Ancestry, Anthropology and History - Social Studies Network

East Meets West: Avar Society’s Genetic Patchwork in Early Medieval Austria

Anthropology.net

JANUARY 18, 2025

New research, published in Nature 1 by an international team of researchers led by the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, delves into the lives of two neighboring Avar communities in Lower Austria. These people were obviously regarded as Avars, regardless of their ancestry." DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-0092.2009.00348.x

Ancestry

Ancestry Archaeology Anthropology Heritage

Tracing the Huns’ Genetic Legacy: A Eurasian Patchwork of Ancestry

Anthropology.net

FEBRUARY 24, 2025

Within a few decades, they built an empire that stretched from the Eurasian steppe to the heart of Central Europe, reshaping political landscapes and leaving an imprint on European history. The researchers found no widespread East Asian ancestry among the European populations of the Carpathian Basin following the Huns' arrival.

Ancestry

Ancestry Archaeology Museum Anthropology

“We Have Always Been Here”: How DNA and Oral Tradition Aligned to Tell the Picuris Pueblo’s Deep Past

Anthropology.net

MAY 1, 2025

In this landscape stands Picuris Pueblo—a small, sovereign tribal nation whose history has long been narrated in stories passed down through generations. federally recognized tribe has led and co-authored a genomic study of its own ancestry. A new study, however, places them squarely in the realm of science. 28, 2021.

Tradition

Tradition Oral History Ancestry Archaeology

Ancient DNA from the Green Sahara Reveals a Lost North African Lineage

Anthropology.net

APRIL 2, 2025

This discovery reveals a deeply rooted and long-isolated genetic lineage in North Africa," said Nada Salem of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, the study’s lead author. This ancient group shares ancestry with the 15,000-year-old foragers of Taforalt Cave in Morocco, associated with the Iberomaurusian culture.

Ancestry

Ancestry Archaeology Anthropology Humanities

Echoes of Movement: How the Grammar of Indigenous Languages Maps the Peopling of the Americas

Anthropology.net

APRIL 30, 2025

Linguistic bottlenecks and demographic echoes The study builds on a long-standing hypothesis in historical linguistics and evolutionary anthropology—that migration events, especially those involving small founder populations, reduce linguistic diversity. In this case, however, the origin is likely in the north.

Archaeology

Archaeology Ancestry Archiving Artifacts

Faces from the Deep Past: How Europe's Skulls Record 30,000 Years of Upheaval

Anthropology.net

MAY 1, 2025

The Bone Archive of Human History If genes are blueprints, skulls are blueprints weathered by time. The short, high, gracile cranial forms common in recent centuries may owe more to changes in nutrition, lifestyle, and climate than to deep ancestry. A paleogenomic history of southeastern Europe. Related Research Olalde, I.,

Ancestry

Ancestry Archiving Archaeology Anthropology

The First Europeans: Ancient Genomes Reveal Complex Histories of Human Expansion and Neanderthal Interactions

Anthropology.net

DECEMBER 13, 2024

Among these pioneers were individuals whose lives and genetic histories have now been reconstructed from the oldest modern human genomes yet sequenced. “This shared Neanderthal ancestry marks a pivotal chapter in the history of modern humans outside Africa,” remarked Johannes Krause, the study’s senior author.

Humanities

Humanities History Ancestry Anthropology

The Journey of Homo sapiens into East Eurasia: What Ancient Genomes Reveal

Anthropology.net

FEBRUARY 26, 2025

Human history is not just about where we came from but how we adapted to the ever-changing environments we encountered. And as we continue to uncover more ancient genomes, our understanding of human history will only deepen. Journal of Physiological Anthropology , 44 (1). Related Research Fu, Q., DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1221359110

