Haplogroup X is found in approximately 2% of
native Europeans, and 13% of all native North Americans. Additionally, the Haplogroup is present in around 3% of Assyrians, with high concentrations in
Erzurum, Turkey as well. Notably, the haplogroup is especially common, at 14.3%, among the natives of
Bahariya Oasis (
Western Desert, Egypt. The X1 subclade is much less frequent, and is largely restricted to North Africa, the
Horn of Africa and the Near East. Subclade X2 appears to have undergone extensive population expansion and dispersal around or soon after the
Last Glacial Maximum, roughly 20,000 years ago. It is more strongly represented in the Near East, the
Caucasus, and southern Europe, and somewhat less strongly present in the rest of Europe. The highest concentrations are found in the
Ojibwe (25%),
Sioux (15%),
Nuu-Chah-Nulth (12%),
Georgia (8%),
Orkney (7%), and amongst the
Druze in Israel (27%). Subclades of X2 are not present in South American Amerindian populations. whose 9000-year old remains were discovered in
Washington State.
Archaeogenetics Haplogroup X has been found in various other bone specimens that were analysed for ancient DNA, including specimens associated with the
Alföld Linear Pottery (X2b-T226C, Garadna-Elkerülő út site 2, 1/1 or 100%),
Linearbandkeramik (X2d1, Halberstadt-Sonntagsfeld, 1/22 or ~5%), and
Iberia Chalcolithic (X2b, La Chabola de la Hechicera, 1/3 or 33%; X2b, El Sotillo, 1/3 or 33%; X2b, El Mirador Cave, 1/12 or ~8%) cultures.
Abel-beth-maachah 2201 was a man who lived between 1014 and 836 BC during the
Levant Iron Age and was found in the region now known as Abel Beth Maacah,
Metula, Israel. He was associated with the
Galilean cultural group. His direct maternal line belonged to mtDNA haplogroup X2b. Haplogroup X has been found in ancient Assyria and ancient Egyptian mummies excavated at the
Abusir el-Meleq archaeological site in Middle Egypt, which date from the late
New Kingdom and
Roman periods. Fossils excavated at the Late Neolithic site of
Kelif el Boroud in
Morocco, which have been dated to around 5,000 years old, have also been found to carry the X2 subclade.
Druze In Eurasia, the greatest frequency and variety of haplogroup X is observed in the
Druze, a minority population in
Israel,
Jordan,
Lebanon, and
Syria, as much in X1 (16%) as in X2 (11%). The Druze also have much diversity of X lineages. This pattern of heterogeneous parental origins is consistent with Druze oral tradition. The
Galilee Druze represent a population isolate, so their combination of a high frequency and diversity of X signifies a phylogenetic refugium, providing a sample snapshot of the genetic landscape of the Near East prior to the modern age.
North America Haplogroup X is also one of the five haplogroups found in the
indigenous peoples of the Americas. (namely, X2a subclade). Although it occurs only at a frequency of about 3% for the total current indigenous population of the Americas, it is a bigger haplogroup in northern North America, where among the
Algonquian peoples it comprises up to 25% of mtDNA types. It is also present in lesser percentages to the west and south of this area—among the
Sioux (15%), the
Nuu-chah-nulth (11%–13%), the
Navajo (7%), and the
Yakama (5%). In Latin America, Haplotype X6 was present in the
Tarahumara 1.8% (1/53) and
Huichol 20% (3/15) X6 and X7 was also found in 12% in
Yanomani people. Unlike the four main Native American mtDNA haplogroups (
A,
B,
C,
D), X is not strongly associated with
East Asia. The main occurrence of X in Asia discovered so far is in the
Altai people in
Siberia. One theory of how the X Haplogroup ended up in North America is that the people carrying it migrated from central Asia along with haplogroups A, B, C, and D, from an ancestor from the
Altai Region of Central Asia. Since the later 2000s and during the 2010s, evidence has turned against the Solutrean hypothesis, as no presence of mt-DNA ancestral to X2a has been found in Europe or the Near East. The New World X2a lineage is not derived from the Old World lineages such as X2b, X2c, X2d, X2e, and X2f, indicating an early origin of the New World lineage "likely at the very beginning of their expansion and spread from the Near East". The X2a subclade has not been found in Eurasia, and has most likely arisen within the early Paleo-Indian population, at roughly 13,000 years ago. A basal variant of X2a was found in the
Kennewick Man fossil (ca. 9,000 years ago). ==Subclades==