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| Skhul (Palestine 120 Ka ago) |
Just found at NeanderFollia[cat] these wonderful artist's recreations. Hartmut Zänder's MySpace page[de] is full of fascinating portraits, just that many of them are from people who are not anymore among us but have been gone for many many thousand years.
Zänder's art is specially dedicated to mtDNA haplogroup K and of course that implies drawing Ötzi, who has ended up being quite more handsome than in other reconstructions I have seen. Now, thanks to Zänder, we can recognize the iceman as a typical North Italian.
But what really caught my attention are the portraits of early H. sapiens, which are quite in the line of what I could imagine. A nice detail is that Zänder draws them with thin lines within a rectangle; I can't be sure if he does that for the reason I imagine but as soon as I saw these images, they reminded me stylistically of the engraved Magdalenian portraits of La Marche.
Update: An older site by the same author with dozens of reconstructed or rather imagined haplogroup matriarchs by Zänder. Quite impressive.
Update (Mar 17 2012): Zaender has a blog: Regional Ancestry Bands, you may want to visit.
Update: An older site by the same author with dozens of reconstructed or rather imagined haplogroup matriarchs by Zänder. Quite impressive.
Update (Mar 17 2012): Zaender has a blog: Regional Ancestry Bands, you may want to visit.
wow, the skhul people were bushmen! :-)
ReplyDeleteIn truth I can't say why he choses this recreation and not others but look at Jebel Irhoud and tell me if she does not remind of modern North Africans somewhat, in the more African (but non-Negroid) side of the equation.
ReplyDeleteIn North Africa as in East Africa (Ethiopia specially) we see people who remind of Khoisans, even if not quite the same. Even one could say the East Asians retain some Khoisan features and that's why they look the way they look an not "Caucaso-Australo-Papuoid" (the most common Eurasian phenotype) or pseudo-Negroid (Negritos, some island Melanesians).
So I did like these reconstructions but admittedly only because they match my ideas based on modern phenotypes.
Just for the record, I do not think Skhul/Qahfez are central to the OoA anyhow but peripheral/parallel and more related to Aterian North Africans in fact (though they may have been vectors of Neanderthal admixture). Instead I relate the OoA with coastal (or maybe coastal and inland) migration through Arabia peninsula, for which there is quite a bit of archaeological evidence (and matches genetics well too).
Hre's another website of the artist with reconstructions for all mitochondrial mothers:
ReplyDeletehttp://zaender.com/ur/magenta/marias.htm
Althought most of them are quite accurate in the sense Zänder likely chooses the most common woman type in the region with the highest frequency of each haplogroup, I've found a blonde, blue-eyed mitochondrial mother for an L3 lineage, which is quite bizarre, but I still think these quite good reconstrutions.
L3h, yes. XD
ReplyDeleteShe's not blond (brown haired with a yellow hair-band) but she does have blue eyes, what is definitely wrong.
I did not understand how the site works first, I thought all links were broken... but it's just heavy and not-too-obvious of javascript.
Pretty cool in any case.
"Instead I relate the OoA with coastal (or maybe coastal and inland) migration through Arabia peninsula, for which there is quite a bit of archaeological evidence (and matches genetics well too)".
ReplyDeleteWhat evidence? Elsewhere you wrote:
"I'll judge for what the hard data says".
But here you seem to be just cooking up some crazy theory that sounds very much ad-hoc and implausible, with no 'hard data' to support it.
"What evidence?"
ReplyDeleteFor the Arabia migration? I can't believe you read this blog when you ask that: http://forwhattheywereweare.blogspot.com/2011/06/various-options-for-migration-out-of.html
"For the Arabia migration? I can't believe you read this blog when you ask that: http://forwhattheywereweare.blogspot.com/2011/06/various-options-for-migration-out-of.html"
ReplyDeleteMy objections at the time still stand. I have no problem with humans having expanded through the Arabian Peninsular. I have extreme doubt about them having entered via the Bab al Mandab, or having once done so they moved along the coast. And the original article you linked to at that older post is less dogmatic about a 'coastal' migration than you are.
"For the Arabia migration?"
ReplyDeleteMore thoughts on it. The fact that we find only downstream Y-haps in the Southern Arabian Peninsular should set off alarm bells for any belief in the Southern Coastal Route for the original OoA. Most common are J1 and E1b, J1 from the north and E1b from Africa. Not indigenous to the Southern Arabian coast. And the mtDNA L's in the region can all be explained as post an original OoA, whenever that was.
And in the Horn of Africa the Asian Y-hap T, from perhaps as far away as India's east coast, is quite common. So the earliest trans Bab al Mandab crossing is much more likely to have been from east to west, not the other way.
Geography should also set off alarm bells for the southern coastal route. At times of lowered sea level the Bab becomes narrower. But sea level is low during colder periods. At such times evaporation is lower, and so precipitation is lower. Increased aridity. Humans would not have expanded far at such times, especially not through the Arabian Peninsular. Or along its coast. I'll grant that, as precipitation increases with increasing temperature, grassland may expand while the Bab was still closed. But grassland would also expand through the Sahara, allowing an entry into the Arabian Peninsular via the Levant.
Anyway, using either route, once out of Africa humans would have by no means been confined to the coast.
The archaeological evidence is there and that is what matters, added to the genetic evidence. Your speculations are otherwise trivial, just grunting because the evidence happens to pile up against your predilections.
ReplyDeleteCan you be a bit less of a sore loser, a bit more of a sport... and admit defeat?
As for the Y-DNA, the same you say for South Arabia is true for North Arabia and the Fertile Crescent. Y-DNA is simply not telling us much of the story in many places: it drifts too much.
I prefer not to comment on your climatic speculations. Just to say that arid or not the south coast is not desert - only semi-desert.
But as for the incorrect expression "Arabia Peninsular" (sic) that you use continuously, I must say it is "peninsula" (noun) and not "peninsular" (adjective). Correct you bad habit, please. You can say either Arabia Peninsula, Arabian Peninsula or Peninsular Arabia but not "Arabia Peninsular".
"The archaeological evidence is there"
ReplyDeleteI am not aware of any archaeological evidence whatsoever. Just speculation.
"As for the Y-DNA, the same you say for South Arabia is true for North Arabia and the Fertile Crescent".
You know very well that is not the case. We have G very near, if not originating in, the fertile crescent. We have both I and J, related haplogroups, apparently originating somewhere near North Arabia. And several mtDNAs are also present through the region.
"Just to say that arid or not the south coast is not desert - only semi-desert".
And both are unlikely to have been prime human habitat. Only occupied once population growth forced people ino them.
"You can say either Arabia Peninsula, Arabian Peninsula or Peninsular Arabia but not 'Arabia Peninsular'".
Noted. Thanks.
"Can you be a bit less of a sore loser, a bit more of a sport... and admit defeat?"
It is you who is refusing to admit defeat, I'm afraid.
"I am not aware of any archaeological evidence whatsoever".
ReplyDeleteSo what are all those tools scattered through Arabia and South Asia in the period usually attributed to the OoA and which are, if anything, closer typologically to those in Africa?
"Speculation"? No! They are hard facts, as hard as it can get, and as factual as it can be.
"We have G"...
G?! G is not basal for CF nor for CDEF: it's rather highly derived and implies a back-migration from South Asia where its "father" F has the greatest basal diversity by far.
Mentioning G is like mentioning mtDNA M1 or N1!
Burning nails! More burning than nails actually.
"And both are unlikely to have been prime human habitat. Only occupied once population growth forced people into them".
It depends on what you see as "prime human habitat", many sea the coasts as such thing.
But in any case, the colonization of Arabia was part of a more ample demographic expansion that also saw people pushed to other latitudes (Palestine, South Africa, 2nd North African wave probably as well). Nobody says that people went to Arabia as first choice...
... after all, it's only aprox. 25% of the basal diversity of L3 (counting L3* as one single branch, what is surely wrong), in turn 50% of that of L3'4 (13%), in turn 50% of that of L3'4'6 (6%), in turn 50% of the basal diversity of L2'3'4'6 (3%), in turn 50% of that of L2"6 (1.6%), in turn 50% of that of L1"6 (0.8%), in turn 50% of that of all known human (= African) mtDNA.
Total: 0.4%!!!
Does this agree with the marginal nature of Arabian ecology or rather with the supposedly lusty one of the Fertile Crescent?
There was a bottleneck of some sort upon leaving Africa, remember.
"It depends on what you see as 'prime human habitat', many sea the coasts as such thing".
ReplyDeleteIf the hinterland is arid, with no readily available fresh water, the coasts can hardly be described as 'prime human habitat'.
"the colonization of Arabia was part of a more ample demographic expansion that also saw people pushed to other latitudes (Palestine, South Africa, 2nd North African wave probably as well). Nobody says that people went to Arabia as first choice..."
My point exactly. They were by no means confined to the Arabian coast. Or any other coast for that matter.
"There was a bottleneck of some sort upon leaving Africa, remember".
Yes. Even the Levant coast is a very confined habitat, but surely more desirable than the South Arabian coastline. The Fertile Crescent is a much more likely route than Arabia.
"G?! G is not basal for CF nor for CDEF: it's rather highly derived and implies a back-migration from South Asia where its 'father' F has the greatest basal diversity by far".
It's pretty close to basal F. As for 'implies a back-migration from South Asia': because ... you were there at the time? And 'where its 'father' F has the greatest basal diversity by far': So? Isn't that diversity more likely to be a product of expansion into a widespread suitable habitat?
And you're ignoring Y-hap K, or IT, or whatever you wish to call it. It is rare that the pattern of diversification of a particular haplogroup can be easily matched to the pattern of haplogroup distribution. But in this case the match emerges clearly.
First IJ branched off, somewhere in Anatolia? At least nearby. Then TL branched off, somewhere around the India/Pakistan border? At least nearby. Then MNOPS branched off, somewhere in SE Asia? At least nearby. Between TL and MNOPS we have K1 in India. We have K2 and K4 in SE Asia and Australia/New Guinea, and K3 in Melanesia. That is a pretty good fit between the pattern of branching and a likely route to Melanesia. Yet it is difficult to make a fit with any migration originating in South Asia.
If IJ formed near Anatolia surely there is no reason why G may not have. After all the 'third generation' haplogroups M and S may have accompanied those 'second generation' Ks beyond SE Asia, so there is no reason why the 'second generation' haplogroup IT could not have accompanied F as it moved into India, leaving behind a descendant haplogroup that became G.
The coast has creeks, it is not desert. Besides, we have already seen that at certain times there were rivers even in Rub al-Khali.
ReplyDelete"It's pretty close to basal F".
It's basal F in fact, along with at least 6 other lineages, mind you.
"Isn't that diversity more likely to be a product of expansion into a widespread suitable habitat?"
No. I do not know why you come now with this when you have agreed to the opposite before.
"And you're ignoring Y-hap K, or IT, or whatever you wish to call it".
It does not matter: it's sub-F it belongs to the back-flow and not to the flow forward.
"It does not matter: it's sub-F it belongs to the back-flow and not to the flow forward".
