arobigines

[Frank Harrist]

http://forum.palanth.com/index.php/topi ... ml#msg2876

[Beagle]

Thanks Frank, I'll see if I can find more on that author.

[Beagle]

I found this. Homo Erectus seafaring 800,000 yrs. ago. The author is Robert Badnarik. His credentials are impressive.




http://mc2.vicnet.net.au/home/mariners/ ... iner1.html

[Minimalist]

Fascinating.

The principal finding of the project so far is that the level of maritime competence required to cross from Timor to Australia with a minimal number of males and females is far in excess of what had been assumed available to these hominids. Hundreds of specific skills are involved, in procuring, transporting, processing, curating, fashioning and assembling numerous materials for one singular, totally abstract goal: to reach a still invisible shore, at immense cost in labour and hardship, and with a perseverance to be maintained over periods of many months. It is perfectly possible to do this with Middle, even Lower Palaeolithic technology. But it is an achievement that renders all current ideas about the cognitive, intellectual and linguistic abilities of these hominids totally superseded.

[stan]

What is the evidence for 800k years ago?

[Minimalist]

Humans also settled the islands of Nusa Tenggara, not by swimming but after they had developed maritime navigation capability. By about 800 ka (800,000 years) ago, hominids had established a substantial population on Flores, which suggests that they had earlier settled Lombok and Sumbawa, the two major islands between Bali and Flores. The Soa Basin in central Flores, north of Boawae, consists of a series of mostly volcanic facies, transected by numerous deep drainage valleys documenting the uniformity of the geological sections (Ehrat 1925; Hartono 1961).

[Beagle]

There is no seafaring evidence of such antiquity anywhere else in the world, although it has been mentioned from time to time that the Strait of Gibraltar may have been crossed by hominids (Freeman 1975: 662, 733; Johnstone 1980: 3). The presence of in situ stone tools in Middle Pleistocene deposits at Sa Coa de sa Multa near Perfuga, Sardinia, provides the earliest known indication of seafaring in the Mediterranean (Bini et al. 1993). The finds have been suggested to be in the order of 300 ka old. Sardinia was connected to Corsica at times of low sea level, but never to the Italian mainland. Similarly, Kefallinía near Greece, where Mousterian tools have been found (Kavvadias 1984), must have been reached via the sea, even though the distance from the mainland was considerably smaller than in the Indonesian crossings. Human skeletal remains from Crete combine both modern and neanderthaloid features and are about 50 ka old, clearly indicating seafaring ability in the late Middle Palaeolithic period (Facchini & Giusberti 1992: 189-208). To reach Crete, at least two crossings totalling about 80 km were required. Upper Palaeolithic evidence we have of European seafaring is also from the Mediterranean, consisting of a 20-ka-old human finger bone in Corbeddu Cave, Sardinia (Spoor & Sondaar 1986; Sondaar et al. 1995); and the discovery of obsidian from Melos, about 11 ka old and involving two journeys of over 100 km each to reach Frachthi Cave on mainland Greece (Perles 1979). Similarly, the presence on Honsho of obsidian from Kozushima, about 50 km from the main island of Japan, some 30 ka ago (Anderson 1987: 279), renders sea crossings in both directions necessary, indicating the availability of advanced navigation technology.

It appears that Neandertal could "sail" too. I wonder why this opinion hasn't hit the medie circus?

[Minimalist]

You mean, like this?


http://www.guardian.co.uk/international ... 99,00.html

Spanish investigators believe they may have found proof that neanderthal man reached Europe from Africa not just via the Middle East but by sailing, swimming or floating across the Strait of Gibraltar.

[stan]

Beagle, where did that long quote about ancient mariners come from?
Thanks.

[Beagle]

Stan, it came from the link that I posted earlier. Here it is again.



http://mc2.vicnet.net.au/home/mariners/ ... iner1.html

[Der Lange]

Ummm, guys, some folk are writing about the spread of hominids without keeping in mind that water levels in seas varied a LOT over the time span discussed. In fact, in the case of the Strait of Gibraltar, folk are talking about a time when IT DID NOT EXIST - the land was SOLID between Europe and North American then!

Only 8,000 years ago, people WALKED to what we call Britain now. There was no separation between continental Europe and the "islands" at that time.

If you check an atlas of history for land levels about 20,000 BCE, a lot of places may still have been islandic at the time, but their shores were a heck of a lot closer to land masses - including Australia. Take a look at Malta then - oops, not so far off from land masses, and gosh, by the way, Italy and Sicily seem to be connected!

Darnit, this geography and geology stuff makes such a mess for uninformed and unattentive "archaeologists"!

[Minimalist]

I seem to recall reading somewhere that the Mediterranean formed some 5 million years ago when the Atlantic broke through the Straits of Gibraltar....similar to the Black Sea flood which is so popular on this board.

5 million years is a little too far back for even homo erectus.

[stan]

There's a channel called the Wallace's Line that runs between some of those Islands and Mainland of Australia, which
was supposed to
be a dividing line between ecosystems, the Asian and the Australian.
Could it be that it plays a part in this question. Could it be that this channel was never bridged by land?

http://www.radford.edu/~swoodwar/CLASSE ... lline.html

[Beagle]

Interesting Stan.

And I agree with Minimalist about the Straits of Gibralter. During the last glacial maximum sea levels fell as much as 300+ ft. Even then, scientists say, the Straits only had one, maybe two small islands above water. I think Mini even posted an article to that effect on this thread.