This appears to be a chapter that the linguist Christopher Ehret wrote for The Cambridge World History, detailing archaeological cultures and population movements within the African continent between 48 and 9.5 kya. I can send the .pdf of the whole chapter to anyone who is interested, but right now I will share a couple of maps from it.
Map 1: Dispersal of Later Stone Age/Upper Paleolithic Cultures Throughout Africa, 48-30k BCE
Map 2: Later Stone Age/Upper Paleolithic Cultures of Africa circa 16-15k BCE (the Oranian is his term for Iberomaurisians)
It is important to point out that Ehret appears to see Middle Stone Age (MSA) cultures as representing not fully modern humans (Homo sapiens sapiens) but a collection of "archaic" populations that, while more similar to modern humans than Neanderthals or Denisovans, weren't quite behaviorally modern. Behaviorally modern humans in his view are correlated with Later Stone Age (aka Upper Paleolithic) cultures that emerged within the last 70,000 years.
UPDATE 9/13/22:The previous chapter in the same book is also of interest to me, and I've also obtained the .pdf for that.
Posted by Tukuler (Member # 19944) on :
Though Oranian is maybe too precise to cover a region, I commend Ehret's refuse of the misnomer iberoMAURUSIAN (see After 82 years why still IBEROmaurusian?). However I've no regard for any 'some anatomically modern human were/are not behaviorially modern human' as late as 48K nonesuch myself. So if Ehret sets a ~100K boundary then OK I guess.
The dead-end OoA Skuhl folk had drilled seashell beads. In Taforalt even older beads were colored with ochre. Way down opposite coast in South Africa they were cooking shellfish, implying practical forethought of low tide Moons to collect them. At Blombos ochre was engraved with lines and angles intimating complex symbolic thought for data storage. At Klipdrift they heated silcrete (link) to flake off blades and they had drilled and ochred seashell beads too. That was between 75-70K yrs ago for south Africa. 100K and 110K are the respective Skuhl and Taforalt dates.
Posted by Tukuler (Member # 19944) on :
Sahel/Sahra/Atlas/Coast temporal mapology always has me wondering about the Aterians. Apparently in place in the Maghreb proper the whole time U6 arrived and first bifurcated. Anything behind speculation Aterians, not San, contributed eyefolds and broad cheeks to northern Africans who have them? But the on point thing is resolving the Aterian decline and disappearance (to me) enigma. Bring me up to date ES.
The one paragraph on Aterians in Ehret chapter.
While covering Dabban, Ehret footnotes a book with Aterian in the title Elena A. A. Garcea Crossing deserts and avoiding seas: Aterian North African–European Relations Journal of Anthropological Research 60 (2004), 27–53
Posted by BrandonP (Member # 3735) on :
quote:Originally posted by Tukuler: However I've no regard for any 'some anatomically modern human were/are not behaviorially modern human' as late as 48K nonesuch myself. So if Ehret sets a ~100K boundary then OK I guess.
I need to correct myself here. In the chapter before the one I linked to in the OP (which I also just obtained in .pdf form), he dates the emergence of "the full package of modern human capacities" to the period between 70-48 kya. The 100 kya figure was my own rough estimate, not Ehret's.
quote:Some of the technological and cultural features present among early fully modern humans had come by stages into being among more archaic humans in the eras preceding 70,000 bce, but the full package of modern human capacities took shape between about 70,000 and 48,000 bce. Then, from sometime around 48,000 bce onward, armed with those capacities, fully modern humans spread outward from Africa, first into far southwestern Asia and from there into Europe and Asia and, much later, across the Bering Strait into the Americas.
Interestingly, Ehret dates the OOA event for "fully modern humans" to around 48 kya, versus 70-50 kya in other sources.
Posted by BrandonP (Member # 3735) on :
quote:Originally posted by Tukuler: Sahel/Sahra/Atlas/Coast temporal mapology always has me wondering about the Aterians. Apparently in place in the Maghreb proper the whole time U6 arrived and first bifurcated. Anything behind speculation Aterians, not San, contributed eyefolds and broad cheeks to northern Africans who have them?
We would need aDNA from "Aterian" remains to be sure. Jebel Irhoud might give us specimens to look at, although it predates the arrival of LSA populations like the Dabban into the region by ~250,000 years.
As for U6 (and the associated "Dzudzuana-like" ancestry), I wonder how that would have reached northern Africa. A lot of people propose a route from western Asia, but I suspect a European contribution from across the Mediterranean is also possible (since the Eurasian ancestry in Dzudzuana is supposedly Villabruna-like). However, Ehret also describes a contribution to the North African Oranian from further south in Africa:
quote:The origins of this technocomplex are uncertain, but in their high proportions of bladelets and microliths, both Silsilian and Oranian have more in common with African Later Stone Age technologies farther south in the continent than with the pre-Glacial Maximum cultures of Egypt and Libya. The Oranian peoples practiced one custom of possible more southerly inspiration as well: they excised the incisor teeth. This trait is not known earlier in North Africa, nor was it found in the contemporary Silsilian in Egypt. But it was a very old custom among Nilo-Saharan peoples farther south in the middle and upper Nile regions.41 Together these features suggest a possible history for future testing in the archaeology – that a new population element, following the Nile north from the Middle Nile Basin around 19,000 bce, may have contributed to the origins of the new technocomplex of that period.
Posted by Tukuler (Member # 19944) on :
I've seen phenotype traits based on aDNA genes. So far none revealing eyefolds. I think the San eyefold and the East Asian eyefold are different phenomena but see no distinguishing gene info for either. Aterian really describes toolkits, right? I myself doubt anything like any kind of 'homogeneous' physical type spanning almost Atlantic to Nile, Sahel to Med seashore.
Personally I think behaviorally modern human with an ~45K introductory date is just a way to project El Castillo Cave painters and thus Europeans as the first truly fully modern humans (sorry, Sulawesi link is just as old) despite obvious modern behavior displayed at least 70K and up to 110K in continental and tectonic Africa. Surprised to see even your average everyday Redditors calling it out. Don't see it much this AMH v BMH/FMH thing in scientific literature.
Homo sapiens sapiens is one species and this threshold stuff smacks of Carelton Coon and them (link) positing hominims reached Hss separately and independently per race/continent --five distinct major races of Erectus humans existed before the emergence of Homo sapiens as the dominant species. No, not lumping Ehret with Coonians just noticing this one parallel notion of Hss being something other than just a species level.
Honestly? Though benign, Ehret's use of BMH/FMH turns me off. So it's taking me a while to read The Cambridge World History Volume I Part II - The Paleolithic and the beginnings of human history Ehret chapters because I feel the need to vet his statements. I don't think it's more up to date than 2013 but you know hypercritical me.
Being fair to Ehret, gotta say it's refreshing to see a prehistory book say what he's saying about the role of Africa(ns), and under the Cambridge brand too.
Didn't get into artifacts but posted on supposed Inner African genetics/genomics re Maurusians elsewhere today. Woulda added it to your thread but din't want to keep harking on the north of the continent as Ehret's chapterss include the whole place.
Posted by BrandonP (Member # 3735) on :
quote:Personally I think behaviorally modern human with an ~45K introductory date is just a way to project El Castillo Cave painters and thus Europeans as the first truly fully modern humans (sorry, Sulawesi link is just as old) despite obvious modern behavior displayed at least 70K and up to 110K in continental and tectonic Africa. Surprised to see even your average everyday Redditors calling it out. Don't see it much this AMH v BMH/FMH thing in scientific literature.
From what I have read so far, Ehret puts a lot of emphasis on behaviorally modern humans emerging in Africa before migrating elsewhere. The 48 kya figure is his estimation of when a subset of those humans migrated out (aka the OOA event). I don't see where he declares Europeans or any other non-Africans as the "first truly fully modern humans".
