Why Homo sapiens Survived Alone

Ever wondered why the Romans were defeated in the Tutterburg forest? what secrets lie buried in prehistoric Ireland? or what made Alexander truly great with a subscription to History hit You can explore our ancient past alongside the world's leading historians and archaeologists. You'll also unlock hundreds of hours of original documentaries with a brand new release every single week covering everything from the ancient world to World War two. Just visit historyhit dot com slash suubbscribe. So how did Rome begin With a throne, a triumph, or a murder between brothers Well, according to legend, the mighty city was founded by the twin sons of Mars, Romulus and Remus abbandoned as infants, suckled by a she wolf and destined for greatness until ambition poisoned their body I'm Tristin Hughes and I cannot wait to get into the explosive story of Romulus and Remus on the ancient live tour in Australia and New Zealand this August I'm going to be joined by the fantastic Jeremy Armstrong. He's a professor of Ancient history and an expert on early Rome. Ketather We'll follow the myth from Divine origins to blood soaked Fing legend teeasing apart what the Romans believe archaeology can actually tell us and How a city built on stories became one of the greatest powers in history. Tickets are on sale now. We're coming to Canberra on the second of August And we're going to be in Auckland on the eighth The tickets they are selling far, so book yours now at fame. com. au. Can't wait to see you there We are used to sharing our planet with millions of other species But only one human species has survived Homo sapiens. Mern humans. Us. Now, this wasn't always the case Early in our story, tens of thousands of years ago We lived alongside several other species of humans. relelatives who shared our world who evolved alongside us sometometimes competing sometimes coexisting ultimately suffering extinction. Like the Nean Ts in Europe and the Denisovans in Asia Human evolution is less like a family tree and more like a tangled web, with new discoveries revealing more about this every year. Welcome to the Ancients I'm Tran Hughes, your host. And this is the story of the early humans who once shared our world Our guest is the paleoanthropologist, presenter, comedian and author Ea Al Shimahi. Ella's new tour, becoming human continues in the UK on the twenty eighth of May Ella, it is great to have you back on the show. Well, thanks so much for having me. I had so much fun last day. It was a lot of fun. And today we're kind of doing A tour of our Einct human relatives, arrchaic humans? Those extinct people, but yeah yeah. the archaics. But, but explaining this, if we went back a hundred thousand years, it wasn't just us. It wasn't just Homo sapiens. There was a whole range of different humans that lived on the earth I cannot get my head round how the public have not fully been introduced to this concept until very, very recently. I kind of had a real fun with this, should we say, for the series Human and in my tour actually as well, because I explain it to people as this is pretty much the only time in human history where one species of human has walked this eararth We're alone today But we never used to be alone. And I think it's so difficult for us to understand because We are the main species in our minds at least on this planet. We are the only human. Nobody comes close in terms of this that and the other also we think. And actually, what's happening right now is incredibly unusual We previously were a regional species And there were lots of other human species who were kind of also regional species And there were lots of us, and I often say it was a lot like Lord of the Rings And A big question as is to how many species there were. of us think that the number that we have right now is the tip of the iceberg. You know, I'm sorry, I think you can easily argue that this is the golden age of paleanthropology and that that number will keep growing. I mean, we keep finding spec it. like it's I don't even I can't comprehend how how big the family tree has got since I became a paleanthropologist, you know, so O like when I was like eighteen and now I'm you know forty two. like the extent to which the family tree has expanded is shocking Absolutely shoc Like they found one hobbit species We thought that was quite impressive. they think they've found two hobbit species The family ch just keeps expanding. I mean, two words just king off Indonesian islands. How exciting right in the future As you say, tip of the iceberg, how many more species we find even just from that one area? Yeah. Okay, so basically twenty odd years ago They discovered a new species of human. They called it Homousiensis because it was found on the island of Flores. It was absolutely shocking. I remember, you know, so young at the time and just being like, What They've done what and it was basically I mean, to the point where when they found this skull, they assumed it was a child because it was so small. And then they realizeed Anatomically, no that's an adult. And it was so controversial There were like shouting matches