The people behind the samples: Biographical features of Past Hunter-Gatherers from KwaZulu-Natal who yielded aDNA (original) (raw)
Related papers
Southern African Humanities, 2019
We report further details on four partial human skeletons from KwaZulu-Natal previously selected for genetic analysis. Dating and genetic results indicate that they derived from agriculturist communities of the mid-second millennium AD. Morphological and genetic analysis shows that three individuals were female; identification of the fourth as female comes from genetic analysis only. All four were adults at death, three older adults and one younger. Genetically, all four individuals cluster strongly with Bantu-speaking populations with West African roots, a result supported by craniometric data for the one individual with a complete and well-preserved cranium. All nevertheless display some admixture with Khoe-San populations. We show that three of the women, and probably the fourth, carried genetic resistance to the Plasmodium vivax malaria parasite, while two had some protection against Trypanosoma brucei gambiense-induced sleeping sickness. The unusual rock-shelter burial locations of three of the women suggest that their deaths required ritual 'cooling'. Lightning and violence are possible causes. We argue that this multipronged approach is necessary for the development of detailed and nuanced understandings of the past and of the individuals who lived in the region centuries ago.
Four Iron Age women from KwaZulu-Natal: biological anthropology, genetics and archaeological context
M. Steyn, G. Whitelaw, D. Botha, M. Vicente, C.M. Schlebusch & M. Lombard. Southern African Humanities 32: 23–56, 2019
We report further details on four partial human skeletons from KwaZulu-Natal previously selected for genetic analysis. Dating and genetic results indicate that they derived from agriculturist communities of the mid-second millennium AD. Morphological and genetic analysis shows that three individuals were female; identification of the fourth as female comes from genetic analysis only. All four were adults at death, three older adults and one younger. Genetically, all four individuals cluster strongly with Bantu-speaking populations with West African roots, a result supported by craniometric data for the one individual with a complete and well-preserved cranium. All nevertheless display some admixture with Khoe-San populations. We show that three of the women, and probably the fourth, carried genetic resistance to the Plasmodium vivax malaria parasite, while two had some protection against Trypanosoma brucei gambiense-induced sleeping sickness. The unusual rock-shelter burial locations of three of the women suggest that their deaths required ritual ‘cooling’. Lightning and violence are possible causes. We argue that this multipronged approach is necessary for the development of detailed and nuanced understandings of the past and of the individuals who lived in the region centuries ago.
An ill child among mid-Holocene foragers of Southern Africa
American Journal of Physical Anthropology, 2004
The skeletal remains of an infant from a southwest South African rock shelter at Byneskranskop show pervasive abnormalities that are consistent with the effects of hypertrophic (hyperplastic) rickets. Diagnostic features include beading of the costochondral junctions of the ribs, flaring and tilting of the metaphyses, and cupping of the distal ulna, as well as general skeletal hypertrophy. With an uncalibrated accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) radiocarbon date of 4820 Ϯ 90 BP (TO-9531), this is a very early instance of the condition, among foragers whose environment and diet make dietary shortages of active vitamin D or dietary calcium improbable. Carbon and nitrogen stable isotope ratios indicate a mixed diet, including marine as well as terrestrial protein. Solicitous care maintained the sick infant to an estimated age of 3.5-5 months; it was buried in a manner like that of other deceased group members. This case suggests that if infanticide was practiced, it was an option only during the immediate perinatal period, when this infant would have appeared normal. This is consistent with documentation of infanticide practices among historic foragers from southern Africa. Am
First Ancient Mitochondrial Human Genome from a Pre-Pastoralist Southern African 2014
The oldest contemporary human mitochondrial lineages arose in Africa. The earliest divergent extant maternal offshoot, namely haplogroup L0d, is represented by click--speaking forager peoples of Southern Africa. Broadly defined as Khoesan, contemporary Khoesan are today largely restricted to the semi-desert regions of Namibia and Botswana, while archeological, historical and genetic evidence promotes a once broader southerly dispersal of click--speaking peoples including southward migrating pastoralists and indigenous marine--foragers. Today extinct, no genetic data has been recovered from the indigenous peoples that once sustained life along the southern coastal waters of Africa pre--pastoral arrival. In this study we generate a complete mitochondrial genome from a 2,330 year old male skeleton, confirmed via osteological and archeological analysis as practicing a marine--based forager existence. The ancient mtDNA represents a new L0d2c lineage (L0d2c1c) that is today, unlike its Khoe--language based sister-clades (L0d2c1a and L0d2c1b) most closely related to contemporary indigenous San--speakers (specifically Ju). Providing the first genomic evidence that pre--pastoral Southern African marine foragers carried the earliest diverged maternal modern human lineages, this study emphasizes the significance of Southern African archeological remains in defining early modern human origins. Downloaded from South Africa at St. Helena Bay (32 O 45' 37S: 18 O 01' 47E, Supplementary figure S1 online). The body had been placed on an impermeable consolidated dune surface, on its right side in a fully flexed position (fig. by guest on October 2, 2014 http://gbe.oxfordjournals.org/ Downloaded from Briggs AW, Good JM, Green RE, Krause J, Maricic T, Stenzel U, Lalueza--Fox C, Rudan P, Brajkovic D, Kucan Z, et al. 2009. Targeted retrieval and analysis of five Neandertal mtDNA genomes. Science 325:318--321. Brotherton P, Endicott P, Sanchez JJ, Beaumont M, Barnett R, Austin J, Cooper A. 2007. Novel high-resolution characterization of ancient DNA reveals C > U--type base modification events as the sole cause of post mortem miscoding lesions. Nucleic Acids Res. 35:5717--5728. Brown KS, Marean CW, Herries AI, Jacobs Z, Tribolo C, Braun D, Roberts DL, Meyer MC, Bernatchez J. 2009. Fire as an engineering tool of early modern humans. Science 325:859--862.
