Stephen Oppenheimer

"Todo el mundo no africano en toda su diversidad racial y cultural fue poblado, en última instancia, por un éxodo clave, y sólo uno, llevado a cabo desde África hace 150.000 años por antepasados africanos". Asi argumenta Stephen Oppenheimer en el revolucionario volumen que ha despertado una acalorada controversia entre autoridades en geologia, linguistica, arqueologia y antropologia. A traves de una minuciosa investigacion y una argumentacion cuidadosa, aportando pruebas evidentes extraidas de recientes descubrimientos en el campo de la genetica por los analisis de ADN, Oppenheimer dibuja la evolucion de la humanidad moderna a partir del antepasado comun africano. Sus investigaciones contradicen a los multirregionalistas. Estos mantienen que poblaciones humanas arcaicas, como los neandertales en Europa y los Homo erectus en el lejano oriente, evolucionaron localmente hasta las razas que conocemos hoy dia. Por el contrario, Oppenheimer afirma que los neandertales europeos, por ejemplo, no son los antepasados de los humanos modernos sino primos que proceden de la misma raiz africana.

Not only are we all descended from a common African ''Adam'' and ''Eve'', but what''s more it can now be proved that all modern non-Africans sprang from a single exodus out of Africa, rather than peopling the earth in multiple waves of migration. In a brilliant synthesis of genetic, archaeological and climatic evidence, Stephen Oppenheimer reveals the story of how a group of no more than a few hundred souls crossed the mouth of the Red Sea some 80,000 years ago. The book follows their halting progress around the world - to the mammoth Steppe heartland of Asia and the now submerged continent of Beringia, and on to the last great unpeopled lands of the Americas. It is a revolutionary account that is both scholarly and entertaining, a remarkable picture of the kinship of all humans.

In a brilliant synthesis of genetic, archaeological, linguistic and climatic data, Oppenheimer challenges current thinking with his claim that there was only one successful migration out of Africa. In 1988 Newsweek headlined the startling discovery that everyone alive on the earth today can trace their maternal DNA back to one woman who lived in Africa 150,000 years ago. It was thought that modern humans populated the world through a series of migratory waves from their African homeland. Now an even more radical view has emerged, that the members of just one group are the ancestors of all non-Africans now alive, and that this group crossed the mouth of the Red Sea a mere 85,000 years ago. It means that not only is every person on the planet descended from one African Eve but every non-African is related to a more recent Eve, from that original migratory group. This is a revolutionary new theory about our origins that is both scholarly and entertaining, a remarkable account of the kinship of all humans.Further details of the findings in this book are presented at www.bradshawfoundation.com/stephenoppenheimer/

British prehistory will never look the same again. Professor Colin Renfrew, University of CambridgeStephen Oppenheimers extraordinary scientific detective story combining genetics, linguistics, archaeology and historical record shatters the myths we have come to live by. It demonstrates that the Anglo-Saxon invasions contributed just a tiny fraction (5%) to the English gene pool. Two-thirds of the English people reveal an unbroken line of genetic descent from south-western Europeans arriving long before the first farmers. The bulk of the remaining third arrived between 7,000 and 3,000 years ago as part of long-term north-west European trade and immigration, especially from Scandinavia - and may have brought with them the earliest forms of English language.As for the Celts - the Irish, Scots and Welsh - history has traditionally placed their origins in Iron Age Central Europe. Oppenheimers genetic synthesis tells a different story. There is indeed a deep divide between the English and the rest of the British. But as this book reveals the division is many thousands of years older than previously thought.Be prepared to have all your cherished notions of English history and Britishness swept away - Clive Gamble

EL ADN de todos los humanos modernos procede, en última instancia, de una mujer que vivió en África hace unos 150.000 años. Es decir, que todos hemos salido de África. Lo que no se sabía hasta ahora era como, cuando y por que el Homo sapiens recorrio los senderos que le alejaban del Eden y poblo la tierra entera. El profesor Oppenheimer, de la Universidad de Oxford, afirma en este libro que los humanos modernos abandonamos Africa en un solo exodo hace unos 80.000 años, explica como se desarrollaron las migraciones hacia Asia, Oceania, Europa y America, y demuestra que la vision eurocentrica segun la cual los primeros que aprendieron a pintar, a tallar, a desarrollar una cultura compleja e, incluso, a hablar, fueron los europeos es completamente falsa.