posted
Non African origin of ancient Egypt is confirmed by most recent study.
quote: "...Proposed migrations between North Africa and neighboring regions have included Paleolithic gene flow from the Near East, an Arabic migration across the whole of North Africa 1,400 years ago (ya), and trans-Saharan transport of slaves from sub-Saharan Africa. Historical records, archaeology, and mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA have been marshaled in support of one theory or another, but there is little consensus regarding the overall genetic background of North African populations or their origin and expansion. We characterize the patterns of genetic variation in North Africa using ~730,000 single nucleotide polymorphisms from across the genome for seven populations. We observe two distinct, opposite gradients of ancestry: an east-to-west increase in likely autochthonous North African ancestry and an east-to-west decrease in likely Near Eastern Arabic ancestry. The indigenous North African ancestry may have been more common in Berber populations and appears most closely related to populations outside of Africa, but divergence between Maghrebi peoples and Near Eastern/Europeans likely precedes the Holocene (>12,000 ya). We also find significant signatures of sub-Saharan African ancestry that vary substantially among populations. These sub-Saharan ancestries appear to be a recent introduction into North African populations, dating to about 1,200 years ago in southern Morocco and about 750 years ago into Egypt, We also find significant signatures of sub-Saharan African ancestry that vary substantially among populations. These sub-Saharan ancestries appear to be a recent introduction into North African populations, dating to about 1,200 years ago in southern Morocco and about 750 years ago into Egypt, possibly reflecting the patterns of the trans-Saharan slave trade that occurred during this period...." http://www.plosgenetics.org/article/...l.pgen.1002397
Afronuts have officially been debunked.
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White Nord
A banned big lipped primate
Member # 14093
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Marin A, Cerutti N, Massa ER. Use of the amplification refractory mutation system (ARMS) in the study of HbS in predynastic Egyptian remains. Boll Soc Ital Biol Sper 1999; 75 : 27-30.
Where did that say anything about the Egyptians not being Tropically adapted black Africans..
Queen Tiye...the Black Queen of the Nile..
Back to your cave..
quote:Originally posted by White Nord: Non African origin of ancient Egypt is confirmed by most recent study.
quote: "...Proposed migrations between North Africa and neighboring regions have included Paleolithic gene flow from the Near East, an Arabic migration across the whole of North Africa 1,400 years ago (ya), and trans-Saharan transport of slaves from sub-Saharan Africa. Historical records, archaeology, and mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA have been marshaled in support of one theory or another, but there is little consensus regarding the overall genetic background of North African populations or their origin and expansion. We characterize the patterns of genetic variation in North Africa using ~730,000 single nucleotide polymorphisms from across the genome for seven populations. We observe two distinct, opposite gradients of ancestry: an east-to-west increase in likely autochthonous North African ancestry and an east-to-west decrease in likely Near Eastern Arabic ancestry. The indigenous North African ancestry may have been more common in Berber populations and appears most closely related to populations outside of Africa, but divergence between Maghrebi peoples and Near Eastern/Europeans likely precedes the Holocene (>12,000 ya). We also find significant signatures of sub-Saharan African ancestry that vary substantially among populations. These sub-Saharan ancestries appear to be a recent introduction into North African populations, dating to about 1,200 years ago in southern Morocco and about 750 years ago into Egypt, We also find significant signatures of sub-Saharan African ancestry that vary substantially among populations. These sub-Saharan ancestries appear to be a recent introduction into North African populations, dating to about 1,200 years ago in southern Morocco and about 750 years ago into Egypt, possibly reflecting the patterns of the trans-Saharan slave trade that occurred during this period...." http://www.plosgenetics.org/article/...l.pgen.1002397
Afronuts have officially been debunked.
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quote:Originally posted by Oshun: ^ Link doesn't work
quote:
May as well post it, someone else was bound to.
Here it is, it is basically the same which has been debunked already a dozen times. For some creasy reason they keep bitting this? lol
Weird is, they put the entirely new paper open, online.
They bring up a weird thesis, and again as ussually they lleft out the complex history model of North Africa. In particularly Northwest Africa. There is no mentioning of the invasions by Romans, Byzantine, Vandals, Ottomans, European slaves such as Saqaliba and Mamluks. Non of this is mentioned.
Yet, some weird theory of 12.000 years ago.
There is no mentioning of who those people were, where they came from. How large that population was..etc...
quote:"There is now a sufficient body of evidence from modern studies of skeletal remains to indicate that the ancient Egyptians, especially southern Egyptians, exhibited physical characteristics that are within the range of variation for ancient and modern indigenous peoples of the Sahara and tropical Africa. In general, the inhabitants of Upper Egypt and Nubia had the greatest biological affinity to people of the Sahara and more southerly areas."
Back to your Meth endused fantasies leukoderm.
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White Nord
A banned big lipped primate
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posted
More denial, the myth of Nilotic Saharan origin is debunked as this is only the result of recent slave trade, and Middle Easterners have had a heavy presence in the region since times prior to the Pre-Dynastic. This study has flipped Afro-Centrism on it's head.
STICK TO THIS STUDY, NOT IRRELEVANT SPAM!
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Show me anywhere in that study where the above what you call "Spam" was overturned.
Tick Tock...
Oh.....
Your worst nightmare...
Put the Meth Pipe down its affecting your reasoning skills.
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White Nord
A banned big lipped primate
Member # 14093
posted
"These sub-Saharan ancestries appear to be a recent introduction into North African populations, dating to about 1,200 years ago in southern Morocco and about 750 years ago into Egypt"
posted
"Frigi et al.(2010) suggest these possibilities as factors in their consideration of the asymmetric assimilation of females of non-African origin into Berber-speaking populations whose males currently have a predominance lineage's defined by the African M35/81 biallelic marker.
quote:Originally posted by White Nord: More denial, the myth of Nilotic Saharan origin is debunked as this is only the result of recent slave trade, and Middle Easterners have had a heavy presence in the region since times prior to the Pre-Dynastic. This study has flipped Afro-Centrism on it's head.
STICK TO THIS STUDY, NOT IRRELEVANT SPAM!
How is it debunked when this study has lots of holes? lol
Maybe to a brain dead person like you it's all-in-all. lol
The keyword they use is "hypothesis".
However, fact is...:
Ancient Local Evolution of African mtDNA Haplogroups in Tunisian Berber Populations
Frigi et al.
Discussion
In this study we attempted to better elucidate the ancient African genetic background in the northwest African area, particularly in Tunisia. To this aim, we focused our study on Berber populations that are considered representative of the ancient North African populations that probably derived from Neolithic Capsians.
During historic times, Berbers experienced a long and complicated history with many invasions, conquests, and migrations by Phoenicians, Romans, Vandals, Byzantines, Arabs, Bedouins, Spanish, Turks, Andalusians, sub-Saharans (communities settled in Jerba and Gabes in the 16th–19th centuries), and French (Brett and Fentress 1996). During these invasions, Berbers were forced back to the mountains and to certain villages in southern Tunisia (Fadhlaoui-Zid et al. 2004).
At present, they are restricted to some isolates in the south who maintain the Berber language and to some populations in the north who lack an origin language.
Many genetic studies on Tunisian Berber populations demonstrate the heterogeneity of Berbers with respect to European and sub-Saharan African contributions and the mosaic structure of Tunisian Berber populations with an absence of ethnic, linguistic, and geographic effects (Cherni et al. 2010).
It is interesting that these “non-African”mtDNA lineages are usually predominant while being diverse (Coudray et al. 2009; Fadhlaoui-Zid et al. 2004; Khodjet-el-Khil et al. 2008).
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posted
Clown, you said that this paper over turns the Nilotic/Afrosan/E1b1b1a Saharan origins of the Egyptians. Where is this overturned in your paper, or maybe you have reading comprehension problems after the Meth Damage.
Nothing in that paper overturns this, leukoderm.
quote:Originally posted by White Nord: "These sub-Saharan ancestries appear to be a recent introduction into North African populations, dating to about 1,200 years ago in southern Morocco and about 750 years ago into Egypt"
Stop bullshitting.
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posted
Nothing is "Overturned" or Debunked in this paper. More Foolishness. What specifics are they defining as "Sub Saharan" anyway.
From this study..
quote:We similarly assume Egyptians have ancestry from four primary source populations: Maghrebi (e.g. Saharawi), eastern Nilotic-speakers (e.g. Maasai), Near Eastern Arabs (e.g. Qatari) and European (e.g. Spanish Basque). These source populations reflect the ancestry assigned in our clustering algorithm analysis (Figure 1).
Only a Fraction of Saharans speak Nilotic, we still have the Afrosan Berbers(Taureg), Oromo, Ethiopians etc.
Again where is this "Overturned" in this so called study??
quote:Originally posted by Troll Patrol:
quote:Originally posted by White Nord: More denial, the myth of Nilotic Saharan origin is debunked as this is only the result of recent slave trade, and Middle Easterners have had a heavy presence in the region since times prior to the Pre-Dynastic. This study has flipped Afro-Centrism on it's head.
STICK TO THIS STUDY, NOT IRRELEVANT SPAM!
