Around about 85,000 years ago my ancestors, and yours, took advantage of a bit of climate change and escaped northwards from Africa. They weren’t the first people in the genus Homo to make the break but there is good genetic evidence to suggest that all modern people outside of Africa are descended from that group.
They initially spread along the coast and by 74,000 years ago they had reached as far as China.
Mt Toba, a volcano in Sumatra then went pop, big time. Volcanic ash covered India and Pakistan, it produced a winter that lasted six years or so. The human population went through a bottleneck, there may have been no more than about 10,000 adults that survived this event. If you’re reading this your ancestors were in the lucky few, oh that gossamer thread.
Sometime in the ten thousand years after that folk in the east shook hands and said “good luck”. Some continued east and colonised Australia, others headed back west, and when things thawed out a bit colonised Europe. There is a nice summary of events <HERE>.
On 26 January 1788 the First Fleet arrived at Port Jackson and the descendants of those brave, early Homo sapiens were reunited. We are all one species. Your ancestors are my ancestors, my ancestors are yours. G’day.
bobmcgee 