An international team of scientists has discovered that the first human migrants set out from Africa via the Sinai Peninsula and through Jordan to Eurasia more than 80,000 years ago. Researchers from the University of Southampton (UK) and Shantou University (China), together with colleagues from Jordan, Australia and the Czech Republic, have demonstrated the existence of a “well-watered corridor” directing hunter-gatherers to the West via the Levant. Asia. and Northern Arabia via Jordan.

Their findings support previous research suggesting that this verdant highway in Arabia, now a desert, was popular with northbound traveling Homo sapiens. The article titled “Dispersion of People from Africa through the Levant” was published in the magazine Science Developments.

“Modern humans evolved in Africa between 300,000 and 200,000 years ago and dispersed from the continent in several stages. They are believed to have continued to populate Asia and then Europe for tens of thousands of years.”

For this latest study, the team conducted fieldwork in the Jordan Rift Valley; Here they discovered hand tools known as “flakes” on the edge of valleys that were now dry river channels, filled with water tens of thousands of years ago. Scientists used luminescent dating techniques to help determine the age of the sediments in which the tools were buried. This method estimates how much time has passed since the sediments were last illuminated.

The results showed that the tools were likely used about 84,000 years ago, then deposited along the valley edge and buried over time.

Paul Carling, professor of geomorphology at the University of Southampton, said: “It has long been thought that, when sea levels were low, people used the southern crossing of the Red Sea from the Horn of Africa to reach south-west Arabia. But our research has shown that there is a route from Africa to Eurasia. It confirms that there is good passage northwards via a single land route.

“Our newly published evidence is an important piece of the puzzle showing that humans migrated along the northern route, using small wetlands as bases.” [під час] hunting large numbers of wild animals in dry grasslands. “Although previous studies have looked for large lakes as potential reservoirs, small wetlands were actually very important as stopover points during migration.”

The lead author of the study, Dr. from Shantou University in China. “During the last interglacial period, the Levant served as a well-watered corridor for the spread of modern humans from Africa, and we have now shown that it is the best corridor in the world,” said Mahmoud Abbas. Case in the Jordan Rift Valley region.

“Paleohydrological data from the Jordanian desert improve our understanding of the environment at that time. Instead of a dry desert, savannah grasslands could have provided much-needed resources for human survival during the journey from Africa to southwest Asia and beyond.”

Researchers say their study shows a strong connection between climate change, human survival and migration. Source