Abstract
Domestic cattle were brought to Spain by early settlers and agricultural societies. Due to missing Neolithic sites in the Spanish region of Galicia, very little is known about this process in this region. We sampled 18 cattle subfossils from different ages and different mountain caves in Galicia, of which 11 were subject to sequencing of the mitochondrial genome and phylogenetic analysis, to provide insight into the introduction of cattle to this region. We detected high similarity between samples from different time periods and were able to compare the time frame of the first domesticated cattle in Galicia to data from the connecting region of Cantabria to show a plausible connection between the Neolithization of these two regions. Our data shows a close relationship of the early domesticated cattle of Galicia and modern cow breeds and gives a general insight into cattle phylogeny. We conclude that settlers migrated to this region of Spain from Europe and introduced common European breeds to Galicia.
Highlights
Neolithization is the transition of human societies from hunting and gathering to settlement and agriculture [1]
The partial mitochondrial genomes are made public in NCBI GenBank under accession numbers MW689247-MW689255, except mitochondrial genomes of samples Bt_MR_(3736BP) and Bt_CO_(60BP), which cannot be made available at NCBI GenBank, since they do not meet the GenBank submission criteria
This study identified and characterized remains of 11 different Galician cattle roaming this region throughout different ages
Summary
Neolithization is the transition of human societies from hunting and gathering to settlement and agriculture [1]. During this process, which started around 10,500 BP in the Middle East, selected plants and animals were domesticated by humans for food, clothing, or other resources these species provided [2]. Genetic data of ancient and modern samples from domestic cattle Bos taurus suggest that the domestication of its wild ancestor, the aurochs Bos primigenius, began in the Middle East [3]. Domestic cattle spread from the Middle East to Anatolia, Europe and Africa, and local domestication or maternal interbreeding with B.
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