in anthropology conferences because there was people kind of understandably being like one Fossil does not a species mate. You can't find one fossil that's unusual and you know, it could be microcephaly, could be dwarfism, it could be this, it could be that, you can't just be cllaiming this crazy thing which is And for those of you who kind not familiar or as familiar with the field This is a species with a brain the size of the brain of chimpanzees brain the size of like an orange or grapefruit It's not really supposed to be a human brain that is capable of making stone tools potentially manipulating fire It doesn't make sense. It's not the way we thought humans were defined And yet here we are with a species that by the way is probably comes up to my hip. so it's probably the size of a four year old Or as one of my friends said recently, the size of a penguin This is perfect. On an island called Flores with giant Komodo dragons, giant rats giant, carnivorous flash eating maribou stalks that are taller than me and these miniature Elephant like creatures, they're relatives of elephants, they're called stegdons, and on this island they were so small that they were the size of cows. And there's a reason why we say it was like Lord of the Rings. Like you know what I mean? This is a fantastical world. It's kind of bonkers And yeah, when the team first found this skull, they like people couldn't believe it. took a really long time to convince some people It was basically when they started finding more of these fossils undreds of thousands of years apart, they were like, okay, that's not microcephally, that's not atorph is it That's a species But then they went and found on an island in the Philippines what looks like a second hbit species And at this point, you're like This is why a lot of us are just like, this is the tip of the iceberg And this the thing I want to start with that because I said tip of the iceberg, imagine how many Indonesian islands there are. I always think of Suluzi. You know what What a jewel in the crown for archaeology and paleoarchcheology that they could well be coming out of there in the coming years and you know what other species they may well find Yeah they've done that. Yeah, Soidozi. I mean, right now there's the oldest figurative art that we know of in the world is from Siduzi It's absolutely incredible. Some people think it's actually not art that we made. someome people actually think it's Deniss made that art There's a wild boar there as well. It's like that's the first figures. water pigs. Yeah It's wild it's, you know, it's wild It's yeah, it's an absolutely incredible thing. I think it's so hard for us to get our heads aroundound I think for me to The thing that I'm really keen for people to kind of understand is that this was a world of many. And now we're the only ones left. And in that world of many, they were the specialists. they were the experienced ones. They were the ones that were really well adapted We weren't We we were the new kid on the block and it wasn't like we were the new kid on the block and we were exceptional and like You know, We turned up and it was written in the stars. you know, it was obvious that we were going to inherit the earth, so to speak It was none of that. We pretty average to start off with But the classic image you get, isn't it? And I think you can actually even see it on the ancient logo if you look closely enough is the image. first off you have a chimp. Then you have someone slightly bigger and then bigger and then alost to hunch over and then to And it's like kind of it one species after another and you slowly get less ape like and more like a modern human And this idea that one species came after the other and then they just got more and more advanced as time goes on. We gott to throw that in the bin, don't we? Yeahah. So that is called the March of Progress, or a lot of people just know it as the descent of Man image I always argue that I have two problems with that particular image. The first is that there are no women on it. And it's not that I love men. it's not that. often to my detriment, let me tell you. but it's not that. it's that off all the things in the world, that is the one thing that men were not doing on their own like propriating. L and you're just like, come on guys. And then the second issue that I have with that particular image is that it gives the impression that evolution is linear Species A goes to species B, Scies A disappears goes extinct. And it's just not the case. In fact, human evolution now, we understand is like some kind of a crazy crazy ar bush tree. likeike it's just this thing that nobody really understands We're actually having massive debates about is that even a species where we don't know. Maybe it's a hybrid, Maybe it's this, Maybe it's that, you know, and nobody can even agree on what a species is Is that a kind of worms that we can tackle? what is a species? Yeah, and I think it's worth doing that because I think confuses a lot of people and if it makes you feel any better all the lovely listeners out there and viewers Join the club. None of us know what a species