Monday, August 20, 2012

Modern Human SE Asian Skull 63,000 Years Old

There are other modern human fossils in China or in Island Southeast Asia that may be around the same age but they either are not well dated or they do not show definitively modern human features. This skull is very well dated and shows very conclusive modern human features," . . . Researchers at Illinois used uranium/thorium dating to determine the age of the skull [in the Annamite Mountains in northern Laos], which they determined was about 63,000 years old.

Research fellow Kira Westaway, of Macquarie University in Australia (who dated the soils around the famous "hobbit" fossil found on Flores Island in Indonesia in 2003), conducted the luminescence analyses. These techniques measure the energy retained in crystalline particles in the soil to determine how much time has elapsed since the soil was last exposed to heat or solar radiation. She found that the layer of soil surrounding the fossil had washed into the cave between 46,000 and 51,000 years ago.

"Those dates are a bit younger than the direct date on the fossil, which we would expect because we don't know how long the body sat outside the cave before it washed in," Shackelford said.


From here.

The time frame at this location between South Asia and Australia is in accord with an oldest South Asian archaelogical relic associated with modern humans shortly predating the Toba erruption circa 75,000 years ago, and with evidence from old human remains and megafauna extinctions of modern humans in Australia circa 45,000 years ago. The data also is the right order of magnitude to fit the oldest wave of migration to Southeast Asia visible in genetic data.

It is also notable because this location is decidedly not a coastal one.

4 comments:

terryt said...

Thanks for drawing attention to that.

"the signal of archaic admixture might be biased at the periphery of the expansion of modern humans".

It is, in fact, exactly where I suggested that members of mt-DNA M had expanded from:

http://ourorigins.wikia.com/wiki/Mt_M_west_to_east

I must get around to putting in a map of SE Asia there. I've already drawn it. I just need to scan and put it in. You may be mildly interested in the other two mt-DNA haplogroups Maju has let me post there:

http://ourorigins.wikia.com/wiki/Mt_N_west_to_east

http://ourorigins.wikia.com/wiki/Mt_R_east_to_west

Perhaps you will understand why I believe that mt-DNA R originated from mt-DNA N in SE Asia.

terryt said...

Sorry. The first quote comes from my last entry at Dienekes. I didn't check. Here it was supposed to be:

"It is also notable because this location is decidedly not a coastal one".

That is in the region Maju chooses to call 'Zomia', the hill country on the border of Northeast India/South China/Burma/Laos. As you say, certianly not 'coastal'.

andrew said...

Maybe modern humans preferred Zomia because they didn't like jungles. I wonder where there are good landscape photos of different geographic regions like Zomia, Island Southeast Asia, and S. China, and I wonder what they would look like with a bit of climate adjustment.

terryt said...

"Maybe modern humans preferred Zomia because they didn't like jungles".

I think you are exactly correct. I have had many arguments with Maju on the subject. He has always insisted that humans left Africa with the full complement of modern human resources. I am certain that they didn't. Their preferred environment would have been semi-open savanna grassland. Trees to hide in, and open regions to survey the layout of the land.

"I wonder where there are good landscape photos of different geographic regions like Zomia, Island Southeast Asia, and S. China"

Haven't been able to find much at all. Here's the best for China:

http://www.google.co.nz/imgres?hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=0lN&sa=X&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=np&biw=1360&bih=629&tbm=isch&prmd=imvns&tbnid=vUvI2UJqFiUg3M:&imgrefurl=http://www.hoeckmann.de/karten/asien/china/index-en.htm&docid=byhmk8t-rPhvPM&imgurl=http://www.top-photogalleries.com/photos/_files/photogallery/d0f18_china_map_natural_vegetation.jpg&w=2500&h=2096&ei=fVU0ULOkGqWwiQfi9oGoBg&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=1055&vpy=287&dur=856&hovh=206&hovw=245&tx=138&ty=132&sig=111497522159891088143&page=1&tbnh=131&tbnw=156&start=0&ndsp=21&ved=1t:429,r:13,s:0,i:112

And here's a satellite picture of SE Asia. But you will have to sort out what the colours mean:

http://www.google.co.nz/imgres?um=1&hl=en&client=firefox-a&sa=N&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=np&biw=1360&bih=629&tbm=isch&tbnid=-dEVbaujIDVmKM:&imgrefurl=http://bioval.jrc.ec.europa.eu/products/vgt_mosaic_continental-sea/cont_seasia_spot_vgt.php&docid=yvvfKdQzmutaCM&imgurl=http://bioval.jrc.ec.europa.eu/products/vgt_mosaic_continental-sea/images/vgt-mosaic_csea.gif&w=550&h=551&ei=ZFc0ULinPMWziQff9YH4AQ&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=689&vpy=228&dur=3159&hovh=225&hovw=224&tx=106&ty=135&sig=111497522159891088143&page=2&tbnh=140&tbnw=157&start=20&ndsp=24&ved=1t:429,r:3,s:20,i:147

"I wonder what they would look like with a bit of climate adjustment".

I read a friend's ancient anthropology textbook on the Burmese. Turns out that the eastern high country is quite open. It is too dry for dense forest. Presumably this zone would at least expand and contract with changing climate.