With that said, he does seem much more supportive of an Upper Paleolithic/Late Stone Age "revolution" happening circa 70 kya than some other workers. He correlates this with a change in the human vocal tract that would have facilitated the development of our current capacity for language.
quote:One particularly notable anatomical difference distinguishes the fully modern humans of the past 50,000 years from both the archaic hominins, such as the Neanderthals, outside Africa and the archaic humans in Africa. In all early hominins, including the archaic humans in the Levant of 100,000 years ago, the pharynx extended downward at an oblique angle from the back of the tongue and was shorter than the oral cavity. In contrast, by 6–8 years of age in all fully modern human beings the pharynx descends at a right angle from the oral cavity, and the two segments of the vocal tract are of roughly equal length. All humans since 50,000 years ago possess this configuration.
He is citing this article by Philip Lieberman and Robert McCarthy:
quote:What we found was that Neanderthal necks were too short and their faces too long to have accommodated equally proportioned SVTs. Although we could not reconstruct the shape of the SVT in the Homo erectus fossil because it does not preserve any cervical vertebrae, it is clear that its face (and underlying horizontal SVT) would have been too long for a 1:1 SVT to fit into its head and neck. Likewise, in order to fit a 1:1 SVT into the reconstructed Neanderthal anatomy, the larynx would have had to be positioned in the Neanderthal’s thorax, behind the sternum and clavicles, much too low for effective swallowing. Instead, these hominids likely possessed SVTs that had a horizontal dimension longer than its vertical one, suggesting that they would have been incapable of producing the full range of sounds made by humans today. Early hominids like Homo erectus and Neanderthals, therefore, would most likely have had SVTs intermediate in shape between those of chimpanzees and humans.
Surprisingly, our reconstruction of the 100,000-year-old specimen from Israel, which is anatomically modern in most respects, also would not have been able to accommodate a SVT with a 1:1 ratio, albeit for a different reason. Although it had only a moderately long face, its extremely short neck would have also placed its larynx too low in the chest if its SVT were equally proportioned. Again, like its Neanderthal relatives, this early modern human probably had an SVT with a horizontal dimension longer than its vertical one, translating into an inability to reproduce the full range of today’s human speech.
It was only in our reconstruction of the most recent fossil specimens—the modern humans postdating 50,000 years— that we identified an anatomy that could have accommodated a fully modern, equally proportioned vocal tract. Interestingly, the date of these specimens coincides with the appearance of the Upper Paleolithic tool kit, which is often associated with a florescence in modern human cognitive capacities.
If we assume that such fossil evidence indicates a 1:1 SVT that was capable of producing a full range of modern speech sounds, it seems logical to suggest that these Upper Paleolithic humans also had brains that were capable of sequencing the complex gestures necessary to produce speech. Taking this one step further (beyond what little hard evidence exists) it is likely that a brain so similar to ours would have possessed not only the capability to produce languages with complex syntax, but also cognitive flexibility. Therefore, we think that the presence of modern human vocal tracts sometime between 100,000 and 50,000 years ago marks the appearance of people with whom we might have had something to talk about.
Posted by Tukuler (Member # 19944) on :
Be patient with me and keep it coming.
Its not so much Ehret I'm against as I am definitely against any concept of distinct AMH BMH FMH Homo sapiens sapiens. If they aren't synonymous, as in here p.14379d re TPL1, the terms have geographic hierarchy attachments restating full sapiens status was attained separately for each race/continent.
I don't know, I imagine each exode of Hss out of Africa were fully anatomical and behavioral humans equipped and perceiving and reacting just like you and me except according to their own various cultural norms. How does Australia fit into this? In the 1950s credible anthropologist posited Australians were not quite modern human because of their morphology.
This larynx development spread there within 5000 yrs of 50K (low estimates)? Can you help me understand how this larynx development spread demically? It still smacks of 'speciazation' race by race supposing it did take place 50ky only to spread through all Hss by 5ky.
Not denying it, if a certainty, but this pharynx angle thing says AMH are no older than 50K. If so, Taforalt and Skuhl BMHs preceed AMH if pharynx angle is the AMH decider.
Maybe there's a peer reviewed doc clearly explaining, and with demonstrative examples of, distinct AMH BMH FMH Hss rather than synonymous usage. These terms do have historic centrist laden lay/amateur/pro usage that Ehret writing seven years ago seems unaware of or maybe trying to redeem.
