Study: Estonians Genetically Closer to Russians Than to Finns (17)

Published: 25.10.2012 12:40

Photo: Postimees/Scanpix

A newly published University of Tartu doctoral thesis has concluded that Estonians and Finns, despite having similar languages, are genetically less related than Estonians are to Latvians, Lithuanians, Poles and northwestern Russians.

Nevertheless, Estonians are still the closest genetic relatives that the Finns have, reported Postimees.

In the study, Tõnu Esko and others compared the DNA sequences of 16 European ethnicities.

Of the DNA sets analyzed, those most distantly related to Estonians were the Italians, French, Spanish, and Finns in northern Kuusamo region.

"Estonians' greater genetic similarity to Latvians and Lithuanians than to Finns has been known from previous classical blood studies, but this study is the first to show our genetic relation in such depth,“ said Esko.

"Since the 13th century we have been ruled by the Germans, Swedes, Poles and Russians,“ said Esko. "In addition to that, the Estonian territory has historically been divided in Estonia and Livonia - the latter is today northern Latvia and southern Estonia. It natural for there to be mixing on the border of two nations.“

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Comments (17)

  • Shock and Awe

    25.10.2012 16:03

    I guess local racists will have to remain silent now.

  • Darwin

    25.10.2012 17:23

    Somewhat research for the 40th of last century to relate genes with ethnicity.

  • Jreb

    25.10.2012 18:48

    I remember reading this study several years ago and in no way did it imply that Estonians & Russians are particularly all that similar, the main point was that Estonians are not as closely related to Finns as people my think (even they they are still the closest genetic relatives to Finns). The Finns genetic map showed that their genetic structure was totally unique for Europe while the Estonian genetic map showed a distribution between the Germanic, Finnish, and Baltic(Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Northwestern Russia) ethnic groups. This means that the Estonian genetics are not as homogenous as people may think. Overall, the closest ethnic group to the Estonians were Latvians. I posted this because I think title may cause unwarranted assumptions .

  • Balt

    27.10.2012 10:50

    As far as Y-DNA haplogroups go, Estonians are predominantly N1c1 or just N (Uralic), I1 (Nordic) and R1a (Most common among Western and Eastern Slavs in Europe). Estonians are on average 34% N, 32% R1a and 15% I1 (the rest R1b, common in Western Europe, others, etc.). Latvians, Lithuanians and Northwestern Russians have a very similar composition (Latvians for example being 40% R1a, 38% N and 6% I1). Interestingly, Northwestern Russians are actually more genetically similar to Estonians, Latvians and Lithuanians than to Central and Southern Russians (who have a dominant frequency of R1a and are almost genetically identical to Belarusians, Ukrainians and Poles). Finns, in contrast, are overwhelmingly N (about 59%), 28% I1 and only 8% R1a. Swedes are mostly I1 (37%) and 22% R1b, 19% R1a and only 9% N. The interesting thing about this is if an individual where of say, Swedish and Polish descent on their father's side and say, Finnish and Russian descent on their mother's side they would genetically be quite close to the average Estonian despite not having any Estonian origin. In summary, Estonians, Latvians, Lithuanians and Northwestern Russians form a genetic group with Finns being closely related to this group.

  • Frank

    28.10.2012 01:32

    Given the large number of naturalised Estonian immigrants from Russia during the 20th C, it should be no surprise.

  • Liisike

    29.10.2012 21:34

    Kas uurimisel arvestati ka, et väga palju soome ugrilasi elas põhja-lääne venemaal ja nii on venelastel palju soomeugrilaste päritoluga geene. Samuti on ju liivlased soome-ugri tõugu ja seega paljud segunenud lätlased tegelikult soome-ugri päritolu. Did the research take into account that many russians have inherited finno-ugric genes from the tribes that lived previouly in the now Russian territory. Also that many Latvians are descendants from the Liivlased.