Ancestry

Ancestry Anthropology Archaeology Humanities

Rethinking the Dawn of Agriculture: Human Agency in the Neolithic Transition

Anthropology.net

MARCH 31, 2025

The shift from a hunter-gatherer existence to an agrarian lifestyle stands as one of the most profound transformations in human history. Understanding these dynamics not only enriches our comprehension of human history but also highlights the intricate web of relationships that have shaped our collective past. Mallick, S.,

Humanities

Humanities Ancestry Anthropology History

Neanderthals and Modern Humans: A Shared Past Revealed Through DNA

Anthropology.net

DECEMBER 13, 2024

By analyzing distinctive genetic markers, researchers quantified this percentage, shedding light on the enduring impact of interbreeding events in human evolutionary history. “Most non-Africans today carry 1-2% Neanderthal ancestry, underscoring the impact of these interactions on the settlement of regions outside Africa.”

Humanities

Humanities Ancestry Anthropology Museum

Resurrecting the Dire Wolf, or Clickbait Science for the 21st Century

Anthropology 365

APRIL 7, 2025

Their morphological resemblance to grey wolves thus results from convergent evolution rather than shared ancestry ( Perri et al. Despite coexisting geographically during the Late Pleistocene, dire wolves show no genomic evidence of interbreeding with grey wolves or coyotes, indicating prolonged evolutionary isolation.

Ancestry

Ancestry Heritage Research History

Are Neanderthals and Homo sapiens Separate Species?

Anthropology.net

DECEMBER 5, 2024

A recent study led by researchers from London’s Natural History Museum and the KU Leuven Institute of Philosophy reignites the debate over whether Homo sapiens and Neanderthals ( Homo neanderthalensis ) should be classified as separate species. Journal : Evolutionary Anthropology , 2022. What Defines a Species?

Ancestry

Ancestry Anthropology Humanities Museum

Ancient Iberian Slate Plaques: Early Genealogical Records?

Anthropology.net

DECEMBER 4, 2024

A recent study, published in the European Journal of Archaeology 1 , suggests these plaques may represent one of humanity's earliest attempts at recording genealogy—a non-verbal precursor to modern ancestry documentation. Journal : Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences , 2017.

Archaeology

Archaeology Artifacts Ancestry Anthropology

Doctors Are Taught to Lie About Race

Sapiens

NOVEMBER 20, 2024

By checking “Patient’s Race,” we health care providers pretend to know something that we cannot possibly know: the patient’s ancestry and associated medical risk. I was struck by an alarming dichotomy: Genetics and anthropology scholarship have unanimously refuted a biological basis for race. The reason lies deep in human history.

Ancestry

Ancestry Anthropology Humanities Museum

The Life of a 17,000-Year-Old Infant from Ice Age Italy

Anthropology.net

DECEMBER 16, 2024

The findings, published in Nature Communications 1 , reveal a wealth of information about the boy's ancestry, physical traits, health, and the environment in which he lived, offering a rare glimpse into the lives of prehistoric humans. The genomic history of southeastern Europe." Current Biology, 31(5), 1110-1120. DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2020.11.029

Ancestry

Ancestry Archaeology Anthropology Humanities

Study: The Indo-European language family was born south of the Caucasus

Strange Maps

SEPTEMBER 16, 2023

This is a huge step forward from the mutually exclusive, previous scenarios, towards a more plausible model that integrates archaeological, anthropological, and genetic findings.” Strange Maps #1220 Got a strange map? Let me know at strangemaps@gmail.com. Follow Strange Maps on Twitter and Facebook.

Archaeology

Archaeology Ancestry Anthropology Humanities

The Fulani Enigma: Unraveling the Deep Genetic History of Africa’s Legendary Pastoralists

Anthropology.net

FEBRUARY 15, 2025

published in The American Journal of Human Genetics 1 , has provided fresh insights into the complex origins of the Fulani, tracing their ancestry back to an ancient, lost world—the Green Sahara. Now, a groundbreaking genetic study by Fortes-Lima et al., But as this study shows, the answer lies much closer to home.

