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Peopling of India
The peopling of India refers to the migration of Homo sapiens into the Indian subcontinent. Anatomically modern humans settled India in multiple waves of early migrations, over tens of millennia. The first migrants came with the Coastal Migration/Southern Dispersal 65,000 years ago, whereafter complex migrations within South and Southeast Asia took place. West Asian Iranian hunter-gatherers migrated to South Asia after the Last Glacial Period but before the onset of farming. Together with ancient South Asian hunter-gatherers they formed the population of the Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC). The population of the IVC was the result of mixing between Iranian hunter gatherers and Ancient Ancestral South Indian (AASI).
With the decline of the IVC, and the migration of Indo-Europeans, the IVC-people contributed to the formation of both the Ancestral North Indians ("ANI"), who were related to contemporary West Eurasians, and the Ancestral South Indians ("ASI"), who were formed out of "Indus Periphery-related groups" who moved south and mixed further with local hunter-gatherers. These two ancestral populations, ASI and ANI, mixed somewhere between 1,900-4,200 years ago, after which a switch to endogamy took place. After the fall of the IVC there was significant southward migration of the IVC people, groups considered the ancestors of modern day Dravidians. The intermixing between ASI and ANI groups was substantial and affected both modern Indo-European populations as well as the Dravidian populations in the subcontinent. The migrations of the Munda people and the Sino-Tibetan-speaking people from East Asia also added new elements.
The dating of the earliest successful migration of modern humans out of Africa is a matter of dispute. It may have pre- or post-dated the Toba catastrophe, a volcanic super eruption that took place between 69,000 and 77,000 years ago at the site of present-day Lake Toba. According to Michael Petraglia, stone tools discovered below the layers of ash deposits in India at Jwalapuram, Andhra Pradesh point to a pre-Toba dispersal. The population who created these tools is not known with certainty as no human remains were found. An indication for post-Toba is haplogroup L3, that originated before the dispersal of humans out of Africa, and can be dated to 60,000–70,000 years ago, "suggesting that humanity left Africa a few thousand years after Toba."
It has been hypothesized that the Toba supereruption about 74,000 years ago destroyed much of India's central forests, covering it with a layer of volcanic ash, and may have brought humans worldwide to a state of near-extinction by suddenly plunging the planet into an ice-age that could have lasted for up to 1,800 years. If true, this may "explain the apparent bottleneck in human populations that geneticists believe occurred between 50,000 and 100,000 years ago" and the relative "lack of genetic diversity among humans alive today".
Since the Toba event is believed to have had such a harsh impact and "specifically blanketed the Indian subcontinent in a deep layer of ash", it was "difficult to see how India's first colonists could have survived this greatest of all disasters". Therefore, it was believed that all humans previously present in India went extinct during, or shortly after, this event and these first Indians left "no trace of their DNA in present-day humans" – a theory seemingly backed by genetic studies.
Research published in 2009 by a team led by Michael Petraglia of the University of Oxford suggested that some humans may have survived the hypothesized catastrophe on the Indian mainland. Undertaking "Pompeii-like excavations" under the layer of Toba ash, the team discovered tools and human habitations from both before and after the eruption. However, human fossils have not been found from this period, and nothing is known of the ethnicity of these early humans in India. Recent research also by Macauly et al. (2005)[who?] and Posth et al. (2016), also argue for a post-Toba dispersal. Early Stone Age hominin fossils have been found in the Narmada valley of Madhya Pradesh. Some have been dated to 200- 700,000 BP. It is uncertain what species they represent.
By some 70-50,000 years ago, only a small group, possibly as few as 150 to 1,000 people, crossed the Red Sea. The group that crossed the Red Sea travelled along the coastal route around the coast of Arabia and Persia until reaching India, which appears to be the first major settling point. Geneticist Spencer Wells says that the early travellers followed the southern coastline of Asia, crossed about 250 kilometres (155 mi) of sea, and colonized Australia by around 50,000 years ago. The Aborigines of Australia, Wells says, are the descendants of the first wave of migrations.
The oldest definitively identified Homo sapiens fossils yet found in South Asia are Balangoda Man. Named for the location in Sri Lanka where they were discovered, they are at least 28,000 years old.
