The First Great Awakening
Part 2, The Toba Eruption.
The first 130,000 years of Sapiens existence was relatively benign for
the most part. We as a species had settled into a survivable niche in the
ecosystem of ancient Africa, especially in and around the great rift valley,
which is in present day Ethiopia. With a firm grasp on hand held tools (pun
intended) such as hand axes, knives, spears, and scrappers we were capable of
butchering scavenged meat and keeping other hungry species away while we were.
I cannot forget to mention the importance of fire. When our ancient ancestors
figured out how to harness and recreate fire at will truly put us on a course
for greatness as a species. It was fire and our ability to control it that set
us up for stardom as a species. Fire allowed us to cook our food, cooking makes
more foods edible year round and releases more nutrients and calories from both
meat and vegetables. All these extra calories gave us extra energy which in
turn made our brains 20 percent larger than our closest evolutionary cousins.
It was our larger brains that allowed us to develop complicated languages and
to think cooperatively. It is our ability to work cooperatively and to
communicate that made us who we are as a species, but as usual I digress, we
must go back to 74,000 years ago, I will post about fire, tools and food at a
later date. As I was stating before I went off topic, Homo sapiens had settled
into a nice little niche as scavengers and gatherers (hunting small game occasionally)
in the African savannahs and the Rift valley until the first real extinction level
event came crashing down on us.
Seventy four thousand years ago a volcano in what is present day Sumatra
erupted. It was one of the largest eruptions the Earth had ever known and it
spewed ash miles into the atmosphere causing a volcanic winter that lasted
between 6-10 years. The earth was already in the midst of another Ice Age and
it is believed that some places dropped 20 degrees almost overnight. This
ecological disaster caused a world wide catastrophe that nearly led us humans
to extinction. At the height of the volcanic winter it is purported that there
may have been as few as 40 “breeding pairs” of Homo Sapiens left in the world.
Think about that for a minute, 40 breeding pairs means under a hundred sapiens
left alive. Remember we weren’t the only HUMAN species alive back then as I
stated in Chapter One, there were at least four other Homo species wandering
the earth when Toba erupted; Neanderthal, Homo Erectus, Homo Florensis (hobbit
man) and the Denisovans, all of them except for perhaps Erectus, who had been
around for nearly 2 million years and was the first Human species to leave Africa,
lived through the Toba explosion. Researchers, including myself, believe that
Erectus, if they were still around then were probably killed out by the
eruption since they mainly resided in Asia and would most likely have been in
the “kill zone”. Sad that after 2 million years they were wiped out by a
volcano, again that is a post for another time. So within a few years of the eruption
there were less than a thousand of us left and the landscape we were used to
was gone. Lakes, rivers and savannahs just disappeared. North Africa became a
desert wasteland cutting us off from escaping the continent so the few
surviving Sapiens did the only thing they could, they headed for the coast. Why
Sapiens hadn’t really adapted a coastal life before is a slight mystery but
most researchers believe that sapiens were content inland in the rift valley
and had no need to expand their ecology at the time. “Necessity is the Mother
of all invention”, I’m not sure who coined that first but it applies here for
sure. Sapiens were pushed out of the mainland and onto the coasts do to the natural
catastrophe that had reshaped the landscape and the climate they were used to.
Ironically it is our time in the caves of the Western and Southern shores of
Africa that gave us what truly makes us stand apart from any other species of animal
on this planet, culture. It was on the coasts that the rag tag bunch of
survivors found our spiritual and cultural roots. In the caves where our
ancestors not only survived but thrived after a near extinction level event is
where archaeologists first discovered things like red ochre (primitive paint
that could only be used for decoration or artistic expression) seashell
necklaces, flutes made from bird bones and the other artifacts that would come
to signify our cultural and spiritual awakening.
The shorelines were teeming with
resources; shellfish, seaweed, seals, birds and a plethora of fish species, it
was heaven on Earth to these people who had just crawled out of a barren
wasteland nearly extinct and completely lost. Researchers believe it was the
abundant shellfish and fish that made our ancestors even smarter as these
highly nutritious foods became a staple of our diets, urging our brains to
expand even more. It is my personal belief that the food may have something to
do with it but what I think really spurred on our first great leap forward was
the mere fact that we as a species had just survived an extinction level event
and found a home that was like no other, the Garden of Eden if you will. As we
began to settle and thrive on the coasts our ancestors retold the tale of the eruption
the climate change and the resulting migration to the sea and all the blessings
that came with it as a sort of spiritual tale. Our first religious story if you
will. The coastal caves our ancestors fled to became our first spiritual or
sacred lands, we began to paint ourselves and adorn ourselves with jewelry as a
way to signify our connection to the land that saved us and gave us new life.
Had our brave ancestors not made that difficult journey across the inhospitable
landscape to the coast 74,000 years or so ago we would have never survived and
you and I wouldn’t be here right now.
In conclusion, it is my belief that
the Toba eruption actually spurred our spiritual and cultural evolution forward
by forcing our ancestors to flee to the coasts. It was in these caves that we
gave thanks and praise to the spirits for keeping us alive and helping us to
not overcome the worst catastrophe we as a species ever saw but to thrive after
nearly becoming extinct. I should note that every Homo sapiens alive can trace
their mitochondrial DNA (the maternal DNA) to one African woman, known as
Mitochondrial Eve, to about 75,000 years ago. This means you really do owe one
of those surviving few people your entire existence. In the next Chapter I will
take a closer look at the actual life in and around those caves. I hope you
enjoyed this installment and cannot wait for you to read the next post. Until
then have a great day and as always………………PEACE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
above image: various perforated shells found in a cave in South Africa that date back about 70,000 years ago.
А при чому тут Африка? Чи це так хочеться автору? Чи він знайомий з останніми відкриттями археології? Чи продовжує відстоювати компартійну лінію прихільників Дарвіна та шкільні підручники 50-60 років ХХ ст.? То треба ж якось розвиватись, а не сидіти скам`яніло на старому мисленні!
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