is But I think there's a reason for that. So basically We were taught at school the biological spepecies concept That whole idea that, you know, a mule basically, so a horse and a donkey get together the offspring they have offspring, but the offspring is infertile. That is a biological species concept That is one of over twenty species concepts So once you get to university and you're studying taxonomy and speciation, you realize that actually biologists can't agree on what a species is and that's why there are so many different spepecies concept And the truth is Species don't really exist It is just a You know, we are trying to put borders and definitions and parameters on nature. nature knows no parameters and borders, right? And so It's a useful tool, but we should understand it for what it is, which is pretty loose. because we have covered in our last chat Clear evidence Neans and humans had sex Yeah But I think as we'll explore other figures like the Denisvans today, there's also evidence of interbreeding Nandal Denisipans, Denisipans, Hmer sapiens as well. Yeah. And so that is where it does start getting really blurs that lines, doesn't it? Yeah, it really, really does. And it's interesting because I think A lot of people now know about the Neanderthal interbreeding with us because a lot of people have done their DNA and they know that they've got, you know a little bit of Neanderthal DNA in them But I think there's this really interesting narrative that's come up. God, I even heard Neil De Gras Tyson the other day saying, oh, well, you know, Africans are God I'm paraprasing him, but it was something like, o Africans are the purer homo sapiens because those outside of Africa have interbred with these other species of humans And the funny thing is that's actually incorrect because not only do we know that that there is a little bit of neandersal DNA in Sub Saharan Africans just because of back migration. And what I mean by that is that yes, the interbreeding happened outside of Africa in all likelihood, but some people kind of went back into Africa And this is a really important thing. A lot of us were looking at this guy There's a lot of human species and we keep finding new human species And there is this thing where we seem to constantly just be having sex with each other. so And a lot of us were like We think that was probably interbreeding within subub Saharan Africa with an ancient species. And shockingly, a team actually uncovered that some modern day West Africans have a signature of what we call a ghost lineage So a ghost lineage is when you're You're analyzing DNA And you can see a very clear intrusion or what we call introgression of foreign DNA into the genome that does not belong to sapiens, it belongs to somebody else. But they don't have the source material. With the anantthes, they have source material, right? When the anthals, we've got anthal genome, with denisopin, we've got a denisopine genome, we've got few of them, right? We just don't have Whoever this ghost lineage is. So I think it's Euroba and a few others from West Africa. There is a signature of an ancient species who And we're like what? I don't know who they are Yeah. So some of the guys behind N leddi the discovery of Homo E Ledi Some of those guys are like, oh maybe it's Nenedi, becauseuse Nedi is in South Africa but it could be Heidelbergenzs. we know those Heidelbegenzs is still in Africa at that time It could be another species we don't even know about. But yeah, so even even if you are from Sub Saharan Africa, you will possibly have some alien DNA in you like the rest of us. Well, I think this is a fun time then to start a meet the team oret the tour. Meet the family or a quick tour of humanity. Who's your favorite then V My favorite is the one we're starting with Because it feels like the granddaddy, you know, the most successful species of all time I'm erectus. I'mo erectus. And he' What a record, almost two million years it was on this earth. It is really, really impressive. and I think it's such a Diverse species. It's both geographically diverse because they existed all over the old world. By the time we turned up, certainly by around three hundred thousand years ago We think they were really only in the far East And they were so different as you would expect, I guess, that some people actually think they're two species. So some people think it's Homo erectus and it's Homoregasta who are the African version of them. I think these days most of us don't like just it's probably just all Homo erectus and It Isn't the first species of Homo I think the species that came before Erectus, you could argue some of them were still in the trees. about Habilis. Yeah. Like Habilis is a big discussion about was haabilis only on two legs or they sometimes in the trees, it's You get to Erectus, Erectus was a biped and was really only a biped O obviously making stone tools So it was habillous to be fair. And some of the species before then, The the first species that we know of to leave Africa, although people need to stop discovering stuff because because there's been a few suggestions of stuff, but let's