Sahara Desert Was Once Lush and Populated

LiveScience ^ | 20 July 2006 | Bjorn Carey

[Marius3188]

At the end of the last Ice Age, the Sahara Desert was just as dry and uninviting as it is today. But sandwiched between two periods of extreme dryness were a few millennia of plentiful rainfall and lush vegetation.

During these few thousand years, prehistoric humans left the congested Nile Valley and established settlements around rain pools, green valleys, and rivers.

The ancient climate shift and its effects are detailed in the July 21 issue of the journal Science.

When the rains came

Some 12,000 years ago, the only place to live along the eastern Sahara Desert was the Nile Valley. Being so crowded, prime real estate in the Nile Valley was difficult to come by. Disputes over land were often settled with the fist, as evidenced by the cemetery of Jebel Sahaba where many of the buried individuals had died a violent death.

But around 10,500 years ago, a sudden burst of monsoon rains over the vast desert transformed the region into habitable land.

This opened the door for humans to move into the area, as evidenced by the researcher's 500 new radiocarbon dates of human and animal remains from more than 150 excavation sites.

[gentlestrength]

The Bible speaks of a time 'before the Earth was divided.' It looks to me like it had been one land mass, that when broken, separated into what we have now. Like a jigsaw, you can almost put the continents back together.

[SunkenCiv]

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[SunkenCiv]

bfl later for me.

[SunkenCiv]

Note: this topic is from 7/20/2006. Thanks Marius3188.

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[SunkenCiv]

Note: this topic is from 7/20/2006. Thanks Marius3188.