The Incredible Human Journey

by Alice Roberts

  6. Wang, S., Lewis, C. M. Jr, Jakobsson, M., et al. Genetic variation and population structure in Native Americans. PLoS Genetics 3: 2049–67 (2007).

  7. Oppenheimer, S. Out of Eden. The Peopling of the World, Constable & Robinson, London (2003).

  8. Goebel, T. The Late Pleistocene dispersal of modern humans in the Americas. Science 319: 1497–502 (2008).

  9. Shang, H., Tong, H., Zhang, S., et al. An early modern human from Tianyuan Cave, Zhoukoudian, China. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104: 6573–8 (2007).

  10. Kitchen, A., Miyamoto, M. M., & Mulligan, C. J. A three-stage colonization model for the peopling of the Americas. PLoS One 3: e1596 (2008).

  Exploring the Coastal Corridor: Vancouver, Canada

  1. Hume, S. Tracking Simon Fraser’s route. Vancouver Sun (2007).

  2. Lacourse, T., Mathewes, R. W., & Fedje, D. W. Late-glacial vegetation dynamics of the Queen Charlotte Islands and adjacentcontinental shelf, British Columbia, Canada. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 226: 36–57 (2005).

  3. Ramsey, C. L., Griffiths, P. A., Fedje, D. W., et al. Preliminary investigation of a late Wisconsinian fauna from K1 cave, Queen Charlotte Islands (Haida Gwaii), Canada. Quaternary Research 62: 105–9 (2004).

  4. Leonard, J. A., Wayne, R. K., & Cooper, A. Population genetics of Ice Age brown bears. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 97: 1651–4 (2000).

  5. Erlandson, J. M., Graham, M. H., Bourque, B. J., et al. The Kelp Highway hypothesis: marine ecology, the coastal migration theory, and the peopling of the Americas. The Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology 2: 161–74 (2007).

  6. Fedje, D. W., & Josenhans, H. Drowned forests and archaeology on the continental shelf of British Columbia, Canada. Geology 28: 99–102 (2000).

  7. Mandryk, C. A. S., Josenhans, H., Fedje, D. W., & Mathewes, R. W. Late Quaternary paleoenvironments of Northwestern NorthAmerica: implications for inland versus coastal migration routes. Quaternary Science Reviews 20: 310–14 (2001).

  Finding Arlington Woman: Santa Rosa Island, California

  1. Johnson, J. R., Stafford, T. W., Ajie, H. O., & Morris, D. P. Arlington Springs revisited. In: Proceedings of the Fifth California Islands Symposium, pp. 541–5 (2000).

  2. Waguespack, N. M. Why we’re still arguing about the Pleistocene occupation of the Americas. Evolutionary Anthropology 16: 63–74 (2007).

  3. Agenbroad, L. D., Johnson, J. R., Morris, D., et al. Mammoths and humans as late Pleistocene contemporaries on Santa Rosa Island. Proceedings of the Sixth California Islands Symposium, pp. 3–7 (2005).

  4. Dixon, E. J. Human colonization of the Americas: timing, technology and process. Quaternary Science Reviews 20: 277–99 (2001).

  5. Eshleman, J. A., Malhi, R. S., Johnson, J. R., et al. Mitochondrial DNA and prehistoric settlements: native migrations on the western edge of North America. Human Biology 76: 55–75 (2004).

  6. Johnson, J. R., & Lorenz, J. G. Genetics, linguistics and prehistoric migrations: an analysis of California Indian mitochondrial DNA lineages. Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology 26: 33–64 (2006).

  7. Kemp, B. M., Malhi, R. S., McDonough, J., et al. Genetic analysis of early Holocene skeletal remains from Alaska and its implications for the settlement of the Americas.American Journal of Physical Anthropology 132: 605–21 (2007).

  8. Wang, S., Lewis, C. M. Jr, Jakobsson, M., et al. Genetic variation and population structure in Native Americans. PLoS Genetics 3: 2049–67 (2007).

  Hunting American Megafauna: La Brea Tar Pits, Los Angeles

  1. Firestone, R. B., West, A., Kennett, J. P., et al. Evidence for an extraterrestrial impact 12,900 years ago that contributed to the megafaunal extinctions and the YoungerDryas cooling. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 104: 16016–21 (2007).

  2. Haynes, G. The catastrophic extinction of North American mammoths and mastodonts. World Archaeology 33: 391–416 (2002).

  Clovis Culture: Gault, Texas

  1. Collins, M. B. Discerning Clovis subsistence from stone artifacts and site distributions on the southern plains periphery.In: Walker, R. B., & Driskell, B. N. (eds), Foragers of the Terminal Pleistocene in North America, University of Nebraska Press: Lincoln and London (2007).

  2. Goebel, T. The Late Pleistocene dispersal of modern humans in the Americas. Science 319: 1497–502 (2008).

  3. Haynes, G. The catastrophic extinction of North American Mammoths and Mastodonts. World Archaeology 33: 391–416 (2002).

  4. Collins, M. B. The Gault Site, Texas, and Clovis research. Athena Review 3: 31–41 (2002).

  5. Byers, D. A., & Ugan, A. Should we expect large game specialization in the late Pleistocene? An optimal foraging perspectiveon early Paleoindian prey choice, Journal of Archaeological Science 32: 1624–40 (2005).

  6. Koch, P. L., & Barnosky, A. D. Late quaternary extinctions: state of the debate. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution and Systematics 37: 215–50 (2006).

  7. Mithen, S. After the Ice. A Global Human History, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts (2003).

  8. Bradley, B., & Stanford, D. The Solutrean-Clovis connection: reply to Straus, Meltzer and Goebel. 38: 704–14 (2006).

  9. Straus, L. G. Solutrean settlement of North America? A review of reality. American Antiquity 65: 219–26 (2006).

  10. Straus, L. G., Meltzer, D. J., & Goebel, T. Ice Age Atlantis? Exploring the Solutrean-Clovis ‘connection’. World Archaeology 37: 507–32 (2006).

  11. Oppenheimer, S. Out of Eden. The Peopling of the World, Constable & Robinson, London (2003).

  12. Holliday, V. T. Folsom drought and episodic drying on the Southern High Plains from 10,900–10,200 C14 yr BP. Quaternary Research 53: 1–12 (2000).

  Meeting Luzia: Rio, Brazil

  1. Neves, W. A., Hubbe, M., & Pilo, L. B. Early Holocene human skeletal remains from Sumidouro Cave, Lagoa Santa, Brazil:History of discoveries, geological and chronological context, and comparative cranial morphology. Journal of Human Evolution 52: 16–30 (2007).

  2. Neves, W. A., and Hubbe, M. Cranial morphology of early Americans from Lagoa Santa, Brazil: implications for the settlementof the New World. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 102: 18309–14 (2005).

  3. Neves, W. A., Prous, A., Gonzalez-Jose, R., et al. Early Holocene human skeletal remains from Santana do Riacho, Brazil: Implications for the settlement of the New World.Journal of Human Evolution 45: 19–42 (2003).

  4. Lahr, M. M. Patterns of modern human diversification: implications for Amerindian origins. Yearbook of Physical Anthropology 38: 163–98 (1995).

  5. Wang, S., Lewis, C. M. Jr, Jakobsson, M., et al. Genetic variation and population structure in Native Americans. PLoS Genetics 3: 2049–67 (2007).

  6. Oppenheimer, S. Out of Eden. The Peopling of the World, Constable & Robinson, London (2003).

  7. Gonzalez-Jose, R., Bortolini, M. C., Santos, F. R., et al. The peopling of the Americas: craniofacial shape variation on a continental scale and its interpretation from an interdisciplinaryview. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 137: 175–87 (2008).

  8. van Vark, G. N., Kuizenga, D., & Williams, F. L. Kennewick and Luzia: Lessons from the European Upper Palaeolithic. American Journal of Physical Anthropology 121: 181–4 (2003).