ReplyDeleteHow the hell can you fit it to any sort of 'back-flow'? Only possible if you make huge, unjustified assumptions and ignore the actual haplogroup evidence.
"I do not know why you come now with this when you have agreed to the opposite before".
What?
"The coast has creeks, it is not desert".
Does it? Are you sure? I don't think so. Certainly a very limited number:
http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2010/world/middle-east/water-not-al-qaeda-is-yemen%E2%80%99s-main-domestic-concern-experts-say/
http://livinggreenandsavingenergy.com/yemen-is-running-out-of-water.html
Quote:
"The country of Yemen has no rivers—none. This means that fresh water comes entirely from ground water and rainfall".
Not ideal human habitat.
"we have already seen that at certain times there were rivers even in Rub al-Khali".
And at such times there were rivers all through Arabia. So why would humans be confined to the coast in any way at all? They could move directly through it.
It's clear that we do not understand each other: you do not understand what I say or why:
ReplyDelete"What?"
... and I do not understand what you say:
"How the hell can you fit it to any sort of 'back-flow'?"
How cannot you?!
And I also happen to think that you do all the time mix apples and oranges at your caprice and convenience:
"Yemen running out of water" (which talks about overpopulation in Sana'a not about what you pretend it talks about).
"The country of Yemen has no rivers—none".
Wikipedia: "The highland regions are interspersed with wadis, or river valleys, that are dry in the summer months. (Yemen has no permanent rivers.)"
They are dry in summer, what was surely not the case in many periods of the past anyhow. People have ALWAYS (since more than 100 Ka ago) lived in Yemen, as the archaeology tells, so they manage and they have always managed.
LOL, Bushmen survive with water in wild roots and such... what the heck?!
"The highland regions are interspersed with wadis, or river valleys, that are dry in the summer months".
ReplyDelete'Highland regions'? What has that got to do with a coastal migration? You said, 'The coast has creeks, it is not desert'. And 'dry in the summer months'? So the original OoA humans were capable of surviving without water for considerable periods?
"what was surely not the case in many periods of the past anyhow".
And during periods when the wadis were not dry in summer presumably the rest of Arabia was also not dry. So people could move all through Arabia. No 'coastal migration'.
"People have ALWAYS (since more than 100 Ka ago) lived in Yemen, as the archaeology tells"
Always? Evidence?
"Bushmen survive with water in wild roots and such... what the heck?!"
For how long do they survive?
"How cannot you?!"
Maju. Why don't you actually take a look at the haplogroups instead of making up your mind in advance, before you even consider the evidence. To me it is ludicrous to think that every one of the F and IT haplogroups formed in India and their present distribution is the result of a strange series of founder effects as they moved out from there.
I think we both agree that a population consisting of various F Y-haps, such as pre-G, pre-IT, Pre H, pre-F1 etc., began to spread from some region. We just disagree on where that region was. The most parsimonius explanation for the evidence is actually that when the spread began haplogroup IT had already formed, and accompanied the other Fs. In the population left behind at the western end of the original region drift eventually led to fixation of Y-hap G. A little further east IJ formed through drift in the group left behind in that region. As the movement continued east TL drifted to fixation in yet another population left behind. Then H. Then K1, F1 and F4 in India, each in separate regions I'll bet. In SE Asia F2, F3 and MNOPS. Further east still haplogroups K2 and K4 eventually reached Australia/New Guinea accompanied (possibly) by M and S. K3 made it to Melanesia.
"a back-migration from South Asia where its 'father' F has the greatest basal diversity by far".
Seems very unlikely. And if we're going to argue from diversity alone we could easily make a case for SE Asia as the place of origin for the whole lot. Or evn Australia/New Guinea.
"LOL, Bushmen survive with water in wild roots and such... what the heck?!"
ReplyDeletehttp://library.thinkquest.org/C006418/local%20host/Bushmen/bushmen.html
Quote:
"Since water is scarce, they carry it with them in large , leathery ostrich shells. When it is impossible to find spring water, they dig a hole in the ground and suck up water through a reed".
And:
"The Bushmen year is divided into two parts : a dry season ,in which families group together about water holes"
I think you are making things up. You don't really know what you're talking about.
I understand that there is fresh water, maybe not "permanent rivers" but certainly pools:
ReplyDeleteImages from Hadhramaut (some of which include freshwater in form of rivers, pools and what seems to be a reservoir).
Bountiful river area near Sana'a.
Images from Wadi Hadramaut in summer (dry).
I don't think these conditions are worse than in Harar or Kenya, some the likely homelands of humankind. Seasonal drought is common in the Hazara territory (Tanzania) for example but they take advantage from that to hunt more easily at the scattered water spots.
Not to mention that hardly ever was drier than it is now.
"Evidence?"
The link is above in this same discussion. Do you mind reading what I write at all?
http://forwhattheywereweare.blogspot.com/2011/06/various-options-for-migration-out-of.htm
"For how long do they survive?"
More than you would if you'd be at my reach. How can you be so childishly annoying?
"To me it is ludicrous to think that every one of the F [...] haplogroups formed in India".
I have a graph from you right over here where YOU claim or admit that F coalesced in "India".
You have changed your mind? Your problem. I have not.
Furthermore, I do not even think that Y-DNA haplogroups are of any great importance in all the debate about human origins. People is totally obsessed with Y-DNA but they get more confusion than answers from it often enough. Use mtDNA preferentially and Y-DNA only as a complement.
"When it is impossible to find spring water, they dig a hole in the ground and suck up water through a reed".
ReplyDeleteWhoa! How smart are these Bushmen! They not only survive without permanent rivers of any sort but also do in sufficient numbers as to keep extremely high levels of genetic diversity!
Naturally they would not be able to survive in Hadramaut for some magical reason that only Terry understands (sarcasm intended, of course).
"a dry season ,in which families group together about water holes"
Whoa! Water holes! Don't you think they'd be able to find/dig them in Hadhramaut?
"Whoa! Water holes! Don't you think they'd be able to find/dig them in Hadhramaut?"
ReplyDeleteNo. Not in Yemen anyway.
"Seasonal drought is common in the Hazara territory (Tanzania) for example but they take advantage from that to hunt more easily at the scattered water spots".
We're not talking 'seasonal drought' in Yemen. We're talking permanent drought.
"People is totally obsessed with Y-DNA but they get more confusion than answers from it often enough. Use mtDNA preferentially and Y-DNA only as a complement".
But we know that Y-DNA is surprisingly independent of mtDNA, and is replaced more easily. The Y-DNA indicates a movement of at least haplgroup F from somewhere near Anatolia to Melanesia. The only reason you can't see it is that you're totally committed to some sort of Garden of Eden origin in India.
"They not only survive without permanent rivers of any sort but also do in sufficient numbers as to keep extremely high levels of genetic diversity!"
ReplyDeleteAnd you really believe that such a method of obtaining drinking water would be sufficient for the whole group?
"Images from Hadhramaut (some of which include freshwater in form of rivers, pools and what seems to be a reservoir)".
A resevoir that was almost certainly not there when H. erectus first moved out of Africa. One seems to be a just a small rain hollow and others look to actually be the sea.
"Bountiful river area near Sana'a".
Well. Quote:
"The city of Ibb is built on the mountain of Jabal Ba’adan, overlooking the lush green countryside of the rain-blessed governorate of the same name".
Sana'a is at an altitude of over 3000 metres, miles from any coast. So what would it have to do with any 'coastal migration'.
"Images from Wadi Hadramaut in summer (dry)".
Dry alright. Considering it was important enough to give its name to the whole coast I presume it is the wettest region along the whole coast. And you believe that humans moved along that coast in preference to moving along the much more inviting region of the Tigris/Euphrates River valleys.
Another interesting snippet from the Bushman link, that you obviously missed:
ReplyDelete"The Bushmen live in one of the driest deserts in the world, the karahari Desert in South Africa. They were driven there by their Hottentot neighbours, for they once lived farther north".
Seems they don't live in the driest regions by choice. They have been forced into them.
"Not in Yemen anyway".
ReplyDeleteSo you think that nobody was able to live in Yemen until industrial methods of perforation and pumping were introduced in the 20th century, right?
Well, you're wrong.
Besides, you normally just need to dig in a dry riverbed (right place, I guess) to make a water hole. In Africa elephants are the main engineers, but in Yemen guess it'll have to be humans.
Besides you have no evidence that there are not or there were not any water holes in Yemen. All the coastal strip and highlands of the Red Sea are not "desert" but mere semi-desert like the Sahel. And that is now, go figure in the pluvial periods!
"We're not talking 'seasonal drought' in Yemen. We're talking permanent drought".
No. We're talking of seasonal drought: except in summer time there are rivers all around. That's seasonal.
"But we know that Y-DNA is surprisingly independent of mtDNA, and is replaced more easily".
Not so independent. I think they are quite coupled in fact.
Whatever the case, if Y-DNA is so easily replaced, it can't be too reliable providing info on ancient times, yes or yes.
"The Y-DNA indicates a movement of at least haplgroup F from somewhere near Anatolia to Melanesia".
What it indicates is origin in South Asia and spread to the West (G, IJ) and East (MNOPS) (and then spread westward of MNOPS as P).
Your diffuse idea (are you proposing something here???) seems to imply that between Anatolia to Papua there was not a single place where F is most likely to have coalesced and boomed from, and that is clearly false because (following your own notes, F*, F1, F4, as well as H, are from South Asia - also F3 AFAIK but you ignored it intently), that means that most F basal diversity (all but G, F2 and maybe IJK) is from South Asia and hence that F therefore coalesced in South Asia and nowhere else, being coupled at that space time essentially with mtDNA M.
Anyhow, it's Y-DNA, which agrees with what I say but it's not even the center of my argument at all, just accessory.
"And you really believe that such a method of obtaining drinking water would be sufficient for the whole group?"
ReplyDeleteYes, absolutely.
"Sana'a is at an altitude of over 3000 metres"...
2300 meters. LOL. >3000 is Bolivia!
"I presume"...
You presume too much.
"you believe that humans moved along that coast in preference to moving along the much more inviting region of the Tigris/Euphrates River valleys".
To arrive to Iraq you need to cross the Sinai desert and then the Syrian desert. Plus the Levant, which was largely inhabited by the dangerous Neanderthals.
So a "group A" moving through that route would have been seriously hindered in their march except probably in the Pluvial periods (i.e. in conditions much wetter than now).
They would also have lacked coastal inhabitation skills, such as boat-building capabilities and knowledge of sea animals, what would have serioulsy hindered their movement through desertic Iran and Balochistan (Alexander's deadly coastal desert). These people might have arrived to South Asia but only after many many trials and only in the context of a pluvial period, and surely heavily admixed by the dominant Neanderthals.
I think that there was a "group A" but these were not the core group of "Eurasians" but they mostly performed the role of mediating in the Neanderthal admixture phenomenon.
