Posted on 07/04/2005 9:59:36 PM PDT by freedom44
THE discovery of human footprints, preserved by volcanic ash, have put back the likely date that the American continent was colonised by Man by almost 30,000 years, British scientists say.
The prints, found by the scientists at the edge of a lake in Mexico, are thought to be about 40,000 years old. Their discovery upsets the widely accepted theory that Man first reached America across a land bridge, now covered by the Bering Sea, 11,500 years ago. Casts of the footprints reveal that a community of Homo sapiens lived in the Valsequillo Basin, near Puebla in central Mexico. Their feet ranged in size from those of small children, aged about 5 or 6, to adults who would have fitted size eight shoes.
The prints were found at the bottom of an abandoned quarry and were preserved in volcanic rock. From the size of the prints, researchers from Liverpool John Moores University and Bournemouth University estimated that the adults ranged in height from 3ft 9ins to 6ft. Almost 270 prints were found at the site, two thirds of them human and the rest from animals including mammoths, an extinct species of camel, prehistoric cow and deer. The Liverpool and Bournemouth team discovered the footprints in September 2003 but have only recently had confirmation of their age from scientists at Oxford University. Dating techniques included radiocarbon dating and optical stimulated luminescence.
Until now it was widely believed that Clovis Man was the first human to set foot on the continent at the end of the last Ice Age. Previous academic research has suggested, however, that human occupation of the American continents may have begun several thousand years earlier.
The footprints are the first evidence of earlier colonisations and would suggest that the first settlers reached the West Coast from Japan or other Pacific Ocean communities.
Professor Matthew Bennett, of Bournemouth University, said yesterday: “Our evidence of humans in America 40,000 years ago is irrefutable.”
He accepted that there would be resistance to the theory that the original migration was not over the Bering Sea: “It is quite controversial. They are not very happy in North America. They are very wedded to the idea of colonisation 11,500 years ago.”
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This one made the radio news this morning. Are the 'original inhabitants' of the New World getting anxious yet?
The persistent practice of underestimating human antiquity in the Americas, is a big problem (except for those who do it, of course), and I'm not going to call into question all geological dating practices, but be aware that these results will likely be derided as unreliable by some. Others will saddle on the results right away, in order to bury Clovis-First-and-Only in a well-deserved grave. However, if past practice is any guide, even if this date is accepted (with or without modification), it will become the new floor beneath which dates won't be accepted.Gods, Graves, and Scholars: The Story of ArchaeologyNow, several of these pyramids located at different sites from Tula to Monte Alban have been discussed, yet one of the most important has yet to be mentioned. This is the Pyramid of Cuicuilco, which stands on a mound 22.4 feet high, situated at the southern limits of Mexico City. The Pyramid of Cuicuilco rises up out of a weird landscape of darkly stony aspect. At one time the volcanoes Ajusco and Xitli (perhaps only the latter) erupted. The god within the pyramid was apparently remiss in diverting the glowing flood of lava that flowed about the pyramid, for half the structure was drowned in bubbling muck. The archaeologists investigating this phenomenon called on colleagues from another faculty, the geologists, for help. How old is the lava, they inquired. The geologists, not realizing that their answer was knocking a world picture awry, answered: "Eight thousand years." ...Yet late research is more inclined to consider it false.
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and...
Mexico Discovery Fuels Debate About Man's Origins
Deseret Morning News/Associated Press | 10-3-2004 | John Rice
Posted on 10/11/2004 6:04:15 PM PDT by blam
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1242132/posts
First Americans - Homo Erectus in America
http://home.pacbell.net/tcbpfb/ | January 01, 1999 | Tom Baldwin (apparently)
Posted on 09/24/2004 7:54:26 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1226526/posts
The fathom was the distance fingertip-to-fingertip of a (Viking) man with his arms outstretched.
"genetic and other data indicates that they are not the ancestors of today's American Indians."
That's not true. Various mtDNA studies (which are inherently unreliable) yield estimates of the ingress of various populations (meaning, an assumed single individual; all other mtDNA lineages having died out) which overlap the age assigned to these prints. And the vast majority of these studies reveal multiple populations entering the Americas at different times. The artificial barrier of Clovis dating is long gone.
"A better diet is making us taller."
I remember from a couple of decades ago that there was some buzz that hunter-gatherers had been tall, then people shrunk as a result of agriculture limiting their diet, and now we're regaining the lost height.
Barefooted? Where was Nike or US Keds?
That makes perfect sense. A length of rope could be measured easily that way, while trying to compare it to height would be cumbersome.
re: the Topper site...
Signs of an earlier American
By Peter N. Spotts | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
September 23, 2004 edition
http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0923/p13s01-stgn.html
We're good at fathoming things around here. ;')
Now I wonder...
There goes another 'proven' scientific theory down the drain.
Japanese, not Chinese. Chinese are affiliated with the Olmec in Mexico. Read the below, a good book too.
Nancy Yaw Davis
The Zuni Enigma
Did a group of thirteenth-century Japanese journey to the American Southwest, there to merge with the people, language, and religion of the Zuni tribe?
For many years, anthropologists have understood the Zuni in the American Southwest to occupy a special place in Native American culture and ethnography. Their language, religion, and blood type are startlingly different from all other tribes. Most puzzling, the Zuni appear to have much in common with the people of Japan.
In a book with groundbreaking implications, Dr. Nancy Yaw Davis examines the evidence underscoring the Zuni enigma, and suggests the circumstances that may have led Japanese on a religious quest-searching for the legendary "middle world" of Buddhism-across the Pacific and to the American Southwest more than seven hundred years ago.
Nancy Yaw Davis holds an M.A. from the University of Chicago and a Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Washington. Author of numerous articles, she has long researched the history and cultures of the native peoples of North America. Her company, Cultural Dynamics, is located in Anchorage, Alaska, where she lives.
Generally, the height of a man is equal (or pretty darn close) to the length of his outstretched arms.
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