Scientists are sure that Homo sapiens first evolved in Africa, and we know that every person alive today can trace their genetic ancestry to there. It has long been thought that we began in one single east or south African population, which eventually spread into Asia and Europe.
Humans first evolved in Africa, and much of human evolution occurred on that continent. The fossils of early humans who lived between 6 and 2 million years ago come entirely from Africa. Most scientists currently recognize some 15 to 20 different species of early humans.
Homo sapiens evolved in Africa before expanding to spread around the globe. Genetic data indicate that the ancestors of current human populations outside Africa did not leave that continent until about 60,000 years ago.
The broad consensus now is that all modern humans are descended from an African population of Homo sapiens that migrated around the world but bred with local archaic populations as they did so.
Homo sapiens evolved exclusively and recently on that continent. At some point in prehistory, our ancestors migrated from Africa to Eurasia and replaced other subspecies of the genus Homo, such as Neanderthals.
A new genomic study has revealed that Aboriginal Australians are the oldest known civilization on Earth, with ancestries stretching back roughly 75,000 years.
Our species, Homo sapiens, has now spread to all parts of the world but it's generally believed that we originated in Africa by about 200,000 years ago.
The islands were settled by different seafaring Melanesian cultures such as the Torres Strait Islanders over 2500 years ago, and cultural interactions continued via this route with the Aboriginal people of northeast Australia.
It is generally held that Australian Aboriginal peoples originally came from Asia via insular Southeast Asia (now Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, East Timor, Indonesia, and the Philippines) and have been in Australia for at least 45,000–50,000 years.
It is true that there has been, historically, a small number of claims that there were people in Australia before Australian Aborigines, but these claims have all been refuted and are no longer widely debated. The overwhelming weight of evidence supports the idea that Aboriginal people were the first Australians.
Co-lead researcher Shimona Kealy said these people probably travelled through Indonesia's northern islands, into New Guinea and then Australia, which were part of a single continent between 50,000 and 70,000 years ago, when sea levels were 25-50 metres below the current level.
Modern humans originated in Africa within the past 200,000 years and evolved from their most likely recent common ancestor, Homo erectus, which means 'upright man' in Latin. Homo erectus is an extinct species of human that lived between 1.9 million and 135,000 years ago.
Common Questions about Mitochondrial Eve
Mitochondrial Eve is the female ancestor of all human beings. The reason is that the mitochondrial DNA passes on only though mothers to children, and the father has no role in it.
In human genetics, the Mitochondrial Eve (also mt-Eve, mt-MRCA) is the matrilineal most recent common ancestor (MRCA) of all living humans.
The real Garden Of Eden has been traced to the African nation of Botswana, according to a major study of DNA. Scientists believe our ancestral homeland is south of the Zambezi River in the country's north.
The likely "first human", she says, was Homo erectus. These short, stocky humans were a real stayer in human evolutionary history. Estimates vary, but they're thought to have lived from around 2 million to 100,000 years ago, and were the first humans to walk out of Africa and push into Europe and Asia.
Aboriginal Australians could be the oldest population of humans living outside of Africa, where one theory says they migrated from in boats 70,000 years ago. Australia's first people—known as Aboriginal Australians—have lived on the continent for over 50,000 years.
Genetic studies have revealed that Aboriginal Australians largely descended from an Eastern Eurasian population wave, and are most closely related to other Oceanians, such as Melanesians.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are the first peoples of Australia, meaning they were here for thousands of years prior to colonisation.
Aboriginal peoples
Genetic studies appear to support an arrival date of 50–70,000 years ago. The earliest anatomically modern human remains found in Australia (and outside of Africa) are those of Mungo Man; they have been dated at 42,000 years old.
Australian Prehistory: Humans are thought to have arrived in Australia about 30,000 years ago. The original inhabitants, who have descendants to this day, are known as aborigines. In the eighteenth century, the aboriginal population was about 300,000.
There is a problem with this story, namely that there is no evidence from the archaeological and biological records that a pygmy population ever existed in Australia or any people prior to Aboriginal people (1). So then why does this myth exist and persist?
All living people share exactly the same set of ancestors before the Identical Ancestors Point, all the way to the very first single-celled organism. However, people will vary widely in how much ancestry and genes they inherit from each ancestor, which will cause them to have very different genotypes and phenotypes.
On July 22, 1894, the Parisian magazine Le Petit Journal organized what is considered to be the world's first motoring competition, from Paris to Rouen. Sporting events were a tried and tested form of publicity stunt and circulation booster.
Africa is called the Cradle of Humankind because human life originated there. The name applies more specifically to a region in South Africa where fossil remains of several human ancestors have been found. The oldest evidence dates back three million years or more.