just not focus on that all in the last few weeks, should we say? but yeah,'s still early days on that stuff So' the first species of homin that we think of or that we think has left Africa incredibly successful And so I think that's also you know that descent of man image that you mentioned in the March of Progress You've got to imagine that that basically means the species like three species ago on that line is still around at the same time as others, which is part of the reason why that image just doesn't work anymore Yeah, but it' such Is it controversial to say that I prefer heomerotus Neandatals I mean, I'm surprised by that, I think. What how come? It's just more's wrong with you? like as an outsider in, first of all, I always like bucking the tread. But We did an interview a couple of years ago with John McNab from Southampton University. Yeah. And I remember, hopefully they got the video footage showing it. He sold you on it, didn't it? But he took out the hand axe and he said The fact that you find this tool whether it's in Southeast Asia. Wefrica or whatever the H erectors had the cognitive ability that they knew how to create this Pret difficult object, unlike the old anal and Mcquit tools from previous humans And they could then pass it down through generations. And then he was saying he's like, this was the mobile phone of like the time. But like that technological leap that he associated and having that hand ax tool and just the whole time period and the geographic extent of them I feel like Hermarectus deserves its due. It's time in the sun as well. It really, you know, and it doesn't I think the thing with Hermarectus bless also I think for a lot of the public, obviously they just remember the friends joke which which I get and it is really funny and obviously fromom the Latin erectors just means erect and it is kind of I get the funniness of it. I think that is part of the reason why that's why they haven't quite had their jam A think The probleblem with erectus is probably that they're so O that we don't have as much kind of granular detail on them like we have with the Neanderthals or some of the latater species. And so We kind of have a lot of certain like interesting anatomical quirks and we kind of know that they were probably manipulating fire We just don't have the stories. And part of the reason you don't have the stories is just because you kind of You need better resolution to have stories. like with Neanderthals, we've got just insane resolution at this point just because You know what it's like, the fossil record kind of gets worse and worse and worse thee An under the Viking longship on island shores, scramble over the dunes of ancient Egypt and avoid the poisonous' cup in Renaissance Florence. Each week on Echoes of History, we uncover the epic stories that inspire Assassin's Creed. We're stepping into feudal Japan in our special series Chasing Shadows, where samurai warlords and Shinobi spies teach us the tactics and skills needed not only to survive, but to conquer. Whether you're preparing for Assassin's Creed Shadows or fascinated by history and great stories, listen to Echoes of History, a Ubisoft podcast brought to you by History Hit. There are new episodes every week let's move on to the next one I've got, which is It seems to be the bit more disputed one, but Homo Hideob againensis. I used to think Homo hydibis been. I used to think there we go. Do that makes anyone feel any better E I can't say it Homa hideing Beenzis I used to just feel very comfortable with basically. I was like, great, Homahad Magzis is the common ancestor of U and the Neanderthals, everybody go home We were just kind of conveniently ignoring that it was quite an inconsistent species, do you know what I mean? It just seemed like like a dumping ground for a lot of other species or for a lot of fossils that didn't necessarily make sense. It felt more like a time period, if I'm to be honest, than an actual cohesive species. What time period roughly was it associated with? So I mean, to be fair, they called it the muddle in the middle. whichich kind of middle paleolithic, just just, I mean, obviously there are other species in that period as well, but it's just It's kind of I mean, technically Even more recently than three hundred thousand years, they were around But obviously, for a few hundred thousand years., how many hundred I guess it depends where you judge it from. But like four hundred thousand years, yes, I think five hundred thousand years as well. Like yeah, it's that mudd in the middle where everybody just goes, we don't know what to do with this And then increasingly I often refer to Chris Stringer, Pfessor Chris Dringer desperately try to use him on all of our projects as our main consultant And um It was interesting actually because we shot, we started shooting human And I was using the term hidleberensas knowing that he wasn't one hundred percent okay with it, And it went to him and he was like, guys, you just got a dump in. Do got a dumping? Yeah, he goes go he goes, you got to be careful because he goes it's just the way you're using it He goes just be careful