An early Zagros hunter and his band. Visualised for me by Gemini AI. My great grandfather?
Introduction
This is the tale of a long journey from the last Ice Age to the present day—a history of my paternal lineage as determined by Y-DNA research, archaeology, linguistics, and, to be honest, a fair amount of conjecture. While this is the story of just one ancestral line of an East Anglian, it represents a single thread in a vast tapestry. There are thousands more ancestors in my past, but their specific stories are lost in the quagmire of genetic recombination. Our ancestry is far less localized than we conventionally think; you likely have a similarly epic story hidden in your own cells. I was simply lucky enough that this one followed a steady genetic marker down through the millennia.
The Subject Matter
I am an English "chappie" from an East Anglian family. However, a DNA test revealed a far more exotic signature:
Y-DNA Haplogroup L
(+M20 +M22 +M317 +SK1412 +SK1414 +FGC51041 +FGC51036)
For the sake of brevity, let’s call it L-FGC51036.
If I were to trace my father's line - back through grandfathers and great-grandfathers, all the way to the depths of the Last Glacial Maximum - who would that ancestor be? How did he survive the biting cold of the Ice Age, and where on this earth was he standing?
The Ice Age Pioneers: 25,000 Years Ago
This is where I believe my direct paternal ancestor lived 25,000 years ago. The climate was seasonally harsh as the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) approached—a period when life in the Zagros would eventually become intolerable. For now, however, my Ice Age ancestor and his band survived by hunting large game, particularly the Bezoar Ibex (wild goat) and the Mouflon (wild sheep). This was the dawn of a profound relationship; our later ancestors would slowly forge a bond with the local ibex, eventually leading to its domestication. By exploiting the varied habitats across different altitudes of the Zagros valleys, they practiced what anthropologists call vertical hunting.
These were not the first humans to inhabit the region. Anatomically modern humans arrived circa 40,000 years ago, but Neanderthals had made these valleys their home long before. While my 23andMe results suggest I have more Neanderthal DNA than 98% of their customers, I take that specific metric with a grain of salt. Regardless of that ancient admixture, these modern humans in the Zagros—likely my direct ancestors—are known to archaeologists as the Baradostian Culture.
The Baradostians are often linked to the Aurignacian Culture of Europe, the famous pioneers who trekked across the European continent between 40,000 and 33,000 years ago. While the European Aurignacians left behind splendid cave paintings and sculptures—often featuring lions—the Baradostians of Southwest Asia left a more subtle mark. Some researchers even suggest that the Aurignacians were actually Baradostians who had migrated into Europe.
While we find fewer examples of Ice Age artwork in the Zagros, this may simply be due to sampling bias; modern politics and conflict often hinder archaeological investigation in the region. Instead, we look to their flint assemblages. The Baradostians were adept at knapping small bladelets and crafting burins—sharp, chisel-edged tools used for piercing hides. They utilized massive limestone caves and rock shelters, such as Shanidar and Yafteh, as seasonal basecamps. Inside, archaeologists have found evidence of large, central hearths where families would gather to cook, repair tools, and perhaps pass down the oral traditions that kept their culture alive.
But the climate was shifting. By 20,000 years ago, the LGM arrived in full force. Even the hardy Baradostians could no longer endure the mountain winters, and the culture faded away as they retreated to more hospitable refuges.
The Aurignacians were not the first Europeans. With the previous post on the Apidima 1 skull fragment from Greece, dated to circa 210,000 years ago, I established that humans with modern Homo sapiens features may well have been wandering in and out of parts of Europe for a very long time. Neither was Apidima 1 the first European. Earlier humans, including Neanderthals had been around Europe for a very long time. Before them, earlier hominins, such as Homo heidelgergensis; and Homo antecessor who left artefacts and footprints on a Norfolk beach, some 800,000 to 900,000 years ago. Recently, stone tools found in Ukraine during the 1970s have been dated to 1.4 millions years of age, and may be associated with an Homo erectus type hominin.
Not the first Europeans, but here in this post I am going to investigate the earliest modern human artefact culture that we currently know to have established itself in Europe, and even in Britain. I'm going to discuss the Aurignacians.
Thought to have spread into Europe from SW Asia in the Levant, where the culture is also found, it has been proposed that an earlier origin could be the Zagros Mountains of Western Iran, where similar tools have been recorded.
Aurignacian yDNA haplogroups so far discovered are C1a, C1b, and K2a
Aurignacian mtDNA haplogroups include N, R, and U.
Of these, only the mtDNA hapologroup U is still common in modern Europe.
Concluded that a 37,000 year old Aurignacian genome has some continuity into the modern European population, and was more akin to modern Europeans, than was a contemporary sample from China. The division between Western Eurasians, and Eastern Eurasians dates back to include the Aurigacians in the West. A contribution to modern European DNA has been identified albeit a small percentage. The genomes sequenced indicated that they were likely dark-skinned and brown eyed, but with reservation.
