BONES TELL STORY OF THAI ORIGIN

Bangkok Post ^ | Sunday November 05, 2006 | ANCHALEE KONGRUT

[JimSEA]

This is of great interest to me as it settles a long standing friendly arguement between me and a friend in Chiang Mai. He is a Thai educated in forestry and holds the most common Thai belief that their ancestors came from southern China about 700 Years ago. Recent arcaeological evidence points to Thais as having been in the area in which they currently live for some 5,000 years. Certainly the physical atributes of ancient skeletons resemble the current residents (Thais). This is excellent as confirmation of the connection will help in the push for preservation of ancient sites.

[JimSEA]

Possible interest?? Blam's Cheddar Man and this seem to show many people in the world live where their ancestors have lived for thousands of years.

[LibertyGrrrl]

This is really interesting....
I love stuff like this!

[claptrap]

I appreciate your concern yet,a nagging thought is
"destination " becomes increasingly important as one
ages. Unless you are a racist where you come from is irrelevant, its where you end up thats important.

Please explain why where a person comes from is so damn important.
Isnt how a person acts more important?

[JimSEA]

Aren't you interested in world history and the spread of the Human Species? In my instance, I began an interest in archeology when a neighbor in Oracle, Az asked it I wanted to help her do some salvage work for the Univ. of AZ along a gas pipeline. Of course, one of the questions was where did these people come from? When we moved to Southeast Asia part-time, my interest went with me. One big question is where the Ban Chiang culture came from. Here is a very advanced culture seemingly springing up 7,000 years ago where there were hunter / gatherers before. It is like a detective novel.

We are all about the same and our individual efforts define us, not our heritage, however, heritage is the story of mankind.

We carry a lot of cultural baggage and understanding it and other peoples histories accurately seems very important to me.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks JimSEA.

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[voiceinthewind]

Thanks for the ping!

[Harrius Magnus]

I thought this was a Star Trek thread. Sorry.

[blam]

Good article, thanks for the ping.

My instincts say the people 'flowed' the other way. Thais going north and becoming Chinese. I think Oppenheimer's DNA studies show that type of flow.

In fact, the Northern Chinese are descended from the Southern Chinese who are themselves descended from people in SE Asia, Thailand.(?)

I'm still just astounded by the Cheddar Man story.

[blam]

Cheddar Man

[ASA Vet]

If you've not been to the Ban Chieng archaeological site you should do so.

[Vicomte13]

"Here is a very advanced culture seemingly springing up 7,000 years ago where there were hunter / gatherers before. It is like a detective novel."

Maybe they figured out agriculture and a few related things 7000 years ago, just like the other people who emerged from being hunter-gatherers.

One of the more-difficult-to-understand (for me) mental fixations of historians and archaeologists is the idea that knowledge has to "move" from one place to another. Middle Eastern people are not exceptionally smart or exceptionally dumb. It is generally recognized that settled agriculture began there several thousand years ago. But then comes the assertion - based on what? A few shards here and there; mostly, I think, a mental prejudice, that sees agriculture spreading out from there, along with alphabets and other inventions. There seems to be a limited capacity for human belief that 58 different cultures, at varying times, all independently invented agriculture, and pottery, and clothmaking, etc., the staples of "advanced" early civilization.

Fortunately, we DO have the fact that agriculture certainly developed completely independently in at least two separate areas: MesoAmerica and the Middle East.

There is no very good reason to believe it did not ALSO independently develop in, say, Western Europe and India and China as well.

I think that there is just a preference for things to trace back to a single origin, which makes everything simpler (and also establishes a "pecking order" among civilizations, which people definitely prefer making, probably for the same reason that people like to root for sports teams even though there's nothing very distinguishable one to the other...Yankees, Red Sox...what's the difference?).

[JimSEA]

I agree with your Ideas. It seems likely that we have better knowledge of civilization in the Mideast because studied the area for a longer period of time, because we have the bible as a guide, and because it is a desert and preserves the past well.

[colorado tanker]

I was thinking the same thing, blam. Suppose the migration was from Thailand north, not vice versa? The conventional wisdom seems more reflective of sino-centrism than solid archaeological evidence.

Of course, there is the even more radical idea that the first home of the Thai people is now under water.

[JimSEA]

The Chinese Civilization was evidently quite spectacular and I certainly would not denigrate its accomplishments. However, it tends to obscure other cultures and their place in history. A lot of this is ethnocentric Chinese vs. barbarians. Surprisingly to me, the Indian civilizations have been overlooked in comparison.

At least recently, even Chinese archaeologists have been looking at some "outlying" areas such as the Silk route civilization, the southern Chinese bronze cultures, the southeast (Taiwan) rice growers, etc.

[Tijeras_Slim]

Thailand?

Well the thai bone is connected to the knee bone.

[colorado tanker]

If you haven't already, sign up for the ping list and you'll see a lot posted about those new developments in China archeology. A lot of fascinating stuff going on.

[blam]

"Of course, there is the even more radical idea that the first home of the Thai people is now under water."

Sundaland (GGG)

"The cradle of human civilization may well have been the prehistoric lowlands of the Southeast Asian peninsula, rather than the Middle East. Since those lowlands ‘sank’ beneath the seas thousands of years ago (actually drowned by rising sea levels), humanity has remained unaware of their possible significance up through the early 21st century. :

[Vicomte13]

Well, the legends of the Elves not only had the Elves originating in the East, by the waters of Cuivienen (which would be a lake sitting about where the Tarim Basin sits today, or maybe Lake Baikal), but also have Mortal Men originating by the waters of the far Eastern Sea (i.e.: China, Southeast Asia) and following the Elves along the Great Western Road across the steppes.

This would mean that Mortal Men entered into the ken of the Elves "East of Eden", so to speak.