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Population genomics of the Viking world

  • Ashot Margaryan, Daniel J. Lawson, Martin Sikora, Fernando Racimo, Rasmus Nielsen, Thomas Werge, Eske Willerslev
  • , Tom Christensen, Peter Pentz, Mads Dengsø Jessen, Anne Pedersen, Jette Arneborg
  • , Andrés Ingason, Mikkel W. Pedersen, Thorfinn Korneliussen, Peter de Barros Damgaard, Gabriel Renaud, J. Víctor Moreno-Mayar, Hugh McColl, Jade Cheng, Jesper Stenderup, Jilong Ma, Sturla Ellingvåg, Morten E. Allentoft, Anna K. Fotakis, Enrico Cappellini, Gabriele Scorrano, Inge Lundstrøm, M. Thomas P. Gilbert
  • , Simon Rasmussen, Ida Moltke, Lara M. Cassidy, Emil Jørsboe, Helene Wilhelmson, Magdalena M. Bus, Rui Martiniano, Claude Bhérer, Marie Allen, Raili Allmäe, Martyna Molak, Alexandra Buzhilova, Allison Fox, Anders Albrechtsen, Berit Schütz, Birgitte Skar, Caroline Arcini, Ceri Falys, Charlotte Hedenstierna Jonson, Dariusz Blszczyk, Denis Pezhemsy, Gordon Turner-Walker, Hildur Gestsdóttir, Ingrid Gustin, Ingrid Mainland, Inna Potekhina, Italo M. Muntoni, Julie Gibson, Jüri Peets, Jörgen Gustaffson, Katrine H. Iversen, Linzi Simpson, Lisa Strand, Louise Loe, Maeve Sikora, Marek Florek, Maria Vretemark, Mark Redknap, Monika Bajka, Tamara Pushkina, Morten Søvsø, Natalia Gigoreva, Ole Kastholm, Otto Uldum, Pasquale Favia, Per Holck, Sabine Sten, Símun V. Arge, Vayacheslav Moiseyev, Wieslaw Bogdaniwicz, Yvonne Magnusson, Ludovic Orlando, Mark Collard, Daniel G. Bradley, Marie Louise Jørkov, Niels Lynnerup, Neil Price, Jan Bill, Søren M. Sindbæk, Lotte Hedeager, Kristian Kristiansen
  • MRC Integrative Epidemiology Unit, University of Bristol
  • Lundbeck Foundation GeoGenetics Centre, GLOBE Instute, University of Copenhagen
  • Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Protein Research. University of Copenhagen
  • The Bioinformatics Centre, Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
  • Smurfit Institute of Genetics, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland
  • Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
  • Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Lund University, Lund, Sweden
  • Sydsvensk Arkeologi AB, Kristianstad, Sweden
  • Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
  • Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
  • Department of Health Technology, Section for Bioinformatics, Technical University of Denmark (DTU), Copenhagen, Denmark
  • Department of Human Genetics, McGill University, Montréal, Quebec, Canada
  • Archaeological Research Collection, Tallinn University, Tallinn, Estonia
  • Museum and Institute of Zoology, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
  • Anuchin Research Institute and Museum of Anthropology, Moscow State University, Moscow, Russia
  • Manx National Heritage, Douglas, Isle of Man
  • Upplandsmuseet, Uppsala, Sweden
  • NTNU University Museum, Department of Archaeology and Cultural History, Trondheim, Norway
  • The Archaeologists, National Historical Museums, Sweden
  • Thames Valley Archaeological Services (TVAS), Reading, UK
  • Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden
  • Institute of Archaeology, University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland
  • Department of Cultural Heritage Conservation, National Yunlin University of Science and Technology, Douliou, Taiwan
  • Institute of Archaeology, Reykjavík, Iceland
  • UHI Archaeology Institute, University of the Highlands and Islands, Kirkwall, UK
  • Department of Bioarchaeology, Institute of Archaeology of National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Kiev, Ukraine
  • Soprintendenza Archeologia, Belle Arti e Paesaggio per le Province di Barletta, Andria, Trani e Foggia, Foggia, Italy
  • Jönköping County Museum, Jönköping, Sweden
  • Trinity College Dublin
  • Heritage Burial Services, Oxford Archaeology, Oxford, UK
  • National Museum of Ireland, Dublin, Ireland
  • Institute of Archaeology, Maria Curie-Sklodowska University in Lublin, Lublin, Poland
  • Västergötlands Museum, Skara, Sweden
  • Department of History and Archaeology, Amgueddfa Cymru–National Museum Wales, Cardiff, UK
  • Trzy Epoki Archaeological Service, Klimontów, Poland
  • Historical Faculty, Moscow State University, Moscow, Russia
  • Sydvestjyske Museer
  • Department of Slavic–Finnish Archaeology, Institute for the History of Material Culture, Russian Academy of Sciences, Saint Petersburg, Russia
  • Department of Research and Heritage, Roskilde Museum, Roskilde, Denmark
  • Langelands Museum
  • Department of Humanities, University of Foggia, Foggia, Italy
  • Department of Molecular Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
  • Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Uppsala University Campus Gotland, Visby, Sweden
  • Tjóðsavnið – Faroe Islands National Museum, Tórshavn, Faroe Islands
  • Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (Kunstkamera), Russian Academy of Science, St Petersburg, Russia
  • Malmö Museum, Malmö, Sweden
  • Laboratoire d’Anthropobiologie Moléculaire et d’Imagerie de Synthèse, CNRS UMR 5288, Université de Toulouse, Université Paul Sabatier, Toulouse, France
  • Department of Archaeology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Colombia, Canada
  • University of Copenhagen, Department of Forensic Medicine, Laboratory of Biological Anthropology
  • School of GeoSciences, University of Edinburgh
  • Department of Natural History, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Trondheim, Norway
  • Trace and Environmental DNA (TrEnD) Laboratory, School of Molecular and Life Sciences, Curtin University, Perth, Western Australia, Australia
  • Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
  • Centre for Urban Network Evolutions (UrbNet), School of Culture and Society, Aarhus University, Højbjerg, Denmark
  • Institute of Archaeology, Conservation and History, Oslo, Norway
  • Department of Historical Studies, University of Gothenburg, SE, 41255 Gothenburg, Sweden
  • Institute of Molecular Biology, National Academy of Sciences, Yerevan, Armenia
  • Section for Evolutionary Genomics GLOBE, University of Copenhagen
  • School of Statistical Sciences, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK
  • Department of Clinical Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
  • Institute of Biological Psychiatry, Mental Health Services Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
  • Department of Integrative Biology, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, USA
  • Department of Statistics, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, USA
  • Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
  • The Danish Institute for Advanced Study, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark
  • The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Cambridge, UK
  • The Lundbeck Foundation Initiative for Integrative Psychiatric Research, iPSYCH, Copenhagen, Denmark

Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review

Abstract

The Viking maritime expansion from Scandinavia (Denmark, Norway, and Sweden) marks one of the swiftest and most far-flung cultural transformations in global history. During this time (c. 750 to 1050 CE), the Vikings reached most of western Eurasia, Greenland, and North America, and left a cultural legacy that persists till today. To understand the genetic structure and influence of the Viking expansion, we sequenced the genomes of 442 ancient humans from across Europe and Greenland ranging from the Bronze Age (c. 2400 BC) to the early Modern period (c. 1600 CE), with particular emphasis on the Viking Age. We find that the period preceding the Viking Age was accompanied by foreign gene flow into Scandinavia from the south and east: spreading from Denmark and eastern Sweden to the rest of Scandinavia. Despite the close linguistic similarities of modern Scandinavian languages, we observe genetic structure within Scandinavia, suggesting that regional population differences were already present 1,000 years ago. We find evidence for a majority of Danish Viking presence in England, Swedish Viking presence in the Baltic, and Norwegian Viking presence in Ireland, Iceland, and Greenland. Additionally, we see substantial foreign European ancestry entering Scandinavia during the Viking Age. We also find that several of the members of the only archaeologically well-attested Viking expedition were close family members. By comparing Viking Scandinavian genomes with present-day Scandinavian genomes, we find that pigmentation-associated loci have undergone strong population differentiation during the last millennia. Finally, we are able to trace the allele frequency dynamics of positively selected loci with unprecedented detail, including the lactase persistence allele and various alleles associated with the immune response. We conclude that the Viking diaspora was characterized by substantial foreign engagement: distinct Viking populations influenced the genomic makeup of different regions of Europe, while Scandinavia also experienced increased contact with the rest of the continent.
Original languageEnglish
JournalNature
Volume585
Pages (from-to)390-396
Number of pages7
ISSN0028-0836
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 16 Sept 2020

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