[pbs] Bulbs and Prehistoric Peoples (and a bit off topic)
Joe Shaw
jshaw at opuntiads.com
Fri Nov 17 19:06:44 EST 2006
Hi Gang,
I've put some links in this posting that will take you to Web articles about
prehistoric humans and plant use. Two that caught my attention concern the
diets of Holocene peoples in Texas, and while not directly about bulbs, do
mention the consumption of bulbs by ancient peoples. After a little more
research I realized that one of may favorite native plants (Camassia) was
employed as a food source by Native Americans in historic times.
(Warnng-moving off topic now)
The information about Holocene peoples got me thinking about events in the
news this week, about the initial efforts to determine the DNA sequence of
Neanderthal humans.
I've put two news articles and two manuscripts online, the information was
published this week in Science and Nature (leading science journals around
the world). The papers describe initial results from efforts to sequence
the genome of Neanderthal humans (Homo sapiens neanderthalensis). As
expected, the results show that Neanderthals were darn similar to modern day
humans at the DNA level.
The molecular clock method estimates how many changes accumulate in DNA
sequences over time (in any given species). By counting the small
differences between modern humans and Neanderthal humans, the scientists
estimate that our last common ancestor lived about 500,000 years ago--a
figure that is in general agreement with archeological data.
To make it legal (for a bulb forum) I also speculate that Neanderthal
humans, like prehistoric peoples everywhere, ate various bulbous and
tuberous plants.
LINK: Article Describing Camp Bowie Midden and Bulbs Found Therein
http://www.texasbeyondhistory.net/bowie/middentell.html
LINK: Geophytes in the Diets of Holocene Peoples of Texas
http://anthropology.tamu.edu/faculty/thoms/publications/SEB-Plains.pdf
LINK: Camassia quamash, a Food Plant
http://www.paghat.com/camas.html
LINK: See Titles with Neanderthal in File Name (dated Nov. 17, 2006)
http://www.opuntiads.com/pdf/
Cordially,
Joe
Conroe TX
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