Here we present genome-wide data from three individuals dated to between 45,930 and 42,580 years ago from Bacho Kiro Cave, Bulgaria1,2. They are the earliest Late Pleistocene modern humans known to have been recovered in Europe so far, and were found in association with an Initial Upper Palaeolithic artefact assemblage. Unlike two previously studied individuals of similar ages from Romania7 and Siberia8 who did not contribute detectably to later populations, these individuals are more closely related to present-day and ancient populations in East Asia and the Americas than to later west Eurasian populations. This indicates that they belonged to a modern human migration into Europe that was not previously known from the genetic record, and provides evidence that there was at least some continuity between the earliest modern humans in Europe and later people in Eurasia. Moreover, we find that all three individuals had Neanderthal ancestors a few generations back in their family history, confirming that the first European modern humans mixed with Neanderthals and suggesting that such mixing could have been common.
Recent arrivals into Europe, with connections to present day West Eurasian populations, and they had some recent Neanderthal ancestry mixed into modern.
The Proto-Aurignacian and the Early Aurignacian stages are dated between about 43,000 and 37,000 years ago. The Aurignacian proper lasted from about 37,000 to 33,000 years ago. A Late Aurignacian phase transitional with the Gravettian dates to about 33,000 to 26,000 years ago.
That is actually a very long time period. One research project proposed a Europe-wide population of only 1,500 at a time. Extended over a long period of many thousands of years.
Interview with Dr James Dilley on the use of these antler points. He suggests that a lack of good wood with which to construct spear shafts may have led to them employing more breakable split antler points to preserve the valuable shafts. The points could have also improved the bleeding out of quarry. Perforated batons are also common on their sites. Use is unknown.
Flint bladelets as with some later cultures, are often a feature of Aurignacian sites. Typical hunter's lithics utilising flint with great economy.
Continental sites produce volumes of reindeer bone. It seems to have been their target prey.
Their landscapes were increasingly cold, open, and treeless.
Culturally they left high quality cave paintings in South France, and carved ivory pieces in Germany. The first Venus figure. The Lion Man. They often painted and sculptured lions, which may have been important to their belief system.
Image. Recorded Aurignacian sites in Britain. Coastline would have been far further out than in the above image. The North Sea was dry, and Britain connected to the continent.
A study of flint burins to type in comparison with sites in Belgium and France. Occupation of the British peninsular would have been impossible for long periods. The conclusion:
British Aurignacian burins busqués are technologically indistinguishable from those found in Belgium
and at Abri Pataud in southern France c. 32 000 14C BP, or c. 37 000 cal BP. Therefore, the
Aurignacian can be considered to have appeared in Britain at this same time. The proposed
c. 32 000 14C BP appearance of burins busqués accords with the few radiocarbon dates from other
sites which directly date Aurignacian occupation of Britain. Morphologically similar lozangic-type
osseous points are also present at Abri Pataud and in Britain at this time.
This period apparently coincides with or closely follows the most significant warm phase during the
lifetime of the Aurignacian: Greenland Interstadial 8. An environmental response to this climatic
amelioration is therefore a plausible reason for the extension of Aurignacian ranges northwards at this
time.
and:
In spite of an overall paucity of material, the presence of two bladelet production techniques suggests
that there were at least two Aurignacian occupations of Britain, or that occupation was sufficiently
prolonged to encompass the replacement of one by the other. The precise timing of what is interpreted
as the more recent of the two techniques – the Paviland burin method – is currently unknown.
More than one occupation during warmer periods around 32,000 years ago, or / and 37,000 years ago. These coincide with warmer interstadials. Find-sites include Goughs Cave, Kents Cavern, and Goats Hole, Paviland. Britain's classic Aurignacian skeletal remains are those of The Red Lady of Paviland. A male who had died in Britain circa 31,000 years ago.
Ice Age reindeer hunters on the European tundra with a talent for the arts. They hunted with split antler tipped throwing spears. They had music, and made flutes, using the long leg bones of vultures. They were talented artists, leaving ivory and bone sculptures, and their famous cave paintings. They were few, and moved around far, following herds and shifts in the bitter weather. Their landscape was open and cold, treeless. Fauna would have included reindeer, tarpan / horses, steppe bison, woolly rhino, mammoth, cave lions, and hyenas. The lion may have been ritually important to their belief systems. They most probably encountered another type of human in Europe - the Neanderthals. Four percent of their own DNA, with long segments, originated among the Neanderthals. The artefact culture survived for thousands of years, until the approach of the Last Glacial Maximum some 25,000 years ago. They persist in a few percent of modern West Eurasian DNA.
In addition to reindeer hunting, some sites are associated with ancient coastlines, and pierced seashells have been found as personal ornamentation. No evidence of fishing, but they may have foraged for shellfish. Ornamentation also includes the teeth of carnivores such as lions and foxes. Red ochre was applied on some remains.
This investigation has really helped me to imagine them. The Europeans who lived here before Last Glacial Maximum. I was really surprised just how many resources there are available online. I've barely touched on this subject. I have only touched on their cave art
I don't want to violate copyright by sharing Tom Björklund's fantastic art work here, but here is a link to his take on the Aurignacian people. I think that creativity blended with archaeology really helps:
