Ancient hominins (the ancestors)

I revisited ancient humans (first time with the Internet) a few years back with recent discoveries about the Denisovans (there is a fascinating cave with a jade bracelet and other discoveries) and other ancient humans (giants and hobbits; Neanderthals and homo floresiensis). Interesting topic for those curious about what it means to be human. Millenia of waves of migration tell a story that isn’t restricted to the past couple hundred years, so if anyone is interested here is a thread for information and discussion on this topic.

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This one has seen some resistance in the northern land bridge theory crowd.

Still? I thought island hopping was fairly accepted by now. Also, hilarious that if there were people wiped it it could have been colonials who did it (like the Indigenous people wouldn’t do that kind of thing to each other)…


If you want some really out there fringe, to which I do not subscribe personally but did look into once upon a time:

To be clear, I do not give this hypothesis personal endorsement.

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The article you posted says that the migration was via the bering straits.

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Ya I posted it thinking it was a different article. I can’t find what I was looking for where it was suggested there was a South Pacific migration. My bad.

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Yeah, I don’t see how people sharing a common origin with the Melanesians, Negritos, and Australian Aboriginals has to arrive in the Americas another way than the Bering strait.

They were obviously the first modern humans to reach Southeast Asia 75 thousand year ago, along coastal India. From there, some of them could have easily have travelled North and cross the land bridge, while the rest moved further South, and eventually reaching Australia.

The next wave of human migration wouldn’t have reached East Asia until around 35kya, a good 4000 years later. Those groups wouldn’t have crossed the Bering strait until 20kya. That gives the Australo-Melanesian group a good 55 thousand year head start to move into the Americas, even if they only did so in limited numbers.

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The possibility that they didn’t stop at Easter Island is intriguing.

The Australo-Melanesian group migrated along coastal routes, not across the ocean.

I think the oldest evidence of human habitation on easter Island is approx 1000 years. Whereas in south america it’s approx 10,000 years.

One reason you might have trouble finding articles that support a southern pacific route, is that those articles are very few on the ground.

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That’s the intriguing part, for me. The question is begging to be asked, “Why not?”. The findings of dirt diggers in recent years have opened many cans of worms.

I’ve dug into this a bit in the past and there’s all kinds of fascinating stuff at the edges.
.For instance I found that Native Americans had some more neanderthal/denisovan genes than later immigrants.

Was it because they mixed in Asia and then moved over.
Was it because neanderthals actually made it to N.America in small numbers ?

It seems I may have been onto something !

Yeah almost everything points to people coming in over the Bering sea. How early they came is the main question and WHO were those humans.

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I agree. But, is it a fault in data or is it because there is a herd mentality if certain areas of research? Graham Hancock was considered a whacko from outside the field until lettered academics proved his theories plausible.

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He’s still a whacko. :grin:

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We needs us some whackos.

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They simply didn’t develop ship building technology capable of long distance open ocean voyage? It took Europeans a pretty darn long time to develop that capability themselves.

The Australo-Melanesian group migrated before the last glacial maximum (33kya~20kya).

One of my life goals is to visit this place and the Altai Mountains .

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/article/151116-denisovan-human-anthropology-ancient-dna

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I get that. I’m less apt to take for given things that are accepted beliefs on what the ancients were capable of in the face of places like the Saksaywaman( Sacsayhuamán) Walls.

Yeah I think we have to keep an open mind the possibility that some of these peoples could have made it. Either by drifting in boats or tsunamis or a few crazy fishermen or religious types . Just small numbers.

Those are from the 15th century😆