Page 17 - Exercise 1A

Page 17 - Exercise 1A

The Human Story

Modern human beings (homo sapiens) first appeared in Africa 150,000 years ago. For thousands of years they stayed in Africa, but about 60,000 years ago, they started to migrate into Asia.

From there, some went north and arrived in Europe about 35,000 years ago. Europe was much colder than today, as this was the time of the Ice Age. However, there was plenty of food there. Our ancestors hunted huge animals, like mammoths and woolly rhinoceroses.

There were already other people in Europe, too. These were the Neanderthals. They left Africa 200,000 years ago. They were bigger and stronger than our ancestors, but by 20,000 years ago, the Neanderthals were extinct.

We don’t know why.

Other groups of modern humans went east, further into Asia. From there, some went south into Australia. The first people reached Australia about 45,000 years ago.

Today Australia is an island, but during the Ice Age a lot of the Earth’s water was ice. So sea Levels were 20 metres lower than today. The seas between Asia and Australia were much shallower and in many places there were land bridges. So it was easy to cross into the new continent.

There was also a land bridge in the north between Siberia and Alaska. About 15,000 years ago, people walked across this land bridge into North America. They moved down through Central America and reached South America about 11,000 years ago. Human beings were now in every continent except Antarctica.

Soon after that - about 10,000 years ago - the last Ice Age ended. As the ice melted, sea levels rose. Australia became an island again and the land bridge to North America disappeared. No new people arrived in these places until modern times.