Europe’s Forgotten Neolithic Migration into Africa

MyHeritage is running a special promotion for a limited time! Click the link https://bit.ly/DanDavisDAND19 or scan the QR code, and use the coupon code DAND19 to get your DNA kit for just $19! Over 7,000 years ago, Neolithic farmers crossed the Mediterranean from Iberia into North Africa. Carrying Cardial Ware pottery, domesticated crops and livestock, these European migrants established communities in Morocco and mixed with indigenous Maghrebi hunter-gatherers. Archaeology and ancient DNA shows how farming spread through migration, cultural adoption and later movements from the Levant. Including the remarkable spread of the R1b-V88 paternal lineage from Mesolithic Europe and Neolithic Iberia into the Green Sahara, and ultimately to populations living around Lake Chad today. *If you enjoy my videos please consider supporting the channel* Become a YouTube Channel Member: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUVwT8zcS5Z_rYXnpomlbfg/join Support me on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/dandavisauthor All my books on Amazon: https://amzn.to/3xngwz5 *Sources* Gronenborn, D., & Horejs, B. (2025). Map: Expansion of farming in western Eurasia, 9600 - 4000 cal BC (update vers. 2025.1) [Graphic]. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.16881455 Maptism, '5100 BC Atlas: A Continent-Wide Snapshot of Neolithic Europe,' 2024. https://maptism.org/maps/5100bc-atlas/ Fregel, R. et al. 2018. Ancient genomes from North Africa evidence prehistoric migrations to the Maghreb from both the Levant and Europe Simões, L. G. et al. 2023. Northwest African Neolithic initiated by migrants from Iberia and Levant Zilhão, J. 2001. Radiocarbon evidence for maritime pioneer colonization at the origins of farming in west Mediterranean Europe Lipson, M. et al. 2025. High continuity of forager ancestry in the Neolithic period of the eastern Maghreb Salem, N. et al. 2025. Ancient DNA from the Green Sahara reveals ancestral North African lineage Cruciani, F. et al. 2010 Human Y chromosome haplogroup R-V88: a paternal genetic record of early mid-Holocene trans-Saharan connections and the spread of Chadic languages. D’Atanasio, E. et al. 2018 The peopling of the last Green Sahara revealed by high-coverage resequencing of trans-Saharan patrilineages Alt, K. W. et al. 2020. A massacre of early Neolithic farmers in the high Pyrenees at Els Trocs, Spain Gibaja, J. F. et al. 2024. The first Neolithic boats in the Mediterranean: the settlement of La Marmotta, Anguillara Sabazia, Lazio, Italy Scerri, E. M. L. et al. 2025. Hunter-gatherer sea voyages extended to remotest Mediterranean islands Van de Loosdrecht, M. et al. 2018. Pleistocene North African genomes link Near Eastern and sub-Saharan African human populations Linstädter, J. and Kehl, M. 2012. The Holocene archaeological sequence and sedimentological processes at Ifri Oudadane, northeast Morocco. Morales, J. et al. 2013. The origins of agriculture in North-West Africa: macro-botanical remains from Epipalaeolithic and Early Neolithic levels of Ifri Oudadane, Morocco Ballouche, A. and Marinval, P. 2003. Données palynologiques et carpologiques sur la domestication des plantes et l’agriculture dans le Néolithique ancien du Maroc septentrional: site de Kaf Taht el-Ghar. Morales, J. et al. 2016. The introduction of South-Western Asian domesticated plants in North-Western Africa: an archaeobotanical contribution from Neolithic Morocco. Martínez-Sánchez, R. M. et al. 2018. The beginning of the Neolithic in northwestern Morocco Martínez-Sánchez, R. M. et al. 2021. Revisiting the Epipalaeolithic–Neolithic transition in the extreme northwest of Africa: the latest results of the chronological sequence of the cave of Kaf Taht el-Ghar, Tétouan, Morocco Martínez-Sánchez, R. M. et al. 2021. La decoración cerámica en el Neolítico de Kaf Taht el-Ghar, Tetuán, Marruecos: campaña AGRIWESTMED 2012 *Artists* https://www.deviantart.com/philipedwin https://x.com/Sulkalmakh https://www.deviantart.com/ancienteuropeans2 *Chapters* 00:00 Europe’s Into Africa migration 02:43 Sponsorship 04:35 Neolithic European Migrations 10:10 Into Africa Migration 15:29 European Lineages in Africa