Have chatted with Rob Schoch via mail...
Rob is smart..
John Anthony West is another fella with good perspective.
Should have posted Haida Gwaii on your *First Americans thread a few weeks back..which I was looking at while forming my post.
something for you from another chat board.... while we are discussing Pacific migration.
Paul Devereux: *Ancient Migrations to the Americas
Author:.......
Date: 08-Jan-04 12:02
Hello Paul,
Although I have not yet received your book, I have two questions for you about the genetic evidence of ancient migrations to the Americas:
1. Is your theory of migration across the Atlantic based upon the presence of mtDNA X group in Noth America?
2. Could the first socalled "superflood" after the last Ice Age have triggered a migration from SE Asia to Central and South America?
RE 1:
In "Out of Eden" Oppenheimer mentions that the X group is found along the 55th parallel in North America. He also tells that group X has recently been identified in North Asia among Altaic peoples of southern Siberia. So he thinks that group X - like the other 4 mtDNA founder lines (A, B, C and D) - came to the Americas across the Beringia 22,000 - 25,000 years ago.
RE 2:
Based upon the studies of Torroni, Foster and Yelena Stariovskaya, Oppenheimer thinks that it is possible that there was a migration of people with mtDNA group B about 12,000 - 15,000 years ago. He tells that group B is absent above the 55th parallel of North America, so he thinks it is possible that this migration took place along the coast to Central and South America.
Oppenheimer also telles that group B dominates Indo-China, Southeast Asia and the Pacific (which was colonized from Southeast according to genetic evidence) and that it is also found in Japan, China and Mongolia, but absent from the Subarctic regions of both Eurasia and North America.
In "Eden in the East - The Drowned Continent of Southeast Asia" (1998) by Oppenheimer, there is a figure showing that after the LGM the sea level gradually rose to about 100 meters belov today's level. Then the sea level rose rapidly 14,000 - 13,500 BP by about 40 meters to about 60 meters below today's level.
I have found two maps of Southeast Asia at different sea levels, one 120 meters and one 50 meters below the sea level today: http://www.fmnh.org/research_collections/zoology/zoo_sites/seamaps/prev_riv120rgb7.htm http://www.fmnh.org/research_collections/zoology/zoo_sites/seamaps/prev_50rgb7.htm Although I have not been able to find a map with sea level about 60 meters below the level today, the maps indicate that a great landmass was lost in Southeast Asia when the sea rose about 40 meters 14,000 - 13,500 years ago. And, as I mentioned above, mtDNA group B is dominant in the area where the land was lost.
I have also found an article according to which the distribution of mtDNA groups A, B, C and D is very different in South America: "Southern Andean and northeastern South American populations exhibit relatively low frequencies of haplogroup A and B, and high frequencies of haplogroup C and D, whereas Northern Andean and northwestern South America populations exhibit relatively high frequencies of haplogroup A and B and low frequencies of C and D." There is also a map showing that group B is very dominant in northern Chile.
So it is tempting to raise the question: Could refugees from the flood in Southeast Asia have migrated and brought haplogroup B to northwestern South America between 12,000 and 15,000 years ago as suggested by Oppenheimer? Could they have brought new skills with them and perhaps have founded Monte Verde about 12,500 years ago?
***************************************************
Roy L. Carlson, Department of Archaeology Simon Fraser University
royc@sfu.ca
Human Response to Environmental Change on the Coast of British Columbia.
Abstract:
As a whole the culture history of coastal British Columbia is characterized more by cultural continuity than by disruptions caused by environmental change, although such disruptions were probably responsible for some changes in local cultural sequences. The earliest colonists so far discovered arrived during the cold dry Younger Dryas (12,300 - 11,400 cal BP), but are not well represented in the archaeological record until the temperature rise of the early Holocene (11,400 - 9000 cal BP). The environment had shifted from an herb tundra at 12,300 to a open parkland with alder by11,400, and then by 10,300 to the dense coastal forest that has continued with some variations in conifer genera up to the present day. The earliest known colonists had a lithic technology similar to that of the arctic adapted Nenana Complex of central interior Alaska, and it is probable that these colonists were hunters who followed the caribou through the Yukon on to the coastal tundra where caribou are known from before there is direct evidence for humans, and then continued down the coast at least as far as the Fraser River. A second wave of colonists may have brought microblade technology to the northern coast about 400 years later. Both isotopic and faunal evidence indicate that these peoples were well adapted to the marine environment of the coast by 10,000 cal BP. The process of cultural change was one of adapting existing arctic technology to the ecological niches of the coastal environment. This process continued as new niches evolved and were discovered, and with population growth and circumscription of territories, resulted in a seasonal round of resource collection at specific localities, and the erection of permanent structures at sites suitable for storage of surpluses and residence during the winter season. New niches that expanded during the Holocene were the cedar forests that arrived about 6000 cal BP, and the development of large salmon runs by 8000 cal BP which when capitalized to their fullest extent using fish traps and preservation and storage of the catch, permitted the development of complex societies based on wealth with social rank, specialists in art and technology, and elaborate ceremonialism. These developments took place between 6000 and 4000 cal BP. It has been customary in the past to view the anadromous salmon resource as more stable than the crops of agricultural societies whereas recent studies have shown that at least in some parts of the salmon area there were major fluctuations in salmon abundance in response to poorly understood climatic factors. These fluctuations may have been responsible for discontinuities in the archaeological record of several coastal localities in which case the human response was probably the dispersal of population aggregates and more reliance on the localized resources of the seasonal round, which in turn resulted in a reduction in social complexity.
Oppenheimer's take on things sounds similar to James Chatters (..of Kennewick Man fame), who thinks Kennewick Man was descended from a group that produced both the Asians and Europeans.
He thinks the Kennewick Man types made their way all along the west coast of north and south America, crossed over in Panama then made their way back north along the Gulf Coast and on up the east coast of the US. I'm anxious for a definition of 'European DNA' that is spoken of in the below linked article.
European DNA found In 7-8,000 Year Old Skeleton In Florida (Windover)
Also, Read the article 'Bye, bye Beringia' linked in the above thread.