Rh- blood likely frequent in ancient Egypt

Takabuti was a married woman who reached an age of between twenty and thirty years. She lived in the Egyptian city of Thebes at the end of the Twenty-fifth Dynasty of Egypt. Her mummified body and mummy case are in the Ulster Museum in Belfast.

How frequent was Rh negative blood in ancient Egypt?

The University of Manchester’s KNH Centre performed an analysis of mitochondrial and exomic genome on Takabuti. The findings show that Takabuti has the H4a1 mitochondrial DNA haplogroup (a haplogroup defines a group of genetic variants held by people who share a common ancestor. Mitochondrial defines the ancestry on the maternal side).

The H4a1 variant possessed by Takabuti is relatively rare in modern populations, with a modern distribution including ~ 2% of a southern Iberian population, ~ 1% in a Lebanese population and ~ 1.5% of multiple Canary Island populations.

How different were the ancient Egyptians from the current population?

Analysis of Takabuti’s well-preserved hair found that it was naturally auburn in colour.

Red-Haired Rh Negative Tribes

In April of 2021, a new book on Takabuti was published, revealing that she had not been killed by a knife, but instead by an axe, probably while she was attempting to escape from her assailant (speculated to either be an Assyrian soldier or one of Takabuti’s own people). The wound was found in her upper left shoulder, and was more than likely instantaneously fatal.

Do you have an extra vertebrae?

It was also found that Takabuti’s heart had not been removed (as previously thought), and she possessed two very rare mutations: an extra tooth (which appears in 0.02 per cent of the population) and an extra vertebra (which occurs in 2 per cent of the population).

Some ancient Egyptians were natural blondes