Out of Africa... and Back?

I've long been extremely interested in the evolution of human kind and our beginnings. It goes back to being a child and my father buying those "Time-Life Books" series covering most science topics, the creation of the planet, solar system, early man, etc. I'd bury my head in those books for hours every time I visited him, and later bought them for my children. I almost made a career out out of Science when I took my first class in Physical Anthropology and read a book called "Lucy" written by Donald Johanson*. The book, which I highly recommend, was about his discoveries of Australopithecus Afarensis fossils in Africa, a very early ancestor to us all.

I was bitten with the bug, wanted to dig up bones, and took every course I could in school relating to Early Man/Anthropology and the Earth sciences, Geology, Oceanography, you name it... thanks to Uncle Sam and the GI Bill, lol. I also developed a keen interest in Neanderthal Man in particular, only made stronger by reading Jean Auel's* first fiction Earth Children series book "Clan of the Cave Bear"... which I also highly recommend, if you like to daydream; a mixture of facts and story telling. (later a movie)

Anyway, straying a bit there, but I came across an article this morning I had to read, like I always do on the subject of early man. What's interesting in this is the premise of the "Out of Africa" theory not being entirely correct, and the whole issue not being that simple. Often discussed is that there were perhaps many migrations out of the African continent, which would make some sense to me. Though rarely talked about is the possibility of migrating back... only to start the process over again later and on up into Europe and Asia.

This article with the links below is about hominid fossils found in the country of Georgia (Europe) that are 1.8 million years old. The oldest ever found outside the African continent, leading to the belief that hominids left far earlier than previously thought, and perhaps went back?

I myself wonder about the ties to Neanderthal in Europe, if any of this is a factor, and Georgia is just along the way. A natural travel route through the middle east where early Neanderthals have been found, and eventually migrated up into all of Europe. I would like to know more about their evolutionary trail myself, and somehow all this ties together, but again I stray, as the article doesn't go into that in any depth unfortunately.

Still... a very interesting read for those with similar interests as mine... yet another piece of the Human puzzle.

A skull that rewrites the history of man

It has long been agreed that Africa was the sole cradle of human evolution. Then these bones were found in Georgia...

By Steve Connor, Science Editor

The conventional view of human evolution and how early man colonised the world has been thrown into doubt by a series of stunning palaeontological discoveries suggesting that Africa was not the sole cradle of humankind. Scientists have found a handful of ancient human skulls at an archaeological site two hours from the Georgian capital, Tbilisi, that suggest a Eurasian chapter in the long evolutionary story of man.

The skulls, jawbones and fragments of limb bones suggest that our ancient human ancestors migrated out of Africa far earlier than previously thought and spent a long evolutionary interlude in Eurasia – before moving back into Africa to complete the story of man.

Experts believe fossilised bones unearthed at the medieval village of Dmanisi in the foothills of the Caucuses, and dated to about 1.8 million years ago, are the oldest indisputable remains of humans discovered outside of Africa.

But what has really excited the researchers is the discovery that these early humans (or "hominins") are far more primitive-looking than the Homo erectus humans that were, until now, believed to be the first people to migrate out of Africa about 1 million years ago.

The Dmanisi people had brains that were about 40 per cent smaller than those of Homo erectus and they were much shorter in stature than classical H. erectus skeletons, according to Professor David Lordkipanidze, general director of the Georgia National Museum. "Before our findings, the prevailing view was that humans came out of Africa almost 1 million years ago, that they already had sophisticated stone tools, and that their body anatomy was quite advanced in terms of brain capacity and limb proportions. But what we are finding is quite different," Professor Lordkipanidze said.

"The Dmanisi hominins are the earliest representatives of our own genus – Homo – outside Africa, and they represent the most primitive population of the species Homo erectus to date. They might be ancestral to all later Homo erectus populations, which would suggest a Eurasian origin of Homo erectus."

Read more below~

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/a-skull-that-rewrites-the-history-of-man-1783861.html

... and this~

　Steve Connor: Out of Africa... and back again? The story of humans unravels

The story of human origins is a messy affair and it seems to get more complicated with every new discovery. It is now clear that the tidy idea of the first "out of Africa" migration about one million years ago is wrong – some of our human ancestors must have emerged from our ancestral homeland much earlier than that.

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/steve-connor-out-of-africa-and-back-again-the-story-of-humans-unravels-1783865.html

All fascinating stuff to me still after all these years... I can't get enough, and thought I would share.

Hope you enjoyed the articles, thanks.

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Take care.

Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Johanson (Donald Johanson)

Ref:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth's_Children (Jean Auel)