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Even most prehistoric Mediterranoids did, Natufians in the narrower sense very really an aberration with their frequency of protomorphic traits at that time.Originally Posted by Jarl
One could call the skulls resembling the leptodolichomorphic Upper Palaeolithics AurignacOID, exactly because the later variants, even in Mesolithic times mostly, latest Neolithic ones, were more progressive. Only the original skulls of that time and spectrum (Combe Capelle, Brünn etc.) being AurignacID.
If you say Nordid and Mediterranid, both are far away from the primitive Natufid standards and that Mediterranids being more gracile means little, since that can be an independent trend among the Neolithic farmers. So this is too, no definitive argument for either origin of the Nordid type. Though again, I personally assume that there were already Mesolithic Proto-Nordoids and that the mixture with the Ice Age hunter-gatherers of rather Cromagnoid type were an important influence - but again not just for the North, but other areas too.
Like Lothar put it, there were Brünn (Aurignacid) and Cro Magnon (Cromagnid) both in the North and the South, leading to the two extremes of proportional variants which being more concentrated in certain parts of Northern or Southern European/North Africa respectively (f.e. the Guanches and some Berber groups):
Similar discussions and typological concepts being used, material I have taken from for the physical aspects, among others from:Like who? Arthur Kemp? Give me names please.
Kurt Gerhardt (1953)
Egon Frhr. von Eickstedt (1934, 1962)
Bertil Lundman (1967)
Ilse Schwidetzky (1974)
Georg Kenntner (1973)
John R. Baker (1974)
Adelheid Bach (1978)
Wolfram Bernhard, Anneliese Kandler-Palsson (1986)
Lothar Kilian (1988)
Ernst F. Jung (1993)
Rainer Knussmann (1996)
Andreas Vonderach (2008)
and many more.
I dont say they all agreed in every detail, nor that all of them were professional anthropologists (some were historians and archaeologists) but I rather made a fusion of various facts they gathered and used some basic concepts being repeated in their works.
Last edited by Agrippa; 12-22-2009 at 11:17 AM.
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Yes. I think it is reasonable to assume gracilisation in the direction of modern forms, begun before the revolution. Like you said, there are UP skulls which, though still archaic in many ways, are gracile. Combe Capelle is perhaps a more semi-Australoid, protomorphic one, but the younger Cheddar Man is not. Perhaps gracilisation within this stock was partly a result of a new selection caused by different, warmer climate and the switch to an agricultural lifestyle, and partly of steady "gracile" gene flow from the ME, rather than one massive demic expansion of farmers. So it would seem from the frequency of Paleolithic markers in Europe. That might explain why Euros are more on the UP-side, than ME side. It is difficult to estimate the genetic impact of Neolithic. From this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neolith..._the_Neolithic it it would seem the Neolithic ancestry is shared by about 20% Europeans, in total. And vast majority of this falls into Southern Europe, chiefly Greece, Bulgaria, Italy and Spain.Though again, I personally assume that there were already Mesolithic Proto-Nordoids and that the mixture with the Ice Age hunter-gatherers of rather Cromagnoid type were an important influence - but again not just for the North, but other areas too.
Like Lothar put it, there were Brünn (Aurignacid) and Cro Magnon (Cromagnid) both in the North and the South, leading to the two extremes of proportional variants which being more concentrated in certain parts of Northern or Southern European/North Africa respectively (f.e. the Guanches and some Berber groups):
I will try to find the book where they wrote about Combe-Capelle, Ethiopian skulls and Meds, and post some info here
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I can very much agree on this and would describe either the Neolithisation, as the further Nordisation and Mediterranisation of Europe after the last Ice Age something like a torch relay. The torch being given on from to the other, with the cultural techniques and some genetic traits of adapative qualities, yet from one step to the next, the overall genetic input, the "neutral markers" and real ancestry from the one who actually ignited the torch becomes lower and lower, until they are close to non existent further away from the starting point, while the culture and probably some genetically determiend traits still made it.
The only thing I want to question is again the use of gracile, as many of those variants were not gracile and leptodolichomorphy and being gracile is not the same. Whether a variant is gracile or not depends, like you said yourself, not just on the narrow-long face, even on the contrary, there are clear markers for that.