  Ancient Hunter-Gatherers in the Amazon Forest: Pedra Pintada, Brazil

  1. Roosevelt, A. C., Lima da Costa, M., Machado, C. L., et al. Paleoindian cave dwellers in the Amazon: the peopling of the Americas. Science 272: 373–84 (1996).

  2. Roosevelt, A. C. Clovis in context: new light on the peopling of the Americas. Human Evolution 17: 95–112 (2002).

  3. Roosevelt, A. C. Ancient and modern hunter-gatherers of lowland South America: an evolutionary problem. In Plew, M. (ed.), Advances in Historical Ecology, Columbia University Press, New York, pp. 165– 92 (1998).

  Black Soil and Revelations: Monte Verde, Chile

  1. Dillehay, T. D., & Collins, M. B. Early cultural evidenc
e from Monte Verde in Chile. Nature 332: 150–52 (1988).

  2. Dillehay, T. D., Ramfrez, C., Piño, M., et al. Monte Verde: seaweed, food, medicine, and the peopling of South America. Science 320: 784–6 (2008).

  3. Ugent, D., Dillehay, T., & Ramirez, C. Potato remains from a late Pleistocene settlement in southcentral Chile. Economic Botany 41: 17–27 (1987).

  4. Keefer, D. K., deFrance, S. D., Moseley, M. E., et al. Early maritime economy and El Niño events at Quebrada Tacahuay, Peru. Science 281: 1833–5 (1998).

  5. Sandweiss, D. H., McInnis, H., Burger, R. L., et al. Quebrada Jaguay: early South American maritime adaptations. Science 281: 1830–32 (1998).

  6. Meltzer, D. J., Grayson, D. K., Ardila, G., et al. On the Pleistocene antiquity of Monte Verde, southern Chile. American Antiquity 62: 659–63 (1997).

  7. Dixon, E. J. Human colonization of the Americas: timing, technology and process. Quaternary Science Reviews 20: 277–99 (2001).

  8. Goebel, T. The Late Pleistocene dispersal of modern humans in the Americas. Science 319: 1497–502 (2008).

  Journey’s End

  1. Stringer, C. Homo Britannicus. The Incredible Story of Human Life in Britain, Penguin Books, London (2006).

  2. Mithen, S. After the Ice. A Global Human History, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts (2003).

  3. Lomborg, B. The Skeptical Environmentalist. Measuring the Real State of the World, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (2001).

  4. Gould, S. J. Wonderful Life. Norton & Co., New York (1989).

  References and Sources for Figures and Maps

  p. 5 The Human Family Tree: ‘Splitters’ Hominin Taxonomy. Based on figure 1 in Wood, B., Lonergan, N. The hominin fossil record: taxa, grades and clades. Journal of Anatomy 212: 354–76 (2008).

  p. 11 Ages and Stages. Adapted from figure, p. 300 in: Stringer, C., Homo Britannicus. The Incredible Story of Human Life in Britain, Penguin Books, London (2006).

  p. 15 Basic Guide to Toolkits. Sourced mainly from Klein, R. G. Archaeology and the evolution of human behaviour. Evolutionary Anthropology 9: 17–36 (2000).

  p. 53 Bodo and Omo crania. Based on photographs and descriptions in: Schwartz, J. H., and Tattersall, I., The Human Fossil Record, vol. 2, Craniodental Morphology of Genus Homo (Africa and Asia), Wiley Liss, New Jersey, pp. 235–40 (2003).

  p. 63 Routes out of Africa. Based partly on figure 1 in Bulbeck, D. Where river meets sea. A parsimonious model for Homo sapiens colonization of the Indian Ocean rim and Sahul. Current Anthropology 48: 315–21 (2007).

  p. 101 Mitochondrial DNA ivy branches. Based on Stephen Oppenheimer’s description and figure in box 2: Shriver, M. D., & Kittles, R. A. Genetic ancestry and thesearch for personalized genetic histories. Nature Reviews Genetics 5: 611–18 (2004).

