Ancient DNA links Germanic languages to a migration into Scandinavia 4,000 years ago
Two studies in Nature analysed DNA from more than 4,500 ancient people, including 712 newly sequenced genomes, and compared population movements with archaeological and linguistic evidence. The researchers suggest a migration into Scandinavia around 4,000 years ago may have brought an early form of Germanic, while a movement west from central Europe around 3,000 years ago offers a possible route for Celtic languages. DNA alone cannot show which languages people spoke.
Bottom line — The studies point to migration as one possible route for Germanic and Celtic languages, but the language link remains an inference.
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The Scandinavian migration may place Germanic’s arrival about 800 years later than traditionally assumed, according to the researchers.
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Around 1,500 years ago, people from what is now northern Germany moved into Denmark and southern Sweden, around the time Old Norse emerged.
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The researchers say those newcomers were closely related to groups that contributed to the Anglo-Saxons, offering a possible explanation for cultural and linguistic similarities.
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The Celtic findings favour a central European origin, but an earlier migration from southwestern Europe into Britain leaves room for a more complex history.
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The authors of The Conversation note that Norway saw little genetic impact from the later migration, yet its people still took part in the linguistic changes that produced Old Norse.