How is it debunked when this study has lots of holes? lol
Maybe to a brain dead person like you it's all-in-all. lol
The keyword they use is "hypothesis".
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quote:Originally posted by White Nord: "These sub-Saharan ancestries appear to be a recent introduction into North African populations, dating to about 1,200 years ago in southern Morocco and about 750 years ago into Egypt"
Stop bullshitting.
Well then, who were those in North Africa 40Ky and beyond? lol
From what I know it was the Homo Sapien Sapien, who migrated from East to Northwest Africa. lol
Pitifully they didn't use this study. During their hypothesis. lol
"Frigi et al.(2010) suggest these possibilities as factors in their consideration of the asymmetric assimilation of females of non-African origin into Berber-speaking populations whose males currently have a predominance lineage's defined by the African M35/81 biallelic marker.
Or this one, lol
Nick A. Drakea,1, Roger M. Blenchb, Simon J. Armitagec, Charlie S. Bristowd, and Kevin H. Whitee
a Department of Geography, King’s College London, Strand, London WC2R 2LS, United Kingdom; b Kay Williamson Educational Foundation, 8 Guest Road, Cambridge CB1 2AL, United Kingdom; c Department of Geography, Royal Holloway, University of London, Egham, Surrey TW20 0EX, United Kingdom; dSchool of Earth Sciences, Birkbeck College, University of London, Malet Street, London WC1E 7HX, United Kingdom; and eDepartment of Geography, University of Reading, Whiteknights, Reading RG6 6AB, United Kingdom
Edited by Ofer Bar-Yosef, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, and approved November 22, 2010 (received for review August 23, 2010)
Ancient watercourses and biogeography of the Sahara explain the peopling of the desert
Evidence increasingly suggests that sub-Saharan Africa is at the center of human evolution and understanding routes of dispersal “out of Africa” is thus becoming increasingly important. The Sahara Desert is considered by many to be an obstacle to these dispersals and a Nile corridor route has been proposed to cross it. Here we provide evidence that the Sahara was not an effective barrier and indicate how both animals and humans populated it during past humid phases. Analysis of the zoogeography of the Sahara shows that more animals crossed via this route than used the Nile corridor. Furthermore, many of these species are aquatic. This dis- persal was possible because during the Holocene humid period the region contained a series of linked lakes, rivers, and inland deltas comprising a large interlinked waterway, channeling water and an- imals into and across the Sahara, thus facilitating these dispersals. This system was last active in the early Holocene when many spe- cies appear to have occupied the entire Sahara. However, species that require deep water did not reach northern regions because of weak hydrological connections. Human dispersals were influenced by this distribution; Nilo-Saharan speakers hunting aquatic fauna with barbed bone points occupied the southern Sahara, while peo- ple hunting Savannah fauna with the bow and arrow spread south- ward. The dating of lacustrine sediments show that the “green Sahara” also existed during the last interglacial (∼125 ka) and pro- vided green corridors that could have formed dispersal routes at a likely time for the migration of modern humans out of Africa.
quote:Originally posted by -Just Call Me Jari-: Nothing is "Overturned" or Debunked in this paper. More Foolishness. What specifics are they defining as "Sub Saharan" anyway.
From this study..
quote:We similarly assume Egyptians have ancestry from four primary source populations: Maghrebi (e.g. Saharawi), eastern Nilotic-speakers (e.g. Maasai), Near Eastern Arabs (e.g. Qatari) and European (e.g. Spanish Basque). These source populations reflect the ancestry assigned in our clustering algorithm analysis (Figure 1).
Only a Fraction of Saharans speak Nilotic, we still have the Afrosan Berbers(Taureg), Oromo, Ethiopians etc.
Again where is this "Overturned" in this so called study??
quote:Originally posted by Troll Patrol:
quote:Originally posted by White Nord: More denial, the myth of Nilotic Saharan origin is debunked as this is only the result of recent slave trade, and Middle Easterners have had a heavy presence in the region since times prior to the Pre-Dynastic. This study has flipped Afro-Centrism on it's head.
STICK TO THIS STUDY, NOT IRRELEVANT SPAM!
How is it debunked when this study has lots of holes? lol
Maybe to a brain dead person like you it's all-in-all. lol
The keyword they use is "hypothesis".
And again they used the words: we similarly "assume".lol
An assumption? Did you read that? assume...lol
Fact and historically documented is the invasion by Romans, Byzantines, Ottomans, Persians, enslaved Mamluks, Saqalibas... Non of this is mentioned.
I wonder, why they used Maasai samples anyway?
Posts: 22234 | From: האם אינכם כילדי הכרית אלי בני ישראל | Registered: Nov 2010
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quote:Originally posted by White Nord: "These sub-Saharan ancestries appear to be a recent introduction into North African populations, dating to about 1,200 years ago in southern Morocco and about 750 years ago into Egypt"
Stop bullshitting.
Now that's weird, because recent studies say something else. These say the people of the South are continues from Mesoletic and Neoletic times till now.
I wonder why they didn't refer to any of these studies? lol
DNA analysis shows that Egyptians group with African peoples from the Sudan, Ethiopia, East Africa and parts of Cameroon, not with Europe or the Middle East.
*Notes on E-M78 and Rosa DNA study linking Egyptians with East and Central Africans. DNA study (Rosa et al. 2007) groups Egyptians with East and Central Africans. Other DNA studies link these peoples together. Quote:“the majority of Y chromosomes found in populations in Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia and Oromos in Somalia and North Kenya (Boranas) belong to haplogroup E3b1 defined by the Y chromosome marker M78“(Sanchez 2005). Codes: Egy=Egypt. Or= Oromo, Ethiopia. Am=Amahara, Ethiopia. Sud=Sudan. FCA=Cameroon. Maa= Massai, Kenya. Note: Eighty (80)% or more of the haplotypes in Cameroon are of West African origin (Rosa et al. 2007, Cerny et al. 2006). Ethiopia, Cameroon and most of the Sudan is located below the Sahara, and thus sub-Saharan.-- Rosa, et al.(2007) Y-chromosomal diversity in the population of Guinea-Bissau. BMC Evolutionary Biology. 7:124
Comparisons of linear body proportions of Old Kingdom and non-Old Kingdom period individuals, and workers and high officials in our sample found no statistically significant differences among them. Zakrzewski (2003) also found little evidence for differences in linear body proportions of Egyptians over a wider temporal range. In general, recent studies of skeletal variation among ancient Egyptians support scenarios of biological continuity through time. Irish (2006) analyzed quantitative and qualitative dental traits of 996 Egyptians from Neolithic through Roman periods, reporting the presence of a few outliers but concluding that the dental samples appear to be largely homogeneous and that the affinities observed indicate overall biological uniformity and continuity from Predynastic through Dynastic and Postdynastic periods.
Zakrzewski (2007) provided a comprehensive summary of previous Egyptian craniometric studies and examined Egyptian crania from six time periods. She found that the earlier samples were relatively more homogeneous in comparison to the later groups. However, overall results indicated genetic continuity over the Egyptian Predynastic and Early Dynastic periods, albeit with a high level of genetic diversity within the population, suggesting an indigenous process of state formation. She also concluded that while the biological patterning of the Egyptian population varied across time, no consistent temporal or spatial trends are apparent. Thus, the stature estimation formulae developed here may be broadly applicable to all ancient Egyptian populations..".
("Stature estimation in ancient Egyptians: A new technique based on anatomical reconstruction of stature." Michelle H. Raxter, Christopher B. Ruff, Ayman Azab, Moushira Erfan, Muhammad Soliman, Aly El-Sawaf,(Am J Phys Anthropol. 2008, Jun;136(2):147-55
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quote:Originally posted by White Nord: "These sub-Saharan ancestries appear to be a recent introduction into North African populations, dating to about 1,200 years ago in southern Morocco and about 750 years ago into Egypt"
Some of the most important evidence of early man in Nubia was discovered recently by an expedition of the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, under the direction of Dr. Kryzstof Grzymski, on the east bank of the Nile, about 70 miles (116 km) south of Dongola, Sudan. During the early 1990's, this team discovered several sites containing hundreds of Paleolithic hand axes. At one site, however, the team identified an apparent stone tool workshop, where thousands of sandstone hand axes and flakes lay on the ground around a row of large stones set in a line, suggesting the remains of a shelter. This seems to be the earliest "habitation" site yet discovered in the Nile Valley and may be up to 70,000 years old.
What the Nubian environment was like throughout these distant times, we cannot know with certainty, but it must have changed many times. For many thousands of years it was probably far different than what it is today. Between about 50,000 to 25,000 years ago, the hand axe gradually disappeared and was replaced with numerous distinctive chipped stone industries that varied from region to region, suggesting the presence in Nubia of many different peoples or tribal groups dwelling in close proximity to each other. When we first encounter skeletal remains in Nubia, they are those of modern man: homo sapiens*.
Nubia's Oldest Battle?
From about 25,000 to 8,000 years ago, the environment gradually evolved to its present state. From this phase several very early settlement sites have been identified at the Second Cataract, near the Egypt-Sudan border. These appear to have been used seasonally by people leading a semi-nomadic existence. The people hunted, fished, and ground wild grain. The first cemeteries also appear, suggesting that people may have been living at least partly sedentary lives. One cemetery site at Jebel Sahaba, near Wadi Halfa, Sudan, contained a number of bodies that had suffered violent deaths and were buried in a mass grave. This suggests that people, even 10,000 years ago, had begun to compete with each other for resources and were willing to kill each other to control them.
Busharia reveals the precocious appearance of pottery on the African continent around the 9th millennium B.C.
The site of Busharia is located near the desert, at the edge of the alluvial plain and near an old Nile channel. It reveals the remains of human occupation at the onset of the Holocene. The settlement is rather eroded, only a few artefacts, ostrich egg fragments and extremely old ceramic sherds remain. These sherds date to circa 8200 B.C. The ceramic assemblage is homogenous, which suggests the existence of a single occupation phase. The decorations and the use of the return technique, common in the central Sahara around the 6th millennium B.C., are unique in this Nubian context for such an early period.
Remains discovered on site suggest the existence of a semi-sedentary population living from hunting, fishing, and the gathering of wild plants. A trial trench and a small-scale excavation were conducted on this Mesolithic site; however, it is impossible to obtain at present a better understanding of the context related to the first ceramics in the region. As this site is located near cultivated zones, it is thus threatened with short-term destruction.
Three scale models—of the Mesolithic hut of el-Barga ( 7500 B.C. ), the proto-urban agglomeration of the Pre-Kerma (3000 B.C.) and the ancient city of Kerma (2500-1500 B.C.)—give a glimpse of the world of the living. They show the evolution of settlements for each of the key periods in Nubian history. Huts indicate the birth of a sedentary way of life, the agglomeration confirms the settling of populations on a territory and the capital of the Kingdom of Kerma marks the culmination of the complexification of Nubian architecture with its ever more monumental constructions. The three models were created in Switzerland by Hugo Lienhard and were installed in the museum in January 2009.
Wadi el-Arab reveals an almost continuous series of settlement remains spanning two millennia as well as the first Neolithic burials known in Africa.
This site is located today in a desert region. Discovered in 2005, it has been under excavation since 2006. This is an open-air site occupied on several occasions during a period between 8300 and 6600 B.C. Its inhabitants then lived in a rather wooded environment, living on fishing, hunting and gathering.
The site reveals numerous flint tools and flakes, grinding stone fragments, ceramic sherds, ostrich eggshell beads, shells and mollusc remains, fish vertebrae and faunal remains. Rare domesticated ox bones were discovered and dated to circa 7000 B.C. This discovery is important for the question regarding the origin of animal domestication in Africa because it reinforces the idea of a local domestication of African oxen from aurochs living in the Nile Valley.
During the 2006-2007 campaign, six burial pits were excavated in three different areas. Dated to between 7000 and 6600, these burials are the first known Neolithic burials on the African continent.
The Upper Palaeolithic Lithic Industry of Nazlet Khater 4 (Egypt): Implications for the Stone Age/Palaeolithic of Northeastern Africa
Authors: Leplongeon, Alice1; Pleurdeau, David2 Source: African Archaeological Review, Volume 28, Number 3, September 2011, pp. 213-236(24)
Abstract:
Between Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 4 and 2, Northeast Africa witnessed migrations of Homo sapiens into Eurasia. Within the context of the aridification of the Sahara, the Nile Valley probably offered a very attractive corridor into Eurasia. This region and this period are therefore central for the (pre)history of the out-of-Africa peopling of modern humans. However, there are very few sites from the beginning of the Upper Palaeolithic that document these migration events. In Egypt, the site of Nazlet Khater 4 (NK4), which is related to ancient H. sapiens quarrying activities, is one of them. Its lithic assemblage shows an important laminar component, and this, associated with its chronological position (ca. 33 ka), means that the site is the most ancient Upper Palaeolithic sites of this region. The detailed study of the Nazlet Khater 4 lithic material shows that blade production (volumetric reduction) is also associated with flake production (surface reduction). This technological duality addresses the issue of direct attribution of NK4 to the Upper Palaeolithic.
Wadi Kubbaniya (ca. 17,000–15,000 B.C.)
In Egypt, the earliest evidence of humans can be recognized only from tools found scattered over an ancient surface, sometimes with hearths nearby. In Wadi Kubbaniya, a dried-up streambed cutting through the Western Desert to the floodplain northwest of Aswan in Upper Egypt, some interesting sites of the kind described above have been recorded. A cluster of Late Paleolithic camps was located in two different topographic zones: on the tops of dunes and the floor of the wadi (streambed) where it enters the valley. Although no signs of houses were found, diverse and sophisticated stone implements for hunting, fishing, and collecting and processing plants were discovered around hearths. Most tools were bladelets made from a local stone called chert that is widely used in tool fabrication. The bones of wild cattle, hartebeest, many types of fish and birds, as well as the occasional hippopotamus have been identified in the occupation layers. Charred remains of plants that the inhabitants consumed, especially tubers, have also been found.
It appears from the zoological and botanical remains at the various sites in this wadi that the two environmental zones were exploited at different times. We know that the dune sites were occupied when the Nile River flooded the wadi because large numbers of fish and migratory bird bones were found at this location. When the water receded, people then moved down onto the silt left behind on the wadi floor and the floodplain, probably following large animals that looked for water there in the dry season. Paleolithic peoples lived at Wadi Kubbaniya for about 2,000 years, exploiting the different environments as the seasons changed. Other ancient camps have been discovered along the Nile from Sudan to the Mediterranean, yielding similar tools and food remains. These sites demonstrate that the early inhabitants of the Nile valley and its nearby deserts had learned how to exploit local environments, developing economic strategies that were maintained in later cultural traditions of pharaonic Egypt.
quote:Originally posted by White Nord: "These sub-Saharan ancestries appear to be a recent introduction into North African populations, dating to about 1,200 years ago in southern Morocco and about 750 years ago into Egypt"
Stop bullshitting.
lol @ that paper you've posted. And it's not even the 1st of April.
Augustin F.C. Holl Museum of Anthropology, The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, United States Received 21 April 2008. Accepted 8 April 2009. Available online 25 June 2009.
Coping with uncertainty: Neolithic life in the Dhar Tichitt-Walata, Mauritania, (ca. 4000–2300 BP)
Abstract
The sandstone escarpment of the Dhar Tichitt in South-Central Mauritania was inhabited by Neolithic agropastoral communities for approximately one and half millennium during the Late Holocene, from ca. 4000 to 2300 BP. The absence of prior evidence of human settlement points to the influx of mobile herders moving away from the “drying” Sahara towards more humid lower latitudes. These herders took advantage of the peculiarities of the local geology and environment and succeeded in domesticating bulrush millet – Pennisetum sp. The emerging agropastoral subsistence complex had conflicting and/or complementary requirements depending on circumstances. In the long run, the social adjustment to the new subsistence complex, shifting site location strategies, nested settlement patterns and the rise of more encompassing polities appear to have been used to cope with climatic hazards in this relatively circumscribed area. An intense arid spell in the middle of the first millennium BC triggered the collapse of the whole Neolithic agropastoral system and the abandonment of the areas. These regions, resettled by sparse oasis-dwellers populations and iron-using communities starting from the first half of the first millennium AD, became part of the famous Ghana “empire”, the earliest state in West African history.
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posted
With thanks to Sundiata for posting this first.
1. Introduction
The Dhar Tichitt, located at 18° 20′–18° 27′ N and 9° 05′–9° 30′ W, is part of the sandstone cliff series of the South-Central part of Mauritania in southwestern Sahara (Fig. 1). The area was colonized by Neolithic agropastoral communities starting from ca. 4000 BP. They spread all along the sandstones cliffs and settled in the Dhar Tichitt, Dhar Walata, Dhar Nema, and beyond [1], [5], [6], [7], [12], [13], [15] and [20]. These groups settled on the cliff's top, along intermittent rivers courses, and interdunal depressions, herding cattle and sheep-goat, cultivating bulrush millet, hunting wild game, gathering wild grain and fruits, and fishing in the available ponds and lakes. The local Holocene climatic record points to a Humid Early Holocene (ca. 10,000–7000 BP) with relatively large size lakes in the Hodh. It was followed by an Mid-Holocene Arid phase (ca. 7000–5000 BP) during which most of the large lakes dried up and SW–NE oriented dunes were formed almost everywhere, except in the baten – cliff foot. A Mid-Holocene humid phase – also known as Nouakchottian – is documented to have taken place from ca. 5000 to 3000 BP [7], [8], [9], [13] and [15]. It is during this period that the characteristic climatic pattern of two contrasted seasons, a more or less longer dry season and a generally shorter rainy season, appears to have developed. The later portion of the Late Holocene, particularly from 2500 BP on, was characterized by a shift toward increased aridity with successive drought episodes. These circumstances triggered the abandonment of the area for wetter regions in the south and east. How did Late Holocene people cope with the intrinsic unpredictability of climatic parameters such as seasonal variations, droughts, or flood during their more than 1500 years occupation of the area? This article, following the perspectives outlined in environmental archaeology research [7], [13] and [16], tackles this issue through the lens of the Dhar Tichitt, Dhar Walata and Dhar Nema archaeological record and attempts to decipher the actual coping strategies devised by Neolithic agropastoralists. The emphasis was placed on methods and theory in the original formulation of an environmental archaeological approach to the evolution of past societies. In a recent shift, exemplified in this paper, the subdiscipline focuses more on results and the “relevance of these results for major themes and research problems” in archaeology and anthropology [13] and [16].