Journal of Human Evolution, 2012
We report here on evidence of early Homo around 1.0 Ma (millions of years ago) in the central plains of southern Africa. The human material, a first upper molar, was discovered during the systematic excavation of a densely-packed bone bed in the basal part of the sedimentary sequence at the Cornelia-Uitzoek fossil vertebrate locality. We dated this sequence by palaeomagnetism and correlated the bone bed to the Jaramillo subchron, between 1.07 and 0.99 Ma. This makes the specimen the oldest southern African hominine remains outside the dolomitic karst landscapes of northern South Africa. Cornelia-Uitzoek is the type locality of the Cornelian Land Mammal Age. The fauna contains an archaic component, reflecting previous biogeographic links with East Africa, and a derived component, suggesting incipient southern endemism. The bone bed is considered to be the result of the bone collecting behaviour of a large predator, possibly spotted hyaenas. Acheulian artefacts are found in small numbers within the bone bed among the fossil vertebrates, reflecting the penecontemporaneous presence of people in the immediate vicinity of the occurrence. The hominine tooth was recovered from the central, deeper part of the bone bed. In size, it clusters with southern African early Homo and it is also morphologically similar. We propose that the early Homo specimen forms part of an archaic component in the fauna, in parallel with the other archaic faunal elements at Uitzoek. This supports an emergent pattern of archaic survivors in the southern landscape at this time, but also demonstrates the presence of early Homo in the central plains of southern Africa, beyond the dolomitic karst areas.
Scientific Reports
Skeletal remains discovered in Simon’s Town, South Africa, were hypothesised as being associated with a former Dutch East India Company (VOC) hospital. We report a novel combined osteological and biochemical approach to these poorly-preserved remains. A combined strontium (87Sr/86Sr), oxygen (δ18OVPDB) and carbon (δ13CVPDB) isotope analysis informed possible childhood origins and diet, while sex-specific amelogenin enamel peptides revealed biological sex. Osteological analyses presented evidence of residual rickets, a healed trauma, dental pathological conditions, and pipe notches. The combined isotope analyses yielded results for 43 individuals which suggested a diverse range of geological origins, including at least 16% of the population being non-local. The inclusion of δ13CVPDB had intriguing implications for three individuals who likely did not have origins in the Cape Town region nor in Europe. Peptide analysis on the dental enamel of 25 tested individuals confirmed they were ...
Ancient genomes from southern Africa pushes modern human divergence beyond 260,000 years ago
2017
ABSTRACTSouthern Africa is consistently placed as one of the potential regions for the evolution of Homo sapiens. To examine the region’s human prehistory prior to the arrival of migrants from East and West Africa or Eurasia in the last 1,700 years, we generated and analyzed genome sequence data from seven ancient individuals from KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. Three Stone Age hunter-gatherers date to ~2,000 years ago, and we show that they were related to current-day southern San groups such as the Karretjie People. Four Iron Age farmers (300–500 years old) have genetic signatures similar to present day Bantu-speakers. The genome sequence (13x coverage) of a juvenile boy from Ballito Bay, who lived ~2,000 years ago, demonstrates that southern African Stone Age hunter-gatherers were not impacted by recent admixture; however, we estimate that all modern-day Khoekhoe and San groups have been influenced by 9–22% genetic admixture from East African/Eurasian pastoralist groups arriving >...
Human remains from Ntshekane, an Early Iron Age site in central KwaZulu-Natal
L.S. Owens, C. Thorp & G. Whitelaw. Southern African Humanities 36: 201–243, 2023
Research at the Early Iron Age site of Ntshekane in central KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, recovered human skeletal remains representing a pregnant adult, two young adults and two infants. All were exposed by severe erosion. Ceramics and an interpretation of settlement history at Ntshekane suggest an infant buried in a grain pit dates to the Msuluzi phase (630–800), one young adult to either the Ndondondwane (800–950) or Ntshekane (950–1050) phase, the second young adult to the Ntshekane phase, with the pregnant woman and possibly the second infant belonging to the Ntshekane phase. The dentition of the pregnant woman and a modified tooth associated with the remains of one young adult indicate the practice of dental modification. Differences in the interments of the two infants possibly relate to the circumstances of their deaths.