History

History Ancestry Geography K-12

Ancient Crossroads of Caucasian Societies: The Genetic and Cultural Evolution of Farmers and Hunter-Gatherers

Anthropology.net

NOVEMBER 29, 2024

Genetic Divides: Farmers in the South, Hunter-Gatherers in the North Distinct Ancestral Lineages Northern Caucasian populations displayed Eastern hunter-gatherer ancestry, while southern groups carried a blend of hunter-gatherer and East Anatolian farmer DNA. Source: Journal of Anthropological Archaeology.

Cultures

Cultures Ancestry Archaeology Anthropology

Did Gut Microbes Help Fuel the Evolution of Large Human Brains?

Anthropology.net

DECEMBER 3, 2024

The evolution of the human brain is one of the most remarkable chapters in our species' history. We know the community of microbes living in the large intestine can produce compounds that affect aspects of human biology," explained Katherine Amato, associate professor of anthropology at Northwestern and lead author of the study.

Humanities

Humanities K-12 Ancestry Anthropology

World on the Move: Teenage Poets Slam their Truth

Anthropology News

FEBRUARY 11, 2025

Nevertheless, the scientific facts are there and the long history of race and racialization is documented. It ties to many anthropological concerns, past and present and across the subfields. Nor is it for satisfaction in the retelling of traumatic history. The identity of my ethnicity is a blank underline in my history.

Anthropology

Anthropology Library Ancestry Cultures

Gradual Growth: The Evolution of Human Brain Size

Anthropology.net

NOVEMBER 29, 2024

Largest Dataset to Date The researchers analyzed the most extensive dataset of human fossil evidence ever compiled, spanning seven million years of evolutionary history. Source: Current Anthropology. However, the new study challenges this idea, presenting a more nuanced perspective of incremental growth.

Humanities

Humanities Ancestry Anthropology Tradition

Ghosts: A Song

Anthropology News

APRIL 3, 2025

These ghosts are both echoes of ancestry and culture, and the silent weight of our search for belonging and self-location within layered identities. The song seeks to reveal the tangled emotions between home and elsewhere, and how everyday gestures are entangled with invisible histories and destinies.

Ancestry

Ancestry Anthropology History Cultures

Social Studies Network

East Meets West: Avar Society’s Genetic Patchwork in Early Medieval Austria

Tracing the Huns’ Genetic Legacy: A Eurasian Patchwork of Ancestry

Trending Sources

“We Have Always Been Here”: How DNA and Oral Tradition Aligned to Tell the Picuris Pueblo’s Deep Past

Ancient DNA from the Green Sahara Reveals a Lost North African Lineage

Echoes of Movement: How the Grammar of Indigenous Languages Maps the Peopling of the Americas

Faces from the Deep Past: How Europe's Skulls Record 30,000 Years of Upheaval

The First Europeans: Ancient Genomes Reveal Complex Histories of Human Expansion and Neanderthal Interactions

The Journey of Homo sapiens into East Eurasia: What Ancient Genomes Reveal

Rethinking the Dawn of Agriculture: Human Agency in the Neolithic Transition

Neanderthals and Modern Humans: A Shared Past Revealed Through DNA

Resurrecting the Dire Wolf, or Clickbait Science for the 21st Century

Are Neanderthals and Homo sapiens Separate Species?

Ancient Iberian Slate Plaques: Early Genealogical Records?

Doctors Are Taught to Lie About Race

The Life of a 17,000-Year-Old Infant from Ice Age Italy

Study: The Indo-European language family was born south of the Caucasus

The Fulani Enigma: Unraveling the Deep Genetic History of Africa’s Legendary Pastoralists

Ancient Crossroads of Caucasian Societies: The Genetic and Cultural Evolution of Farmers and Hunter-Gatherers

Did Gut Microbes Help Fuel the Evolution of Large Human Brains?

World on the Move: Teenage Poets Slam their Truth

Gradual Growth: The Evolution of Human Brain Size

Ghosts: A Song

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