Fig. 1. Location of the Dhars in southern Mauritania: from west to east, the Dhar Ousen, Dhar Tidjikja, Dhar Tichitt, Dhar Walata and Dhar Nema (Source: Google Earth).
2. Holocene environment
Palaeoclimatic research in ancient lacustrine deposits found in different parts of the Dhar Tichitt [7], [8], [9] and [15] has allowed a general reconstruction of the main outlines of the regional environment during the last 10,000 years. Three kinds of lakes have been documented all over the study area: • piedmont lakes set at the cliff foot on impervious sedimentary formations that collect rain water from their catchment basin (Fig. 2);
Fig. 2. Diatoms deposit from the piedmont lake at the foot of Akhreijit Site cliff (Author's photo).
• interdunal lakes created by both the rising water-tables and rainfall; • hydrographic lakes fed by local network of streams and rivers. There are nonetheless some intermediate kinds of lakes that combine piedmont and interdunal characteristics as is the case at Tichitt oasis and Khimiya further east.
Evidence for a relatively large Early Holocene lake measuring approximately 100 km west-east was found between the Dhar Ousen (18° 20′ N and 10° 45′ W) in the west and the Dhar Tichitt (18° 20′ N and 8° 55′ W) in the east. The sandstone cliff was its northern shore but its southern limits have not yet been traced with precision [8] and [9]. With significant variations in size and depth, it lasted from ca. 9500 to 7000 BP. The diatoms flora consists above all of Melosira sp. in association with Cyclotella kutzingiana, C. ocellata, Cymbella gastroides and Rhopalodia parallela. Melosira is a planctonic species of deep and extended water bodies. Melosira italica is a northern alpine species and Cyclotella ocellata is a boreal one [17]. The climate was wet and cool with a more even distribution of rainfall. The large lake evolved into lagoons and was split into smaller independent lakelets.
All the lakes dried out during the Middle Holocene Arid phase (ca. 7000–5000 BP), a period that witnessed the accumulation and build up of very extensive and thick deposits of eolian sands.
Late Holocene interstratified clayey and sandy deposits point to a climate with contrasted seasons. Small lakes dotted the landscape surrounded by rings of high grass and trees as indicated by the high density of fossil roots (Fig. 2). The recorded diatomite flora is made of tropical epiphyte and littoral species such as Amphora ovalis, Epithemia argus, E. sorex, Navicula oblonga, N. Radiosa and Rhopalodia gibba. These species thrive in shallow water tending to brackish.
Additional evidence, from pollen analyses and faunal remains, was harnessed to achieve a higher resolution in the reconstruction of the main characteristics of the Dhar Tichitt Late Holocene environment. Most of the analyzed pollen samples were collected from contexts in direct association with archaeological remains. Gramineae, Cyperaceae and Chenopodiaceae/Amaranthaceae are largely predominant among non-arboreal pollen. The tree component is made of four species only: Acacia sp., Balanites egyptiaca, Capparidaceae sp. and Combretaceae sp. The pollen analyses point to a vegetation with an important grass and shrub stratum with scattered trees [7]. Animal bones on the other hand point to a broader ecotonal situation. Beside domestic animals, the faunal material reveals habitats ranging from fresh water lakes and streams to desertic environment. Fish [Lates niloticus], crocodile [Crocodylus niloticus], python [Python mollure] and Hippopotamus amphibious are from water habitats. Four species of large gazelles and antilopes living preferentially in woodland and grassland with regular water requirement are represented (Table 1, Fig. 3 and Fig. 4). Six species, including two carnivores, rhinoceros, equids, large gazelles, and large antilopes with varying water requirements live more often than not in a grassland and light bush environment. Animals that roam the desert and are resilient to water shortage are represented by the addax, small gazelles and Genetta genetta (Table 1). All these environmental indicators point to wetter climate than the present with, however, contrasting seasons [2], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [12] and [13].
Table 1. Faunal remains arranged after preferential animals habitats.
Taxa Site 38 Site 46 General survey DN4 Domestic Animals Bos taurus 35 5 32 139 Ovis/capra 12 2 14 5
Total 214 77 111 764 Faunal remains and habitats. a Skull and numerous vertebras in anatomic connection suggesting natural death.
Full-size image (20K)
Fig. 3. The general distribution of faunal remains according to animal habitats.
Fig. 4. Variation in the distribution of faunal remains according to animal habitats as reflected in each sample.
3. The Neolithic occupation of the Dhars
There are a few scattered stone tools, handaxes and flakes, assigned to the Early Stone Age [20]. All are surface finds difficult to interpret. There is no evidence of Late Stone Age occupation of the Dhars. Accordingly, there may have been an influx of new populations that had already mastered livestock husbandry of cattle and sheep/goat. These groups that were moving away from the drying Late Holocene Sahara found suitable environmental conditions in the Dhar Tichitt, Dhar Walata and Dhar Nema at the beginning of the second millennium BC [1], [2], [3], [5], [6], [7], [12] and [15]. These conditions, probably linked to the presence of high aquifers, monsoonal rains and vestigial lakes, allowed for the Neolithic occupation to take root and prosper. How did they cope with climatic uncertainty and what does this entail? The key element at this juncture was the presence of water. It could be obtained through rainfall, lakes, rivers, streams and springs. The positive fluctuations of the aquifers could also make life sustainable despite low rainfall level. In general, however, there may have been a combination of rainfall and water-table fluctuations to support Neolithic life in the Dhars. The timing, quantity and distribution of rainfall are some of the crucial variables in the sustainability of human life along the Saharan margins. They affect agriculture, livestock husbandry, as well as wildlife in general and in the absence of hydraulic engineering capabilities are in fact the controlling factors of human success or failure. The timing, distribution and quantity of rainfall are fundamentally unpredictable from one year to the next. How did Neolithic people from the Dhars handle these unpredictable variables? The Neolithic occupation of the Dhars lasted from ca. 2200 BC to 4/300 BC. Their sites were distributed in different ecological zones, in the sandy lowland, the front of the cliff escarpment, and the secondary and tertiary valleys of the hydrographic network (Fig. 5 and Fig. 6). The pace of settlement expansion will be dealt with later but at this stage suffices it to state that the occupations of all the regions ecological niches were contemporaneous (Fig. 7).
Fig. 5. Radiocarbon chronology of the Dhar Tichitt settlements [7]. Fig. 5. Chronologie radiocarbone des peuplements du Dhar Tichitt [7].
Fig. 6. Radiocarbon chronology of the Neolithic occupation of Bou Khzama (Dhar Nema 4, Date BC).
Fig. 7. Patterns of settlement expansion in the Dhar Tichitt-Walata from ca. 2000 to 400 BC (Source: Holl 2004).
3.1. Intensification
Significant progress has been made in research on early West African agriculture [3], [4], [5], [7], [10], [12], [14], [18] and [19]. But the genesis of West African grain farming is nonetheless still poorly understood in terms of the dynamic processes involved. Domesticated millet – Pennisetum glaucum – dated to the beginning of the second millennium BC has been found in the Dhar Tichitt [12], Dhar Walata in Mauritania [3] and the “Kintampo” site of Birimu in North-Central Ghana [19]. A second wave of evidence pointing to the cultivation of domesticated millet dating to the turn of the first millennium BC has been documented at such places as Oursi in Burkina Faso, Gajiganna in Nigeria [14], suggesting a wide spread adoption of millet that reached the rainforest and East Africa during the first millennium BC. Domesticated African rice, Oriza glaberrima, is attested at Jenne-Jeno in the second half of the first millennium BC. The concept of intensification refers to a range of strategies aimed at securing a stable and reliable resources supply. It has two divergent implications. In one set of strategies, sustainability would be achieved through the broadening of collected resources – stretching the diet-breadth in both plant and animal resources. The other strategies set operate on a narrow range of resources that experience a strong and sustained exploitation pressure. In a co-evolving conundrum, the selected plant or animal went through a cascade of directional change that alters some of their characteristics; non-shattering and in the longer run larger grain for wild Pennisetum for example, or reduced body-size for some mammals.
