New path for early human migrations through a once-lush Arabia contradicts a single ‘out of Africa’ origin
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Wednesday, October 4, 2023
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Little is known, however, about the pathways of these migrations.
Key Points:
- Little is known, however, about the pathways of these migrations.
- Our evidence suggests this valley had a riverine and wetland zone that would have provided ideal passage for hunter-gatherers as they moved out of Africa and deep into the Levant and Arabia.
Wandering out of Africa
- Researchers hypothesise humans migrating out of Africa would have used platforms in the eastern Sahara, the Nile River Valley, or the margins of the western Red Sea.
- From there, these small bands of hunter-gatherers would have passed into the Sinai – a land bridge connecting Africa with the rest of Asia – following migrating animals and hunting a variety of them for sustenance.
- For many of these hunter-gatherers, the next stop on the journey would have been the southern portion of the Jordan Rift Valley.
When Arabia was a verdant land
- Our findings from sedimentary sections ranging 5 to 12 metres in thickness showed ecosystem fluctuations over time, including cycles of dry and humid environments.
- We also found evidence for the presence of ancient rivers and wetlands.
- Luminescence dating showed the sedimentary environments formed between 125,000 and 43,000 years ago, suggesting there had been multiple wet intervals.
- Towards the south, fieldwork in northern Saudi Arabia has also demonstrated a network of rivers and lakes was once present in the region.
Multiple migrations into South-West Asia
- Our findings from the Jordan Rift Valley indicate there were multiple early human migrations from Africa, and into Asia, during favourable conditions.
- Our results also suggest, together with the Levantine and Arabian evidence, that hunter-gatherers used inland river and wetland systems as they crossed South-West Asia.
- Although ancient DNA evidence indicates Homo sapiens interbred with Neanderthals and Denisovans multiple times as they spread into Asia, on-the-ground evidence for these encounters has generally been lacking.