Posted on 01/27/2012 8:32:48 AM PST by Theoria
Altai in southern Siberia sits right at the centre of Russia. But the tiny, mountainous republic has a claim to fame unknown until now - Native Americans can trace their origins to the remote region.
DNA research revealed that genetic markers linking people living in the Russian republic of Altai, southern Siberia, with indigenous populations in North America.
A study of the mutations indicated a lineage shift between 13,000 and 14,000 years ago - when people are thought to have walked across the ice from Russia to America.
This roughly coincides with the period when humans from Siberia are thought to have crossed what is now the Bering strait and entered America.
'Altai is a key area because it's a place where people have been coming and going for thousands and thousands of years,' said Dr Theodore Schurr, from the University of Pennsylvania in the US.
Among the people who may have emerged from the Altai region are the predecessors of the first Native Americans.
Roughly 20-25,000 years ago, these prehistoric humans carried their Asian genetic lineages up into the far reaches of Siberia and eventually across the then-exposed Bering land mass into the Americas.
'Our goal in working in this area was to better define what those founding lineages or sister lineages are to Native American populations,' Schurr said.
The region lies at the intersection of what is now Russia, Mongolia, China and Kazakhstan.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
“Human populations are tightly interwoven”
How does the Toba bottleneck connect with this?
Modern Humans may have their origins in Central Asia.
Very cool.
Some are more tightly interwoven than others.
http://blog.capertravelindia.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Orchha-Khajuraho185kms-5hrs.jpg
When I studied anthropology and archaeology 20 years ago, we were taught that there were three basic human bone structures and that they were Caucasian, Asian, and African. We were told that the human specimens found might not be perfect examples of one or the other but they could all fall under the three categories.
And if we aren’t too politically correct, visually, most people do too, with definite mixing all around.
I think there may be some truth to the people here previous to the european last wave (a lot of us) having an Asian bone structure and looks. The Indian / native American often has straight black hair, mid brown skin, almond eyes.
If Asians traveled here and took over a previously European people, it would explain the differences between the looks of native Americans and today’s Asians.
I find it all so fascinating.
One of my cousins is married to an archaeologist who is a paleo-indian expert. He worked at Museo Archaeologico de Mexico for many years before taking a job stateside at a university.
He supervised a lot of neat digs at sites in Mexico, and always invited us to visit them-since my family is Hispanic, I found it particularly fascinating, and have ever since.
He was talking about the politically incorrect theory of well-traveled far ancestors who sailed, traded and mated all over the world long before any land bridges or empires came to be. Many of his collegues thought he was nuts-he is laughing his ass off now every time he is vindicated.
They are not Russians. Russians are Slavs. These people are another ethnic group whose territory was seized under the Czars.
Thanks for adding some common sense to the discussion! People can get over zealous when they think they know something.
That's funny!
I once knew an Indian who spoke Russian. How did you learn Russian, I asked? From my father, he said. And he? From his father. Now it all starts making sense.
Ping.
Were Altoids the traditional mint of the Altaics?
Stole? Nobody ever stole land before land rights were established. You either held it by force or let it go and move or die in the face of greater force. All the liberal handwringing about displacing ‘native peoples’ is nonsense as said natives weren’t really native, but trespassers themselves who’d driven out the previous trespassers.
Fascinating that they’re frozen in time technologically. That photo, if the tech existed, could have been taken centuries earlier. I wonder if some cultures are simply dead ends.
That is one long dang walk.
Your monomania is refreshing in contrast to people who can’t seem to think about anything else.
We're slipping people post 58?
Outstanding post. Won’t our white guilt ever be assauged?
Can you see us setting up additional “native” casinos as DNA evidence points to additionl genotypes having been here before?
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