The Dhar Tichitt has been hailed as an interesting case of local intensification that resulted in the domestication of wild millet. Relying on P. Munson [12] and [13], Stemler [18] offers the most coherent rendering of the intensification theory. Starting with a question, she wonders if it is “possible that it was the adoption of herding and the extensive use of wild grain that initiated the population growth indicated in the archaeological record at Dhar Tichitt?” She then moves on to argue that “if so, this change in the economy may have resulted in the necessity for increasingly labor-intensive practices to provide sufficient food for a growing population”, and concludes that “this trend eventually resulted in the highly intensive interaction between plants and people that we call agriculture” [18]. From this perspective, bulrush millet was part of a cohort of wild plants that included Cenchrus biflorus (cram cram), Brachiaria deflexa, Panicum turgidum, P. laetum, exploited by Akhreijit Phase (ca. 1750 BC) foragers. The shifting frequencies of different species culminating in a 61% proportion of bulrush millet impressions in potsherds from the Chebka phase (ca. 1000–900 BC) is supposed to illustrate the gradual domestication of this species and the shift to the practice of agriculture. The domesticated millet from Oued Chebbi in the Dhar Walata dated to the beginning of the second millennium BC [1], [2] and [3] shed serious doubt on the gradualist model alluded to above and makes it very unlikely. There is not yet any convincing evidence for the presence of Late Holocene mobile foragers settlements in the Dhars. The domestication of Pennisetum glaucum was probably an unanticipated result of semi-nomadic herders exploitation of local resources. Contrary to the other equally exploited wild plants, wild Pennisetum adjusted to the regular and sustained exploitation by both humans and livestock. This adjustment resulted in the growth of non-shattering large grain varieties that became humans staple food. Despite the sustained presence of Pennisetum glaucum remains in the Dhar Tichitt and Dhar Walata archaeological record, the importance of this grain in Neolithic people diets cannot be assessed accurately. Plants macroremains frequencies obtained from impressions on pot-sherds cannot be translated directly into patterns of past humans diets.
3.2. Seasonality
No evidence of hydraulic engineering – like well, cistern and other water storage devices – has yet been documented in the Dhars’ archaeological record. Neolithic people certainly relied on springs, rain and surface water that were available and availability was very likely strongly constrained by seasonal variations. Accordingly, one may well be founded to consider that the landscape was lush green; springs and streams were flowing, and lakes full of water during the rainy seasons. This overall availability of water was altered progressively with the onset of the long dry season. Some streams may have dried up faster than others, and at the peak of the dry seasons, a limited number of places may still have had some water available. Such places were generally found around piedmont and interdunal lakes where the water-table allowed for the year-round availability of water. Such places were focal areas for settlement during the dry seasons, and many, like Ngoungou (Site 45) in the Dhar Tichitt and Bou Khzama (DN 4) in the Dhar Nema were used intermittently for the whole duration of the Dhars Neolithic occupation [5], [6], [7] and [16]. Bou Khzama, located in the Dhar Nema at 16° 44′ 20″ N and 7° 16′ 26″ W, is an extensive surface site spread over tens of hectares. It sits on a stabilized dune at some 200 m west of the cliff escarpment. The site was sampled and excavated in 2001 and 2002 by a team led by A. Person [15]. The excavated unit measured 140 m2 and revealed a number of archaeological features including hearths, burials, pits, stone caches, iron smelting furnaces, slag heaps, etc. The site is clearly a palimpsest that resulted from intermittent and successive occupations over more than three millennia, from ca. 2280–2060 BC to 1220–1380 AD (Fig. 6). Bou Khzama, located next to the mouth of a seasonal stream, was very likely used as dry season camping area by groups of herders, hunters, fishermen during the Neolithic occupation and later by iron-using communities at the time of the Ghana kingdom.
Faced with a predictable dry season water shortage, the Dhars Neolithic people devised a robust strategy to enhance their livelihood, a short range and pulsatory nomadism. Water sources were most of the time at a “walking” distance range. Groups could have walked up to 5–10 km to fetch water in large clay vessels or “goat-skins”, to be kept in large storage jars in the “household compound”. Groups of herders probably took livestock herds to dry season camping areas for most of the duration of the dry season. They left their traces in the archaeological record in the form of shallow scatters of food waste, broken sherds and grain processing stone tools [5], [6] and [7]. Following this rationale, the sites located on the cliff, all built with dry stone masonry, were permanent villages of more or less linked communities. Dry season camps on the other hand, all aggregation points located in the sandy lowland, may have shifted from place to place following the pace of drying of surface water. Some of these sites with longer lasting and reliable water supply were resettled years after years. With the onset of the summer rains – June-July – the dispersed groups of herders moved back to their respective villages, pen the livestock in large corrals and shift to the preparation of the fields for the millet growing season. The combination of hunting, fishing, livestock husbandry, agriculture, as well as other crafts including pottery, stone tools making, etc., exerted a considerable demand on households’ labor pools. How did these societies handle these conflicting schedules?
4. The dynamics of agropastoral economy, site layout and household structure
Mixed agropastoral economies combine in varying degree, agricultural activities, livestock husbandry, hunting, fishing, wild plants gathering and many other crafts. In the yearly cycle and depending on climatic parameters, all the activities mentioned above have period of low and high labor demands. The scheduling of productive activities and the corollary allocation of labor require well-tested social mechanism to cope with life during the Late Holocene in the Dhars regions of Mauritania and elsewhere. Alliance building, household structure and patterns of inheritance are such mechanisms that operate more or less as labor recruitment and retention devices. The multiplicity of simultaneous and/or successive tasks required for the smooth operation of mixed agropastoral economy can hardly be handled by a nuclear family. Cooperation along task-specific groupings and/or age-sets could help households navigate acute labor shortage and activities bottlenecks. They are however difficult to document in the archaeological record. Nonetheless, habitation features from permanent villages provide a number of clues on the solutions devised by Neolithic settlers of the Dhars during the Late Holocene. While dry season sites were characterized by scattered surface remains, permanent villages located on the cliff point to a heavy investment in habitation facilities construction. The standard Neolithic household unit – a compound – part of an intricate village layout including narrow streets and open plazas was delineated by a dry-stone wall, surrounding a number of dwelling units and storage areas. In most of the cases, each unit had a single hearth and one or many storage areas and was part of a cluster of connected compounds, those sharing walls. The number of dwelling units per compounds that varies from two to nine at Akhreijit where a systematic inquiry was conducted. It suggests that each of the compounds was inhabited by a multicellular family unit, an extended or polygamous family [6] and [7]. Such social units allow for an optimal recruitment, retention and allocation of labor and at the same time enhance the status of those able to attract a large following. In this perspective, wealth and prestige are materialized by the number of dependents.
4.1. Patterns of settlement
The reconstitution of the main patterns of the expansion of settlement in the Dhar Tichitt-Walata is partly inferential as a limited number of sites have been excavated and dated. The new research on the Dhar Nema [15] is not yet fully published. Research on the Dhar Tichitt settlement sequences [5], [6] and [7] was instrumental in developing this model (Fig. 7). Large villages and large dry season camps, measuring more than 5 hectares, were all settled from the very beginning of the Dhars Neolithic occupation around ca. 2200–2000 BC. The settlement probably started with a small number of settlers. They were distributed in three main “clusters” set at 40–50 km. The western part of the Dhar Tichitt had a higher density of settlement right from the beginning. Population growth was relatively slow as the Early Settlement Sequence lasted for more than 1000 years, from ca. 2200/2000 BC to 1200/1000 BC. The location of all the pioneer sites was optimal, along the escarpment and at the intersection of the sandy lowland and the cliff top. Significant population growth and the foundation of new smaller villages took place mostly in the western confines of the Dhar Tichitt with however a new settlement at Chegg el Khail in the central part during the Middle Settlement Sequence ca. 1200/1000–700 BC (Fig. 7). The distance between sites groups was then reduced to 20 km in the Dhar Tichitt. Small villages and hamlets spread all over the landscape, precisely along the secondary and tertiary valleys, during the Late Settlement Sequence ca. 700–400 BC. All of this growth took place in the central and eastern part of the Dhar Tichitt-Walata. Subregional clusters of settlements with one large central village, a few small villages and numerous hamlets emerged during this sequence. Dakhlet el Atrouss, at the center of the study area, reached 95 hectares in surface extent. Chebka, Akhreijit and Khimiya in the west were protected by a perimeter wall. The average territory per settlement dropped from 466.66 km2 in the Early Settlement Sequence to 31.11 km2 in the Late one. Competition for land may have triggered conflict in the west. The colonization of the cliff top helped to alleviate the pressure on land and resources of the optimal zone where evidence of conflict is manifest by the presence of perimeter walls.
5. Conclusion
The details on the initial colonization of the Dhars are not known. But it is nonetheless clear that groups of cattle and sheep/goat herders settled along the sandstone cliffs at the end of the third millennium BC. They devised successful strategies to cope with the overall unpredictability of the climatic parameters. Through sustained intensification, short range and pulsatory nomadism, and colonization they succeeded in building the earliest extensive village communities of West Africa. The middle of the first millennium BC witnessed the onset of an acute arid phase that precipitated the disaggregation of the Neolithic agropastoral occupation of the Dhars. The abandonment of the whole area was probably gradual with small groups of families moving south and southeast in search for better environments. These populations may have later contributed to the rise of the Ghana Empire. The earliest settlers of Awdaghost were mobile herders [11]. Iron smelters settled in the Dhar Nema [15]. The fluctuations in the level of Awdaghost aquifers, as indicated by the increasing depth of wells from ca. 500–600 AD to 1500 AD (Fig. 8), attest to the continuation of long-term climate change that started at the end of the 1st millennium BC. The disruption of the Dhars water cycle put an end to the most successful prehistoric agropastoral economies of West Africa.
