Are you sure we read the same article?
Because the "Out of Africa" Theory is based on the premise that mankind originated IN Africa, not in Europe.
Hm, earliest hominid not from Africa but Europe? :o
- Thread starter Kyriakos
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Are you sure we read the same article?
Because the "Out of Africa" Theory is based on the premise that mankind originated IN Africa, not in Europe.
Very much so
Here a link of that dusty lab work of boring results that only inflame boring scientists to great enthusiasm
and which opens a window to our hominid development back in time by analysing DNA of extant, still living hominids
enabling to date changes in for example our metabolism indicating at what time in our development that change offered significant evolutionary advantages.
It is not easy reading, not fit for tabloids, but very interesting (if you like it) and along this kind of work over time we will see more and more important conclusions.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4163920/
take note that this article uses the proper word hominins for our ancestors up to the point of our common ancestor with great apes.
hominids are ancestors of both humans and great apes.
These old Sumerian myths are, already for their going so far back in time, fascinating.
Key in these myths for the hominid topic is that we were according to this myth created/modified by gods.
Some dates:
Sumerian myths are currently dated by some theories roughly at 300,000 years ago.
Eve: the mtDNA of the mitochondrial Eve was estimated at 200,000 years ago in 1987 based on DNA mutation analysis of 147 people (worldwide sample).
The finding that made it to the tabloids.
Adam: You can do the same with the male Y-chromosome
A similar analysis in 2013 into the male Y-chromosome including assumed variations, on another sample of 69 people, delivered for Adam 120,000-156,000 years ago
On this same 69 people sample it delivered for the Eve mtDNA 99,00-148,000 years ago.
So far this 300,000 years ago does not match that precise.
Again:
There is still a lot of work to do
DNA analysis on living species is a fine objective window that will deliver much more.
Link to Nature: http://www.nature.com/news/genetic-adam-and-eve-did-not-live-too-far-apart-in-time-1.13478
Link to Science: http://science.sciencemag.org/content/341/6145/562
Thorgalaeg
Deity
What do you mean exactly? That the myth talks about things supposedly happened 300.000 years ago or that the myth itself originated 300.000 years ago? I find the later extremely hard to believe.
My bad I was not clear in my wording.
I mean that the Sumerian myths talk about things that happened by some theories 300k years ago.
BTW
my own opinion is that you have to be very cautious about "time" in these myths.
If you look at the Sumerian King list, these kings got very old, some up to 36,000 years !!!
A bit like the biblical Methusalem (969 year).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumerian_King_List
Thorgalaeg
Deity
I think there is some systematic error in dates, be it biblical patriarchs or sumerian kings. The older you get the longer people live. Maybe it has something to do with astronomy or lenguage.
Jip
But so far no one has found one systematic way to get converted to more normal ages that are biologically plausible.
There are cultures in the world where there is no real distinction between "wise" and "old".
Perhaps these high numbers of age are a way to express respect for the old kings.
But still... this kind of psychological explanation is no real (natural) science anymore.
yung.carl.jung
Hey Bird! I'm Morose & Lugubrious
Can the two of you share a source for these or any Sumerian myths? I would prefer a book, sort of an oversight, but Ill take anything you got. I read the epic of Gilgamesh, that is pretty much it.
I am also looking for general nonfiction reads on ancient religions and myths.
Samuel Noah Kramer is a respected Sumerian expert that wrote several books on Sumer and Enki. I checked Amazon and they are there.
This is a nice site with articles: http://www.livius.org/sources/content/anet/104-106-the-epic-of-atrahasis/
If you want to stretch your imagination there is "the lost book of Enki" from Sitchin. Very popular, but imo too speculative. It wants to demonstrate that aliens were here to mine gold and we were their slaves.
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yung.carl.jung
Hey Bird! I'm Morose & Lugubrious
Thanks a lot Hortbern! And for that ancient aliens bit.. "conspiracy theories" are a dedicated hobby of mine and Ill make sure to check it out!
Berzerker
Deity
If numbers help identify those in need of disqualification I'm all for it
Oh I see, you're talking about the OP article. I thought you were referring to the recent posts of a Moroccan find pushing "us" back another 100k... The OP article doesn't say anything about the out of africa theory, that deals with where 'we' originated and where we went afterward. If a European ape went to africa 5-8 mya aint relevant to the 200-300kya anatomically modern humans living there before leaving africa 80-100 kya.
Berzerker
Deity
According to Sitchin's theory people (some, our ancestors) were created to work, to labor for the gods... There was no adam (earthling) to till the land, Adam works in the Garden, etc... The first peoples were a step up from their hominid ancestor (erectus?) but continued development led eventually to "us" and thats when things got out of control, the daughters of man were desirable and the sons of god mated with them. Thats why we see in myth a certain group living very long lives, they were either gods or their semi-divine offspring.
