SHOVELING - into the North Italian Bronze Age with an integrative approach to unearth the evolutionary origins of a non-metric dental trait

Abstract:

• earlier or coeval migrations from Asia;
• ancestral inheritance from a hominin;
• local selection due to diverse possible agents.

To test which of the proposed hypotheses might explain the presence of shovel-shaped incisors in Italian protohistoric individuals, we propose an integrative approach which includes anthropological investigation, ancient DNA and stable isotope analyses, along with genetic examination of modern populations from different regions. The proposed research will elucidate population dynamics or adaptation of Bronze Age people in Northern Italy, contributing to shed light on our ancestry. Moreover, and even more significantly, it will highlight from an ancient perspective the evolutionary aspects behind the development of a pleiotropic gene, its interplay with environment and cultural behaviors, and possibly its interaction with other genetic sites