Fig. 8. Fluctuations of the Awdaghost aquifers as shown by increasing/decreasing well's depth, from ca. 400/600 to 1500 AD.
Acknowledgements
I wish to thank Professor S. Cleuziou and Dr. A-M. Lezine for their invitation to write and present this paper. My research in the Dhar Tichitt was funded by a grant of the French Ministry of Cooperation to Professor Henry-Jean Hugot. I am grateful to Dr. Raymonde Bonnefille for her support and training in pollen analysis and Dr. F. Poplin for training in faunal analysis. Kay Clahassey from the University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology helped with the figures. References [1] S. Amblard, Agricultural evidence and its interpretation on the Dhars Tichitt and Oualata, South-eastern Mauritania. In: G. Pwiti and R. Soper, Editors, Aspects of African Archaeology, University of Zimbabwe Publications, Harare (1996), pp. 421–427. [2] S. Amblard-Pison, Communautés Villageoises Néolithiques des Dhar Tichitt et Oualata (Mauritanie), British Archaeological Reports, Oxford, 2006. [3] S. Amblard and J. Pernes, The identification of Cultivated pearl millet (Pennisetum) amongst plant impressions on pottery from Oued Chebbi (Dhar Oualata, Mauritania), The African Archaeological Review 7 (1989), pp. 117–126. Full Text via CrossRef | View Record in Scopus | Cited By in Scopus (25) [4] In: J. Harlan, J.J. De Wet and A.B.L. Stemler, Editors, Origins of African Plants Domestication, Mouton Publishers, The Hague/Paris (1976). [5] A. Holl, Subsistence Patterns of the Dhar Tichitt Neolithic, The African Archaeological Review 3 (1985), pp. 151–162. Full Text via CrossRef | View Record in Scopus | Cited By in Scopus (10) [6] A. Holl, Background to the Ghana Empire: Archaeological Investigations on the Transition to Statehood in the Dhar Tichitt Region (Mauritania), Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 4 (1985), pp. 73–115. Article | PDF (2567 K) | View Record in Scopus | Cited By in Scopus (6) [7] A. Holl, Économie et société néolithique du Dhar Tichitt, Éditions Recherche sur les Civilisations, Paris (1986). [8] G. Hugot, État actuel des recherches sur le Quaternaire lacustre du bas-versant de Tichitt, Annales IMRS 1 (1975), pp. 26–35. [9] G. Hugot, Un secteur du Quaternaire lacustre mauritanien: Tichitt (Aouker), Mémoires de l’Institut mauritanien de la recherche scientifique, Chambéry, 1977. [10] F. Marshall and E. Hildebrand, Cattle before crops: the beginnings of food production in Africa, Journal of World Prehistory 16 (2002), pp. 99–143. Full Text via CrossRef [11] B. Moussie and J. Devisse, Hydrologie, environnement et archeology. In: J. Devisse, Editor, Tegdaoust III : recherches sur Aoudaghost, Campagnes 1960/65, Editions recherches sur les civilisations, Paris (1983), pp. 365–386. [12] P.J. Munson, Tichitt tradition: A Late Prehistoric Occupation in the Southwestern Sahara. Unpubl. PhD thesis, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1971. [13] P.J. Munson, A Late Holocene (c. 4500-2300 BP) Climate chronology for the Southwestern Sahara, Palaeoecology of Africa 13 (1981), pp. 53–60. View Record in Scopus | Cited By in Scopus (2) [14] K. Neumann, A. Ballouche and M. Klee, The emergence of plant food production in the West African Sahel: new evidence from Northeast Nigeria and northern Burkina Faso. In: G. Pwiti and R. Soper, Editors, Aspects of African Archaeology, University of Zimbabwe Publications, Harare (1996), pp. 441–448. [15] A. Person, T. Ibrahim, H. Jousse, A. Finck, C. Albaret, L. Garenne-Marot, V. Zeitoun, J.-F. Saliège and S. Ould M’Heimam, Environnement et marqueurs culturels en Mauritanie orientale : le site de Bou Khzama (DN4), premiers résultats et approche biogéochimique. In: A. Bazzana et and H. Bocoum, Editors, Du nord au Sud du Sahara: Cinquante ans d’archéologie française, Editions Sepia, Paris (2004), pp. 195–213. [16] In: E. Reitz, C.M. Scarry and S.J. Scudder, Editors, Case Studies in environmental archaeology, Springer, New York (2008). [17] S. Servant-Vildary, Étude des diatomées et paléolimnologie du bassin tchadien au Cénozoïque supérieur, ORSTOM, Paris (1978). [18] A.B.L. Stemler, Origins of plant Domestication in the Sahara and the Nile. In: M.A.J. Williams and H. Faure, Editors, The Sahara and the Nile, A.A. Balkema, Rotterdam (1980), pp. 503–526. [19] In: M. Van der Veen, Editor, The exploitation of plant resources in Ancient Africa, Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publisher, New York (1999). [20] R.Vernet, Préhistoire de la Mauritanie. Centre culturel français – Sepia, Nouakchott, 1993.
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posted
Now they are like, damn we have to go back to the drawingtable....again....How can we figure out a way...lol
See, white Nord you are likely a descendant of Saqalibas or Mamluks or one of these invaders as mentioned before, and you are now confused.
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White Nord
A banned big lipped primate
Member # 14093
posted
"Proposed migrations between North Africa and neighboring regions have included Paleolithic gene flow from the Near East, an Arabic migration across the whole of North Africa 1,400 years ago (ya), and trans-Saharan transport of slaves from sub-Saharan Africa. Historical records, archaeology, and mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA have been marshaled in support of one theory or another, but there is little consensus regarding the overall genetic background of North African populations or their origin and expansion."
Pre-Dynastic migration from the Levant pre-dates that of Nilotes. It enters Northern Africa at around the same time that you all claim East Africans migrated northward into the Nile. You all have been thoroughly debunked by this "authoritative" study.
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quote:Originally posted by White Nord: "Proposed migrations between North Africa and neighboring regions have included Paleolithic gene flow from the Near East, an Arabic migration across the whole of North Africa 1,400 years ago (ya), and trans-Saharan transport of slaves from sub-Saharan Africa. Historical records, archaeology, and mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA have been marshaled in support of one theory or another, but there is little consensus regarding the overall genetic background of North African populations or their origin and expansion."
Pre-Dynastic migration from the Levant pre-dates that of Nilotes. It enters Northern Africa at around the same time that you all claim East Africans migrated northward into the Nile. You all have been thoroughly debunked by this "authoritative" study.
Lol it's obvious you have nothing to refute all of what was posted. Due to the lack of critical thinking on historic perspectives.lol
So where is the evidence of your Paleolithic gene flow?
Where is all of the archeological evidence.
Name the date and times, of these early settlements...this is what we are asking.
Just a reminder, the AE were tropical adapted people matching with poeple from the Sahara and Sahel. They were comprised out of groups from the Sahara and Sahel on a continues flow. As I have shown above in previous posts and continue to do so below...what did you show, where are those samples?lol
And for the record, Eurasians were and are cold adapted, due to living in the cold area for a long time. You know the Ice Age.lol
Large parts of the Arabian Peninsula weren't inhabited, but for the Levant, Yemen and Oman. The early settlers came from Northeast-East Africa. Other groups who expanded from the North into the Southern Arabian Peninsula parts. Are only recently there. A few thousand years.
More,
The Berbers were a dark skinned native African people that spoke a common language and shared ethnic characteristics. Besides the Afri in the regions controlled by Carthage, the tribes that took part in the wars against the Romans were the Lotophagi, the Garamantes, the Maces, the Nasamones, the Misulani or Musulamii, the Massyli and the Massaesyli.
"Berbers are mostly Muslim, ethnically mixed and spread across the country - from the Rif mountain range in the north to the Atlas mountains, and the desert in the south. For this reason, language is all-important to the Berbers, uniting their pluralistic culture."
"Through the centuries, Berbers have mixed with so many other ethnic groups, notably the Arabs, that they are now identified usually on a linguistic rather than racial basis."
Posts: 22234 | From: האם אינכם כילדי הכרית אלי בני ישראל | Registered: Nov 2010
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quote:Originally posted by White Nord: "Proposed migrations between North Africa and neighboring regions have included Paleolithic gene flow from the Near East, an Arabic migration across the whole of North Africa 1,400 years ago (ya), and trans-Saharan transport of slaves from sub-Saharan Africa. Historical records, archaeology, and mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA have been marshaled in support of one theory or another, but there is little consensus regarding the overall genetic background of North African populations or their origin and expansion."
Pre-Dynastic migration from the Levant pre-dates that of Nilotes. It enters Northern Africa at around the same time that you all claim East Africans migrated northward into the Nile. You all have been thoroughly debunked by this "authoritative" study.
So what is the "proposal"? lol
Pronunciation: /prəˈpōzəl/ noun 1 a plan or suggestion, especially a formal or written one, put forward for consideration or discussion by others:
Mitochondrial DNA structure in the Arabian Peninsula
Two potential migratory routes followed by modern humans to colonize Eurasia from Africa have been proposed. These are the two natural passageways that connect both continents: the northern route through the Sinai Peninsula and the southern route across the Bab al Mandab strait.
