Assuming that humans dispersed into Asia predominantly via a southern coastal route is firmly rooted in conventional wisdom. But, the evidence is far more equivocal on the question.
Northern and Central Asia have been neglected in studies of early human migration, with deserts and mountains being considered uncompromising barriers. However, a new study argues that humans may have moved through these extreme settings in the past under wetter conditions. By analyzing past climate, northern Asia emerges as a potential route of human dispersal, as well as a zone of potential interaction with other hominins such as Neanderthals and Denisovans.From here.
Feng Li, Nils Vanwezer, Nicole Boivin, Xing Gao, Florian Ott, Michael Petraglia, Patrick Roberts. "Heading north: Late Pleistocene environments and human dispersals in central and eastern Asia." PLOS ONE, 2019; 14 (5): e0216433 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0216433
12 comments:
Papuans surely took the southern route?
@DDeden Not necessarily, there are other migration route theories, that have the ancestors of Papuans arriving earlier and via northern Asia.
Regarding parsimony I meant. Can you point me to northern migration theories?
@DDeden, I come at the subject via the hypothesis that there was an early migration into the Americas via a northern route before the last LGM. This theory has been gaining traction due to, mainly genetic evidence, for some time. From Schurr (2000): “Over the past 10 years, however, new methodologies have provided a, number of, important insights into the peopling of the New World.
Molecular genetic studies of the variation of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) in Siberian and Amerindian populations have allowed further inferences to be made about the timing of the colonisations, the number of migrations that reached the New World, and possible regions from which ancestral Native Americans might have originated. Most notably, the new mtDNA data suggest not only a very early movement of peoples into the New World but also the genetic contributions of populations originating outside of Siberia, from other parts of Asia. Overall, the mtDNA research implies that the colonization of Siberia and the Americas was more complex than previously supposed—that there were, in fact, multiple expansions of ancient peoples that contributed to the genetic diversity in aboriginal Siberian and Amerindian populations."
So, there are different viewpoints as to which direction/migration route the people carrying mtdna haplogroup M (the ancestor of mtdna Q - widespread in Oceania and Papua New Guinea) took to get to Beringia and south east Asia and Papua/Oceania.
The accepted paradigm about the migration of haplogroups M and N once L3 left Africa and differentiated, until recently ran like this: Haplogroup M migrated through the Arabian, peninsula, India and on into China and thence to north east Asia. This is coupled with a presumed northern migration route for haplogroup N above the Himalayas. While this hypothesis has much evidence to support it, including the presence of L3 in Arabia and early subclades of haplogroup M in India, it would have haplogroup M reaching Beringia too late for the early entry date idea to be feasible. So given the widespread evidence for an early peopling of the Americas, I have often looked at academic papers concerning migration routes.
Recently, evidence has been emerging, that a single wave of migration, for haplogroups M and N, via central Asia, is a distinct possibility.
Moreno-Mayar et al. (2016) found that carriers of human mitochondrial DNA macrohaplogroup M colonized India from south eastern Asia. They base their conclusion on the fact that founder ages of M lineages in India are significantly younger than those in East Asia, Southeast Asia and Near Oceania. Moreover, there is a significant positive correlation between the age of the M haplogroups and its longitudinal geographical distribution. These results point to a colonization of the Indian subcontinent by modern humans carrying M lineages from the east instead the west side. Consequently, the ancestors of Papuans may not have arrived via the coastal migration route but via central Asia.
Other supporting evidence for this is the percentage of Denisovan ancestry in Papuans, presumably picked up somewhere near the Altai in southern Siberia.
Then there's the Lu et al. (2016) paper, hypothesizing that AMH reached the Tibetan plateau much earlier than previously believed. They give a date of 62,000 – 38,000 years ago.
This evidence of an early, joint, northerly migration of haplogroups M and N, would tend support an early peopling of the Americas prior to the last LGM.
It would also mean that there is an alternative migration route for the ancestors of Papuans via the northern, central Asain route to the Sahul region.
Andrew what is your take on all this? NeilB
I do not assume that particular groups in East Asia, Southeast Asia, Australia, Melanesia, and Oceania arrived via a Southern route, but I also don't rule out the possibility. I am close to agnostic on the issue.
There are DNA evidence based arguments that cut both ways. There is a dearth of dated physical remains or human relics that are reliably dated, although there are some remains in SE Asia just post-Toba that would suggest a Southern Coastal route. Archaeology re the Northern route isn't very complete and could have lots of new surprises for it.
I think it is very likely that the ancestors of the Jomon in Japan arrived via a Northern route. I think it is possible that Papuans and Aboriginal Australians represent a merger of Northern route and Southern route migrations or multiple waves of migration, as the phylogenic diversity of those populations is quite great for a single coastal route migration.
"I do not assume that particular groups in East Asia, Southeast Asia, Australia, Melanesia, and Oceania arrived via a Southern route,"
Obviously in this respect, I mean only regarding the ultimate ancestral migration from West Eurasia to East Eurasia.
The routes of particular groups within East Eurasia, Australia, Melanesia and Oceania is often well established. For example, we have a very good idea of the timing and source of the Austronesian settlement of Oceania from a starting point in Formosa with a Melanesian component added at a particular moment later on, and we have a very good idea about the route taken from mainland Asia to Papua New Guinea, Melanesia and Australia and the timing of those migrations.
Similarly, we have a pretty good idea about what kind of migrations have taken place within mainland East Asia and Southeast Asia in the Holocene era.
Patience please.
All true and thanks for your insight. I would say, that although I lean towards the northern migration route being older, the combinations you suggest are most likely.
It would be interesting to see DNA extracted from the 120,000 year old teeth, the Chinese discovered a few years ago and attributed to AMH, don't you think?
https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2019/06/first-australians-may-have-arrived-in.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed:+TheArchaeologyNewsNetwork+(The+Archaeology+News+Network)&m=1#ycu6CGqgUMUIrrBz.97
Papuans settled Australia. This claim is correct (finally). But nearly all of their other claims are not what they seem IMO. The maritime culture originated in Papua.
"I think it is very likely that the ancestors of the Jomon in Japan arrived via a Northern route."
A recent article on MtDNA of SEAsians included a Jomon woman, closest to Andamaners. Also the YAP gene is shared by Andamaners & Jomon. The Ainu (word for village is khotan) descend from a blend of Aynu H&G male nomads of Central Asia Takla Makan (Khotan town) that went northeast to around Sakhalin & Hokkaido where they met Jomon females that had moved up from the south.
I don't see support for Papuans & Andamaners descent from north-of-India ancestors. Canoes of bark from Papua to N Australia and later canoes of logs from Papua to Andamans, Taiwan, Okinawa.
we analyze the whole-genome sequence of a 2.5 kya individual (IK002) characterized with a typical Jomon culture that started in the Japanese archipelago >16 kya. The phylogenetic analyses support multiple waves of migration, with IK002 forming a lineage basal to the rest of the ancient/present-day East Eurasians examined, likely to represent some of the earliest-wave migrants who went north toward East Asia from Southeast Asia. Furthermore, IK002 has the extra genetic affinity with the indigenous Taiwan aborigines, which may support a coastal route of the Jomon-ancestry migration from Southeast Asia to the Japanese archipelago. This study highlight the power of ancient genomics with the isolated population to provide new insights into complex history in East Eurasia.
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/579177v1
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