Mycenean royal face reconstructed

[RichT]

One of the joys of not working is being able to deeply (or obsessively, if you must) pursue things that spark my interest, and I found this question of blue-eyed, auburn-haired Mycenaeans quite interesting - though as you can imagine, once you get into skin tones etc, and relatedness of modern to ancient populations, you quickly get into some extremely dodgy and unpleasant internet territory.

But skirting round all of that, here is the paper with the DNA analysis for these graves:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/223611071_Kinship_between_burials_from_Grave_Circle_B_at_Mycenae_revealed_by_ancient_DNA_typing

More info about Mycenaean DNA; see especially the table "Extended Data Table 2. Phenotypic inference of ancient individuals".

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5565772/

'HIrisPlex' appears to be the state of the art for eye/hair prediction, and for Mycenaeans, it's brown/brown (with occasional variations).

I also asked ChatGPT for a summary of knowledge of this individual (Gamma 58):

"Regarding Gamma 58, the woman interred in Grave Circle B at Mycenae, specific details about her eye and hair color remain undetermined. While mitochondrial DNA analysis has identified her haplogroup as UK (now referred to as haplogroup K), this information pertains to maternal ancestry and does not provide insights into physical traits such as eye or hair color.

Efforts to retrieve nuclear DNA from her remains, which could have offered clues about these phenotypic characteristics, have not been successful. Consequently, without nuclear DNA data, it's not possible to determine Gamma 58's eye and hair color.

In the broader context of Mycenaean populations, genetic studies suggest that while brown eyes and dark hair were predominant, variations did exist, including alleles associated with lighter eye colors. However, applying these general findings to Gamma 58 specifically would be speculative without direct genetic evidence."

So, no surprise, this 'reconstruction' is utter hogwash.