Recent archaeological and genetic evidence have favored a unique southern coastal route. Under this scenario, the study of the population genetic structure of the Arabian Peninsula, the first step out of Africa, to search for primary genetic links between Africa and Eurasia, is crucial.
The haploid and maternally inherited mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) molecule has been the most used genetic marker to identify and to relate lineages with clear geographic origins, as the African Ls and the Eurasian M and N that have a common root with the Africans L3.
"Particularly, Yemen has the largest contribution of L lineages (30). So, most probably, this area was the entrance gate of a portion of these lineages in prehistoric times, which participated in the building of the primitive Arabian population."
Viktor Černý1 et al.
Migration of Chadic speaking pastoralists within Africa based on population structure of Chad Basin and phylogeography of mitochondrial L3f haplogroup
Quote:
We use high-resolution genetic data to investigate the genetic and linguistic support for hypotheses concerning the population history in the Chad Basin. The mitochondrial L3f3 haplogroup is found almost exclusively in Chadic speaking populations and its TMRCA corresponds well with archaeological and linguistic dates of the proposed migration of Chadic speaking pastoralists from East or North East Africa to the Chad Basin.
Haplogroup L3f is defined by the coding variants
3396-4218-15514-15944del and the control region motif 16209–16519 with a TMRCA of 57,100 ± 9,400 YBP. This haplogroup diversifies into sub-haplogroups L3f1, L3f2 and L3f3. The most geographically widespread sub-haplogroup is L3f1, which is distributed across the African continent [3] and also Arabia [32,33] and has a TMRCA of 48,600 ± 11,500 YBP.
..."The youngest clade, L3f1b2, seems to be more frequent in the Middle East. L3f1a seems to be older (37,700 ± 10,000 YBP) than its sister sub-haplogroup L3f1b and is also less diversified. A few samples from Chad belong to these sub-haplogroups: two to L3f1a and one to L3f1b3."
"We then estimated pairwise FST genetic distances between populations (Additional file 4) and displayed these on a MDS plot (Figure 3). Interesting results are immediately evident – while Chadic populations form a relatively homogeneous group, the Cushitic populations split into two completely different clusters. The first group is composed of Horn of African populations, such as Ethiopian and Somali Cushitic populations, which are close to neighbouring Ethiopian Semitic speaking groups and relatively close also to Chadic people from the Chad Basin. The second Cushitic group is composed by more southern groups from Tanzania, i.e. Burunge and Iraqw, who occupy outlier positions even within the Afro-Asiatic MDS plot. In the MDS plot, geography is more strongly associated with genetic distance than is linguistic affiliation.
Overall, we observe that Chadic speaking populations are intermixed with other populations from Chad Basin, including Niger-Congo, Semitic, and Berber speaking people. In this context, it seems that the linguistic categories play a secondary role in structuring the genetic diversity."
quote:It is known and generally accepted that the original Arabs came from and arose at Yemen.
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quote:Originally posted by White Nord: "Proposed migrations between North Africa and neighboring regions have included Paleolithic gene flow from the Near East, an Arabic migration across the whole of North Africa 1,400 years ago (ya), and trans-Saharan transport of slaves from sub-Saharan Africa. Historical records, archaeology, and mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA have been marshaled in support of one theory or another, but there is little consensus regarding the overall genetic background of North African populations or their origin and expansion."
Pre-Dynastic migration from the Levant pre-dates that of Nilotes. It enters Northern Africa at around the same time that you all claim East Africans migrated northward into the Nile. You all have been thoroughly debunked by this "authoritative" study.
More on the people who match the Ancient Egyptians in a continues model. From where the Egyptian culture arose.
The nubian mesolithic: A consideration of the Wadi Halfa remains
References and further reading may be available for this article. To view references and further reading you must purchase this article.
Meredith F. Small* et al.
Morphological variation of the skeletal remains of ancient Nubia has been traditionally explained as a product of multiple migrations into the Nile Valley.
In contrast, various researchers have noted a continuity in craniofacial variation from Mesolithic through Neolithic times.
This apparent continuity could be explained by in situ cultural evolution producing shifts in selective pressures which may act on teeth, the facial complex, and the cranial vault.
A series of 13 Mesolithic skulls from Wadi Halfa, Sudan, are compared to Nubian Neolithic remains by means of extended canonical analysis.
Results support recent research which suggests consistent trends of facial reduction and cranial vault expansion from Mesolithic through Neolithic times.
From about 20,000 BCE, there are further refinements in stone technology. Very specialized tools appeared, including arrowheads, fishhooks, grindstones, and awls. These most refined of stone implements have the generic name 'microlithic.' This era of the late Paleolithic also saw the development of complex composite tools such as bows and arrows. As well, fishing equipment, including boats, and even pottery appeared in some environmental niches. As tools became more specialized and finely made, local variations, including stylistic ones, became more and more the rule...
From the standpoint of African history the most important development of the late Stone Age was the emergence of more settled ('sedentary') societies. These probably developed first along the banks of the Upper Nile in the Cataracts region, in modern day southern Egypt and northern Sudan (ancient Nubia). Evidence of barley harvesting there dates from as early as 16,000 BCE. The ability to make greater use of abundant wild grains, probably coupled with greater exploitation of aquatic resources, led to a more settled existence for some people. These more sedentary peoples were a part of what is now known collectively as the African Aquatic Culture/ Tradition. This way of life spread from the Upper Nile into a much larger area of Africa during the last great wet phase of African climate history, which began about 9,000 and peaked about 7,000 BCE. The higher rainfall levels of the period created numerous very large shallow lakes across what are now the arid southern borderlands of the Sahara desert. Inhabitants of shore communities crafted microlithic tools to exploit a marine environment: fishing and trapping aquatic animals. This provided abundant food supplies, particularly high in protein and supported the earliest known permanent settlements. Culturally and linguistically related peoples ancestral to modern Black Africans established settlements throughout this vast, ancient great lakes area. It is theorized that they spoke the mother Nilo-Saharan tongue. Sophisticated water-related technologies supported not only the development of settled communities, but also the invention of things like pottery, which were formerly thought to be associated exclusively with the Food Production Revolution of the later New Stone Age, or Neolithic. While the African aquatic tradition itself lasted only until the beginning of the modern drier period, around 3,000 BCE, its legacy has been felt ever since.
Basil Davidson, Africa in History (1975)
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quote:Originally posted by White Nord: "Proposed migrations between North Africa and neighboring regions have included Paleolithic gene flow from the Near East, an Arabic migration across the whole of North Africa 1,400 years ago (ya), and trans-Saharan transport of slaves from sub-Saharan Africa. Historical records, archaeology, and mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA have been marshaled in support of one theory or another, but there is little consensus regarding the overall genetic background of North African populations or their origin and expansion."
Pre-Dynastic migration from the Levant pre-dates that of Nilotes. It enters Northern Africa at around the same time that you all claim East Africans migrated northward into the Nile. You all have been thoroughly debunked by this "authoritative" study.
Let's recap, but this time with some additional images. lol
DNA analysis shows that Egyptians group with African peoples from the Sudan, Ethiopia, East Africa and parts of Cameroon, not with Europe or the Middle East.
*Notes on E-M78 and Rosa DNA study linking Egyptians with East and Central Africans.[/b] DNA study (Rosa et al. 2007) groups Egyptians with East and Central Africans. Other DNA studies link these peoples together. Quote:“the majority of Y chromosomes found in populations in Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia and Oromos in Somalia and North Kenya (Boranas) belong to haplogroup E3b1 defined by the Y chromosome marker M78“(Sanchez 2005). Codes: Egy=Egypt. Or= Oromo, Ethiopia. Am=Amahara, Ethiopia. Sud=Sudan. FCA=Cameroon. Maa= Massai, Kenya. Note: Eighty (80)% or more of the haplotypes in Cameroon are of West African origin (Rosa et al. 2007, Cerny et al. 2006). Ethiopia, Cameroon and most of the Sudan is located below the Sahara, and thus sub-Saharan.-- Rosa, et al.(2007) Y-chromosomal diversity in the population of Guinea-Bissau. BMC Evolutionary Biology. 7:124
Comparisons of linear body proportions of Old Kingdom and non-Old Kingdom period individuals, and workers and high officials in our sample found no statistically significant differences among them. Zakrzewski (2003) also found little evidence for differences in linear body proportions of Egyptians over a wider temporal range. In general, recent studies of skeletal variation among ancient Egyptians support scenarios of biological continuity through time. Irish (2006) analyzed quantitative and qualitative dental traits of 996 Egyptians from Neolithic through Roman periods, reporting the presence of a few outliers but concluding that the dental samples appear to be largely homogeneous and that the affinities observed indicate overall biological uniformity and continuity from Predynastic through Dynastic and Postdynastic periods.
