\doc\web\99\12\aust.txt Date sent: Mon, 23 Aug 1999 15:34:24 -0400 To: hbe-l@a3.com, H-Bd@egroups.com From: Peter Frost Copies to: "Ian Pitchford" , Subject: [h-bd] Re: Aborigines were the first Americans >Aborigines were the first Americans >By Sarah Toyne snip >The theory that Aborigines could have travelled by water to the Americas has >been given further credence by the discovery of a painting of an ocean- going >vessel in Western Australia, which is 20,000 years old. The 4,000-mile journey >between Australia and South America can still be undertaken with relatively >short island hops. I don't think it's necessary to assume some kind of trans-oceanic migration. Before the Malay expansion some four thousand years ago, all of southeast Asia was inhabited by populations similar to the native inhabitants of Australia and Papua/New Guinea. In fact, there are still isolated pockets of these peoples in Malaya and on the Andaman Islands. If we go back in time, I suspect that Australoid populations once occupied all of the littoral of East Asia. From there, they could have followed the coastline of Beringia and then colonized the Americas. We shouldn't fall into the assumption that the distribution of human populations was static and unchanging prior to Columbus. Mongoloids are characterized by cold adaptations (e.g., the epicanthic eyefold), so it is likely that they originated in northern Asia and only later pushed south and east -- probably at the expense of already established populations. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dr. Peter Frost GETIC (Groupe d'études inuit et circumpolaire) Université Laval Sainte-Foy (Québec) CANADA G1K 7P4 Tel. (418) 683-1740 Website: http://www.globetrotter.net/gt/usagers/pfrost Lorsque l'homme veut faire l'ange, il finit par faire la bête.