There was instead a "group B" (essentially a subgroup of mtDNA L3'4, with some L0 too), much more numerous and/or stable if we are to attend to the high number of L(xM,N) clades proper of Arabia peninsula (but not the Fertile Crescent), which was at least partly specialized in coastal foraging and, mind you, boating of some sort (maybe "reed horses" like those still used in Peru?) These people moved across the Red Sea into Yemen and along the South Arabian coast into the Persian Gulf 'Oasis' (swampland) and maybe along the Red Sea into Palestine, being in fact the ancestors of "group A".
Eventually (maybe after having absorbed some from "group A", which carried Neanderthal admixture), a select group of them moved (mtDNA pre-M and pre-N) marched further East and "discovered" South Asia.
That's the most likely story and almost requires boating every two steps. Boating or deadly deserts or the feared "Neanderlands" of the North, where not just everything was too cold and dark but also were inhabited by a different, very strong and scary people, our kind surely considered to be monster-like.
"Seems they don't live in the driest regions by choice. They have been forced into them".
Maybe there were people living there before they did. Of course, demographic pressure drives migrations, that's something I fully agree with. People eventually moved out of Africa because they were feeling demographic pressure from their kin and found, in some cases, alleviation elsewhere.
"More than you would if you'd be at my reach. How can you be so childishly annoying?"
ReplyDeleteI haven't set out to annoy you. I've set out to explain things to you that you seemed not to understand properly. This misunderstanding has led you to make assumptions that are incorrect.
"2300 meters. LOL. >3000 is Bolivia!"
OK. I got a bit carried away there. I've checked and it's only 7270 feet a.s.l. Sorry for misleading you. But it is the altitude that gives a temperate and moist climate. And the region certainly cannot be described as 'coastal'. And how are any early humans who made it into the mountains there supposed to have escaped from those mountains and spread all the way to India?
"So a 'group A' moving through that route would have been seriously hindered in their march except probably in the Pluvial periods (i.e. in conditions much wetter than now)".
Wasn't there a paper recently that suggested the OoA occurred during just such a pluvial?
"So you think that nobody was able to live in Yemen until industrial methods of perforation and pumping were introduced in the 20th century, right?"
Basically. Although we know that Y-hap J1 arrived there before that time, but presumably not at the original OoA.
"much more numerous and/or stable if we are to attend to the high number of L(xM,N) clades proper of Arabia peninsula (but not the Fertile Crescent)"
Those non-M/N haplogroups are much more likely to be relatively recent arrivals, rather than being remnants of an original OoA. Probably brought in once Y-hap J1 (and T) was able to cross the southern Red Sea.
"All the coastal strip and highlands of the Red Sea are not 'desert' but mere semi-desert like the Sahel".
But the same cannot be said for the Indian Ocean coast.
"what would have serioulsy hindered their movement through desertic Iran and Balochistan (Alexander's deadly coastal desert)".
Yes. H. sapiens would not have moved through that 'deadly coastal desert'. So there, finally, goes the 'coastal migration theory'. However there are mountain ranges further inland through Iran and Baluchistan that presumably also have a more temperate and moist climate. H. spaiens could easily have moved along the boundary between forested mountain and the lower desertland all the way to the Afghanistan/Pakistan border.
"You have changed your mind? Your problem. I have not".
Unlike some I'm prepared to change my mind in the light of new evidence.
(continued)
(continued)
ReplyDelete"I have a graph from you right over here where YOU claim or admit that F coalesced in 'India'".
That was before MNOPS was shown to be a single clade within K, and before IJ was shown to be actually connected to K. And before TL was also shown to branch off between IJ and MNOPS. And possibly before T was separated from K*. Surely that whole rearrangement must suggest something significant to you also.
"What it indicates is origin in South Asia and spread to the West (G, IJ) and East (MNOPS) (and then spread westward of MNOPS as P)".
Only because you insist that it is so.
"That's the most likely story and almost requires boating every two steps".
The alternative requires no boating whatsoever.
"To arrive to Iraq you need to cross the Sinai desert and then the Syrian desert".
No you don't. The Levant coast is relatively moist. And the Tigris and Euphrates are easily crossed in the headwaters. Is that region really 'too cold and dark'? And were the Neanderthals there really 'very strong and scary people'? The obstacles to expansion are more likely to have been the Taurus, Caucasus and Zagros Mountains. We know that H. erectus entered the region very early in the piece, so it would have been no trouble for H. sapiens to survive there.
"between Anatolia to Papua there was not a single place where F is most likely to have coalesced and boomed from"
Yes. Anatolia. And members of the haplogroup moved east from there. In the region bounded by the three mountain ranges we find basal N haplogroups: N1'5 and N2. And mtDNA X sits both to the south and to the northwest of the region. Were their ancestors ever in India? I presume the humans from Anatolia carrying Y-haps F and K were able to move along the boundary between the desert and the south-facing mountain slopes, eventually reaching India, possible with mtDNA M.
You are set out to discuss in circles without evidence day after day. That is childish and annoying.
ReplyDelete"And how are any early humans who made it into the mountains there supposed to have escaped from those mountains and spread all the way to India?"
I don't see any need to explain this: nomads migrate according to their needs. I do not think that the coastal habitat was ever deserted, even if maybe only thinly populated: as long as there was a water spot or a water providing plant such as coconut, some roots, etc., all the rest was solved.
"Wasn't there a paper recently that suggested the OoA occurred during just such a pluvial?"
Two papers both proposed the Abbasia Pluvial. One at the beginning via the coast and the other at the end via the many wadis in the Arabian interior. I am not going to provide the same link for the third time in few days, it's clear that you have not even clicked it... and you insist in arguing.
"Basically" [nobody has lived in Arabia ever - never mind the archaeology].
Nonsense. People have lived in Arabia since "always", albeit at small densities which allowed for a quite big replacement at the Neolithic.
"Those non-M/N haplogroups are much more likely to be relatively recent arrivals"...
No, they cannot be. I have discussed it several times: when East Africans are mostly L3/L2, you don't get the rare clades you get in Arabia, largely L0, L4, L6 (and also L3), by means of recent migration: it must be old, very old.
I will be officially vindicated in this as I have been in the past for other claims that went before the official research dynamics. The data is there and is hard to avoid: there is an Arabian substrate that is from near the OoA period.
"But the same cannot be said for the Indian Ocean coast".
Actually I meant the Red Sea in Yemen and Asir but the Indian Ocean/Arabian Sea as well. So yes, it can be said (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Arabian_Desert.jpg).
"Yes. H. sapiens would not have moved through that 'deadly coastal desert'".
In this is clear that we are not in agreement and will never be. Why to insist?
"Surely that whole rearrangement must suggest something significant to you also".
Gujarat, Sindh... that area.
"The alternative requires no boating whatsoever".
I have no problem with boating but I do have a problem with Neanderthal competence and cold.
It's conceptual. We won't agree ever. Accept it.
"The Levant coast is relatively moist".
But you still need to cross the Sinai desert if you arrive from Egypt.
"And the Tigris and Euphrates are easily crossed in the headwaters".
For which you have to get deep into Neanderthal lands, high into the mountains, which are snowed 1/3 of the year (now, it was worse in the Ice Age), cross deep creeks... That's a no-no, much less for any sort of fast paced migration.
"Is that region really 'too cold and dark'?"
Cold and mountainous indeed. You know that rivers are usually born in mountains, often very high ones, right?
[Y-DNA F] "Yes. Anatolia".
We are never going to agree, Terry. Face it.
"We are never going to agree, Terry. Face it".
ReplyDeleteYes. I'm obviously wasting my time with you. All the claims you made in this last entry are complete rubbish.
"I will be officially vindicated in this as I have been in the past for other claims that went before the official research dynamics".
I'm confident that you will be proved wrong.
"All the claims you made in this last entry are complete rubbish".
ReplyDeleteI'll prove it, although I realise you know more about the subject than do the authors, and I know I'm wasting my time, but have a look at this:
http://bham.academia.edu/JeffreyRose/Papers/135311/The_Upper_Palaeolithic_of_South_Arabia
Quote from the Introduction:
"It is concluded that the current body of evidence does not support an 'Out of Africa' scenario via the Bad al Mandab Strait from MIS 4 onward".
And:
"a tentative correlation is proposed between the bottleneck release of mtDNA haplogroup M1 into Africa with archeological data that attests to the appearance of a 'foreign' and 'hybrid' lithic technology in the Horn of Africa at the MSA/LSA boundary".
So to your claims:
"I am not going to provide the same link for the third time in few days, it's clear that you have not even clicked it... and you insist in arguing".
You're deliberately avoiding the real point. You're claiming a 'special case' of periodic increased moisture as an explanation of your preferred belief while ignoring the fact that at such times the whole Arabian Peninsula as far north as Kurdistan becomes open for migration. Something is drastically wrong with your reasoning here.
"You know that rivers are usually born in mountains, often very high ones, right?"
Don't be ridiculous. You know very well it is not necessary to reach the absolute source of a river to cross it.
"Gujarat, Sindh... that area".
How can you seriously claim that region as being the origin of IJ? Or MNOPS? Surely you don't believe that the people sorted themselves into separate haplogroups before moving either east or west. Surely if your belief was correct we'd find some basal IJ haplogroups in SE Asia and some basal MNOPS haplogroups in SW Asia rather than the obviously derived members we find i n the 'wrong' place today. Something is drastically wrong with your reasoning here.
"when East Africans are mostly L3/L2, you don't get the rare clades you get in Arabia, largely L0, L4, L6 (and also L3), by means of recent migration: it must be old, very old".
In spite of your claims to the contrary members of every one of those haplogroups is also found in East Africa and, what's more, none have a deep origin specifically in the Hadramawt coastal region. It is apparent no surviving haplogroups were present there as long ago as the 23 mutation level of any original OoA. You see the haplogroups as evidence for the great southern coastal migration because you desperately wish them to be such. Something is drastically wrong with your reasoning here.
(continued)
(continued)
ReplyDelete"But you still need to cross the Sinai desert if you arrive from Egypt".
Leaving for now the very real probability that the Sinai Desert doesn't actually reach the Mediterranean during pluvials, you're ignoring the fact that the gap between the very habitable Nile Delta and the very habitable Levant coast is very short. And you're ignoring the fact that Alexander's army had huge difficulty following the very habitable (according to you) Makran coast yet Egyptian armies had no trouble periodically following the extremely arid (according to you) Mediterranean coast. Something is drastically wrong with your reasoning here.
"For which you have to get deep into Neanderthal lands"
Spoken like a deeply committed racist and separatist. Don't you really mean that human groups should remain separate and that H. sapiens should not have been allowed to marry H. neanderthalensis? It's perfectly obvious that they did interbreed on occasions so they must have come in contact with each other. Again something is drastically wrong with your reasoning here.
"I don't see any need to explain this: nomads migrate according to their needs".
Humans, by preference, move through the habitat they are most familiar with. If they live in an isolated region with no similar habitat within an appropriate distance they are trapped. Unless the climate changes, and we are back at the beginning. The whole Arabian Peninsula, including Kurdistan, becomes available for expansion, not just the coast.