because it's not because I wasn't just referring to it as like, my head against species. I was referring to it in the ancestal our common ancestor our like the common ancestor with Neanderthals and being that he's was one of the people that was kind of putting that forward that forward that theory, the fact that he was kind of going rethink it. we actually went back and reedited a scene so that I was no longer saying that because we just thought we'd like this show to be scientifically kind of relevant for at least two years So yeah, so how it begins this is something. whether it's One species or several, probably end up being one or two species. And the common ancestor between neanderals Senisphans and us We still don't really know. No No idea. No clue at all. Yeah, no clue at this point Should we talk about Denisivs? Yeah. come on because they deserve time in the spotlight as well, don't they? So so set the scene, Denisvvenans, whereereabouts we thinking in the world? Okay, so have you guys done it you must have done an episode on Denisivvenans? Iind dove. Okay And it involves Tibet and handprints up in the Tibet peninsula the Tibet plateau. Okay Yeah, which I'm sure will So yeah, so I think the thing the reason why a lot of us feel incredibly excited about Denisivvans is not just that we now call them Dragon Man as well, which just come on man. But it's that it was the Holy Grail of Paleanthropology. You know, I remember articles being written actually calling it the Holy Grail of Paleanthropology, and that's because Similar to the hobbit, it was completely unexpected So you've got to imagine twenty years ago, even fifteen years ago, we thought we kind of knew the landscape. And then we realized we really didn't know much That's why the landscape was generally like Homo sapiens in Africa Nanander was in Europe Hom erectus in I mean, we were still kind of debating if Homo erectis and the dates because I will say The dates in the F East U very controversial So I would say twenty years ago, people were open to it, but we weren't as confident as we are today. So then what happened was The incredible team at the Max Planank Institute, that's where Sante Puba, who won the Nobel Prize for sequencing Neandthal genenome, along with other things, I guess. his team were basically trying to extract Neandthal DNA off like anything they could find basically at this point A tiny little finger bone is absolutely tiny, was found in a cave in Siberia in Russia called Ais ofa cave They crushed it up. they were like, great, let's get mthiful DNA out of it and they actually extracted some neeanderthal DNA only upon examination. It wasn't a Neanderthal. It was human, but it wasn't homeomo sapiens and it was just explosive because they had realized they had accidentally stumbled upon a whole new human species And it was bonkers because they had They got to the point very, very quickly where they had the whole genome of the species sequenceced to really high resolution and yet had no idea what the species looked like. And that I cannt express this enough, has never happened before and is not generally the way one does this kind of thing. Usually you find a fossil And then you speent forever trying to extract its DNA, right That's what they're doing with Hobbit for exam, and that's what're doing Home and Eedi. They're desperly trying to extract DNA, because it would kind of be handy to know exactly where these fellas fell Fellas and Ladets, I should say And as they were Yeah as like they we were looking at this DNA, they were like, okay, so we've effectively now a position where we have the species DNA sequenced. we now know as a result all these things, for example, they realize that they were really closely related to the Neanderthals to the point where some palo anthropologists would actually argue that they're Asian Neanderthals. They realiz that they were incredibly closely related to us They realize that Tibetans have mutations that are very unique, that mean that the mechanism by which they are able to live at high altitude different to the mechanism that other people living today are able to live at high altitude. It's a completely different mechanism And that mechanism is from Denisovent. This is a fact very. And it's actually the best case that we have of really positive introgression into our genome. That's very easy to explain And then another team actually went and found these well they were actually sequencing these tiny little shards of bone from that same cave Denisva cave. And they were what you call undiagnostic bone. and for the archaeologists listening, you kind of know what undiagnostic bone is it's On an archaeological site or in an archaeological site, in an assemblage sometimes you find these little bits of shards of bone and you're like, well that could be human, that could be cave bear, that could be a bird. We've got no idea. Bag them because you always have hope as an archaeologist that somebody will invent This incredible technology that will tell you what it is, but mostly those just stay in bags in museums or like these sites and you know, they're just labeled But they started