Veiled beneath the Persian Gulf, a once-fertile landmass mayhave supported some of the earliest humans outside Africa some 75,000 to 100,000years ago, a new review of research suggests.
At its peak, the floodplain now below the Gulf would havebeen about the size of Great Britain, and then shrank as water began to floodthe area. Then, about 8,000 years ago, the land would have been swallowed up bythe Indian Ocean, the review scientist said.
The study, which is detailed in the December issue of thejournal Current Anthropology, has broad implications for aspects of humanhistory. For instance, scientists have debated over when earlymodern humans exited Africa, with dates as early as 125,000 years ago andas recent as 60,000 years ago (the more recent date is the currently acceptedparadigm), according to study researcher Jeffrey Rose, an archaeologist at theUniversity of Birmingham in the U.K.
"I think Jeff's theory is bold and imaginative, andhopefully will shake things up," Robert Carter of Oxford BrookesUniversity in the U.K. told LiveScience. "It would completelyrewrite our understanding of the out-of-Africa migration. It is far fromproven, but Jeff and others will be developing research programsto test the theory."
Viktor Cerny of the Archaeogenetics Laboratory, the Instituteof Archaeology, in Prague, called Rose's finding an "excellenttheory," in an e-mail to LiveScience, though he also points out the needfor more research to confirm it.
The findings have sparked discussion among researchers, including Carter andCerny, who were allowed to provide comments within the research paper, about who exactly thehumans were who occupied the Gulf basin.
"Given the presence of Neanderthal communities in theupper reaches of the Tigris and Euphrates River, as well as in the easternMediterranean region, this may very well have been the contact zone betweenmoderns and Neanderthals," Rose told LiveScience. In fact, recent evidencefrom the sequencing of the Neanderthal genome suggests interbreeding, meaning weare part caveman.
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Watery refuge
The Gulf Oasis would have been a shallow inland basinexposed from about 75,000 years ago until 8,000 years ago, forming the southerntip of the FertileCrescent, according to historical sea-level records.
And it would have been an ideal refuge from the harshdeserts surrounding it, with fresh water supplied by the Tigris, Euphrates,Karun and Wadi Baton Rivers, as well as by upwelling springs, Rose said. Andduring the last ice age when conditions were at their driest, this basinwould've been at its largest.
In fact, in recent years, archaeologists have turned upevidence of a wave of human settlements along the shores of the Gulf dating toabout 7,500 years ago.
[Discovery: 100-million-year-old ancient crocodile]
"Where before there had been but a handful of scatteredhunting camps, suddenly, over 60 new archaeological sites appear virtuallyovernight," Rose said. "These settlements boast well-built, permanentstone houses, long-distance trade networks, elaborately decorated pottery,domesticated animals, and even evidence for one of the oldest boats in theworld."
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Rather than quickly evolving settlements, Rose thinksprecursor populations did exist but have remained hidden beneath the Gulf. [History'sMost Overlooked Mysteries]
"Perhaps it is no coincidence that the founding of suchremarkably well developed communities along the shoreline corresponds with theflooding of the Persian Gulf basin around 8,000 years ago," Rose said. "Thesenew colonists may have come from the heart of the Gulf, displaced by risingwater levels that plunged the once fertile landscape beneath the waters of theIndian Ocean."
Ironclad case?
The most definitive evidence of these human camps in theGulf comes from a new archaeological site called Jebel Faya 1 within the Gulfbasin that was discovered four years ago. There, Hans-Peter Uerpmann of theUniversity of Tubingen in Germany found three different Paleolithic settlementsoccurring from about 125,000 to 25,000 years ago. That and other archaeologicalsites, Rose said, indicate "that early human groups were living around theGulf basin throughout the Late Pleistocene."
To make an ironclad case for such human occupation duringthe Paleolithic, or early Stone Age, of the now-submergedlandmass, Rose said scientists would need to find any evidence of stonetools scattered under the Gulf. "As for the Neolithic, it would bewonderful to find some evidence for human-built structures," dated to thattime period in the Gulf, Rose said.
Carter said in order to make for a solid case, "wewould need to find a submerged site, and excavate it underwater. This wouldlikely only happen as the culmination of years of survey in carefully selectedareas."
Cerny said a sealed-tight case could be made with "somefossils of the anatomically modern humans some 100,000 years old found in SouthArabia."
And there's a hint of mythology here, too, Rose pointed out."Nearly every civilization living in southern Mesopotamia has told someform of the flood myth. While the names might change, the content and structureare consistent from 2,500 B.C. to the Genesis account to the Qur'anic version,"Rose said.
Perhaps evidence beneath the Gulf? "If it looks like aduck, and quacks like a duck, we have at least to consider the possibilitythat we have a small aquatic bird of the family Anatidae on our hands,"said Rose, quoting Douglas Adams.