"It is concluded that the current body of evidence does not support an 'Out of Africa' scenario via the Bad al Mandab Strait from MIS 4 onward".
ReplyDeleteI would appreciate a WHY to that "conclusion" but in any case, the proposal of Armitage 2011 is prior the MIS 4: c. 125,000 Ka ago.
"You're claiming a 'special case' of periodic increased moisture"...
I'm not even discussing climate but very reluctantly, pushed by you, who do not seem to know what you are talking about either (or even less than I do).
My main argument is archaeological evidence.
... "ignoring the fact that at such times the whole Arabian Peninsula as far north as Kurdistan becomes open for migration".
(1) The Arabia Peninsula does not reach to Kurdistan. It conventionally ends at a blurry desertic strip (isthmus) between Aqaba and Kuwait.
(2) There are clear climatic differences today between the southern Arabian coastal strip, which is NOT desert and the bulk of the Arabia Peninsula, which is desert. You are systematically and stubbornly ignoring this critical fact, claiming that the semi-desert is desert and that the desert becomes lush when the semi-desert does in the same manner. Back to planet Earth, please.
"You know very well it is not necessary to reach the absolute source of a river to cross it".
To cross without a boat and with the family (children, elderly, heavily pregnant women)? Yes. You need to reach very close to the absolute source of any river worth that name... Healthy adults can swim across many warm zone rivers but that's not a means of travel. And it's not even a practical sport in cold areas or where crocodiles exist.
Boats are a must.
"How can you seriously claim that region as being the origin of IJ? Or MNOPS?"
F. Don't put words in my mouth.
"It is apparent no surviving haplogroups were present there as long ago as the 23 mutation level of any original OoA".
A complex debate for breakfast time but L6 fits best with a Yemeni origin. Don't you think anyhow that it is MOST strange that so many old and rare L(xM,N) haplogrous are found in Arabia Peninsula of all places - and NOT in the Fertile Crescent?
...
..."the gap between the very habitable Nile Delta and the very habitable Levant coast is very short".
ReplyDeleteSome 170 Km.: 100 miles (between Al Mashrijah and Gaza). I think this is at least a mild barrier: permeable but still there.
Not to mention the issue of traveling along the Nile "without boats" (unreal because I have already shown you that the exploited islands in the Nile).
"And you're ignoring the fact that Alexander's army had huge difficulty following the very habitable (according to you) Makran coast"...
On the contrary: I claim that such desertic area is a mild barrier as well and that it's best traveled in small groups knowledgeable of the local conditions and preferably with boats (for fast travel and getting seafood). It is in any case highly inappropriate for an army of foreigners but Makranites manage well.
"yet Egyptian armies had no trouble periodically following the extremely arid (according to you) Mediterranean coast."
They were knowledgeable... Alexander was a crazy adventurer in exotic lands: the Persians had controlled that area for long and had no major problems that we know of. They knew the land.
"Spoken like a deeply committed racist and separatist".
Put it the way you want but I do think that Neanderthals managed to keep us at bay for many millennia thanks to their formidable strength and our limitations with the climatic conditions they were used to. Some day that changed and Neanderthals vanished soon after.
"Don't you really mean that human groups should remain separate"...
Don't mix apples and oranges: Neanderthals were a different species and I have no opinion on whether these two "human groups" "should" do anything: I'm just judging what I see as facts in the archaeological record: we did not mix with very limited exceptions ("in Candyland" it'd be more than 50% Neanderthal ancestry for us: it's no: Candyland hypothesis is wrong).
This is not an ideological but scientific matter.
"Humans, by preference, move through the habitat they are most familiar with".
Nonsense, prejudice! We move through and use almost all kind of habitats. The only exceptions are very cold ones and, before camel domestication, very dry ones (deserts). We have preference for warm habitats with at least some water but that's it.
I knew I was wasting my time, but a few parting comments:
ReplyDelete"I would appreciate a WHY to that 'conclusion'"
Did you not read the article? It's pretty clear to me.
"any case, the proposal of Armitage 2011 is prior the MIS 4: c. 125,000 Ka ago".
And I see no reason to alter my comment at that post. There is actually no convincing evidence for an original Bab al Mandab exit. There is evidence that can be interpreted as supporting such an hypothesis but in every case the evidence is capable of alternative interpretations.
"To cross without a boat and with the family (children, elderly, heavily pregnant women)? Yes. You need to reach very close to the absolute source of any river worth that name..."
Rubbish. I've waded many rivers miles from their source.
"F. Don't put words in my mouth".
You're conveniently ignoring the fact that IJ, TL and KMNOPS are derivatives of F, and two of those haplogroups cannot possibly have originated in the Gujarat/Sindh region. So it is unlikely that F did either.
"Don't you think anyhow that it is MOST strange that so many old and rare L(xM,N) haplogrous are found in Arabia Peninsula of all places - and NOT in the Fertile Crescent?"
Not at all. The timing of their arrival in the peninsula fits very well with later Y-hap crossings, but are difficult to match to an original OoA.
"Some 170 Km.: 100 miles (between Al Mashrijah and Gaza). I think this is at least a mild barrier: permeable but still there".
Yes. A 'mild barrier'. Nowhere near as difficult, or as long as, the Indian Ocean coastline.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gedrosia
Quote:
"Historians say he [Alexander] lost three-quarters of his army to the harsh desert conditions along the way."
Harsh desrt conditions?
"I have already shown you that the exploited islands in the Nile"
No you didn't. I'm sure I pointed out that rivers cvhange their course reasonably often and there is no way to tell if the appropriate 'islands' were such when Paleoloithic humans inhabited them.
"such desertic area is a mild barrier as well and that it's best traveled in small groups knowledgeable of the local conditions and preferably with boats (for fast travel and getting seafood)".
Boats in the desert? Don't be ridiculous. And how could a newly arrived population be 'knowledgeable of the local conditions'?
"the Persians had controlled that area for long"
As far as I'm aware the Persians had nothing to do with that region of the coast at all. Alexander certainly didn't come acroos any on his voyage. And nor did Nearchus although he did encounter a few 'primitive' people along the coast.
"I do think that Neanderthals managed to keep us at bay"
Yes: 'I think'. Of course you realise they hybridised at times.
"Neanderthals were a different species"
I doubt it. See above.
"Did you not read the article?"
ReplyDeleteI read the paper back in the day, not now. Why are you so greedy about the information you personally share? I'll tell you: in my experience it is because you want to keep pretexts to blame the other side later on and/or because you deliberately want to keep the debate confuse (because you know well that the evidence is NOT supportive of your thesis). You did the same with "human" presence in Altai, and in many other occasions. You just love to keep things confuse, imprecise, unclear... and then throw your opinions like artillery, no matter what.
"And I see no reason to alter my comment at that post".
And I see no reason to read your alleged comment that you won't bother synthesizing here. You can be so annoying!
"There is actually no convincing evidence for an original Bab al Mandab exit. There is evidence that can be interpreted as supporting such an hypothesis"...
There is evidence that can be read as supporting that hypothesis, yes.
There is no "convincing evidence" of people not having boats at the time either but you insist on that. Am I the one taking sides on the grounds of the evidence or is it you?
"I've waded many rivers miles from their source".
"Miles"? That's not an informative figure. I can tell you that you cannot wade the Ebro but very close to its source at the Cantabrian Range. Much depends on the river, your determination and the risks you want to take but in general sizable rivers cannot be crossed by family-type groups without boats (excepted rivers that freeze in winter).
"You're conveniently ignoring the fact that IJ, TL and KMNOPS are derivatives of F".
NO! I'm talking of F as a whole and these are only one branch under F (IJK actually). It's you the one shamelessly cheating by ignoring this fact that all these branches aren't but sub- or even sub-sub-branches of a sub-branch (IJK) under F. I don't have to bear that: you know well the phylogeny to be messing like this.
I really don't know why I have so much patience with your cheating. So you get a warning here because you truly deserve it.
...
...
ReplyDelete"Harsh desrt conditions?"
He made the crossing with 1/3 (???), so it's possible to make it even for a prick like Alexander.
But small groups of people knowledgeable of the seasonal patterns and surely using boats for coastal foraging (and maybe even travel) could gradually migrate along that coast (or even the interior I guess) without much problem.
Balochis today live there without major problem, right? Sure: it is a harsh area with low densities but it is habitable.
Balochistan is described by WP as:
"Balochistan's landscape is composed of barren, rugged mountains and fertile land. During the summer, some regions of Balochistan are the hottest. Most of the land is barren, particularly in the Iranian and Afghan side of the region, and it is generally sparsely populated".
Makran's 1000 km coastline is described as:
"The climate is very dry with very little rainfall. Makran is very sparsely inhabited, with much of the population being concentrated in a string of small ports (...)and many smaller fishing villages".
Sparsely but populated and heavily reliant on sea resources. A good place to practice boating skills - although there are others.
In any case nothing that impedes human life: no Rub al Khali, no Sahara, no Takla Makan.
"No you didn't".
Yes I did. I am absolutely sure that I pointed you to this paper: Van Peer et al. 2003. "The Early to Middle Stone Age Transition and the Emergence of modern Human Behaviour at site 8-B-11, Sai Island, Sudan". PDF.
So you know how and where early humans crossed the Nile. Notice that this site includes Acheulean, Sangoan and MSA levels, what implies a very early stage in human prehistory with dates that could reach to as early as 223 Ka (+/-19 Ka) ago (max.)
Middle Sangoan is dated to c. 182 Ka. and Upper Sangoan to 152 Ka. These people are probably ancestors (by a minor line?) of all modern human beings alive today. And they went to an island. in the middle of the Nile without problems.
"Boats in the desert? Don't be ridiculous".
Boats at the sea? Where's the "ridicule" in such an idea?
"And how could a newly arrived population be 'knowledgeable of the local conditions'?"
They migrated very slowly for sure. It's not like they were racing to reach Australia, mind you: it took them many many generations.
So they had time to get used to local conditions everywhere they went, everywhere being normally just a few dozen, maybe a hundred, kilometers away.
Why would you move faster than that? Why to emigrate thousands of kilometers in one life? It's possible but, in principle, pointless.
"As far as I'm aware the Persians had nothing to do with that region of the coast at all".
It seems you've never seen a map of Darius' empire, see WP: Makran.
Actually you seem unaware of the fact that all the Eastern half of Iran is a semi-desert (tending to desert), yet populated in scattered form. It is this strip of Eastern Iran what really separates West Eurasia from South Asia but it's not any absolute barrier in any case.
"... you realise they hybridised at times".
Yes. War and love can coexist in long spans of time. What's the problem? (Assuming it was not rape).
"Yes. War and love can coexist in long spans of time. What's the problem? (Assuming it was not rape)".
ReplyDeleteEven if it was rape the fact that the two populations produced fertile offspring shows, by definition, that they belonged to the same species.
"And they went to an island. in the middle of the Nile without problems".
The authors provide no evidence whatsoever that it was an island at the time. It could quite easily have been connected to the bank of the Nile.
