Denisovans The Archaic Humans Of The Paleolithic Period

Even with all our modern technology and advanced science, we still know relatively little about the origins of our fascinating species. We have an idea about the natural processes that have led to the emergence of Homo sapiens as we know ourselves today as well as the nature of some of our ancestors. We also possess insight into other archaic human species that we once shared this planet with. Even though we have these bits of information and a general picture of what happened, much about our origins and early history remains mysterious.

Denisovans are an extinct species of hominid and a close relative to modern humans. This book looks at the evolution of these mysterious humans and examines the theories regarding their history. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about the Denisovans like never before.

Denisovans are an extinct species of hominid and a close relative to modern humans. This book looks at the evolution of these mysterious humans and examines the theories regarding their history. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about the Denisovans like never before.

Denisovans are an extinct species of hominid and a close relative to modern humans. This book looks at the evolution of these mysterious humans and examines the theories regarding their history. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about the Denisovans like never before.

Reveals the profound influence of the Denisovans and their hybrid descendants upon the flowering of human civilization around the world • Traces the migrations of the sophisticated Denisovans and their interbreeding with Neanderthals and early human populations more than 40,000 years ago • Shows how Denisovan hybrids became the elite of ancient societies, including the Adena mound-building culture • Explores the Denisovans’ extraordinary advances, including precision-machined stone tools and jewelry, tailored clothing, and celestially-aligned architecture Ice-age cave artists, the builders at Göbekli Tepe, and the mound-builders of North America all share a common ancestry in the Solutreans, Neanderthal-human hybrids of immense sophistication, who dominated southwest Europe before reaching North America 20,000 years ago. Yet, even before the Solutreans, the American continent was home to a powerful population of enormous stature, giants remembered in Native American legend as the Thunder People. New research shows they were hybrid descendants of an extinct human group known as the Denisovans, whose existence has now been confirmed from fossil remains found in a cave in the Altai region of Siberia. Tracing the migrations of the Denisovans and their interbreeding with Neanderthals and early human populations in Asia, Europe, Australia, and the Americas, Andrew Collins and Greg Little explore how the new mental capabilities of the Denisovan-Neanderthal and Denisovan-human hybrids greatly accelerated the flowering of human civilization over 40,000 years ago. They show how the Denisovans displayed sophisticated advances, including precision-machined stone tools and jewelry, tailored clothing, celestially-aligned architecture, and horse domestication. Examining evidence from ancient America, the authors reveal how Denisovan hybrids became the elite of the Adena mound-building culture, explaining the giant skeletons found in Native American burial mounds. The authors also explore how the Denisovans’ descendants were the creators of a cosmological death journey and viewed the Milky Way as the Path of Souls. Revealing the impact of the Denisovans upon every part of the world, the authors show that, without early man’s hybridization with Denisovans, Neanderthals, and other yet-to-be-discovered hominid populations, the modern world as we know it would not exist.

An influential geneticist traces his investigation into the genes of humanity's closest evolutionary relatives, explaining what his sequencing of the Neanderthal genome has revealed about their extinction and the origins of modern humans.

Archaeologists have found evidence that as humans entered what we now refer to as the Upper Paleolithic Era, they started using a whole new toolset. The evidence suggests that major behavioral shifts also occurred. For example, humans started making arresting cave paintings and carving statuettes. Scholars refer to these changes as the Upper Paleolithic Revolution. Readers will learn how archaeologists use evidence to piece together what life was like during the Upper Paleolithic Era. Theories about the origins and development of language are also discussed, as are new discoveries about archaic human admixture with modern humans.

“Even-handed, up-to-date, and clearly written. . . . If you want to navigate between the Scylla and Charybdis of Neanderthal controversies, you’ll find no better guide.” —Brian Fagan, author of Cro-Magnon In recent years, the common perception of the Neanderthal has been transformed thanks to new discoveries and paradigm-shattering scientific innovations. It turns out that the Neanderthals’ behavior was surprisingly modern: they buried the dead, cared for the sick, hunted large animals in their prime, harvested seafood, and spoke. Meanwhile, advances in DNA technologies have forced a reassessment of the Neanderthals’ place in our own past. For hundreds of thousands of years, Neanderthals evolved in Europe very much in parallel to the Homo sapiens line evolving in Africa, and, when both species made their first forays into Asia, the Neanderthals may even have had the upper hand. Here, Dimitra Papagianni and Michael A. Morse look at the Neanderthals through the full dramatic arc of their existence—from their evolution in Europe to their expansion to Siberia, their subsequent extinction, and ultimately their revival in popular novels, cartoons, cult movies, and TV commercials.