going through them. It was actually, I think a PhD student And she went through it and she realized She was using this incredible technology called Zoom MS And she realized that actually it was human and then they sent it for DNA testing. It turned out it was a girl who they nicknamed Denny and she was half Neanderthal, half Denisa. So they were at the point where they had a hybrid. They'd found a hybrid. Like nobody had ever found a hybrid of anything before of any human spe. They found a hybrid and they still had no idea what the species looked like And that's why people were saying it's the Holy grail of Paleanthropogy, we need to know what this species looks like. And there was lots of whispers, like loads of people were like, we think a lot of the Etern material, a lot of the material in the far East is theisvan and it's mislabeled. Is this where we get the name for the legendary name? Dragon M. Well. you would think because there's a lot of A lot of human material in that area does get called dragon this and dragon that and just as a site like this is completely side choute here, but it's just a fascinating detail It was sometimes ground up some of those teeth that her ancient human teeth were sometimes ground up for Chinese medicine. and then referred to as dragon teeth and what have you. So it's just a fascinating kind of little detail. But anyway The story goes that in China during World War twoI, when it was Japanese occupied that a gentleman had found this skull. It was quite a big skull, the harbin skull, we call it the harbin skull And he got concerned because the place was Japanese occupied So he hid it at the bottom of the well And then on his deathbed, he told his kids about it. So twenty twenty one, just before then they I think they gave it to some scientists And the scientists analyzed it and they were like, that is a big skull. Like it's a big skull. L it looks. bigger than in Neandth thought it certainly it looks bigger than I was and They basically were like, that's a new species. and they called it. Dragonan, basically. they called it Dragon Man. Now, there's two different details about this life think it really funny One is that wonderful story about the bottom of a well? Yeah, it's great. Yeah, it's been called into question. No Like some people are like,, we think it was a bit more suspect than that and that was like a cover up story. The other thing is it's worth saying that they had found a bit of Tibetan jawbone that they realized was Denisvan A few years earer and they did the DNA and they were like, said, they've got a bit, but it wasn't, you know, aull scar Yeah. So people are looking at this full kind of dragon man homoongi thing going, oh, come on What if that's the face of the Denisovans And then just this summer they did the DNA analysis and it came back as indeed the face of the Denisa. But how long is it just taking me to tell that story? That is the mystery of the Denisiva? But it's great. Noike. You did the story of the justice though because it's the same time that I'm tired. I need a braid. Do you know what I mean? L Okay,' not now. rightight. That's how amazing it is. like that's the kind of Hundreds of incredible academics putting work in unwrap a mystery that is like, you know, almost two decades old. Yeah I mean, that story. And then you see the replicas of that skull today Actually we have done epode with Chris on this. Yeah ye yeah. And first of all, the replica skull, which is green, which one hilarious. Yeah, it's because was that in a three D. What' you call it a? A three D printer? Yeah something that. Yeah, but it's incredible and it gives you the size cranium The fact that it's that new story, the link to Tibet today and explain why they can live at such high altitudes with this species as well And yes, normally you think, you know big skulls or you think of like the Neanders, but actually then you've got the Denisvan cousins as well with even bigger ones. So's just it's fascinating and it's developing all the time We did cover the Neanderals quite a lot in our last episode, but of course they are in the picture some a hundred thousand years ago as well. And at that time Although they still they've been around for a long time by them, but they're still doing incredibly well, aren't they? They are they are They're an incredibly successful species They were hanging on in Europe and in Central Asia. in climates where we weren't surviving, you know we'd have to let it out of there or we were becoming locally extinct We're never one hundred percent sure if we migrated out of there because it got too difficult, we just disappeared But yeah, we couldn't make it there But it's kind of funny in the context of all these other species in some ways the Neanderthals are the most immure You you know what I mean? Partly, I think because so many paleanthropologists, Europe is our backyard. So we have ended up digging here and people know the landscape and you know, there's Obviously the history of paleanthropology started, I guess, a bit more in Europe. I mean it was also happening in Africa, obviously as well It helps explain, you know, there's some