"Sparsely but populated and heavily reliant on sea resources. A good place to practice boating skills - although there are others".
Your link claims:
"The coast of Makran possesses only one island, Astola Island, near Pasni, and several insignificant islets".
There are far better places to 'practice boating skills' than on a barren coast exposed to the open ocean.
"It seems you've never seen a map of Darius' empire, see WP: Makran".
Of course I've seen a map of the empire. Just because Darius claimed it doesn't mean he used it extensively. And look at the photograph of the Makran Highway. I'm sure that Paleolithicc humans would easily have survived in the surrounding hills (not). Quote:
"The climate is very dry with very little rainfall. Makran is very sparsely inhabited, with much of the population being concentrated in a string of small ports including Chabahar, Gwatar, Jiwani, Gwadar (not to be confused with Gwatar), Pasni, Ormara and many smaller fishing villages".
Presumably the produce of the 'fishing villages' is used as trade items. Those small ports would have been extremely useful to Paleolithic humans as trading a fishing villages I'm sure (not). Another quote:
"The harsh desert path is often mistaken as the whole of Makran region". So the coast is actually the least desirable part of Makran. Back to you:
"Balochistan's landscape is composed of barren, rugged mountains and fertile land".
And that fertile land is absolutely unproductive without irrigation. Another quote from your link:
"The Mykians are also thought to be responsible for many inventions like qanats and underground drainage galleries that bring water from an aquifer on the piedmont to the gardens or palm groves on the plains. These inventions were very important reasons behind the success of the empire".
So the Paleolithic people used such irrigation methods?
"They migrated very slowly for sure".
Very slowly, and not all the way, because they are never going to move far from fresh water. What is ideal habitat today was surely ideal habitat during the Paleolithic.
"He made the crossing with 1/3 (???), so it's possible to make it even for a prick like Alexander".
You're claiming, in effect, that Alexander and his army had huge difficulty following a particularly bountiful coastal route when just a couple of years before he had, very easily, followed a desolate, barren, inhospitable, inland route all the way to the Indus. Doesn't make sense.
Sorry. I missed this:
ReplyDelete"Why are you so greedy about the information you personally share?"
I'm not greedy. I just don't keep the links. I expect anyone who is interested to remember the conclusions.
"'Miles'? That's not an informative figure".
OK. Kilometres from the source.
"you cannot wade the Ebro but very close to its source at the Cantabrian Range".
I'll bet that does not involve getting 'high into the mountains, which are snowed 1/3 of the year'.
"NO! I'm talking of F as a whole and these are only one branch under F (IJK actually)".
And IJ brached off IJK somewhere west of India. So presumably IJK itself originated west of India. So presumably F itself was at one time west of India. Besides which we know for sure that F or its ancestor moved from Africa. Surely we should look for evidence of the route it took rather than simply assume it flew to India.
"the fact that the two populations produced fertile offspring shows, by definition, that they belonged to the same species".
ReplyDeleteThat's not a definition. It could apply to lions and tigers, go figure! We don't even know what constraints interbreeding between the two species existed; if there are claims that Asian women pregnant of European men have some delivery problems (because of worse relation baby size - pelvis hole) you can imagine what could be the case with a wholly different species, even if related enough not to have lost all interfertility. Surely the limited amount of Neanderthal influence and the fact that we were not simply absorbed into Neanderthal populations in so many millennia means that we are different species and that we could not interbreed easily anymore.
"The authors provide no evidence whatsoever that it was an island at the time".
They probably think it is not necessary to demonstrate. They were surely never confronted by someone like you in the peer review process.
"There are far better places to 'practice boating skills' than on a barren coast exposed to the open ocean".
The Red Sea maybe? ;)
"Just because Darius claimed it doesn't mean he used it extensively".
LOL, you want reality to bend to your ideas instead of, logically, bending your ideas to reality.
"Presumably the produce of the 'fishing villages' is used as trade items".
Fishing villages used to be self-sustained or almost. You get nearly all the food from the sea, all you need is fresh water and the occasional vegetable. And I'm sure that they have fresh water, or those villages would not exist at all.
I understand that you have an inland cattle herder mentality but the sea can provide nearly all, look at Aleuts. I'd mention also your neighbors, the Maori people, but you'd say that they have pigs and batatas... what is just a diversion.
"So the Paleolithic people used such irrigation methods?"
Balochistan is at the core of the South Asian Neolithic. I am sure that those early farmers managed in spite of not having the engineering works of the Mykians.
And I'm sure that before them, hunter-gatherers managed as well. Remember the Bushmen, please.
"... they are never going to move far from fresh water".
Not more than Bushmen probably, yes. But I'm sure that Makran, like South Arabia, has fresh water. You just like to exaggerate the dryness of semi-desertic areas (emphasis in "semi") but that is unsustainable, practically a lie that you tell yourself (and me) once and again.
"You're claiming, in effect, that Alexander and his army had huge difficulty following a particularly bountiful coastal route when just a couple of years before he had, very easily, followed a desolate, barren, inhospitable, inland route all the way to the Indus. Doesn't make sense".
I'm not claiming anything because I have not admittedly studied in such details the campaigns of Alexander, nor I will. I think it is irrelevant because a water pool can keep a band of people (and some of their game) alive for a long time, while it would not be able to quench the thirst of even one of the many phalanxes that Alexander walked across the globe.
Why don't you make a search for hydrographic studies of both areas, or better, paleo-hydrographic ones?
"OK. Kilometres from the source".
ReplyDeletePlease, I did not mean that you use the same vagueness with metric units. I meant that "miles" (or "kilometers") is utterly vague.
"I'll bet that does not involve getting 'high into the mountains, which are snowed 1/3 of the year'".
I would say so, specially in the Ice Age, when the snow line was lower.
Whatever the case, just think Perigord and its many rivers (Dordogne, etc.) Do you really think that Neanderthals, or Sapiens after them, walked all the way to the Massif Central each time they needed to cross them? That would be absurd and some sort of raft would have been built very soon as solution to such an annoying problem, even without any prior experience.
We do not have that big think over our shoulders just to style a pretty face or wear fashionable hats, you know.
"And IJ brached off IJK somewhere west of India".
ReplyDeleteWell, IJ coalesced in West Asia, but we do not know where it "branched off", i.e. the intermediate human links between the IJK and the IJ node lived. Probably the first ones still lived in South Asia and the coalescence of this haplogroup is in fact a signature of their westward expansion.
"So presumably IJK itself originated west of India".
Very possibly in Pakistan, maybe even in the Baluchistan you detest so much.
We have:
1. F in South Asia (Sindh/Gujarat?)
2. IJK is a bit of a mystery (see below)
3a. IJ in West Asia (Zagros?)
3b. K is again a mystery (see below)
4a. MNOPS in SE Asia
4b. LT in Pakistan
4c. K1 reported in SA (your own notes)
So, solving the equation from the bottom:
··> K should have coalesced in South Asia (Narmada?)
··> IJ should have coalesced in Pakistan (half way between Zagros mts. and Narmada river - Baluchistan?)
There's always some uncertainty but that's what we can say.
"Besides which we know for sure that F or its ancestor moved from Africa. Surely we should look for evidence of the route it took rather than simply assume it flew to India".
That approach is fundamentally wrong: the basal diversity of F is highest in SA, what means that F coalesced in SA almost without any doubt.
Also the immediate ancestor of F is not from Africa: it is CF and it is from Asia. If C coalesced in SE Asia, you can estimate where the centroid falls: North Central India or maybe even as far East as Bihar-Bengal. But here it may be wise to apply a correction towards the common African origin, i.e. to the West.
"That's not a definition. It could apply to lions and tigers, go figure!"
ReplyDeleteYou are wrong there. The hybrid offspring are infertile. So they are separate species.
"They probably think it is not necessary to demonstrate. They were surely never confronted by someone like you in the peer review process".
They didn't have to be. They thought of it themselves:
"Human occupations took place on the channel banks, apparently at times when the river regime changed to low-energy, perhaps seasonal, activity."
So the authors suggest the people walked to what is now the island.
"The Red Sea maybe?"
A region of closely spaced islands is the most obvious region to learn the required skills.
"I'm not claiming anything because I have not admittedly studied in such details the campaigns of Alexander, nor I will".
I'm sure you won't. You're afraid you might learn something about the geography of the region that proves your theory wrong.
"And I'm sure that before them, hunter-gatherers managed as well. Remember the Bushmen, please".
Where the Bushmen live is nowhere near as arid as the coastl region of Baluchistan. And remember that the Bushmen were pushed into the semi-arid region they now occupy.
"Why don't you make a search for hydrographic studies of both areas, or better, paleo-hydrographic ones?"
I will. I'll let you know how I get on.
"Whatever the case, just think Perigord and its many rivers (Dordogne, etc.) Do you really think that Neanderthals, or Sapiens after them, walked all the way to the Massif Central each time they needed to cross them?"
They could wade any of the rivers in that region, at least in places and seasonally. I had a look at the Ebro. Guess what? The upper catchment, where the rivers would be easily waded in places, is precisely the Basque region. Whether Basques have been pushed upstream by later arrivals or they have always lived in the headwaters is a problem you are in a better position to answer than I am. I'll go back and look at your haplogroup maps and see if any are centred on the Ebro. But anyway, by the Perigordian humans definitely had boats.
"That approach is fundamentally wrong: the basal diversity of F is highest in SA, what means that F coalesced in SA almost without any doubt".
ReplyDeleteIt is your approach that is 'fundamentally wrong'. Basal diversity does not automatically equal region of coalescence.
"We have:
1. F in South Asia (Sindh/Gujarat?)
2. IJK is a bit of a mystery (see below)
3a. IJ in West Asia (Zagros?)
3b. K is again a mystery (see below)
4a. MNOPS in SE Asia
4b. LT in Pakistan
4c. K1 reported in SA (your own notes)"
Excuse me. G? Otherwise I agree with all the above. I'll turn to the mysteries.
"but we do not know where it [IJ] 'branched off', i.e. the intermediate human links between the IJK and the IJ node lived. Probably the first ones still lived in South Asia and the coalescence of this haplogroup is in fact a signature of their westward expansion".
You're going about it in the wrong order. You're making an assumption and then postulating a theory as to how the evidence might fit that theory. It is just as likely that IJ 'branched off' exactly within the region where the two haplogroups are found today. It was the remainder of K that moved east into the Indian subcontinent.
"··> K should have coalesced in South Asia (Narmada?)"
Quite possibly. Especially K1.
"··> IJ should have coalesced in Pakistan (half way between Zagros mts. and Narmada river - Baluchistan?)"
I dont think so. See above.
"Also the immediate ancestor of F is not from Africa: it is CF and it is from Asia".
But where in Asia? You assume South Asia and that CF flew there.
"If C coalesced in SE Asia, you can estimate where the centroid falls"
I've noticed you're very selective in when you use the centroid as indicating coalescence. C's centroid is actually in East Asia, as is D's.
Ligers: "The fertility of hybrid big cat females is well documented across a number of different hybrids".
