Posted on 04/03/2008 3:34:56 AM PDT by BGHater
Hold the potty humor, please, but archaeologists digging in a dusty cave in Oregon have unearthed fossilized feces that appear to be oldest biological evidence of humans in North America.
The ancient poop dates back 14,300 years. If the results hold up, that means the continent was populated more than 1,000 years before the so-called Clovis culture, long believed to be the first Americans.
"This adds to a growing body of evidence that the human presence in the Americas predates Clovis," said Michael Waters, an anthropologist at Texas A&M University who was not involved in the project.
DNA analysis of the dried excrement shows the people who lived in the caves were closely related to modern Native Americans. Their genetic roots reach across the Bering Strait to Siberia and eastern Asia.
"These are probably the ancestors of some of the Native Americans living in America now," said Eske Willerslev, director of the Centre for Ancient Genetics at the University of Copenhagen. He co-authored the report that appears in today's online Science Express.
The age of the finding also calls into question the theory that people who crossed the Bering Land Bridge to Alaska migrated south through ice-free corridors as glaciers began to break up. Geological evidence suggests the corridors weren't open 14,300 years ago, though the glaciers had pulled back from the coasts.
"People probably came either by boat or maybe even walking along the West Coast," Willerslev said.
Before the Oregon discovery, the oldest human remains in North America were two sets of bones about 13,000 years old from California and Nevada. Kennewick Man, the skeleton found on the banks of the Columbia River in Eastern Washington, dates to 9,400 years ago.
(Excerpt) Read more at seattletimes.nwsource.com ...
They found so few coprolites in that cave, I bet they were just passing through.
This is one of the most recent maps I have seen, from last fall. It is from Beringian Standstill and Spread of Native American Founders:
See also: A Three-Stage Colonization Model for the Peopling of the Americas.
Re “More here:”
This site has 4 or 5 other articles of interest to people at this thread, on death of megafauna, 50,000 remains in US, Neanderthal revised studies, etc.
You must really dislike science.
Looks like the “American Indians” are going to lose their rights!!! /sarc
That would be just offal.
“That would be just ‘offal’.”
Nice pun!
It’s stool late to tell now.
They were glad for that collapse layer, because it capped the older strata. The dig was meticulous, and funded year after year, pretty much a dream situation for the excavators. Adovasio was so tired of having the same tired worn-out fake counterarguments trotted out, that (by his own account) he exclaimed “horse —” at what was supposed to have been one of those peer-to-peer roundtables on the finds.
New url, w/pics!
I guess that sounds more refined than "dropping the kids off at the pool."
we’ll just have to like it or lump it.
This new data really does bowel me over.
I'm not sure I follow. Would you mind putting a little finer point on your statement so this ol' East Texas country boy doesn't have to guess at what you mean???
“THey were glad for that collapse layer, because it capped the older strata.”
But do you know if they have dug into the older strata, or do they have plans to do so, and do they have any idea what caused the collapse?
You can still do that in New York City. I saw it once. Was a “lady” even! Crowded sidewalk and everything - unbelievable!
Isn't that special.
Since these haplogroups are common throughout the Americas (and found in ancient DNA samples in the Americas) and rare in Asia (and not found in ancient Asian DNA samples) it seems to be accepted that any occurrence of A2 or B2 elsewhere is the result of gene flow out of the Americas to other places.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.