fascinating stuff going on in the Far East that we're only just starting to understand And part of that is what you would call bias. like it's not in an intentional way. I just mean like That's where the researchers are. You know And also quite frankly, the interest is there for a popular audience. If you say Neanderthal on the podcast today There's a lot of interest in the Western world straight away because of that rec. Absolutely. But what's really interesting right now is in the far East, people are also really interested in human origin. Good, good. But also partly that's because there's this narrative that maybe humanity started from here. Right. Yeah. that's what we always do. we always I know this to be very common. like wherever you find something that's like therefore humumanity must have started here. Well shall we now go back to Africa and A country that even has a place called the Crle ofumanankind. But I don't think this was found at that location, was't, wasn't it The species you mentioned earlier, Fascinating one. Homem on Nedi. Yes You mentioned how when the hobbit was discovered Not is Disbelief when that was for Same thing with hormonality Yeah, so Ho N Ledi was found by two like amateur cavers. There were amateur cavers at the time, they've become a lot more professional since then. And they basically stumbled upon it was because it is in a place where there are so many human fossils. It actually I believe it's actually part it was already part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site. It' The cradle of kinds. Yeah They found another one of the humankind, basically, and they found like a bunch of fossils They took it to Professor Lee Berger, who's based out there and was based at Vittz University And they basically, I think they teamed up with National Geographic as well and they basically started this massive excavation project that also had this quite kind of full on media component and they They did a number of things. One is that This isn't quite revolutionary actually. They opened up the fossils to everyone I think it's fair to say the biggest criticism of our field is that we hold on to fossils like they're a treasure that nobody else is allowed to touch with in the field. It's a real problem I think there are serious ethical issues with it because it basically means that some of the most famous, most important fossils in our history which should be owned by all of us or at least We should all have scientific access to of some kind U behind lock and key and nobody can get to other than the researcher that's found them and one or two people that they allow in The team behind Leddys discovered did is they basically completely opened it up. They were like, it's open You want to come research we're going to make it straightforward for you Part of the reason though why they did that is, yes, they're kind of revolutionary in their thinking, but also it's because they had so many fossils. so many fossils I think they wanted help understanding what on Earth they were looking at I can't understand they were found in this cave And this cave system is quite difficult to get to. this particular bit of this the cave is quite difficult to get to And there's not much else in there. So if it was a If it was for example because let's say a flood or bear or some kind of carnival was taking home owner Ledy in this human species in you would expect them to also be taking other food or if it was a flood, you would expect other bones, other animals to Re emerge just H own Lady It's very difficult to give an interpretation to that other than burial, that they were intentionally basasically by their peers This Hermoede is a tiny species, not as small as the hobbit, but small And they've got small brains. and traditionally we have been told and we understand Ver weo You know, I mean, we see animals moreourn for other animals. We've all seen videos of elephants and, you know, really kind of incredible behaviors Burly isn't just a an emotional behate bit. It's a behavior at a different level. Like you know when You think about what very ill is. Yes, they might not believe in an afterlife. I'm not saying that. Burial is not something. that is associated with a small brain and you've got them doing burial And a lot of us now just think that's veryer. It was really controversial when it first came out, but I think we're at the point where it's like, It does look like Laria. I remember that. I remember that there were lots people. there was a lot of push backack at the start saying, We just need more proof. We need to analyze the. But I that's the beauty of as time goes on. having that scientific technology, it's like, yeah, it looks pretty, pretty clear now. it looks one hundred thousand years old or Yeah, I mean, so basically one hundred thousand I mean, it depends how you look at it, but certainly Around three hundred thousand there were still around, there were probably still around one hundred thousand as as well. I remember the last estimate At the same time as modern humans in Aerm. Yeah. nice little bit of overlap I can't remember when exactly they ended. I should