Latest Hunter-gatherer Stories

Modern humans left Africa over 60,000 years ago in a migration that many believe was responsible for nearly all of the human population that exist outside Africa today.Now, researchers have revealed that men and women weren't equal partners in that exodus. By tracing variations in the X chromosome and in the non-sex chromosomes, the researchers found evidence that men probably outnumbered women in that migration. The scientists expect that their method of comparing X chromosomes with the...

By Prendergast, Kate Our prehistoric ancestors survived rapid climate change and rising temperatures as extreme as those we face today, says Kate Prendergast. What can they tell us about global warming? BETWEEN 18- 20,000 YEARS AGO, average temperatures in Europe probably fell to at least 10[degrees]C below the levels they are today. In the last great Ice Age, glaciers expanded rapidly and covered large areas of northern and central Europe in ice sheets. Much of Europe resembled tundra and...

WASHINGTON -- A study of DNA from ancient farmers in Europe shows sharp differences from that of modern Europeans - results that are likely to add fuel to the debate over European origins. Researchers led by Wolfgang Haak of Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz, Germany, argue that their finding supports the belief that modern residents of central Europe descended from Stone Age hunter-gatherers who were present 40,000 years ago, and not the early farmers who arrived thousands of years...