  • Jüri Estam

    30.10.2012 12:40

    Until the Russian "window to the West" was carved out at the Neva River Delta in the form of Petrograd just some centuries ago, a big swath of territory to the East of Estonia and Finland was inhabited basically by various Finnic peoples - the Ingrian Finns, Karelian Finns, Votes, Vepsians, etc. From a Fenno-Ugrian standpoint, much of Northeastern Russia is a graveyard of nations and languages, with others hanging on by the skin of their teeth. Many people are unaware of or are incapable of seeing modern Russia as superimposed atop many areas that are neither European nor Slavic. The Finnic arc of cultures that spreads from the Baltic Sea and the Sami territories over to the far north of Russia is a civilization of its own, simply not very visible - once you cross the Eastern borders - to those who are not very much in the know about the "Russias" (actually non-Russias) submerged in that large land mass. Very often, when you see a blonde person (many have brown and black hair, of course) in Leningrad Oblast, you are actually encountering an assimilated Finnic person. Of course our genes are similar or identical. It is just that a dwindling number of Estonians still speak Estonian, but that person in Russia has often forgotten his or her mother tongue. This goes to show once again how important having your own territory and government is in the modern era, if your culture is to survive. Over there on the other side of the Narva river, that person's grandmother or mother may still have spoken a related heritage language that has subsequently been erased or is struggling to continue to be spoken by a small group, often made up of older persons. To Shock and Awe: to little peoples across the world, it is not a matter of racism. It's a matter of struggling to not go out of business; for these cultures to remain distinct and hopefully interesting with their diversity and differences; it is a matter of language death vs. survival and élan vital and the right to exist on God's green Earth, be it otherwise as festooned with gray concrete as it is. It is a matter of not just paying lip service to diversity, but of recognizing that little cultures deserve moral support and practical measures in order for the world to not finish as one great big homogenized vat of sameness. See the Red Book of the Peoples of the Russian Empire

  • Balt

    30.10.2012 22:07

    @ Jüri Estam Beautifully said, thank you!

  • "good" news for russophobes

    31.10.2012 08:52

    Shoch and Awe, well said, thank you! Frank, the number of naturalised Estonian immigrants from Russia during the 20th C, is actually very small.

  • Observer

    01.11.2012 20:59

    Jüri makes a good point. Northwestern Russians are essentially Russified Finnic people. As pointed out by Balt, this is confirmed by the fact that Northwestern Russians have less similarity to Central and Southern Russians than to Estonians and Latvians.

  • Yu Hai

    02.11.2012 15:31

    I'm completely not surprised about this. Finno-Ugaric peoples, as they look like, have been assimilated into ordinary European peoples for centuries. Similarily, the overall Finno-Ugaric peoples may be less related to Samoyedic peoples and Yukaghirs than to Baltic peoples and Livonians may be less related to Eestis than to Latvians. Whatever studies scholars made, the peculiar Uralic languages are there. The Finno-Ugric peoples have never been noted for their physical characteristics, nor do they have lots of distinctive culture: • Ukkoism has been extinct; • All secular customs among them looks just like other Europeans do; • Even their languages contains huge amount of Indo-European loanwords (too many such that people naturally ask "what remains?"). At a first glance, it's regrettable that Finno-Ugric peoples have "vanished" (just like Bulgars). But after think twice it clear that all is well: as the ancient Eurasians arrived at the hinterland of European civilization, they were destined to be naturalized into common European civilization. And we should rejoice in that Finno-Ugric peoples succeed to do that without losing their mother tongue, in that they have accepted well developed European civilization and intermarried with them, and in that Samoyedic peoples and Yukaghirs to preserve cultures, languages, and physical characteristics of Proto-Uralic people.

  • Donald

    02.11.2012 22:26

    If many Russian settlers in Estonia are in fact Russified Finnic people, then assimilating them into Estonian speakers would in fact be just reconnecting them to their Finnic roots.

  • Balt

    03.11.2012 11:38

    @ Donald True, I've always wondered whether most of the Russian population in Estonia came from Northwestern Russia or other parts of Russia. I know Russians came from all over the former Soviet Union, but it would be interesting if the majority of them came from neighbouring regions in Northwest Russia (like Pskov, Novgorod, Vologda and the Leningrad Oblasts or the Republic of Karelia). I haven't been able to find any statistics on it so far.

  • AV

    03.11.2012 15:07

    @"good" news... Not sure, how you can say that "the number of naturalised Estonian immigrants from Russia during the 20th C, is actually very small". Before the Soviet occupation, the share of Russian population in Estonia was about 5%. By the end of it, it was around 35%. Can you really say that an increase from 5% to 35% was very small? How much should it have increased to be big in your view?

  • AV

    03.11.2012 15:21

    @Donald - you are right, but the assimilation has more to do with the mentality and culture than genes. If those "Russified Finnic people" have obtained the mentality of "homo soveticus" then it is hard to hope for a successful assimilation despite the genetical closeness...

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