Meanwhile would you lay out your view who is and who is not AMH who is and who is not BMH who is and who is not FMH for me and allay my confusion? Thanks.
quote:Originally posted by BrandonP:
... Ehret ... I don't see where he declares Europeans or any other non-Africans as the "first truly fully modern humans".
...
... a change in the human vocal tract that would have facilitated the development of our current capacity for language.
All humans since 50,000 years ago possess this configuration.
He is citing this article by Philip Lieberman and Robert McCarthy:
quote:What we found was that Neanderthal necks were too short and their faces too long to have accommodated equally proportioned SVTs. Although we could not reconstruct the shape of the SVT in the Homo erectus fossil because it does not preserve any cervical vertebrae, it is clear that its face (and underlying horizontal SVT) would have been too long for a 1:1 SVT to fit into its head and neck. Likewise, in order to fit a 1:1 SVT into the reconstructed Neanderthal anatomy, the larynx would have had to be positioned in the Neanderthal’s thorax, behind the sternum and clavicles, much too low for effective swallowing. Instead, these hominids likely possessed SVTs that had a horizontal dimension longer than its vertical one, suggesting that they would have been incapable of producing the full range of sounds made by humans today. Early hominids like Homo erectus and Neanderthals, therefore, would most likely have had SVTs intermediate in shape between those of chimpanzees and humans.
Surprisingly, our reconstruction of the 100,000-year-old specimen from Israel, which is anatomically modern in most respects, also would not have been able to accommodate a SVT with a 1:1 ratio, albeit for a different reason. Although it had only a moderately long face, its extremely short neck would have also placed its larynx too low in the chest if its SVT were equally proportioned. Again, like its Neanderthal relatives, this early modern human probably had an SVT with a horizontal dimension longer than its vertical one, translating into an inability to reproduce the full range of today’s human speech.
It was only in our reconstruction of the most recent fossil specimens—the modern humans postdating 50,000 years— that we identified an anatomy that could have accommodated a fully modern, equally proportioned vocal tract. Interestingly, the date of these specimens coincides with the appearance of the Upper Paleolithic tool kit, which is often associated with a florescence in modern human cognitive capacities.
If we assume that such fossil evidence indicates a 1:1 SVT that was capable of producing a full range of modern speech sounds, it seems logical to suggest that these Upper Paleolithic humans also had brains that were capable of sequencing the complex gestures necessary to produce speech. Taking this one step further (beyond what little hard evidence exists) it is likely that a brain so similar to ours would have possessed not only the capability to produce languages with complex syntax, but also cognitive flexibility. Therefore, we think that the presence of modern human vocal tracts sometime between 100,000 and 50,000 years ago marks the appearance of people with whom we might have had something to talk about.
.
The "supportive quote" speaks mostly of SVT and larynx leaving the pharynx until the last paragraph (I take it this SVT ratio is pharynx vs oral cavity lengths). Lieberman and McCarthy give a 100,000K date. BMH blinging Skuhl could talk they just couldn't produce our full range of speech. This is different from losing capability of pronouncing clicks or gutturals, etc., if unused in the parent's language as among all living Hss.
BTW contrasting your and most's use of a single OOA event, I take it there were several OOA events after the first successful OOA stragglers. I see seepage rather than waves.
Posted by Tukuler (Member # 19944) on :
Hope you haven't given up our dialog? I want to learn more from you.
Just stumbled across that which is my 'background' on the AMH v BMH ting. I guess your Ehret (2015) seeks to knock out the teeth of BMH/FMH as non-African in origin.
quote:
Tends to support the following abrupt BMH hypothesis and co-opt early gradual AMH=BMH of Africa for Euros.
quote: This list doesn't exhaust all the possible ways of defining "modern behavior", but it gives you some idea of what archeologists look for. But when do we see these different behaviors first crop up in the archeological record? There are two basic camps in the debate. The first is what I call the "late, abrupt hypothesis", which means that the capacity for modern human behavior didn't evolve until very late, about 50,000 to 40,000 years ago.
