Journal Article

Ancient genomes show social and reproductive behavior of early Upper Paleolithic foragers

Ctr Biol Sequence Anal ; Danmarks Tekniske Universitet = Technical University of Denmark (DTU), Section for GeoGenetics ; Globe Institute ; Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences ; University of Copenhagen = Københavns Universitet (UCPH)-University of Copenhagen = Københavns Universitet (UCPH)-Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences ; University of Copenhagen = Københavns Universitet (UCPH)-University of Copenhagen = Københavns Universitet (UCPH), Sikora, Martin, Deviese, Thibaut, Manica, Andrea, Borutskaya, Svetlana B, Nigst, Philip R, Sousa, Vitor C, Institute of Ecology and Evolution ; Universität Bern = University of Bern = Université de Berne (UNIBE), Excoffler, Laurent, Russian Academy of Science (RAS), Orlando, Ludovic, McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research ; University of Cambridge [UK] (CAM), Institute of Molecular Biology of the National Academy of Sciences of Armenia (IMB NAS RA) ; National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Armenia [Yerevan] (NAS RA), Nielsen, Rasmus, Institute of Ecology an

2017

Overview

Present-day hunter-gatherers (HGs) live in multilevel social groups essential to sustain a population structure characterized by limited levels of within-band relatedness and inbreeding. When these wider social networks evolved among HGs is unknown. To investigate whether the contemporary HG strategy was already present in the Upper Paleolithic, we used complete genome sequences from Sunghir, a site dated to ~34,000 years before the present, containing multiple anatomically modern human individuals. We show that individuals at Sunghir derive from a population of small effective size, with limited kinship and levels of inbreeding similar to HG populations. Our findings suggest that Upper Paleolithic social organization was similar to that of living HGs, with limited relatedness within residential groups embedded in a larger mating network.

• Publisher: American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS),CCSD,American Association for the Advancement of Science,The American Association for the Advancement of Science
• Subject: Culture / DNA, Ancient / Environmental Sciences / Forage / Gene sequencing / Genome, Human / Genomes / History, Ancient / Hominids / Humans / Hunter-gatherers / Inbreeding / Mating / Multilevel / Paleolithic / Population Density / Population structure / Reproductive behavior / Reproductive Behavior - history / Russia / Social behavior / Social Behavior - history / Social Networks / Social organization / Social Organizations