Hunter-gatherers took refuge in European 'water world' for millennia

Ancient genomic data has revealed that inhabitants of the Rhine-Meuse river delta — wetland and coastal areas of modern-day Netherlands, Belgium and western Germany — maintained high levels of hunter-gatherer genetic ancestry for thousands of years after successive migrations from the east transformed most of Europe into farming and animal-herding communities. This group’s eventual mix with communities of people with ancestry from the central Eurasian steppe catalysed the expansion of Bell Beaker culture, which was accompanied by major shifts in the genetic make-up of both Britain and the Rhine–Meuse delta.