  p. 119 Routes from Sunda to Sahul. Based on figure 1 in Bulbeck, D. Where river meets sea. A Parsimonious model for Homo sapiens colonization of the Indian Ocean rim and Sahul. Current Anthropology 48: 315–21 (2007).

  p. 152 Routes into central and northern Asia. Based on figures 5.5, 5.7 and 5.9 in Oppenheimer, S. Out of Eden. The Peopling of the World, Constable & Robinson, London (2003).

  p. 207 Routes into Europe. Based on figure 1 in: Mellars, P. Neanderthals and the modern human colonization of Europe. Nature 432: 461–5 (2004); figure 1 in Bar-Yosef, O. The Upper Paleolithic revolution. Annual Reviews in Anthropology 31: 363–93 (2002); figure 3.4 in Oppenheimer, S. Out of Eden. The Peopling of the World, Constable &Robinson, London (2003).

  p. 208 Upper Palaeolithic Artefacts from Üçagizliğizli Cave. Redrawn from Kuhn, S. L., Stiner, M. C., Reese, D. S., & Gulec, E. Ornaments of the earliest Upper Palaeolithic: new insights from the Levant. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 98: 7641–6 (2001). p. 209 Pierced Nassarius shells from Üçagizli Cave. Redrawn from Kuhn, S. L., Stiner, M. C., Reese, D. S., & Gulec, E. Ornaments of the earliest Upper Palaeolithic: new insights from the Levant. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 98: 7641–6 (2001).

  p. 214 Simplified plan of Peştera cu Oase. Redrawn from Zilhao, J. E., Trinkaus, E., Constantin, S., et al. The Peştera cu Oase people, Europe’s earliest modern humans. In: Mellars, P., Stringer, C., Bar-Yosef, O., Boyle, K. (eds),Rethinking the Human Revolution: New Behavioural and Biological Perspectives on the Origins and Dispersal of Modern Humans, McDonald Institute of Archaeology Monographs, Cambridge (2007).

  p. 262 Stages in the manufacture of Aurignacian beads. Based on figures in White, R. Systems of personal ornamentation in the Early Upper Palaeolithic: methodological challengesand new observations. In: Mellars, P., Boyle, K., Bar-Yosef, O., &Stringer, C. (eds), Rethinking the Human Revolution: New Behavioural and Biological Perspectives on the Origin and Dispersal of Modern Humans, McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, Cambridge (2007).

  p. 300 Routes into the Americas. Based on figure 7.1 in Oppenheimer, S. Out of Eden. The Peopling of the World, Constable & Robinson, London (2003); figure 1 in Goebel, T. The Late Pleistocene dispersal of modern humans in the Americas.Science 319: 1497–502 (2008).

  Acknowledgements

  I want to express my thanks to the huge team of people who made this book and the BBC2 television series possible.

  The producers, Michael Moseley, Kim Shillinglaw and Paul Bradshaw, made the journey happen and kept it on track!

  I was away filming for around 26 weeks, through the spring and summer of 2008, and I couldn’t have done it without the love and support of my husband, Dave Stevens, who stayed at home while I roamed the world. I’m extremely grateful to the originators of Skype and Facebook for helping me stay in contact with family and friends when I was far, far away.

  I must also thank my Head of Department, Jeremy Henley, the Department of Anatomy and the University of Bristol, for granting me a leave of absence, allowing me to take the wonderful opportunity of making this journey.

  Many friends and colleagues have kindly assisted me with this book.

  I am massively indebted to Stephen Oppenheimer, Colin Groves and Jo Kamminga, for their careful reading of early drafts and wise advice and guidance. Many of the producers, directors and researchers on the series, especially Kim Shillinglaw, Paul Bradshaw, Dave Stewart, Pete Oxley, Naomi Law, Mags Lightbody and Sam Cronin, also provided me with valuable feedback and fact checks. Many thanks are due to Martha Sullivan and Jodie Pashley for furnishing me with transcripts of interviews.

  I am very grateful to Chris Stringer (Natural History Museum) and Peter Forster (Anglia Ruskin University) for their thoughtful advice.

