People always ask me what to read in relation to the field of historical population genetics. In the 2000s there were a series of books which focused on the mtDNA and Y results from modern phylogeographic analysis. Journey of Man, Seven Daughters of Eve, The Real Eve, and Mapping Human History. But there hasn’t been much equivalent in the 2010s.
Why? I think part of the issue is that the rate of change has been so fast that scholars and journalists haven’t been able to keep up. And, the change is happening right now, so it would likely mean that any book written over a year would be moderately out of date by publication.
I noticed today that Jean Manco has an updated and revised version of her book, Ancestral Journeys: The Peopling of Europe from the First Venturers to the Vikings. This was needed, because the original book was written before some major recent findings, though after some preliminary ones. As Manco has observed herself it was feasible to replace speculations with facts.
Since it seems likely that George R. R. Martin’s next book will be published before David Reich’s, I think that’s all you got. Any suggestions would be welcome.
As for the flip side for history that might be useful to understanding the genetics results, J. M. Roberts The History of the World is the best cliff notes I can think of. It’s obviously a high level survey, but frankly that would improve the interpretation I see in some papers. The fact that much of the history has no contemporary relevance is pretty unimportant, since you want to focus on the older stuff, which is where ancient DNA really shows its metal.
At some point ancient DNA will start to exhibit diminishing returns. Then the long hard slog of interpretation and synthesis will have to begin in earnest.
For a layman who reads blogs like GNXP and wanted to know more, reading Mallory’s “In Search of the Indo-Europeans” and Anthony’s “The Horse, The Wheel, and Language” were great serious introductions to topics I had only read about online.
agree