The second camp, called the "early, gradual hypothesis", claims that the capacity for modern behavior developed beginning a couple hundred thousand years ago, and that we see archeological evidence of modern behavior over many tens of thousands of years. Advocates of the late, abrupt idea consider the arrival of modern humans in Europe and the explosion of cave art, jewelry, carvings, complex tools, and other inventions on that continent between 40,000 and 30,000 years ago to mark the big event - the dawn of modern human cultural behavior. But advocates of the early, gradual interpretation point to evidence in Africa of pigment grindstones, complex tools, and specialized types of foraging, such as fishing, which are all earlier than 50,000 years old. According to this idea, then, it wasn't one single genetic change that spurred the development of modern human behavior. Instead, the capacity was built up slowly, and modern behavior became more and more advanced over time.
It turns out that one member of our research group, Alison Brooks, is a strong supporter of this second hypothesis. She's done a lot of research to show that there's evidence of beads and other symbolic behavior, like cave art, in Africa between 90,000 and 70,000 years old. Part of her interest in working with our team at Olorgesailie is to see whether there's more evidence one way or the other about the evolution of modern behavior
^ Like I said, he's pretty adamant that what he calls BMH emerged in Africa.
As for your earlier post, I wouldn't get too hung up on Lieberman and McCarthy's 50 kya date for the emergence of modern human linguistic abilities. I think they chose that date as a rough estimate. Anywhere between 100-70 kya could be a more likely date.
Posted by BrandonP (Member # 3735) on :
quote:Meanwhile would you lay out your view who is and who is not AMH who is and who is not BMH who is and who is not FMH for me and allay my confusion? Thanks.
What does "FMH" mean? I know AMH means "anatomically modern human" and BMH means "behaviorally modern human", but what about FMH?
I do the line between AMH and BMH, if it exists at all, could be fuzzy, especially the further back in time. I wouldn't say we have a complete picture of the abilities of AMH prior to 100-60 kya. We know certain technologies associated with LSA/UP cultures become more widespread after 70 kya, but (as was pointed out in this thread) at least some of these technologies do go back much farther in time.
Posted by Djehuti (Member # 6698) on :
FMH means 'Fully Modern Human'. I've heard the term several times before in other bio-anthro fora but am also unsure as to its definition since I initially thought the term describes those populations of "full" or total AMH ancestry. If that's the case then many Eurasians especially Europeans and Australasians are not FMH because the former carry Neanderthal ancestry and the latter Denisovan ancestry. The big debate in anthropology is the alleged disconnect between the Anatomical Moderns and Behavioral Moderns wherein the anatomy precedes the behavior (culture) instead of simultaneously coinciding with it.
This is an excellent article here:
When did we become fully human? What fossils and DNA tell us about the evolution of modern intelligence When did something like us first appear on the planet? It turns out there’s remarkably little agreement on this question. Fossils and DNA suggest people looking like us, anatomically modern Homo sapiens, evolved around 300,000 years ago. Surprisingly, archaeology – tools, artefacts, cave art – suggest that complex technology and cultures, “behavioural modernity”, evolved more recently: 50,000-65,000 years ago.
Some scientists interpret this as suggesting the earliest Homo sapiens weren’t entirely modern. Yet the different data tracks different things. Skulls and genes tell us about brains, artefacts about culture. Our brains probably became modern before our cultures.
The “great leap”
For 200,000-300,000 years after Homo sapiens first appeared, tools and artefacts remained surprisingly simple, little better than Neanderthal technology, and simpler than those of modern hunter-gatherers such as certain indigenous Americans. Starting about 65,000 to 50,000 years ago, more advanced technology started appearing: complex projectile weapons such as bows and spear-throwers, fishhooks, ceramics, sewing needles.
People made representational art – cave paintings of horses, ivory goddesses, lion-headed idols, showing artistic flair and imagination. A bird-bone flute hints at music. Meanwhile, arrival of humans in Australia 65,000 years ago shows we’d mastered seafaring. This sudden flourishing of technology is called the “great leap forward”, supposedly reflecting the evolution of a fully modern human brain. But fossils and DNA suggest that human intelligence became modern far earlier.
Anatomical modernity
Bones of primitive Homo sapiens first appear 300,000 years ago in Africa, with brains as large or larger than ours. They’re followed by anatomically modern Homo sapiens at least 200,000 years ago, and brain shape became essentially modern by at least 100,000 years ago. At this point, humans had braincases similar in size and shape to ours.