  And to Paul Valdes and Joy Singarayer (Bristol Research Initiative for the Dynamic Global Environment – BRIDGE – University of Bristol), climate consultants for the series, for sharing the palaeoclimate maps with me. Enormous thanks to Dave Stevens who took my rough sketches and made them into beautiful maps and diagrams.

  Thank you to everyone involved with filming the series. Each of the five programmes – corresponding with the chapters in this book – was filmed by a different team, with a cast of contributors, some of whom I have written about in the book, others whom I must remember here.

  In Africa: thanks to Dave Stewart, producer/director extraordinaire (thank you for recommending The Songlines!); Mags Lightbody, who saved my laptop in Dubai, and carried Omo II ‘home’ in a shawl; Graham Smith (‘the bear’), cameraman, often to be seen hanging out the side of a helicopter or small plane; Rob McGregor, camera assistant/ cameraman – thank you for yoga on the beach and for hauling me off the rocks in Israel; Andrew Yarme, soundman – thank you for driving to Cape Town and for the Sounds of Omo!

  Thanks also to Arno and Estelle Oostuysen, for looking after us at Nhoma camp; all the Bushmen of Nhoma, and Theo for keeping guard on our night in the bush; to Raj Ramesar, for an introduction to Capetonian genetics, and all the study participants who shared their results with us; Kyle Brown, for the tour around Pinnacle Point; Jeff Rose, for introducing me to Omani archaeology; and Yoel Rak, for showing me
Skhul Cave.

  In India, Southeast Asia and Australia: thanks to Ed Bazalgette, producer/director (and outback-barbie guitarist); Naomi Law, researcher and macarena teacher, goddess of organisation and serenity (remember the night when the lights went out in Mungo?); Chris Titus King, cameraman with an excellent sense of the absurd; Freddie Claire, soundman, with a joke for every occasion (Poppadom preach and Indian otters); Alex Byng, camera assistant; Phil Dow, camera assistant in Oz; Toby Sinclair, fixer extraordinaire in India (thank you for the jasmine garlands!); and Alan d’Cruz, fixer in Malaysia.

  Many thanks to Michael Petraglia and Ravi Korisettar, for giving up time to talk to me during their excavation at Jwalapuram; Bert Roberts, for fascinating insight into luminescence dating and the Hobbit controversy; Stephen Oppenheimer, for talking to me about genetics and phylogeography, and for reviewing the India-to-Australia chapter – huge thanks; Hamid Isa, for his knowledge of the Semang people; Ipoi Datan, for bringing the Niah skull back to its findspot; Tony Djubiantono, for letting me examine the bones from Flores; Robert Bednarik, for masterminding the construction of a Stone Age raft; Sally May, fixer and Australian rock art expert in Gunbalanya; Anthony Murphy and all the artists at the Injalak Arts & Crafts Centre; Michael Westaway, archaeologist at Mungo; Alan Thorne, for introducing me to Mungo Man; and Sheila van holst Pellekaan, for an insight into Australian genetics.

  In Siberia and China: thanks to Fiona Cushley, assistant producer, for her Russian expertise and walking the wall with me; Tim Cragg, cameraman,

  Adam Prescod, soundman and Jack Burton, second cameraman, for keeping going in the c-c-cold; and Qian Hong, fixer in China.

  I am also grateful to Svetlana Demeshchenko, head curator at the Hermitage, for letting me see the beautiful artefacts from Mal’ta; Vladimir Pitulko, for talking to me about Yana – and for trying to get me there!; Piers Vitebsky and Anatoly Alekseyev, for introducing me to Arctic culture; Jo Kamminga, for teaching me to make a bamboo knife, and for reviewing the manuscript of this book – and for my copy of Prehistory of Australia; Xingzhi Wu, for introducing me to Zhoukoudian and Peking Man; Wei Jun, Wang Hao Tian, Liu Cheng Jie and Liu Cheng Yi; and Fu Xianguo, for an introduction to early Chinese pottery.