migration of tribal groups from asia – america during the ice age
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Research paper
Migration of tribal groups from Asia America during the Ice Age
Much has been said about how the first humans reached the
Americas and there are several hypotheses that try to explain this
fact, however, scientists agree on the same idea, the first humans to
arrive in the New World moved from Asia to the Americas through the
Bering Strait during the last Ice Age of the Pleistocene, which took
place approximately between 110,000 to 10,000 years before the
present time or BP.
Some theories state that humans might have travelled by boat
those 55 miles that separate the two continents, as theres evidence
that others reached Australia about 40,000 years ago, still the
strongest theory assumes that they did it by land, migrating along a
pack of ice called Beringia, which connected Siberia to the north west
of Canada working as a bridge for the migrating humans.
Even though modern humans crossed the Beringia, it is said it
took them thousands of years until they reached the north of the
Americas and finally entered the New World and these certainties are
proved by genetic archaeologists that state: There is much genetic
diversity in the first population than was previously thought in
comparison to the humans in Asia. For according to genetic
archaeologists humans endured the extremely cold weather in the
Beringia area for a long period. According to Ripan Malhi, a geneticist
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in the department of anthropology at the University of Illinois: The
ancestors of Native Americans who first left Siberia perhaps as much
as 30,000 years ago, came to a standstill on Beringia, a landmass
that extended from Northeastern Siberia to Western Alaska, and they
were isolated long enough as much as 15,000- to maturate and
differentiate themselves genetically from their Asian brothers.
Why did the homo sapiens migrate to the north crossing the
landmass that joined the continents? The answer is: because they
were following their sustenance, since it is well proved that by that
time the modern human in Asia and Siberia was a skillful hunter, who
chased several animals like mammoths, mastodons, bisons and deer,
which began to migrate to the New World and consequently, led the
first Natives of America to new lands unknown to them. However,
these hunters were so fierce that they butchered almost all the
animals on the area and soon had to move looking for more
mammals following the herds, therefore, little by little they entered
the Americas peopling the northwest of the Canadian area known as
Yukon, where great findings were made in Old Crow Basin such as it
is stated in the National Geographic Magazine (September 1979):
And here we emerge from the realm of speculation into
archaeological acceptance - the earliest widely acknowledged
occupation site in the New World, carbon dated to at least 27,000
years ago.. A prominent discovery on this area is a fossil bone from
a caribou, carbon dated to be 27,000 years old and used as a tool to
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remove flesh and/or hides from animals, which shows a clear
evidence of human manufacture
During this time, Canada and the northern part of United States
were almost completely covered with ice, nevertheless, there is a
hypothesis which states that about 25,000 to 10,000 BP there were
two huge ice sheets called the Laurentiade in the east and the
Cordilleran in the west, which had a passage in between called the
Ice free Corridor, this extent was free of ice and early humans could
follow herds along this corridor to Central North America and
subsequently, to Central America and South America.
Some archaeologists believe that the true discoverers of the
New World and first inhabitants of the Americas were the Clovis
people, who migrated through Beringia going down along the Ice
Free Corridor and settling near a town called Clovis, in New Mexico,
where different types of evidence, including a mammoth fossil
skeleton with a spear-point in its ribs, were found. However, not all
archaeologists accept this version, for there are some who claim that
there have been earlier inhabitants called Pre Clovis in other areas
such as Dutton and Selby, but there is still no solid evidence to
support this new argument.
The Clovis People, who belonged to the early Paleo-Indian Era
(approximately 12,000 years BP) used the animals hides to make
their clothes, which they tailored with precision, for protection against
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the inclement weather. They were also hunters and foragers, they
hunted animals like mammoth, bison, horse and camel and they did it
using a highly mobile hunting strategy and fluted spear points as
weapons which they made and were found much later on the
discovery area mentioned before. These samples of spear points
show how developed the Clovis people were, being considered by the
Wiscosin Historical Society members as ingenious, when they state:
The Early Paleo-Indian tradition is characterized by the distinct
production of fluted projectile points, which possess a longitudinal
groove, or flute on one or both faces. Fluted points are an example of
the incredible ingenuity and resourcefulness of the early peoples that
inhabited North America
All things considered, I strongly believe in the theory developed
before, since they rely on findings made by professionals. It is a fact
that human beings are deeply involved in knowing more about their
past as if this reassured their existence and showed them their
purpose in life, which would be fundamentally surviving, that is why
thanks to uncounted researchers we are able to know more about our
ancestors and it is my belief that the early Natives of the Americas
have survived throughout history, unintentionally peopling the New
World. They are then, a sample of the faculty and potential our
species has and quite deserving, the owners of the title of the most
developed species in the world.
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Sources
http://www.geneticarchaeology.com/research/researchers posit new ideas.
National Geographic Magazine, September 1979, pages 330 363.
http://yukon.taiga.net/vuntutrda/archaeol/pleis.htm
http://www.wisconsinhistory.org/museum/artifacts
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/08071193203.htm
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http://www.geneticarchaeology.com/research/researchershttp://www.wisconsinhistory.org/museum/artifactshttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/08071193203.htmhttp://www.geneticarchaeology.com/research/researchershttp://www.wisconsinhistory.org/museum/artifactshttp://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/08071193203.htm