Assuming the brain was as modern as the box that held it, our African ancestors theoretically could have discovered relativity, built space telescopes, written novels and love songs. Their bones say they were just as human as we are.
Because the fossil record is so patchy, fossils provide only minimum dates. Human DNA suggests even earlier origins for modernity. Comparing genetic differences between DNA in modern people and ancient Africans, it’s estimated that our ancestors lived 260,000 to 350,000 years ago. All living humans descend from those people, suggesting that we inherited the fundamental commonalities of our species, our humanity, from them.
All their descendants – Bantu, Berber, Aztec, Aboriginal, Tamil, San, Han, Maori, Inuit, Irish – share certain peculiar behaviours absent in other great apes. All human cultures form long-term pair bonds between men and women to care for children. We sing and dance. We make art. We preen our hair, adorn our bodies with ornaments, tattoos and makeup.
We craft shelters. We wield fire and complex tools. We form large, multigenerational social groups with dozens to thousands of people. We cooperate to wage war and help each other. We teach, tell stories, trade. We have morals, laws. We contemplate the stars, our place in the cosmos, life’s meaning, what follows death.
The details of our tools, fashions, families, morals and mythologies vary from tribe to tribe and culture to culture, but all living humans show these behaviours. That suggests these behaviours – or at least, the capacity for them – are innate. These shared behaviours unite all people. They’re the human condition, what it means to be human, and they result from shared ancestry.
We inherited our humanity from peoples in southern Africa 300,000 years ago. The alternative – that everyone, everywhere coincidentally became fully human in the same way at the same time, starting 65,000 years ago – isn’t impossible, but a single origin is more likely.
The Network Effect
Archaeology and biology may seem to disagree, but they actually tell different parts of the human story. Bones and DNA tell us about brain evolution, our hardware. Tools reflect brainpower, but also culture, our hardware and software.
Just as you can upgrade your old computer’s operating system, culture can evolve even if intelligence doesn’t. Humans in ancient times lacked smartphones and spaceflight, but we know from studying philosophers such as Buddha and Aristotle that they were just as clever. Our brains didn’t change, our culture did.
That creates a puzzle. If Pleistocene hunter-gatherers were as smart as us, why did culture remain so primitive for so long? Why did we need hundreds of millennia to invent bows, sewing needles, boats? And what changed? Probably several things.
First, we journeyed out of Africa, occupying more of the planet. There were then simply more humans to invent, increasing the odds of a prehistoric Steve Jobs or Leonardo da Vinci. We also faced new environments in the Middle East, the Arctic, India, Indonesia, with unique climates, foods and dangers, including other human species. Survival demanded innovation.
Many of these new lands were far more habitable than the Kalahari or the Congo. Climates were milder, but Homo sapiens also left behind African diseases and parasites. That let tribes grow larger, and larger tribes meant more heads to innovate and remember ideas, more manpower, and better ability to specialize. Population drove innovation.
This triggered feedback cycles. As new technologies appeared and spread – better weapons, clothing, shelters – human numbers could increase further, accelerating cultural evolution again.
Numbers drove culture, culture increased numbers, accelerating cultural evolution, on and on, ultimately pushing human populations to outstrip their ecosystems, devastating the megafauna and forcing the evolution of farming. Finally, agriculture caused an explosive population increase, culminating in civilisations of millions of people. Now, cultural evolution kicked into hyperdrive.
Artefacts reflect culture, and cultural complexity is an emergent property. That is, it’s not just individual-level intelligence that makes cultures sophisticated, but interactions between individuals in groups, and between groups. Like networking millions of processors to make a supercomputer, we increased cultural complexity by increasing the number of people and the links between them.
So our societies and world evolved rapidly in the past 300,000 years, while our brains evolved slowly. We expanded our numbers to almost 8 billion, spread across the globe, reshaped the planet. We did it not by adapting our brains but by changing our cultures. And much of the difference between our ancient, simple hunter-gatherer societies and modern societies just reflects the fact that there are lots more of us and more connections between us.