ReplyDeleteTiglons:
"a fifteen-year-old hybrid between a lion and an "Island" tiger was successfully mated with a lion at the Munich Hellabrunn Zoo. The female cub, although of delicate health, was raised to adulthood".
"At the Alipore Zoo in India, a female tiglon named Rudhrani, born in 1971, was successfully mated to an Asiatic Lion named Debabrata. The rare, second generation hybrid was called a litigon (pronounced /ˌlaɪˈtaɪɡən/). Rudhrani produced seven litigons in her lifetime.".
But maybe this is enough for you to claim that Panthera is a single species? Most biologists would disagree however.
"So the authors suggest the people walked to what is now the island".
I do not gather that. Remember that, seasonal or not, the Nile is the longest river on Earth and carries a lot of water, even in the "dry" season. And this is in Nubia, virtually in Egypt! Possibly the island was not so interesting (smaller) in the floods season.
Also remember that the Nile Crocodile gets that name for something: you'll better not swim or walk in the Nile or any other African water body, because you are risking your life.
...
Do you learn modern geography in ancient "history" books? That sounds quite unlikely.
Anyhow, you can't get the correct impression on how a 15 people huntergatherer band would perform based on what an Iron Age imperialist army does. That's why Vietnam was lost: the war-o-copter is not necessarily mightier than the bicycle.
..
"A region of closely spaced islands is the most obvious region to learn the required skills".
Your prejudice. It may even be a good idea but it does not matter because it would delay the invention of boating for too long. It is highly unrealistic to imagine that humans did not need and use boats to cross the Nile, exploit lake Chad or lake Victoria, etc.
"Where the Bushmen live is nowhere near as arid as the coastl region of Baluchistan".
Really? Then why does it have much lower population densities? C'mon! If it'd be such a nice place, the Bantu or the Whites would have taken it long ago. They live there in part because everywhere else has been grabbed by more powerful nations.
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ReplyDelete"They could wade any of the rivers in that region, at least in places and seasonally".
No. You cannot. And that's not enough anyhow for normal needs.
For example I know well the stuary of Urdaibai, near Santimamiñe and where my father's line family roots are. You can swim across in low tide (if healthy and knowing the strong currents) but that's quite useless if you need to do it daily and maybe bring supplies and less able people like young children. Also there's always a risk because any error and the current will carry you to the open sea, where you will probably die.
You can indeed walk 10 km upstream to where it can be waded (it's a small river) but that's wasting a full day or more if your goal is just to cross the estuary. It's totally absurd: those people needed and indeed used boats of some sort daily.
Most hunting grounds are river/swamp areas for a reason (and yes, Urdaibai is a marsh, and was surely in Paleolithic times a wonderful hunting and fishing territory to live in).
Dordogne was much better, as the many remains show. It was also the "metropolis" of Paleolithic Europe, where most techno-cultural advances happened first. If they could pain the constellations and keep calendars, if they were chasing whales... they had good quality boats for sure, maybe those so typical of the high latitudes made of leather and branches.
"Whether Basques have been pushed upstream by later arrivals or they have always lived in the headwaters is a problem you are in a better position to answer than I am".
Basque identity is probably are a modern, post-Celtic or post-Roman construct. But ancient peoples did not mostly live in the Ebro valley, which was mostly colonized in the Epipaleolithic period, it seems. It was too cold or whatever.
"the Perigordian humans definitely had boats".
Sure but why did not you admit to that before?
"Basal diversity does not automatically equal region of coalescence".
ReplyDeleteOnly, it seems, if it is convenient to your preconceptions - sarcasm meant.
"Excuse me. G?"
G is under F and was not the matter of discussion.
I wrote: "··> IJ should have coalesced in Pakistan (half way between Zagros mts. and Narmada river - Baluchistan?)"
There was a typo here. It should read IJK. I had earlier argued that IJ coalesced in West Asia (Zagros?), I meant to deal with its "father" IJK at that point.
"I've noticed you're very selective in when you use the centroid as indicating coalescence. C's centroid is actually in East Asia, as is D's".
I was estimating the centroid of CF (i.e. C+F), not C alone. I have also in the past used mild corrections (1/4 or 1/3 the distance) toward the upstream centroid to best estimate the most realistic (IMO) true coalescence place: to add some holistic coherence to the resulting narrative.
"But maybe this is enough for you to claim that Panthera is a single species? Most biologists would disagree however".
ReplyDeletePossibly. However fertility is rare, and even hybrids between horses and donkeys are occcasionally fertile. And the hybrids are not fertile with each other. They have to be bred back with a member of one of the original species. So I guess both pairs can justifiably be called separate species.
"I do not gather that".
You obviously didn't read it correctly.
"Possibly the island was not so interesting (smaller) in the floods season".
In most arid regions rivers occasionally run dry and just a series of pools remain. And remember, we're talking about what is now an island so just one branch of the Nile needs to dry up for it to be accessible by walking.
"Do you learn modern geography in ancient 'history' books? That sounds quite unlikely.
I learned my geology at university and on my job when I graduated. So I have a very long time perspective.
"you can't get the correct impression on how a 15 people huntergatherer band would perform based on what an Iron Age imperialist army does".
But it does give one a very good idea as to how easy or difficult it is to survive in any particular region. And 'a 15 people huntergatherer band' is likely to suffer inbreeding depression within a few generations and then die out.
"Really? Then why does it have much lower population densities?"
Because the populated regions of Baluchistan are irrigated, even though the coast receives less rainfall than does the Kalahari. Concerning Makran:
http://www.geocities.ws/pasnionline/Makran_History.html
Quote:
"The area possesses a very dry climate with very low rainfall. Makran is very sparsely inhabited, with much of the population being concentrated in a string of small ports including Chah Bahar, Gwatar, Jiwani, Gwadar (not to be confused with Gwatar), Pasni, Ormara and many smaller fishing villages. The total length of the coastline is about 1,000 km (of which 750 km is in Pakistan)".
That length of coastline is far greater than that along the Mediterranean coast of the Sinai. And:
http://www.lycos.com/info/kalahari-desert--rainfall.html
Quote:
"The Kalahari Desert is not a true desert in the sense that it is well vegetated and receives copious but very unpredictable rainfall".
And:
"Although called a desert, the Kalahari Desert is not in fact a desert at all! At least not by the normal standards for classifying a desert. A more correct term would be a 'thirstland', as no-where in the Kalahari Desert sands is the rainfall less than 150mm a year".
So, as I said, it is not as arid as the Makran coast. And look at the strip of relatively healthy rainfall along the northern strip of Iran:
http://www.atozmapsdata.com/zoomify.asp?name=Country/Modern/Z_Iran_Precip
"Only, it seems, if it is convenient to your preconceptions - sarcasm meant".
ReplyDeleteIt is you who is altering your perspective depending on what point you are trying to make. My interpretations of the evidence are at least consistent.
"G is under F and was not the matter of discussion".
G is under F in the same way that IJK is under F. As are H, F1, F2, F3, F4 and MNOPS. And, like IJ, its presence far to the west of India is a problem for your belief.
"It should read IJK. I had earlier argued that IJ coalesced in West Asia (Zagros?), I meant to deal with its 'father' IJK at that point".
It is difficult to make a convincing case for IJK to have coalesced further east than did IJ. Especially seeing we have LT in Pakistan and MNOPS in SE Asia. So you finish up with IJK in the same region as LT when it had branched off earlier from the other two doesn't make sense. However MNOPS coalescing in SE Asia after its ancestor moved from South Asia does make sense. And we have that remnant F haplogroup G in Anatolia which you insist arrived there from some Indian garden of Eden. Doesn't it make some sort of sense to you that we should see much of the trail that Y-hap F took from Africa to India. G, IJK, H, F1, F4, F2, F3, K1, MNOPS, K3, K4, K2. They stretch out in a line with a widening in India. Certainly makes sense to me.
"I have also in the past used mild corrections (1/4 or 1/3 the distance) toward the upstream centroid to best estimate the most realistic (IMO) true coalescence place"
Correction: to where you wish to place the coalescence place.
"You can swim across in low tide (if healthy and knowing the strong currents) but that's quite useless if you need to do it daily and maybe bring supplies and less able people like young children".
Low tide? That's hardly 'headwaters'. And any primitive boat would not be much easier than swimming.
"You can indeed walk 10 km upstream to where it can be waded (it's a small river) but that's wasting a full day or more if your goal is just to cross the estuary".
But not a waste of time if you actually live upstream.
"It's totally absurd: those people needed and indeed used boats of some sort daily".
And you are able to claim that only because you wish it to be so.
"Sure but why did not you admit to that before?"
I have never claimed otherwise. People had reached Australia some time before the Perigordian and so I have always presumed the required technology had begun spreading around the world about 50,000 years ago. And it has always seemed very likely to me that at least the modern human European Y-chromosome line began in SE Asia, so presumably they carried the technology as they moved back west. I'm sure you are well aware that has long been my position.
"Most hunting grounds are river/swamp areas for a reason"
The Kalahari?
"Dordogne was much better, as the many remains show".
I think you're beginning to see reason.
"they had good quality boats for sure, maybe those so typical of the high latitudes made of leather and branches".
And when were such boats invented?
"But ancient peoples did not mostly live in the Ebro valley, which was mostly colonized in the Epipaleolithic period, it seems. It was too cold or whatever".
More seeing reason. The Ebro valley was colder than the surrounding mountains? I don't think so. There is another reason why the Ebro valley was not populated. The invention of boats? Before then people had simply been wading across the rivers where they could, usually near the headwaters.
The Nile does not run dry ever, mind you. It is normal or huge depending on the season, but never small, much less dry.
ReplyDelete"the populated regions of Baluchistan are irrigated"...
I do not care if they are "irrigated": the water comes from somewhere and was available to hunter-gatherers too (who, btw, don't need to "irrigate" anything - that's something farmers do).
You talk like if it was a true desert, when it's just an arid area. It's obvious that you cannot figure out the difference between deep desert, mild desert, semi-desert and mere arid areas. For you it's all just like Takla Makan - but in reality it is not.
Not to mention that the migration happened almost for sure in the Pluvial period anyhow.
"Makran is very sparsely inhabited"...
I quoted that previously myself: it is inhabited, wow! Takla Makan or Rub al Khali are not, mind you.
You don't think Kalahari is dry enough, then look at Central Australia! Haven't people lived there for "ever"? Yes, they have.
"G is under F in the same way that IJK is under F. As are H, F1, F2, F3, F4"...
ReplyDeleteYes, bravo!
"... and MNOPS".
No, not at all. MNOPS is under K, which is under IJK.
"And, like IJ, its presence far to the west of India is a problem for your belief".
I do not understand this sentence.
"It is difficult to make a convincing case for IJK to have coalesced further east than did IJ".
That was the point I was trying to make, and it is all because no K sublineage seems to have coalesced West of Pakistan, so the centroid of K is surely in India (in the Federal Republic of India) and hence the centroid of K and IJ (i.e. IJK) is roughly at Balochistan or otherwise in Pakistan.
