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Some people think our global family tree is neat and linear — one trunk, a few tidy branches, and everyone filing out in orderly lines. 🥱 A 2022 study by Wohns, McVean and colleagues, published in Science, and summarised in New Scientist, throws a spanner in that fantasy. Instead of a tidy family tree, what they found is a jungle — tangled, sprawling, and very, very African.
Let’s set the stage. For 20 years geneticists have been reading whole genomes, and this study compiled 3,609 complete genomes (plus cameo appearances from three Neanderthals and one Denisovan). Add to that another 3,589 ancient DNA samples too broken to join the party but still whispering clues, and you get the largest genealogy of our species ever attempted: a 2-million-year-long family reunion. Imagine a WhatsApp group chat with every human who ever lived — chaos, drama, and receipts included. 📲
So what did the receipts say?
First shock: the earliest genetic variants cluster in north-east Africa, especially modern Sudan. The oldest ones — about 2 million years old — predate Homo sapiens entirely and belong to early Homo. Translation? Africa wasn’t just our cradle; it was the workshop, laboratory, and launchpad for the entire genus. 🍼🔬
Second shock: this wasn’t some Disney “Circle of Life” where one ancestral population gave birth to all of us. Instead, the data screams multiple African populations, diverging and reconnecting, like braided rivers. 🌊 Sometimes separated, sometimes mixing, always flowing. If you wanted one “Garden of Eden,” sorry — Africa gave you a whole greenhouse complex. 🌱🌱🌱
Third shock: the migration timelines are messy — gloriously messy. According to the genealogy, humans may have reached Papua New Guinea ~140,000 years ago, which is almost 100,000 years earlier than archaeology has confirmed. They may also have walked into the Americas ~56,000 years ago, long before the textbook figure of 18,000 years. 😳 Of course, archaeologists aren’t all buying this — glaciers back then blocked routes like an icy border wall. But then again, the White Sands footprints in New Mexico (23–21k years ago) and artifacts in Mexico (33k years ago) suggest we’ve been underestimating early wanderlust. Maybe humans were the original backpackers: “glacier in the way? no problem, we’ll figure it out.” 🎒❄️
Now, not everyone agrees. Geneticist Jennifer Raff warns us not to take the “Sudan = birthplace of all humanity” conclusion too literally. Fair. Fossils show H. sapiens in Morocco (~315k years ago) and Ethiopia (~233k years ago). The honest answer? Africa had many cradles. Humanity was a continental collaboration, not a one-city startup. 💡
And the plot thickens: a separate study of six sub-Saharan Africans from the past 18,000 years found three ancestral lineages — eastern, central, southern Africa — still circulating. Around 50k years ago, they interbred. By 20k years ago, they stopped. So even relatively “recent” Africa was more diverse than Europe is today. Let that sink in: while Ice Age Europe was a frozen monoculture, Africa was basically the original United Nations. 🌍✊🏾
So what’s the big picture? This family tree shows humanity is not a straight trunk with branches but a tangled forest where branches intertwine, break off, and graft back together. Some lineages vanish, others persist, and some masquerade as “new discoveries” only because their cousins elsewhere died out. Every one of us carries ghosts of lost populations. Your DNA is a graveyard and a diary. 🪦📖
But perhaps the most important takeaway is this: Africa is the beating heart of the human story. Not a side chapter, not a forgotten prelude, but the main stage. The deepest lineages, the most ancient splits, the boldest migrations — all African first. Every other continent? Spin-offs. Africa is the original showrunner. 🎬
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8 Myths This Study Buries (with a smile)
1. Myth: Humanity had one “Garden of Eden.”
Truth: Africa had many cradles, braiding lineages over millennia. 🌱
2. Myth: Africa is a genetic blank slate.
Truth: Africa holds the oldest, richest human diversity anywhere. 🧬
3. Myth: History starts when Europe enters the chat.
Truth: African DNA preserves 2 million years of Homo history. ⏳
4. Myth: People only reached the Americas 18,000 years ago.
Truth: Genetic whispers hint at 56,000 years — with footprints and tools as backup. 👣
5. Myth: Papua New Guinea was late to the party.
Truth: Try 140,000 years ago. The guest list was early and global. 🏝️
6. Myth: Neanderthals and Denisovans were strangers.
Truth: They’re in the family chat. You share group photos with them. 🧑🤝🧑Neanderthals and Denisovans are descendants of Homo Erectus which also dispersed originally from Africa.
7. Myth: Africa needs Europe to “explain” it.
Truth: Genomes themselves expose Africa’s central role, no middleman required. 🔥
8. Myth: Humanity is divided into races.
Truth: The tree shows only overlapping, reconnecting, intertwined branches. 🌳
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Final Thought
If you really want to understand who you are, stop staring at Europe’s footnotes and start listening to Africa’s archives. The world’s largest family tree just confirmed what oral traditions, archaeology, and common sense already whispered: we are all African relatives, arguing over the family barbecue. 🍗🔥
Source: Anthony Wilder Wohns et al. , A unified genealogy of modern and ancient genomes.Science375,eabi8264(2022).