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Peopling of India
The peopling of India refers to the migration of Homo sapiens into the Indian subcontinent. Anatomically modern humans settled India in multiple waves of early migrations, over tens of millennia. The first migrants came with the Coastal Migration/Southern Dispersal 65,000 years ago, whereafter complex migrations within South and Southeast Asia took place. West Asian Iranian hunter-gatherers migrated to South Asia after the Last Glacial Period but before the onset of farming. Together with ancient South Asian hunter-gatherers they formed the population of the Indus Valley Civilisation (IVC). The population of the IVC was the result of mixing between Iranian hunter gatherers and Ancient Ancestral South Indian (AASI).
With the decline of the IVC, and the migration of Indo-Europeans, the IVC-people contributed to the formation of both the Ancestral North Indians ("ANI"), who were related to contemporary West Eurasians, and the Ancestral South Indians ("ASI"), who were formed out of "Indus Periphery-related groups" who moved south and mixed further with local hunter-gatherers. These two ancestral populations, ASI and ANI, mixed somewhere between 1,900-4,200 years ago, after which a switch to endogamy took place. After the fall of the IVC there was significant southward migration of the IVC people, groups considered the ancestors of modern day Dravidians. The intermixing between ASI and ANI groups was substantial and affected both modern Indo-European populations as well as the Dravidian populations in the subcontinent. The migrations of the Munda people and the Sino-Tibetan-speaking people from East Asia also added new elements.
The dating of the earliest successful migration of modern humans out of Africa is a matter of dispute. It may have pre- or post-dated the Toba catastrophe, a volcanic super eruption that took place between 69,000 and 77,000 years ago at the site of present-day Lake Toba. According to Michael Petraglia, stone tools discovered below the layers of ash deposits in India at Jwalapuram, Andhra Pradesh point to a pre-Toba dispersal. The population who created these tools is not known with certainty as no human remains were found. An indication for post-Toba is haplogroup L3, that originated before the dispersal of humans out of Africa, and can be dated to 60,000–70,000 years ago, "suggesting that humanity left Africa a few thousand years after Toba."
It has been hypothesized that the Toba supereruption about 74,000 years ago destroyed much of India's central forests, covering it with a layer of volcanic ash, and may have brought humans worldwide to a state of near-extinction by suddenly plunging the planet into an ice-age that could have lasted for up to 1,800 years. If true, this may "explain the apparent bottleneck in human populations that geneticists believe occurred between 50,000 and 100,000 years ago" and the relative "lack of genetic diversity among humans alive today".
Since the Toba event is believed to have had such a harsh impact and "specifically blanketed the Indian subcontinent in a deep layer of ash", it was "difficult to see how India's first colonists could have survived this greatest of all disasters". Therefore, it was believed that all humans previously present in India went extinct during, or shortly after, this event and these first Indians left "no trace of their DNA in present-day humans" – a theory seemingly backed by genetic studies.
Research published in 2009 by a team led by Michael Petraglia of the University of Oxford suggested that some humans may have survived the hypothesized catastrophe on the Indian mainland. Undertaking "Pompeii-like excavations" under the layer of Toba ash, the team discovered tools and human habitations from both before and after the eruption. However, human fossils have not been found from this period, and nothing is known of the ethnicity of these early humans in India. Recent research also by Macauly et al. (2005)[who?] and Posth et al. (2016), also argue for a post-Toba dispersal. Early Stone Age hominin fossils have been found in the Narmada valley of Madhya Pradesh. Some have been dated to 200- 700,000 BP. It is uncertain what species they represent.
By some 70-50,000 years ago, only a small group, possibly as few as 150 to 1,000 people, crossed the Red Sea. The group that crossed the Red Sea travelled along the coastal route around the coast of Arabia and Persia until reaching India, which appears to be the first major settling point. Geneticist Spencer Wells says that the early travellers followed the southern coastline of Asia, crossed about 250 kilometres (155 mi) of sea, and colonized Australia by around 50,000 years ago. The Aborigines of Australia, Wells says, are the descendants of the first wave of migrations.
The oldest definitively identified Homo sapiens fossils yet found in South Asia are Balangoda Man. Named for the location in Sri Lanka where they were discovered, they are at least 28,000 years old.
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