Usually larger variants are also more gracile on the skull, the thickness of the bones, their specific form, muscle markers etc. all are clear indicators for gracile vs. robust, being leptomorphic by body type or leptodolichomorphic on the skull doesnt mean that.
Some authors used this as it would be interchangeable, but its not. Just because in some reasons we see robust Cromagnoids (eurydolichomorph) and gracile Aurignacoids (leptodolichomorph), this doesnt mean its a general pattern.
F.e. for the Nordoid skulls from Eastern Europe:
Yamnaya (Pit-grave = Ockergrabkultur), Kurgan Culture:
Male, hypermorph, mesokran, europid:
Male, mäßig hypermorph, dolicho-mesokran, europid:
Female, mäßig hypermorph, dolicho-mesokran, europid:
Male, relatively narrow faced, dolichokran, europid:
Male, mäßig hypermorph, dolichokran, europid:
Male, hypermorph, subdolichokran with "uralid" (mongoloid-mongoliform) admixture:
Female, europid, skull artificially deformed:
Male, hypermorph, meso-dolichokran, europid:
Male, narrow faced, dolichokran, europid:
Reconstruction of a Yamnaya-man:
A lot of them, though having a high face, are very robust and thats as clear in the samples of the LBK people from Germany and later Corded Ware (called "stenodolichomorphs" by some authors = "strong dolichomorphs", because of their very robust characteristics.
The same pattern can be seen in some Iranoid prehistoric and even historic groups.
Last edited by Agrippa; 12-23-2009 at 11:15 AM.
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Thats false of course, I wrote the text very fast, so there are some mistakes in it, this being the most obvious one, because bigger-larger variants are more robust on the skull, smaller ones more gracile - inside of the same general spectrum.Usually larger variants are also more gracile on the skull
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There have been several Kenyan specimens of proto-Caucasoids from Paleolithic, which very closely resemble Combe-Capelle. They lack strong prognathism, and more typical Negroid robusticity. They could be the first pre-cursors of the Aurignacian, or Proto-Med race.
Gambles Cave:
http://carnby.altervista.org/troe/02-09.htm
The remains of six Upper Aurignacian men have been discovered in the two colonies named. Five of these were exhumed by Leakey at Gamble’s Cave, Elementitia,54 and the sixth is the famous Oldoway skull discovered by Reck in 1914.55 Two of the Gamble’s Cave specimens, and Oldoway, which are all masculine, consist of nearly complete skulls and long bones. The others from Gamble’s Cave are too fragmentary to be of much value.
In general, these specimens belong in the purely sapiens category, as represented by Galley Hill, Kanjera, Grimaldi, Combe Capelle, and Afalou #28. At the same time, however, they differ from all named in one important respect-they are extremely tall, with statures of 177, 179, and 180 cm., which even exceeds the Crô-Magnon and later Afalou figures, but the great stature is unaccompanied by the broad shoulders and bodily bulk of the hybrid Europeans and North Africans. The long bones are very slender, and the hands and feet small and narrow.
The same principle of attenuation applies to the faces. In all of them, and especially in Oldoway, the faces are extremely narrow, and very long, especially in the upper segments. The browridges are weak, the zygomatic arches feebly developed, the mandibles light and slender, with narrow bigonial diameters, and weak, although positive, chins. The orbits are high and narrow, and the noses likewise. The Gamble’s Cave skulls are leptorrhine, leptene and leptoprosopic; Oldoway is mesorrhine, and hyperleptoprosopic. The two Gamble’s Cave skulls are orthognathous, but Oldoway possesses considerable alveolar prognathism.
Gambles Cave fossils were dated back to Late Paleolithic, more recently. However, similar discoveries at Naivasha (also by Leaky), yielded another specimen which is apparently much older. Consequently, there is strong evidence supportin East African origin of certain proto-Caucasoid features, and of proto-Med or Aurignacoid race in particular.
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Its quite obvious to me that the ancestors of most Mongoloids and Australoids (& related) have to come to Eurasia and beyond from an early wave, which might have been distinct from the later one, which finally formed the Proto-Europoid people in the Near East-Central Asia.
The later waves from East Africa might have brought new, progressive trends not just to the Europids, but also certain non-Europid Eurasian populations, probably they are responsible for the appearance of some Proto-Mongoloid groups and Neomelanesids in South East Asia too.
