Ancient DNA reveals Asian and Persian ancestry of the Swahili people

March 29 () –

The inhabitants of the ‘Swahili coast’ – the Indian coast in eastern Africa – have Asian and Persian ancestry as well as African descent, reveals a study on ancient DNA.

Archaeologists believe the results, based on findings from excavations including those led by Professor Stephanie Wynne-Jones of York University, UK, and Professor Jeffrey Fleisher, of Rice University, US, confirm that between the years 900 and 1100 relations were established between Asian merchants and African traders in coastal cities of Kenya and Tanzania. The findings are published in Nature.

DNA analyses, performed at Harvard University’s Reich Laboratory, allowed scientists to estimate that people of African and Persian descent began having children together around the turn of the second millennium. The descendants of those children ruled the Swahili cities 500 years later and were recovered from burials excavated by the team.

Professor Stephanie Wynne-Jones, co-author of the study from York University’s Department of Archaeology, acknowledges it’s a statement that “we have long believed that cultural changes were associated with the adoption of Islam, and this new research provides us with a genetic time frame that suggests this is a reasonable hypothesis.”

“Merchants from Persia traveled to the African coast to trade and stayed there for a long time,” he continues. “The DNA from the burials we have studied show African and Persian ancestry. The Persian line came from men, which suggests that they entered into relationships with African women.”

Some 500 years later we see ancestry coming from Arabia instead of Persia, probably related to changing economic and political influences.

Jeffrey Fleisher, of Rice University, and one of the study’s co-authors, says, “Oral histories of Swahili living in East Africa have often told us of their Persian ancestry, which researchers have believed for many years to be it was a way for the Swahili people to use their trade links with Persia and other foreign countries for political gain, but our data reveals that these oral records were correct, which shows how important it is to take oral traditions seriously.”

The study has shed new light on Swahili culture, long associated with archaeological investigations suggesting African ancestry for all coastal civilizations.

Professor Wynne-Jones stresses that “this data should be seen as a catalyst for a new, less binary approach to Swahili society. It shows that people were moving and establishing deep connections and families in the Indian Ocean region, and that migrants persians would have been part of the cosmopolitan world created by coastal African societies”.

“The research that has supported this study is part of a long-term commitment to explore the human experience and daily life on the coast,” he concludes.