Ancient Mitogenomes from Belize Provide Insights into the Mobility and Migration of Ancient Communities in Mesoamerica and the Caribbean

Abstract

Maya peoples have undergone several largescale demographic transformations over the past 3000 years, including the formation and depopulation of large urban centers, climatic events, and multiple colonial regimes. Archaeological and stable isotope evidence from across the Maya lowlands throughout these periods paints a picture of a demographically mobile population with complex and dynamic relationships among some of the largest urban polities in antiquity. The nature of the genomic relationship between ancient Maya urban centers, as well as their relationship with present-day Maya communities, however, remains under-characterized. Here, we present mitogenomic data of 16 ancient Maya Ancestors recovered from interments in the ancient Maya cities of Caracol and Santa Rita Corozal located in Western and Northern Belize. These ancient data were combined with 110 newly collected contemporary individuals from Northern Belize, along with nearly 600 previously published ancient and contemporary comparative mitogenomes recovered from sites spanning Mesoamerica and the Caribbean to reconstruct paleodemographic and mobility patterns of maternal lineages through time. Our results are consistent with broadly interconnected Maya populations that have maintained maternal genetic continuity across much of the Holocene, and which are not structured by linguistic family. Significance Recent developments in genome-wide studies have provided valuable insights into the relationships between Indigenous Peoples across Mesoamerica. Fewer have focused on matrilineal relationships specific to the Maya, a group that has had a sustained influence in the region for millennia and had some of the largest urban polities since antiquity. Here, we contribute the whole mitogenome sequencing of 16 ancient Maya Ancestors from the polities of Caracol and Santa Rita Corozal in Belize. We additionally contribute 110 whole mitogenomes from living residents who identify as Maya people living in the Northern Belizean district of Corozal, a region known to have a complex migratory history, past and present. We find evidence of sustained maternal lineage sharing both between Maya-speaking groups, and with other groups across Mexico, a pattern not clearly structured by linguistic affiliation. This study contributes to characterization of the complex demographic history in Mesoamerica by providing diachronic population genomic analysis at a more granular level.