This is also consistent with what we could call 'Southern Asian model of human expansion beyond Africa' (aka 'coastal model') that I spouse based on the facts of population genetics (and also some very interesting rather recent archaeology).
"So you finish up with IJK in the same region as LT when it had branched off earlier from the other two doesn't make sense".
It does make sense because LT and K1 are "the sons who stayed at home" (of K, grandsons of IJK), while IJ and MNOPS are "the wayward sons/grandsons" who went around the world looking for adventure. (Or maybe were kicked out or whatever). In any case in all or most lineages we can see this: homely and wayward sons/daughters of sorts: those who stay at the homeland and coalesce into certain lineages and those who move away and coalesce into others. In this case it's quite clear:
1. First "generation" (F-derived): F1, F3, F4, H and surely IJK are homely; F2 and G are wayward.
2. Second "generation" (IJK-derived): K is homely, IJ is wayward.
3. Third "generation" (K-derived): TL, K1 are homely, MNOPS is wayward.
Etc.
Notice that the notion of "generations" is just to illustrate the phylogenetic hierarchy and does not imply a timeline: G could still be younger than MNOPS (for instance), even if G is a grand-uncle of MNOPS (happens when the pseudo-generations have no limited time-span).
So in the end I posit a homeland, a demographic pool, in Pakistan/NW India for F, IJK and K (and TL as well), which sent successive or parallel waves through much of Asia, some of which made a really huge impact (IJ, MNOPS).
"Doesn't it make some sort of sense to you that we should see much of the trail that Y-hap F took from Africa to India".
Nope, because F did not exist probably before South Asia and because in places of low demographic intensity like Southern Arabia, full Y-DNA replacement is possible and happened.
In any case we should not see G but CF* or CDEF* That stuff does not exist anymore: it has been erased by drift or whatever. DE* has been located instead (at extremely low frequencies), as you know, but it's another story altogether.
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ReplyDelete"Low tide? That's hardly 'headwaters'".
That's what I'm saying: that even if headwaters are 10 or 20 km upstream (it's a very short river), you do not want to do all that journey: you want to cross the estuary at whim because the boars or the seafood or your semi-incestuous cousin-lover may be at the other side of that water strip. And also because you can move faster up and downstream or reach difficult coastal spots or organize a water rescue with a raft or boat.
I find simply unthinkable to live by the water being human and not having boats/rafts. Other animals do not have our intelligence or crafting skills, so that justifies they do not, but in our case it is simply unthinkable.
"And any primitive boat would not be much easier than swimming".
A lot easier if you want to carry things and keep them safe and dry. The risk is also much smaller (you can always swim if the boat wrecks).
"I'm sure you are well aware that has long been my position".
Ok. But I do not agree - not at all. I do not see why boats could only be invented once in Sundaland. Even if Wallacea and Philippines are island countries that truly seem to demand boats and boating skills... in order to reach them boats had to exist before. Otherwise the Wallace Line and such would have applied to H. sapiens and we would have never reached Wallacea, at least not in a long time.
Instead we did almost as soon as we reached Sundaland, as we can appreciate from the genetic data (you know well this is my stand).
"The Kalahari?"
The Kalahari also includes seasonal swamps (check up Okawango delta). But anyhow I said "most" not "all".
"And when were such boats invented?"
Probably in the H. ergaster period. It is very likely that they crossed Gibraltar in northwards direction in fact.
"The Ebro valley was colder than the surrounding mountains?"
People did not live in the high mountains but at the piedmont, where several habitats converged, guaranteeing food all seasons. The fact is that most of the Ebro valley is empty of Paleolithic sites, as is most of inland Iberia (Plateau)... but then there are some minor exceptions.
Similarly North France was almost empty then but the more Northernly Rhine basin was not most of the time. Why? Because of specifics that are not so easy to grasp: the Rhine-Danube and the Dniepr-Don basins were loess steppe, which were rich, while the Seine basin or the Balcans were dry steppe, of very low interest for our kind because they surely hosted much less hunt.
"The Nile does not run dry ever, mind you".
ReplyDeletehttp://www.unesco.org/new/fileadmin/MULTIMEDIA/FIELD/Cairo/pdf/STATISTICAL_ANALYSIS_OF_DRY_PERIODS.pdf
And:
http://www.earthtimes.org/climate/ice-melt-arctic-dry-nile-H1-megadrought/333/
The Nile is quite capable of ceasing to flow during extreme drought. And you may find this interesting:
http://www.libraryindex.com/pages/3418/Tropical-Climate-Change.html
"I do not care if they are 'irrigated': the water comes from somewhere and was available to hunter-gatherers too (who, btw, don't need to 'irrigate' anything - that's something farmers do).
You lack some basic understandi ng here. The irrigation water comes from artificial bores and dams.
"You talk like if it was a true desert, when it's just an arid area. It's obvious that you cannot figure out the difference between deep desert, mild desert, semi-desert and mere arid areas".
No Maju. It is you who is suffering delusions here.
"I quoted that previously myself: it is inhabited, wow!"
Don't be an idiot. It is NOW.
"You don't think Kalahari is dry enough"
I'll remind you:
"The Kalahari Desert is not a true desert in the sense that it is well vegetated and receives copious but very unpredictable rainfall".
Makran:
""The area possesses a very dry climate with very low rainfall".
Makran is much more a 'desert' than is the Kalahari.
"It does make sense because LT and K1 are 'the sons who stayed at home'.
To carry on your illustration using 'generations' it is far more likely that G and is the son that stayed behind, along with his 'nephew' IJ. As the 'father' and the 'grandson' K(xIJ) moved east another 'son' H and IJ's son LT stayed behind. Others carried on and eventually the 'greatgrandson' MNOPS reached SE Asia, along with several of his 'uncles'.
"G could still be younger than MNOPS (for instance), even if G is a grand-uncle of MNOPS (happens when the pseudo-generations have no limited time-span)".
True, but you have no evidence for that. And MNOPS cannot really be older than IJ, or even LT. Unless you're blindly committed to your Indian garden of Eden belief.
"In any case we should not see G but CF* or CDEF*"
Why? Especially when you've just written, 'in places of low demographic intensity like Southern Arabia, full Y-DNA replacement is possible and happened'. Presumably G and IJ replaced those haplogroups in the region they had earlier inhabited
"That's what I'm saying: that even if headwaters are 10 or 20 km upstream (it's a very short river), you do not want to do all that journey: you want to cross the estuary at whim because the boars or the seafood or your semi-incestuous cousin-lover may be at the other side of that water strip".
ReplyDeleteAnd if they're not you have no reason to cross the estuary. If all your aquaintances lived on your side of the estuary and upstream of it you would live quite comfortably without crossing it.
"I do not see why boats could only be invented once in Sundaland".
Why not? Other things seem to have been invented once, and then spread and been improved, or at least altered, as they spread.
"People did not live in the high mountains but at the piedmont, where several habitats converged, guaranteeing food all seasons".
And where the rivers could be waded.
"Dordogne was much better, as the many remains show. It was also the 'metropolis' of Paleolithic Europe, where most techno-cultural advances happened first".
And not based around any major river valley. And what about your own map of the Aurignacian here:
http://forwhattheywereweare.blogspot.com/2011/08/did-homo-sapiens-outnumber-neanderthals.html
I think I begin to see a pattern here. These people seem to be dodging the major rivers. Don't you find it a little surprising that if the people had efficient boats, as you claim, and the rivers would have been such a good source of food, as you claim, that people should have been so reluctant to utilize that habitat?
"The fact is that most of the Ebro valley is empty of Paleolithic sites, as is most of inland Iberia (Plateau)... but then there are some minor exceptions".
So the Ebro was occupied only once humans had managed to reach most of the Mediterranean islands? Do you think it possible that there is a connection?
Can you quote to the letter and abide to what the papers say? Because you say that:
ReplyDelete"The Nile is quite capable of ceasing to flow during extreme drought".
And the source says:
"They [the dunes found today in East Sudan] crossed the Nile, which was probably dried up at the time of their formation".
No date is provided here but all the figures at the beginning are of several million years. What is a geological and NOT prehistorical (human) time frame.
Later, when they discuss lakes, they do talk of Pleistocene and Holocene time frames but that is not the Nile.
The Nile does not get dry. It has never done in all human (pre-)history.
Besides the Sai settlement is much longer than any possible drought spell: it's almost a permanent site for evolving Humankind at the very root of our species. It's a window to our origins as Homo sapiens and a window that strongly implies boats.
"... and dams".
You can't dam a dry river, only permanent ones. But first of all you need a river.
Also you do not really know where the water comes from. You're guessing.
"Makran is much more a 'desert' than is the Kalahari".
The Kalahari desert is said "desert", even if it's only such thing seasonally, and Makran is NEVER said to be a desert. So it is NOT any desert, only a dry or semi-arid zone (take your Alexander dreams down that pedestal).
"To carry on your illustration using 'generations' it is far more likely that G and is the son that stayed behind, along with his 'nephew' IJ".
That does not respond to any logic. Because of the "random flea effect", most "sons" stay by the "father", so basal diversity tells us what happened.
"And MNOPS cannot really be older than IJ, or even LT".
I did not say that but it can well be, there's nothing impeding it. I'd guess that Q and R1b (<MNOPS) arrived to West Asia after IJ and G but the opposite is not impossible at all. There's always the possibility that IJ and G were in "larval" stages (private lineages) at the time and had not yet coalesced as such finished, clear cut, haplogroups.
Just because something is higher in the phylogeny it does not mean that it is older automatically. Not at all.
"Presumably G and IJ replaced those haplogroups in the region they had earlier inhabited".
Presumably J* did but only after "touching base" first in South Asia as F (etc.)
G and the rest of IJ colonized the Neanderthal region, so they do not apply.
"If all your aquaintances lived on your side of the estuary and upstream of it you would live quite comfortably without crossing it".
ReplyDeleteMaybe your kind of psychology can do that, not mine. If there is another side we must explore it and know it and maybe also take possession and use it (unless strong opposition from someone else arises). You do not stop at a river or sea shore when you can see the other side: you go and explore. If not today, then tomorrow, if not you, then your son.
We are humans: we explore. Today we have technical problems about exploring the planets and stars but we are, at least some are, anxiously thinking on how to overcome those problems and reach out there. And you bet that reaching out to Mars is a lot harder to figure out than crossing a stupid river.
"Other things seem to have been invented once"...
Actually most things have been invented several times, often almost simultaneously (as pre-conditions for the key discovery had accumulated) or in other cases discovered, abandoned, re-invented...
"And where the rivers could be waded".
I know most of those rivers and they have bridges on them for a reason. Also didn't you say that by that time they already had boats?
They even do yearly contests of river descent on logs, so they are certainly "navigable".
"And not based around any major river valley. And what about your own map of the Aurignacian"...
Danube, Rhine, Garonne, Dordogne, Rhône, Dniepr, Don... all those are big rivers. Admittedly river sediments may have hidden archaeological treasuries in many such valleys but still the evidence for their use is overwhelming.
