On the coexistence of multiple species of humans, innovation and pangolins

While we anatomically modern humans hunker down at home, we have time to read about our ancestors and antecessor, who turns out not to be our parent after all

Haaretz Archaeology & Science View in browser

Ruth Schuster

Treehouses are the dream of all kids who don't actually have treehouses and haven't developed the joys of vertigo or common sense just yet. By the time we're grown up many of us have developed the notion that we don't want to fall fifty or even ten feet to the ground, we don't want twigs in our sensitive bits and we don't want ants anywhere. But we all arose from tree-climbing apes. And to the aficionados of arborealism among us, it is intriguing to learn that while our australopithecine ancestors were strutting about Africa on two legs, just a million years ago, there was another archaic hominin still in the trees. As adults, that is. Think about it – the archaeologists managed to infer how archaic humans moved millions of years ago. That is very cool. The truth is we aren't sure australopithecines were our direct ancestors. Maybe they were, maybe they weren’t. But it's now sure that one candidate daddy, Homo antecessor, known from exactly one cave in Spain, isn't.  This week archaeologists reported another stunning work, analyzing proteins from a tooth 800,000 years old that had once graced the mouth of antecessor. It isn't our ancestor. But it is our cousin, a few times removed: a sister group of the ancestor we share with Neanderthals and Denisovans. Whoever we descended from, our anatomically modern human ancestors spread around the world quite fast, it seems, and now different studies have shown that many seem to have developed some pretty remarkable skills at very roughly the same time (after the Ice Age) independently – such as farming in the highlands of New Guinea starting 7,000 years ago, earlier than any of the peoples around them, and storing fish for later consumption in the very low land of the Florida Keys, rather later. In fact the earliest food storage seems to date nearly half a million years ago, consisting of hanging elephant bones on a cave wall, but storing live fish is a whole new kettle of, well. What does all of this mean? It means that we have a propensity to climb trees and worry about leaner times. The coronavirus crisis could lead to a supply chain crunch that will make all this seem all too relevant. But even if chickens are in short supply, read this to find out why you shouldn't eat pangolins anyway, and stay tuned.

Archaic Humans Still Half in the Trees Coexisted With Other Species Who Walked Ruth Schuster | 31.03.2020

Oldest Human Genetic Data Gleaned From 1.8-million-year-old Tooth Ariel David | 01.04.2020

Prehistoric New Guineans Discovered Farming Independently Ruth Schuster | 26.03.2020

Native Americans in Ancient Florida Developed Pre-electricity Fish Storage Ruth Schuster | 30.03.2020

Pangolins, a Food in the East, Could Be the Missing Link in the Coronavirus Epidemic Ruth Schuster | 26.03.2020

How Judaism Handled Epidemics Down the Ages Elon Gilad | 31.03.2020

Climate Change and Coronavirus: Environment Briefs for This Week Ruth Schuster | 29.03.2020

Blood Type May Influence How Prone You Are to the Coronavirus, Report Says Ruth Schuster | 24.03.2020

Earliest Animal With Head and Tail Discovered in Australia, Says New Paper Ruth Schuster | 23.03.2020

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