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Wallacean Archipelago
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The role of Plant Foods in the evolution and Dispersal of early Humans kernsverlag.com Jul 30, 2022 11 facts
claimThere is no direct evidence for Pleistocene plant food use by Homo sapiens or earlier hominin populations in the Wallacean Archipelago due to poor preservation and a lack of systematic archaeobotanical recovery.
claimGenetic evidence suggests that Denisovans may have been present in the Wallacean Archipelago, based on admixture with early Australian and New Guinean populations.
perspectiveO’Connor et al. (2017) argue that the use of a diverse range of shellfish, fish, and other marine resources by early modern humans in the Wallacean Archipelago demonstrates their adaptive capacity and dietary flexibility, rather than just a reliance on easy-to-capture resources.
claimEarly human populations likely utilized culturally transmitted knowledge regarding the ecology and processing requirements of tropical plant foods, combined with the cognitive capacity to apply this knowledge to novel species and environments, to migrate across the Wallacean Archipelago and into Sahul.
claimH. erectus likely made limited water-crossings to island environments in the Wallacean Archipelago, alongside several proboscid and rodent species.
measurementHominin dispersal into the Wallacean Archipelago and Sahul is evidenced by stone tools found on Flores (1 million years ago), the Philippines (709,000 years ago), and Sulawesi (200,000 years ago).
claimThe movement of humans across the Wallacean Archipelago and the peopling of Sahul, the Pleistocene continent encompassing Australia, New Guinea, and the Aru Islands, represents a critical threshold in human history where populations crossed biogeographic boundaries that were impassable for other animals, including hominin ancestors such as Homo floresiensis, Homo luzonensis, and possibly Denisovans.
claimEarly modern human populations in the Wallacean Archipelago and mainland Sahul relied on marine resources.
claimGenetic restrictions from Asian mainland populations led to the allopatric speciation of dwarfed hominins, specifically H. floresiensis and H. luzonensis, in the Wallacean Archipelago.
claimThe colonization of the Wallacean Archipelago by early modern humans, which relied heavily on lean marine proteins like shellfish and fish, necessitated access to fats and carbohydrates from other sources.
claimEarly human populations at the Madjedbebe archaeological site exploited plant genera including Buchanania, Canarium, Livistona, Pandanus, and Terminalia, which are found across the Wallacean Archipelago and the southern dispersal arc.