，同时也将其置于南美洲遗传背景的更广泛背景下。
我们报告了的的喀喀湖周边土著人群的第一个线粒体 DNA 第一高变区序列：艾玛拉语和克丘亚语的使用者，以及湖上浮岛的“乌鲁人”。我们从一个曾经有乌鲁语记录的地方采集了艾玛拉语使用者的样本，以检查可能的语言转变模式。这些数据与从已发表的来源整理的其他美洲印第安人群体的数据进行了比较。
我们的结果揭示了我们以前的乌鲁语但现在是艾玛拉语使用者样本的遗传独特性，与所有其他安第斯中部样本的相对同质性形成对比。
表征安第斯中部人群的遗传亲和力与该地区不断扩张的政体的连续性高度一致，最终以印加人为顶峰。然而，在的的喀喀湖周边，当今一部分讲艾玛拉语的人口表现出一种特殊的地位：也许是与他们原来的乌鲁语言血统（现已在该地区灭绝）相关的遗传相关性，与乌鲁人口的独特性的民族历史主张相符。我们的结果强调了遗传描述需要考虑语言转变这一普遍现象。