Because its just astonishing how primitive the first wave modern Homo sapiens were, which we can still look at, almost as some kind of "living fossils" in the form of the Australid and Palaemelanesid race, some Australoid and Negritid remains here and there in Southern and South Eastern Asia, even in the Americas, yet all other Eurasians are significantly more progressive and seem to have been so from the start.
If comparing Combe Capelle or Bruenn with the Pintubi skull:
Extremely primitive Pintubi left, modern-progressive Europid skull right
http://canovanograms.tripod.com/pintubi1/
Combe Capelle vs. Oberkassel (Cromagnoid vs. Aurignacoid after Knussmann 1996):
Its quite obvious, that though the Combe Capelle skull has primitive traits, even in comparison to Cro Magnon (the old) which is significantly more progressive, the overall impression and traits in detail are much more progressive than that of Pintubi, yet most living Australid individuals (!), not talking about Palaemelanesid skulls, even though being a more than 30.000 years old (!) skull of an unspecialised form in Europe.
So I'd assume, though we can't exclude local developments (like a more robust skull because of one sided selection = also plausible, but even then not all primitive traits can't be explained by that) of the Australids or mixture with older strata, this is rather not the best explanation for this pattern, since this traits can be found among Southern and South Eastern Asians too, as well as Indianids here and there, that we deal with different waves of modern humans which had different levels most likely already when leaving Africa.
This means to me that the Proto-Europoids came mostly from a later and more progressive wave of modern humans, which came from East Africa, which also entered most other areas of Eurasia, but weren't always as successful, often mixing with the older inhabitants (like in the case of Proto-Mongoloids in SEA, Weddoids and Melanesids f.e.).
Obviously there wasnt just one wave of moderns out of Africa and some marched back as well I have to add.
The classic Europid traits seem to have evolved rather in the area between the Near East and Central Asia already, entered Europe then, where they further specialised to the racial variants we can find today.
Its however totally unclear whether the Central Asian Europids or those which were on the European continent for a longer time developed more Cromagnoid traits or not, especially if considering the fact that in North Africa and Asia we find Cromagnoids as well - to this day. I think it would be plausible for a certain stage at least, considering the fact they seem to be the better form for a colder climate, yet its not proven yet and a lot of speculation. We just know that at a certain stage, Cromagnoid features were more common in Europe than in the warm period-Neolithic times, most likely related to what I already said in other posts.
Last edited by Agrippa; 12-28-2009 at 03:57 PM.
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That is exactly my impression too. These first waves had to be Australoid-like in form, and perhaps their only remaining relics are the Ainus, Veddas and Aborigines. It is interesting to note that early Paleolithic skulls of Homo sapiens from China are proto-Mongoloid in form, but also Cro-Magnon like and... Australoid!
However, I would not necessarily lump Australoids with Asian Negrittos into a single wave. To me it seems well possible they represented two consecutive waves, that could have subsequently interbreed for centuries. If you compare Melanesians to some other South-East Asians insular Abroigines they might seem similar. But if you compare Murrayans or Carpentarians to Andamanese Negrittos, then they differ considerably.
From genetic studies and affinities between Caucasoids and Mongoloids, it seems that there had to be some Eurasian Cro-Magnon-Mongoloid continuum. Cro-Magnon fossils are found in Central Asia. And semi-Mongoloid, or even Mongoloid skulls (Chancelade) are found in Europe. These hunter-gatherers of the Northern tundras probably formed a string of considerably interbreeding population.
I guess it was not until the later migrants, who had to resemble more the gracilised Aurignacoids, expanded from North-East Africa, and in an altered form from Middle East and Asia Minor into Europe, that Maghrebians an Europeans diverged greatly from this Cro-Magnon / proto-Monogolid spectrum into the direction of the modern Caucasoid race...
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Yes, those are all valuable points I considered as well. As for the Negritids in special, they are a tricky case. Some authors say this, others that, good arguments are present for many explanations from the fields of prehistory-archaeology, ethnology, physical anthropology and genetic studies, yet I haven't heard something really conclusive.
But I personally think right now, that they are a local specialised form. If they had more recent relations to the Negrids of Africa is hard to tell, since we have to consider the fact, that there are also Palaemelanesids which look quite similar to those!
