Historical Genetics in Albania and Greece

While not entirely static, Albania has more continuity from the late Bronze Age to the present than the rest of the Balkans. 

Most of Europe exhibits significant continuity with the late Bronze Age at a general level, but most of Europe has also seen that mix tweaked more in the subsequent 3200 years and the shuffling has been particularly great in the Balkans which saw migratory waves from Romans, Slavs, Germanic tribes, Huns, Avars, and Ottomans in the post-Bronze Age era, leaving the Balkans in their currently ethnically fragmented state.

The history of the Albanian people has long been debated, as they first appear in historical records in the eleventh century CE and their language is not closely related to any surviving Indo-European branches. Here, to reconstruct their history, we analysed over 6,000 ancient West Eurasian genomes and 74 newly sequenced present-day ethnic Albanians. Using a range of population genetics methods, including an enhanced protocol to detect identity-by-descent segments between ancient and present-day individuals, we detect continuity of West Balkan Late Bronze and Iron Age ancestry in Early Medieval Albania, to a greater degree than in neighbouring Balkan regions. 

We find that present-day Albanians predominantly descend from this remnant palaeo-Balkan group, which by at least 800–900 CE already exhibited a genetic profile suggesting that they are ancestral to many modern Albanians. In addition, we observe geographically structured admixture with Medieval East European-related groups, averaging 10–20% across present-day Albanians. Our findings provide insight into the demographic processes shaping Albanian ancestry and help locate the origin area of the Albanian language.

Davranoglou, LR., Lauka, A., Aristodemou, A. et al. "Ancient DNA evidence for the history of the Albanians." Nat Hum Behav (May 4, 2026) (pay per view). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-026-02462-z

Most of Greece has a gradient of Slavic ancestry dating to the middle ages that is largest in the north and smallest in the south. The Deep Maniots (a.k.a. Inner Mani) in southern mainland Greece are an exception to the rule on the paternal side. According to this Wikipedia link:

In the early modern period, Maniots gained a reputation as fierce and proudly independent warriors, who engaged in piracy and blood feuds. They lived mainly in fortified villages and "tower houses" built as defenses against "Frankish" (see Frankokratia) and Ottoman invaders.

The Maniots claim to be descendants of the ancient Spartans and heirs to their militaristic culture. Modern observers noted Maniots' self-identification as warriors ready to "preserve their liberty" with arms. Genetic studies have identified the Maniots of Inner Mani as a population isolate within mainland Greece, showing substantial parental genetic continuity from antiquity and limited influence from medieval population movements. 

. . .

In Outer Mani, family names end in -eas, while surnames of Inner Mani end in -akis, -akos, or—less frequently—-oggonas.

The Maniot dialect in Greece rejected sound chances found in other modern Greek dialects.

[It] shared with Tsakonian and with dialects spoken around Athens until the 19th century—is the divergent treatment of historical /y/ (written <υ>). Although this sound merged to /i/ everywhere else, these dialects have /u/ instead (e.g. [ˈksulo] versus standard [ˈksilo] 'wood'). These varieties are thought to be relic areas of a previously larger areal dialect group that used to share these features, and was later divided by the penetration of Arvanitika in much of its area, in the late Middle Ages. Other features of the Maniot dialect include the palatalization of velar consonants, i.e. the realization of /k, ɡ, x, ɣ/ as ([tɕ, dʑ] or [ɕ, ʑ] before /i, e, j/. This feature is shared with many southern dialects of Greek; especially Cretan.

The Mani can, in some respects, be seen as comparable to Appalachian populations in the U.S., which share its culture of honor, its tendency to be organized in clans, its reduced admixture with outside groups, and a conservative dialect of its language (the Appalachian dialect of English is the closest living dialect of England to the Elizabethan dialect spoken in Shakespeare's era).

Notably, the founder effects seen are contemporaneous with the influx of Slavic migration into Greece (and Slavic expansion more generally), and may have been associated with a conscious resistance to and rejection of Slavic migration in the several centuries after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Per Wikipedia:

A 2017 study found they are genetically different from other groups in the Peloponnese region. Maniot individuals share a significant amount of their genome with each other, indicating a high degree of relatedness. They are also genetically isolated from other Greek populations, though they show some overlap with people from Sicily and southern Italy. This is attributed to the Maniots having the lowest levels of Slavic genetic ancestry in the Peloponnese. Maniots from East Mani have very little Slavic ancestry (0.7–1.6%), while those from West and Lower Mani have higher, but still relatively low, amounts (4.9–10.9%). The rest of the Peloponnesian population has a higher percentage of Slavic ancestry (4.8–14.4%). 

This genetic isolation suggests that the Maniots may be descended from the ancient Dorians.

The paper and its abstract are as follows: 

The Deep Maniots, an isolated population at the southernmost tip of mainland Greece, have drawn scholarly interest for their unique dialect, culture, and patrilineal clan structure. Geographically shielded by the Mani Peninsula, they are thought to have been minimally affected by 6th-century CE migrations that transformed Balkan demography. 

To investigate their genetic origins, we analysed Y-DNA and mtDNA from 102 Deep Maniots using next-generation sequencing. Paternally, Deep Maniots exhibit an exceptional prevalence (~80%) of West Asian haplogroup J-M172 (J2a), with subclade J-L930 accounting for ~50% of lineages. 

We identify Bronze Age Greek ancestry in Y-haplogroups nearly absent elsewhere, highlighting their longstanding genetic isolation. The absence of northeast European-related paternal lineages, common in other mainland Greeks, suggests preservation of southern Greece’s pre-Medieval genetic landscape. 

Y-haplogroup phylogeny reveals strong founder effects dated to ~380–670 CE, while the emergence of clan-based social structure is estimated around 1350 CE, centuries earlier than previously thought. 

In contrast, maternal lineages display greater heterogeneity, primarily originating from ancient Balkan, Levantine, and West Eurasian sources. These results align with historical and anthropological accounts, showcasing Deep Maniots as a genetic snapshot of pre-Medieval southern Greece, offering new perspectives on population continuity and mobility in the Late Antique eastern Mediterranean.

Davranoglou, LR., Kofinakos, A.P., Mariolis, A.D. et al. "Uniparental analysis of Deep Maniot Greeks reveals genetic continuity from the pre-Medieval era." 9 Commun Biol 157 (2026) (open access). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-026-09597-9