Kramer compiled an anthology (Mythologies of the Ancient World?) with 10 researchers contributing their work on 10 cultures, Kramer's was of course the Sumerians (the black headed ones). In his section he noted a myth about our origin, the gods rebelled at having to work so Enki declares a creature exists roaming his Abzu (southern domain) that will serve as a primitive worker (lulu?) once given the image of the gods, so clay, 'divine' blood, 14 birth goddesses and a bunch of experimentation later and our lineage is born.
Enki may be both the biblical serpent and a Sumerian fish god, its amazing how many african gods are serpents or fish. The Zulu have a myth about their distant past, they believe the gods created their ancestors, called 'the artificial ones' and they were at war with the 'apemen'. The Sumerian king's list attributes extremely long lives and reigns to the 'mythical' kings, but one list (Berossus?) had 10 kings reigning 432,000 years before the flood.
The rebellion of the gods happened 40 years after they arrived on Earth, 40 x 3,600 (Sumerian sar or divine year) = 144,000, so if the flood was ~14 kya "we" began appearing about 300,000 years ago. Adam was not among those people, he came later. So its very interesting to see DNA testing show our common ancestors within that range, and recent research suggests the pain women suffer in child birth began with our emergence, not our hominid ancestors. So the 'curse' upon Eve - that she will suffer increased pain in child birth - is a clue to the age of the story. Its quite possible we lived in africa for thousands of years with one language and culture before spreading out and losing contact.
Btw, as Joseph Campbell noted in his Masks of God series, the number 432,000 shows up in Indian myth, the architecture of Angkor Wat, and the Norse myth of Valhalla - thru 540 doors go 800 warriors to battle at Ragnarok. In Genesis God says his spirit would not reside in man for his days are numbered 120 years. Those are not our years, they're God's years - the Sumerian sar of 3,600 years. And 120 x 3,600 = 432,000 years. Man would be wiped out by the flood 432,000 years after "God" arrived on Earth. God (or someone else) changed their mind and let us survive, according to Sumerian myth it was Enki who told the Sumerian Noah (Zuisudra) about the impending calamity and how to avoid drowning.
Zecharia Sitchin's "The 12th Planet" offers a mind blowing interpretation of "The Enuma Elish", the Babylonian Epic of Creation. I highly recommend it, and its paperback for maybe $7... He wrote several books, "The Earth Chronicles" but the 12th planet is the best imo. His analysis of new world mythology was a nice addition to the series, he shows the Inca and Sumerians shared a very similar cosmology. He didn't show the Inca also share similar features with Toltec/Aztec cosmology too.
On that painful childbirth
and more important the risk to die from it.
With the increasing brain size and corresponding head skull size of a baby, childbirth became more and more difficult and a risk.
That is a clear relation of the "start" story of for example Adam-Eve and hominids getting a bigger brain.
Evolution adapted us to that:
A. The first adaptation was to have the brain grow after birth. But the problem with that is that the essential fatty acid omega-3, being 8% of weight in the brain, is a rare part of food. Animal brains and seafood have the animal form of omega-3 that we need and our metabolism has poor capabilities to convert vegetable omega-3 into animal omega-3. Females being twice as good in that conversion. Females can also better store omega-3 than males in their higher amount of fat tissue. But if that storage is low, she will deplete the omega-3 in her own brain to give her baby enough omega-3 in the womb and with breast milk at the expense of herself, including her own brain (causing omega-3 shortage side effects, now recognised as postnatal depression).
So this brain size is balanced at the edge.
Also: old hominid tribes living in a location with an abundancy of omega-3 from seafood or mammalian brains as food that stay in place are likely to have females that do not need to have a big fat storage.
EDIT. Also: the oldest fertility goddesses we can find as small sculptures are often (always ?) fat females with a big pelvis/hip !
B. The second adaptation was to increase the flexibility of the female pelvis to increase the skeleton opening for the bigger head of the baby.
Here we see a lot of variance between genetically different tribes all over the world. The dominant tribes in todays world have issues like described in the painful childbirth of Eve, and you can see in the hospitals where women often prefer the painless treat. . But there are also many tribes, some almost extinct or diluted that have no issue at all and deliver after less than a half hour of labor and continue to work afterwards. I saw that happening in a documentary of a African tribe. No hardship at all. It was amazing. I could not find that documentary back, but here a link to a list up: http://womenagainststirrups.proboards.com/thread/146/women-require-assistance-childbirth
One of the complicating factors is that the female body needs adequate Vitamin D to loosen up the pelvis. Sun on the bare skin is needed to make Vit D in our body. With our migrating over the world to areas with less sun and wearing clothing a big variance in available sunlight comes in the suitable pelvis equation. What also plays a role is that tribes adapted to a lot of sun by having a lot of pigment in their skin to protect against UV damage (Africa !)and as a consequence have a lower yield of effective sunlight, are pidgeon holed in that sunny environment because if they migrate to cold areas with less sun, needing to wear clothing, they have a shortage of Vit D. This happens actually now with African refugees in for example Sweden.
Getting a "white" skin, without much pigment, was the first big evolutionary adaptation to live in colder climates with less sun that need cloting.