"I think I begin to see a pattern here. These people seem to be dodging the major rivers".
Are you kidding me? They followed them most of the time! They lived by them!
"So the Ebro..."
Forget about the cold Ebro valley, ok? Think about the Tisza, the Danube, the Rhine, the Rhône, the Dordogne, the Dniepr, the Don...
"They followed them most of the time! They lived by them!"
ReplyDeleteThat's not what your own data says.
"Forget about the cold Ebro valley, ok? Think about the Tisza, the Danube, the Rhine, the Rhône, the Dordogne, the Dniepr, the Don..."
So the Ebro is colder than the surrounding piedmont? And most of the rivers you mention have been barriers to migration through most of our history.
"Admittedly river sediments may have hidden archaeological treasuries in many such valleys"
You're making things up now to suit your theory. And haven't you maintained that what are islands today have always been islands? Or does that only apply to the Nile?
"No date is provided here but all the figures at the beginning are of several million years".
Climate always fluctuates. And the river doesn't actually have to 'dry up' before you don't need boats to cross it. The authors of the paper make no claim that boats were needed to reach the island.
"It's a window to our origins as Homo sapiens and a window that strongly implies boats".
Only in your imagination.
"Today we have technical problems about exploring the planets and stars but we are, at least some are, anxiously thinking on how to overcome those problems"
And Paleolithic humans presumably had the same problems regarding wide expanses of water.
"You can't dam a dry river, only permanent ones. But first of all you need a river".
Do you know nothing about hydrology? I thought you worked as a gardener. Dams catch runoff for times when there is no precipitation.
"I know most of those rivers and they have bridges on them for a reason".
Bridges allow crossings to be more than just seasonal.
"Also didn't you say that by that time they already had boats?"
Yes, but obviously incapable of navigating the larger rivers or the sea.
"most 'sons' stay by the 'father', so basal diversity tells us what happened".
Rubbish. No-one would ever move if that was the case.
"I did not say that but it can well be, there's nothing impeding it".
And there's nothing impeding G being older than the other F haplogroups.
"There's always the possibility that IJ and G were in 'larval' stages (private lineages) at the time and had not yet coalesced as such finished, clear cut, haplogroups".
In fact I think that is quite likely. But they most likely lived in the region where they later coalesced.
The reality is that, according to archaeological data, nobody lived in the Ebro valley, including the piedmont. People lived north of the Pyrenees and south of it only in specific areas, notably the Iberian coast, what implies crossing the Ebro (and other rivers) near their mouths.
ReplyDeleteGet over it! Crossing rivers was normal. Otherwise we'd see them (in the archaeological record) as barriers and not centers of life as we actually do.
"And haven't you maintained that what are islands today have always been islands? Or does that only apply to the Nile?"
I've mantained that the authors of the Sai paper treat Sai as if it was always an island and never claim otherwise. You have not brought any evidence of changes in the Nile - well you did... for the age of Dinosaurs or something, not for the last 200,000 years or so.
You are the one imagining things in order for your cards castle not to collapse: now you blow to the right, now to the left... but it's falling down as we speak no matter what.
"The authors of the paper make no claim that boats were needed to reach the island".
They also make no claim about people peeing... draw your own conclusions.
"Dams catch runoff for times when there is no precipitation".
Dams are built at permanent rivers, believe me. In fact the main use of dams is to control floods and generate electricity. They can help against seasonal drought too but only that much.
"Yes, but obviously [boats] incapable of navigating the larger rivers or the sea".
Yet they were the same people (by Y-DNA MNOPS, mtDNA N and R) who were at Sundaland and Wallacea. Something in your narrative falters.
Well, more like everything.
I'm tired: you have your own ideas, which I disagree with almost universally. You should start your own blog and see if anyone thinks that what you say actually makes any sense at all.
For me it's nonsense: you boats model is nonsense, your crossing the rivers by the mountains is nonsense, your ideas about F sublineages are nonsense.
Got it?
A very innocent comment just to state that never a river has been a border in France except for the two large estuaries of the Gironde and the Loire rivers (which are interior seas). And actually it's not that true about the Loire river as the Duchy of Brittany succeeded in conquering the southern bank formerly a possession of Poitou (and populated by ethnic Poitevins : dialects and surnames are quite clear) hence why Breton placenames can be found in the area. As for the Gironde estuary, only in its greatest extension does it become a border as Gascon people inhabited both banks up to the fortress of Blaye. Then as it gets too large, both banks do diverge.
ReplyDeleteThe Dordogne river never was a border : both banks always belonged to the very same entities it crossed, be it Limousin, Périgord or Bordelais. In Périgord, both banks speak the very same dialectal variant of Guyennais, the border is just in the North of the valley, on the crests separating the Dordogne valley from the Isle valley (which indeed speaks Limousin and is quite distinct in many aspects such as vernacular architecture). BTW already in Paleolithic times, neither the Dordogne nor the Vézère rivers were border for people inhabiting the country. Both banks of the Dordogne river in Bordelais do speak Gascon as well, the border with Oïlic Saintongeais in some kilometers in the North.
The Rhine clearly is not a border at least in Alsace ! Once more, the natural border is the Vosges which separate the Germanic world from the Romance world.
The Rhône is not a border either : the very same language is spoken on both banks, be it Provençal around Nîmes and Arles or Gavot around Valence. The differenciation is more of a North/South one with contradictory influences coming from Provence and Lyonnais propagated by the river valley.
IMO that rivers are borders is a pure product of 19th century thought when countries like France sought for natural borders. If anything rivers are highways.
"IMO that rivers are borders is a pure product of 19th century thought when countries like France sought for natural borders. If anything rivers are highways".
ReplyDeleteThey became 'highways' only with the development of the Neolithic. Before that time the larger rivers tended to be borders.
"never a river has been a border in France except for the two large estuaries of the Gironde and the Loire rivers (which are interior seas)".
Exactly. The major rivers were borders until efficient boating was developed.
"The reality is that, according to archaeological data, nobody lived in the Ebro valley"
That's what I've bben trying to draw your attention to.
"I've mantained that the authors of the Sai paper treat Sai as if it was always an island and never claim otherwise".
No. They wrote, 'Human occupations took place on the channel banks, apparently at times when the river regime changed to low-energy, perhaps seasonal, activity'. So they seem to believe thast humans walked to the islands at a time of lowered flow. No need for boats.
"You have not brought any evidence of changes in the Nile - well you did... for the age of Dinosaurs or something, not for the last 200,000 years or so".
Try this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nile
Quote:
"The Sudd swamps which form the central part of the basin may still be subsiding. The White Nile Rift System, although shallower than the Bahr el Arab rift, is about 9 kilometres (5.6 mi) deep. Geophysical exploration of the Blue Nile Rift System estimated the depth of the sediments to be 5–9 kilometres (3.1–5.6 mi). These basins were not interconnected until their subsidence ceased, and the rate of sediment deposition was enough to fill and connect them. The Egyptian Nile connected to the Sudanese Nile, which captures the Ethiopian and Equatorial headwaters during the current stages of tectonic activity in the Eastern, Central and Sudanese Rift Systems.[21] The connection of the different Niles occurred during cyclic wet periods. The River Atbara overflowed its closed basin during the wet periods that occurred about 100,000 to 120,000 years ago. The Blue Nile connected to the main Nile during the 70,000–80,000 years B.P. wet period. The White Nile system in Bahr El Arab and White Nile Rifts remained a closed lake until the connection of the Victoria Nile to the main system some 12,500 years ago".
That takes the changes in the Nile up until the Neolithic.
"Dams are built at permanent rivers, believe me".
And they're also built on seasonal rivers, believe me.
"Yet they were the same people (by Y-DNA MNOPS, mtDNA N and R) who were at Sundaland and Wallacea. Something in your narrative falters".
On the contrary. The fact they are the same people (the same haplogroups anyway) goes a long wayto supporting the idea that they carried boating with them.
"For me it's nonsense: you boats model is nonsense, your crossing the rivers by the mountains is nonsense, your ideas about F sublineages are nonsense".
You think it's nonsense because you have this strange idea that the earth has always been as it is at present.
"Before [Neolithic] the larger rivers tended to be borders".
ReplyDeleteFalse, as the Danube, Rhine, Rhône, Dniepr, Don... show in the best studied case, which is Europe. I have no reason to think it was otherwise in Asia or Africa.
You are becoming very annoying with your unjustified proclamations of subjective faith. I strongly demand that either you back them with data or refrain from posting them. There is no reason for the rest of us, beginning with myself, to waste our time reading and replying to such ill-conceived and ill organized comments (one-liners' list, a clear sign of lack of reflexion).
"'Human occupations took place on the channel banks"...
According to Wikitionary ("An edge of river, lake, or other watercourse"). and any other resource I know of a river bank is the lands that lay OUTSIDE the river itself: the shores. It is the same as Basque ibar or Spanish vega, rivera.
"That takes the changes in the Nile up until the Neolithic".
Doesn't seem to be much clear but whatever. The authors treat Sai as an island and talk of river banks (shores), so there was a river around the island. They never say that the island stopped being such thing.
"The fact they are the same people (the same haplogroups anyway) goes a long wayto supporting the idea that they carried boating with them".
But then they could not even cross the Dordogne! Can you make up your mind? It can be boat or no boat but not both at the same time!!!
"The authors treat Sai as an island and talk of river banks (shores), so there was a river around the island. They never say that the island stopped being such thing".
ReplyDeleteBut they certainly seem to assume that people walked to the island, otherwise they would hardly bother suggesting they reached the island 'during times when the river regime changed to low-energy, perhaps seasonal, activity'.
"But then they could not even cross the Dordogne!"
I'm not familiar with the Dordogne but I assume that for much of its length it is quite possible to wade across it at times during most years. See here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dordogne_(river)
Look at the photographs. The river looks quite easily waded in all photographs except the bottom one (Altillac). The photographs from the Perigord look very easy to cross.
"I strongly demand that either you back them with data or refrain from posting them. There is no reason for the rest of us, beginning with myself, to waste our time reading and replying to such ill-conceived and ill organized comments (one-liners' list, a clear sign of lack of reflexion)".
Your obstinacy is admirable but you still seem to insist that the flow in the Nile has always been constant. So, to satisfy your demand for yet more evidence of variation in Nile flow (although I'm sure you will not accept it as such):
http://geology.geoscienceworld.org/cgi/content/abstract/28/4/343
And section 13.4 of this is relevant:
http://books.google.co.nz/books?id=gXgyHLT_hwIC&pg=PA268&lpg=PA268&dq=nile+pleistocene&source=bl&ots=7Mf09jjcHh&sig=3vGpqmGAxX201wghnTAA6LZzmts&hl=en&ei=3xRKTueTNY75mAXhk5iECA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8&sqi=2&ved=0CFYQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=nile%20pleistocene&f=false
Your assumption that humans reached the island in the Nile by boat is completely unwarranted. And you still haven't explained why the Ebro should have been so sparsely inhabited at a time when you claim boats were widespread and efficient.