Zakrzewski (2007) provided a comprehensive summary of previous Egyptian craniometric studies and examined Egyptian crania from six time periods. She found that the earlier samples were relatively more homogeneous in comparison to the later groups. However, overall results indicated genetic continuity over the Egyptian Predynastic and Early Dynastic periods, albeit with a high level of genetic diversity within the population, suggesting an indigenous process of state formation. She also concluded that while the biological patterning of the Egyptian population varied across time, no consistent temporal or spatial trends are apparent. Thus, the stature estimation formulae developed here may be broadly applicable to all ancient Egyptian populations..".
("Stature estimation in ancient Egyptians: A new technique based on anatomical reconstruction of stature." Michelle H. Raxter, Christopher B. Ruff, Ayman Azab, Moushira Erfan, Muhammad Soliman, Aly El-Sawaf,(Am J Phys Anthropol. 2008, Jun;136(2):147-55
AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL ANTHROPOLOGY 121:219–229 (2003)
Variation in Ancient Egyptian Stature and Body Proportions Sonia R. Zakrzewski* Department of Archaeology, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BF, UK
'The ancient Egyptians have been described as having a “ Negroid” body plan (Robins, 1983).
Variations in the proximal to distal segments of each limb were therefore examined. Of the ratios considered, only maximum humerus length to maximum ulna length (XLH/XLU) showed statistically significant change through time.
This change was a relative decrease in the length of the humerus as compared with the ulna, suggesting the development of an increasingly African body plan with time.
This may also be the result of Nubian mercenaries being included in the sample from Gebelein.
The nature of the body plan was also investigated by comparing the intermembral, brachial, and crural indices for these samples with values obtained from the literature. No significant differences were found in either index through time for either sex. The raw values in Table 6 suggest that Egyptians had the “ super-Negroid ” body plan described by Robins (1983). The values for the brachial and crural indices show that the distal segments of each limb are longer relative to the proximal segments than in many “African” populations (data from Aiello and Dean, 1990). This pattern is supported by Figure 7 (a plot of population mean femoral and tibial lengths; data from Ruff, 1994), which indicates that the Egyptians generally have tropical body plans. Of the Egyptian samples, only the Badarian and Early Dynastic period populations have shorter tibiae than predicted from femoral length. Despite these differences, all samples lie relatively clustered together as compared to the other populations.'
quote:Originally posted by White Nord: "Proposed migrations between North Africa and neighboring regions have included Paleolithic gene flow from the Near East, an Arabic migration across the whole of North Africa 1,400 years ago (ya), and trans-Saharan transport of slaves from sub-Saharan Africa. Historical records, archaeology, and mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA have been marshaled in support of one theory or another, but there is little consensus regarding the overall genetic background of North African populations or their origin and expansion."
Pre-Dynastic migration from the Levant pre-dates that of Nilotes. It enters Northern Africa at around the same time that you all claim East Africans migrated northward into the Nile. You all have been thoroughly debunked by this "authoritative" study.
quote: Northern Egypt near the Mediterranean shows the same pattern- limb length data puts its peoples closer to tropically adapted Africans that cold climate Europeans
"...sample populations available from northern Egypt from before the 1st Dynasty (Merimda, Maadi and Wadi Digla) turn out to be significantly different from sample populations from early Palestine and Byblos, suggesting a lack of common ancestors over a long time. If there was a south-north cline variation along the Nile valley it did not, from this limited evidence, continue smoothly on into southern Palestine.
The limb-length proportions of males from the Egyptian sites group them with Africans rather than with Europeans."
Barry Kemp, "Ancient Egypt Anatomy of a Civilisation. (2005) Routledge. p. 52-60
quote:"When the Elephantine results were added to a broader pooling of the physical characteristics drawn from a wide geographic region which includes Africa, the Mediterranean and the Near East quite strong affinities emerge between Elephantine and populations from Nubia, supporting a strong south-north cline."
Barry Kemp. (2006) Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization. p. 54
quote: "From the Mesolithic to the early Neolithic period different lines of evidence support an out-of-Africa Mesolithic migration to the Levant by northeastern African groups that had biological affinities with sub-Saharan populations. From a genetic point of view, several recent genetic studies have shown that sub-Sabaran genetic lineages (affiliated with the Y-chromosome PN2 clade; Underhill et al. 2001) have spread through Egypt into the Near East, the Mediterranean area, and, for some lineages, as far north as Turkey (E3b-M35 Y lineage; Cinniogclu et al. 2004; Luis et al. 2004), probably during several dispersal episodes since the Mesolithic (Cinniogelu et al. 2004; King et al. 2008; Lucotte and Mercier 2003; Luis et al. 2004; Quintana-Murci et al. 1999; Semino et al. 2004; Underhill et al. 2001). This finding is in agreement with morphological data that suggest that populations with sub-Saharan morphological elements were present in northeastern Africa, from the Paleolithic to at least the early Holocene, and diffused northward to the Levant and Anatolia beginning in the Mesolithic.
Indeed, the rare and incomplete Paleolithic to early Neolithic skeletal specimens found in Egypt - such as the 33,000-year-old Nazlet Khater specimen (Pinhasi and Semai 2000), the Wadi Kubbaniya skeleton from the late Paleolithic site in the upper Nile valley (Wendorf et al. 1986), the Qarunian (Faiyum) early Neolithic crania (Henneberg et al. 1989; Midant-Reynes 2000), and the Nabta specimen from the Neolithic Nabta Playa site in the western desert of Egypt (Henneberg et al. 1980) - show, with regard to the great African biological diversity, similarities with some of the sub-Saharan middle Paleolithic and modern sub-Saharan specimens.
This affinity pattern between ancient Egyptians and sub-Saharans has also been noticed by several other investigators (Angel 1972; Berry and Berry 1967, 1972; Keita 1995) and has been recently reinforced by the study of Brace et al. (2005), which clearly shows that the cranial morphology of prehistoric and recent northeast African populations is linked to sub-Saharan populations (Niger-Congo populations). These results support the hypothesis that some of the Paleolithic-early Holocene populations from northeast Africa were probably descendents of sub-Saharan ancestral populations...... This northward migration of northeastern African populations carrying sub-Saharan biological elements is concordant with the morphological homogeneity of the Natufian populations (Bocquentin 2003), which present morphological affinity with sub-Saharan populations (Angel 1972; Brace et al. 2005).
In addition, the Neolithic revolution was assumed to arise in the late Pleistocene Natufians and subsequently spread into Anatolia and Europe (Bar-Yosef 2002), and the first Anatolian farmers, Neolithic to Bronze Age Mediterraneans and to some degree other Neolithic-Bronze Age Europeans, show morphological affinities with the Natufians (and indirectly with sub-Saharan populations; Angel 1972; Brace et al. 2005), in concordance with a process of demie diffusion accompanying the extension of the Neolithic revolution (Cavalli-Sforza et al. 1994)."
---Cranial Discrete Traits in a Byzantine Population and Eastern Mediterranean Population Movements F. X. Ricaut, M. Waelkens. Human Biology, Volume 80, Number 5, October 2008, pp. 535-564
quote:The Upper Palaeolithic Lithic Industry of Nazlet Khater 4 (Egypt): Implications for the Stone Age/Palaeolithic of Northeastern Africa
Abstract:
Between Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 4 and 2, Northeast Africa witnessed migrations of Homo sapiens into Eurasia. Within the context of the aridification of the Sahara, the Nile Valley probably offered a very attractive corridor into Eurasia. This region and this period are therefore central for the (pre)history of the out-of-Africa peopling of modern humans. However, there are very few sites from the beginning of the Upper Palaeolithic that document these migration events. In Egypt, the site of Nazlet Khater 4 (NK4), which is related to ancient H. sapiens quarrying activities, is one of them. Its lithic assemblage shows an important laminar component, and this, associated with its chronological position (ca. 33 ka), means that the site is the most ancient Upper Palaeolithic sites of this region. The detailed study of the Nazlet Khater 4 lithic material shows that blade production (volumetric reduction) is also associated with flake production (surface reduction). This technological duality addresses the issue of direct attribution of NK4 to the Upper Palaeolithic.
Authors: Leplongeon, Alice1; Pleurdeau, David2 Source: African Archaeological Review, Volume 28, Number 3, September 2011, pp. 213-236(24)
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AuthorsTeebi AS, et al. Show all Journal Community Genet. 2005;8(1):21-6.
Abstract
The Arabs in general are genetically diverse. Major factors that contributed to their diversity include the migrations of Semitic tribes from the Arabian Peninsula, the Islamic expansion in the 7th century AD, the Crusade wars and the recent migration dynamics. These events have resulted in the admixture of the original Arabs with other populations extending from east and south Asia to Europe and Africa. Their demographic features include high rates of consanguinity, a large family size and a rapid population growth. There is a high frequency of autosomal recessive disorders and increased frequencies of homozygosity for autosomal dominant traits, such as familial hypercholesterolemia and X-linked traits, such as glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase deficiency. The patterns of autosomal recessive disorders, including their mutations, may be different in various geographic locations within the Arab world. However, there are disorders that are specifically prevalent among the Arabs either uniformly or in certain locations. The Arab Genetic diseases include Bardet-Biedl syndrome, Meckel syndrome, autosomal recessive severe childhood muscular dystrophy, osteopetrosis and renal tubular acidosis, Sanjad-Sakati syndrome and others.
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