probably check that, but yeah, but certainly three hundred thousand years when we were there, were they were around ye Land a Viking Longship on island shores, scramble over the dunes of ancient Egypt and avoid the poisonous's cup in Renaissance Florence. Each week on Echoes of History, we uncover the epic stories that inspire Assassin's Creed. We're stepping into feudal Japan in our special series Chasing Shadows, where samurai warlords and Shinobi spies teach us the tactics and skills needed not only to survive, but to conquer. Whether you're preparing for Assassin's Creed Shadows or fascinated by history and great stories, listen to Echoes of History, a Ubisoft podcast brought to you by History Hit. There are new episodes every week So those are someome of the other big species. So it's kind of useful to think about this for a second. Yeah. You've got us, obviously, you've got the Neanderals, you've got the Denisvans, you've got Homo erectus, you've got Homohydrbogensus, even though we're not hundred percent sure if it's a true species, but there's something going on there You've got H own and Leddy. Did I already say the hobbit? No. We mentioned it earlier H Fluiziensis. Fluiziensis The second what we think hobbit like species, homo Lz on Ninis.is. So you're looking at eight human species that were contemporaneous with us The magnificent eight. But here's the really, really interesting thing If that ghost lineage that is in those West Africans is not Lenedi and it's not Heidel Bogenzis, that means that there were nine species. At least Yeah, no, contontemporanares At least at least at the time. And once again so that ghost species is the one that our an sister. So in West Africans Some populations of West Africans There is a signature of an ancient species that introgressed that kind of its DNA kind of came into ours, our homo sapien DNA. It's alien DNA We call it a ghost lineage because we don't have the source. So if Like with the neandthal DNA in ours, we know it's two percent, but we would never call that ghost linage because we know the source of it. Oras we call it a ghost because we're like,, we have no idea who you are.ike why are you show yourself? If you take nothing away from today Viewers and listeners, can I just suggest It's the term ghost lineages. But I mean that is very, very cool. We've covered everything from ghost lineages to Dragon Man. Yeah and more. H five. Mold on. Yes Gs I If there was at least eight or nine lineages that well, spepecies one hundred thousand years ago We talked in the last episode about, you know larger genetic variation, bigger groups from a sapiens how they can then the Anstel was ultimately in dgo extinct before all the others Is it just quite a big element of luck? Were we lucky that we ended up being the I think the people on top at the end I think there's a little bit of luck I don't think it was just luck I just don't I don't see how it could have just been luck. I think I've said this to two before, but I think if you put like a hundred paying anthropologists in room, we would all disagree on exactly what it is But I think it's fair to say All of those other species were incredibly successful, had been around a lot longer than us And now they're obviously not here I think for each of those species there were a number of factors involved and the factors could be slightly different. So for example It is hard to argue that the hobbit homeom Floreiziensis was not affected by volcanic eruptions. does look like there was basically like continuous volcanicck activity that seemed quite intense But I think a lot of paleanthropologists consider us to be the final nail in the coff to a lot of species And I think what's happening there is that we have In my opinion, we have a brain that is primed to be incredibly cooperative. We are hyper social. and by that, I mean bond a lot as a species. I know people really struggle with that because they see us as this like warmongering species and I'm not saying we're not, trust me I'm just saying and this is dark War technically is cooperation. It's just cooperation with your species against another species. And by nature we are Reredibly incredibly social You might not realize it, but music, dancing, ritual They're all behaviourors, which are, a lot of us would argue very inbuilt into us that are Primarily for bonding purposes, they've really help bonding some fascinating experiments on this There's like, oh Godd, there's a silent disco experiment. There's like all kinds of experiments where they show that people really bond. like people even report higher pain thresholds after dancing with complete strangers in a synchronized manner I think this stuff is deeply embedded within us.s like even ritual Ritualers is You know, we could, I don't know do everything from our sofa, but we insist on doing it in a group and like doing this ceremony and blah, blah blah blah and the rest of And I think when you've got a species that's that per social, that cooperative. and that has a brain that's plastic that likes to copy each other. That is a recipe for invention. And then if you have a lot of that species Gold dust