V. Eickstedt told in his great work about the races of the world an interesting story about various scholars which confused a very "Kafrid/Bantuid-looking" Palaemelanesid at first look with a real African Negrid. They were even absolutely sure, even an expert for Africa which travelled to South Eastern Africa on various occasions!
So there can be a certain phenotypical overlap between Melanesids and Negrids of Africa obviously, thats why I think its a possibility that this Negritids are just a reduced variant of these Proto-Negroid forms from the Australo-Melanesid spectrum of SEA/Melanesia - until a closer and more recent relation being revealed by new studies of course.
In the Indian/South Asian context they are furthest away from the Europids and some put them into the position of the "autochthonous" people there, though again this conclusions might be not without criticism now and in the future, as its not for sure that a similar people by racial and genetic features ever lived in greater numbers in India.
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There is an excellent online resource on Andamanese Negrittos and all South-East Asian Aboriginee tribes here:
http://www.andaman.org/
Some good info on Paleoindians and Pericu Indians too. Apparently genetically, Negrittos seem to be
http://www.andaman.org/BOOK/chapter6/text6.htm
Negrito's in Arabia:
http://www.andaman.org/BOOK/chapter47/text47.htm
http://www.andaman.org/BOOK/reprints...tle-gillin.htm
It seems they are quite distinct from Australian Aborigines. The article mentions that there were two schools of thought. One assumed Veddoids developed independently. Genetically however, Andamanese are related to Veddas. This should not be a surprise. Even if they represent two disctinct waves of settlers, they would have interbred for centuries by now. Ainus too are related to the Japanese, but they represent a much different racial type. And indeed comparing Andamanese to Australians:
http://www.andaman.org/BOOK/chapter6/text6.htm
Reveals they are distinct ("Other indicators of relationships"). It also seems that Negrittos represent an early migration wave:
This together with some Negritto relics from Europe and Arabia suggests to me that Andamanese traits are not entirely a result of convergent evolution, like proposed by Aleksiejew.... The early colonization of the Andaman archipelago by bearers of the M2 lineage supports the growing evidence of an early movement of humans through southern Asia and indicates that phenotypic similarities with African groups are convergent. It also suggests that early human migrants were capable of reaching all the islands of southern Asia and, therefore, Near Oceania, by the late Pleistocene. Such dispersal is consistent with the scattered distribution of negrito populations. All lines of evidence - social, cultural, historical, archaeological, linguistic, phenotypic, and genetic - support the conclusion that the Andaman islanders have been isolated for a substantial period of time. It is not currently possible to distinguish between two or more founding events and a single colonization followed by extensive population subdivision; a more detailed mtDNA phylogeny of south and southeast Asia may permit future work to differentiate between these two hypotheses. Whichever turns out to be correct, the implications for understanding the population dynamics of prehistory are profound. These findings illustrate the importance of sampling human biodiversity prior to significant modern admixture and extirpations and show that sequences derived from aDNA can have a significant role in the interpretation of contemporary human genetic distribution.
Im quite certain there had to be a close genetic relation between these two, now weakened by centuries of drift and influxes from Monogloid populations. Phenotypical similarity is too striking. The problem is most of these populations are little, insular hunter-gatherering communities which are very prone to drift. Y-DNA and mtDNA studies of these small populations should be always taken with a pinch of salt. Theres the similar case with the Ainus.V. Eickstedt told in his great work about the races of the world an interesting story about various scholars which confused a very "Kafrid/Bantuid-looking" Palaemelanesid at first look with a real African Negrid. They were even absolutely sure, even an expert for Africa which travelled to South Eastern Africa on various occasions!
So there can be a certain phenotypical overlap between Melanesids and Negrids of Africa obviously, thats why I think its a possibility that this Negritids are just a reduced variant of these Proto-Negroid forms from the Australo-Melanesid spectrum of SEA/Melanesia - until a closer and more recent relation being revealed by new studies of course.
To me, most certainly the Andamanese Negrittos present a much different type to the more proto-morphic Australian Aborigines. From the article it seems to me that the now extinct Australian "Pygmies" and Tasmanians represented the later migration waves with higher affinicty to the Negrittos.In the Indian/South Asian context they are furthest away from the Europids and some put them into the position of the "autochthonous" people there, though again this conclusions might be not without criticism now and in the future, as its not for sure that a similar people by racial and genetic features ever lived in greater numbers in India.
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