The bible states for that "start" not only the painful childbirth but also the shame of being naked. So there we see also the "start" of the cultural habit to wear clothing, decreasing Vit D.
And ofc I hope some day to see some DNA mutation analysis on genes of different tribes that handle the skull size, omega-3 metabolism and storage, the pelvis change of a female and our capability to have the right skin.
To get dates of the necessity of those changes.
and more important the risk to die from it.
With the increasing brain size and corresponding head skull size of a baby, childbirth became more and more difficult and a risk.
That is a clear relation of the "start" story of for example Adam-Eve and hominids getting a bigger brain.
Evolution adapted us to that:
A. The first adaptation was to have the brain grow after birth. But the problem with that is that the essential fatty acid omega-3, being 8% of weight in the brain, is a rare part of food. Animal brains and seafood have the animal form of omega-3 that we need and our metabolism has poor capabilities to convert vegetable omega-3 into animal omega-3. Females being twice as good in that conversion. Females can also better store omega-3 than males in their higher amount of fat tissue. But if that storage is low, she will deplete the omega-3 in her own brain to give her baby enough omega-3 in the womb and with breast milk at the expense of herself, including her own brain (causing omega-3 shortage side effects, now recognised as postnatal depression).
So this brain size is balanced at the edge.
Also: old hominid tribes living in a location with an abundancy of omega-3 from seafood or mammalian brains as food that stay in place are likely to have females that do not need to have a big fat storage.
EDIT. Also: the oldest fertility goddesses we can find as small sculptures are often (always ?) fat females with a big pelvis/hip !
B. The second adaptation was to increase the flexibility of the female pelvis to increase the skeleton opening for the bigger head of the baby.
Here we see a lot of variance between genetically different tribes all over the world. The dominant tribes in todays world have issues like described in the painful childbirth of Eve, and you can see in the hospitals where women often prefer the painless treat. . But there are also many tribes, some almost extinct or diluted that have no issue at all and deliver after less than a half hour of labor and continue to work afterwards. I saw that happening in a documentary of a African tribe. No hardship at all. It was amazing. I could not find that documentary back, but here a link to a list up: http://womenagainststirrups.proboards.com/thread/146/women-require-assistance-childbirth
One of the complicating factors is that the female body needs adequate Vitamin D to loosen up the pelvis. Sun on the bare skin is needed to make Vit D in our body. With our migrating over the world to areas with less sun and wearing clothing a big variance in available sunlight comes in the suitable pelvis equation. What also plays a role is that tribes adapted to a lot of sun by having a lot of pigment in their skin to protect against UV damage (Africa !)and as a consequence have a lower yield of effective sunlight, are pidgeon holed in that sunny environment because if they migrate to cold areas with less sun, needing to wear clothing, they have a shortage of Vit D. This happens actually now with African refugees in for example Sweden.
Getting a "white" skin, without much pigment, was the first big evolutionary adaptation to live in colder climates with less sun that need cloting.
The bible states for that "start" not only the painful childbirth but also the shame of being naked. So there we see also the "start" of the cultural habit to wear clothing, decreasing Vit D.
And ofc I hope some day to see some DNA mutation analysis on genes of different tribes that handle the skull size, omega-3 metabolism and storage, the pelvis change of a female and our capability to have the right skin.
To get dates of the necessity of those changes.
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Berzerker
Deity
thanks for that, very informative... I read somewhere they think it took from 10k-20k for dark skinned ancestors to become 'white' and blue eyed...but it was probably a fishing culture that led to us? Might explain all the African fish gods
There are DNA time data on that white skin, but there is a great variance also indicating that it happened several times. A complicating factor is that when evolution starts altering pigment of the skin, it also alters the resistance against bacterial infections on the skin. It seems that the fast track to get a skin color change towards dark and also towards white needs only 100 generations, but that the subsequent optimising of all metabolic and other side effects needs significant more time.
BTW Ramses II had a white skin and red hair. One of the places assumed where this white skin evolved was Egypt.
Guess I need to dig in there to get it into a simple overview.
Jip
the fishing gods and the omega-3 fatty acid !
Eyeopener for me, thanks
Another info related:
tribes living in Peru/Chili in mountanous areas had the tradition that males took the long journey to the coast to collect fish eggs and brought them back to their pregnant wife or as wedding gift.
Fish eggs have a lot of omega-3 and Vit D (fatty fish the most).
EDIT on that fish & white skin.
Considering:
A. Vit D AND omega-3 are in abundancy available in fatty fish (the liver and eggs). Salmon is superfood here.
B. Without wearing clothing the sunlight is enough in South Europe for enough Vit D.
C. Even when white skin was already there in Europe, dark skin stayed long viable in Europe (up to only 5,000 BC)
You could conclude from this:
A. tribes living in Northern Europe could keep their dark skin and wear thick clothing against the cold, because there was always seafood, fresh or dried/frozen supplying Vit D.
B. tribes living in Southern Europe and the Middle East only needed a white skin when wearing clothing for cultural reasons and living in areas to far from seafood.
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