The Journey of Man: A Genetic OdysseyAllen Lane, 2002 - 224 pages Around 60,000 years ago, a man walked the soil of Africa. Every person alive today is descended from him. How did he come to be father to all of us - a real life Adam? To find out, Spencer Wells embarked on a unique voyage of discovery, travelling the world and deciphering the genetic codes of people from the Sahara Desert to Siberia. He reveals how our DNA enables us to work out where our ancestors lived, (and who they may have fought, loved and learned from); to re-trace their footsteps from Africa to the far corners of the earth ; to understand how we evolved into such a huge variety of sizes, shapes and races - and, ultimately, to create a family tree for the whole of humanity. |
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Page 58
... relatively warm climes of southern and eastern Africa , they would not have needed the warmth provided by a furry exterior . They probably had the epicanthic fold . While this feature could have arisen twice in different parts of the ...
... relatively warm climes of southern and eastern Africa , they would not have needed the warmth provided by a furry exterior . They probably had the epicanthic fold . While this feature could have arisen twice in different parts of the ...
Page 69
... relatively rapidly , by following the coast of eastern Africa . - - Now for the big leap : if humans could migrate over long distances within a continent , using the same technologies and exploiting the same resources , why couldn't ...
... relatively rapidly , by following the coast of eastern Africa . - - Now for the big leap : if humans could migrate over long distances within a continent , using the same technologies and exploiting the same resources , why couldn't ...
Page 108
... relatively warm and moist conditions around 50,000 years ago , when the eastern Sahara was in retreat and a gateway opened along the Red Sea . Perhaps they migrated down the Nile to the Mediterranean , then spread eastward across the ...
... relatively warm and moist conditions around 50,000 years ago , when the eastern Sahara was in retreat and a gateway opened along the Red Sea . Perhaps they migrated down the Nile to the Mediterranean , then spread eastward across the ...
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Common terms and phrases
Aborigines actually Adam Africa agriculture analysis ancient animals anthropologists apes appear Asian Australia Cavalli-Sforza cent central Asia China chromosomes clan climate coastal colleagues common ancestor continent culture Darwin defined descendants developed earliest early human east Asia Eurasian Europe Europeans evolution evolutionary expansion extinct favour frequency genes genetic data genetic diversity genetic variation geneticists genome Hindu Kush hominid Homo erectus human diversity human genetic human migration human populations hunter-gatherers hunting ice age impala India Indo-European Indo-European languages infer ingredients journey known languages leap lifestyle linguistic living marker Mediterranean Middle East Middle Eastern migration million mitochondrial DNA modern humans molecules mtDNA mutations Native Americans Neanderthals Neolithic non-African northern nucleotide Nyae origin past perhaps polymorphisms recent region route sample Siberia simply soup recipes south-east Asia southern species spoken spread steppe suggests thousands trace unique Upper Palaeolithic western Y-chromosome lineages