0:02 [Music]
0:03 How can we tell the story of our
0:07 species, Homo sapiens, over 300,000
0:10 years across seven continents?
0:11 Well, let's try doing it using six objects.
0:13 objects.
0:15 Because these objects tell a tale that
0:17 spans all the way back to the distant
0:20 past. First off, a skull that
0:23 transformed our understanding of how and
0:26 when we came into existence. Here's
0:27 Here's
0:29 a question we should all probably know
0:31 the answer to. When did our species
0:34 begin? Like, how old are we? Well, until
0:37 recently, we got that completely wrong.
0:39 For a long time, our species, Homo
0:41 sapiens, were thought to have emerged
0:43 about 200,000 years ago, probably in
0:44 East Africa. But then, research
0:47 conducted at one site warped our
0:49 understanding completely. Back in the
0:51 60s, in a remote cave in Morocco, a
0:54 mining operation stumbled across a
0:57 fossilized skull. Soon the site was full
0:59 of archaeologists and over the years
1:01 they discovered human remains that were
1:04 frankly kind of weird.
1:07 This is a replica of Jebel Hudwan which
1:09 is one of the fossils that was found in
1:11 that Moroccan cave. This skull was so
1:13 confusing for archaeologists because it
1:15 has a mish mash of features. So if you
1:18 look at this brow ridge here that
1:20 protrudes so much you would just not
1:22 find that on a homo sapiens living
1:25 today. That is very old. It's more
1:27 reminiscent of some of the older species
1:29 like Neanderthalss for example. And
1:32 yeah, the face
1:34 that's pretty grassile. It's very
1:37 delicate, very similar to our own. It's
1:40 kind of all tucked in underneath the
1:44 brain case. So, how did this really
1:48 strange mix fit into the human tree? It
1:49 was a complete mystery. Some people
1:51 thought perhaps it was an African
1:53 Neanderthal. Others thought it was just
1:55 some strange thing that was happening in
1:58 Morocco and had nothing to do with us.
2:00 So, this skull that is a strange blend
2:05 of old and new is actually around
2:09 300,000 years old and a homo sapiens.
2:11 So, it pushes back the age of our
2:14 species by about 100,000 years. Turns
2:17 out, thanks to this discovery, we're a
2:19 lot older than we thought we were. This
2:22 fossil was also found in Morocco,
2:24 remember? And we used to think our
2:26 origins were in East Africa. And so it
2:29 points to a much more complex continentwide
2:30 continentwide
2:33 process that led to the beginning of our
2:37 species. Next, a mysterious rock
2:40 formation that reveals the awakening of
2:43 human minds.
2:45 If you to meet an early homo sapiens,
2:47 you might recognize them. They might
2:50 look like us, but did they think like
2:53 us? Well, there's a cave in the Zadilo
2:56 Hills of Botswana that contains a clue.
2:58 The rocks were formed in a way which
3:00 looks like the body and the head of a
3:02 snake. Now, the overall shape is
3:05 natural, but there is nothing natural
3:09 about the detail. The rock has over 300
3:12 man-made indentations all over, and
3:14 those indentations
3:17 end up looking like scales. So, were the
3:19 people in the cave trying to make the
3:22 rock look even more like a snake?
3:24 Archaeologists also found the remnants
3:27 of prehistoric tools that were burnt or
3:30 intentionally smashed. Why would you go
3:34 to the trouble of making a tool only to
3:35 damage it? Well, some of the
3:37 archaeologists that have worked on this
3:39 material have suggested that it's
3:42 ritualistic destruction. Could this be
3:45 an offering? All of this points towards
3:48 a kind of abstract thought. This cave
3:51 paints a picture of these people that
3:53 were able to see and think beyond what
3:57 was tangibly in front of them. Now, that
3:59 is something that we thought only
4:01 happened quite recently, but this site
4:03 is dated to about 70,000 years ago. And
4:06 we can't be 100% sure how they were
4:09 thinking and about their belief system.
4:11 But it's possible that they were asking
4:13 for very similar things to what we would
4:16 ask for, health, children, food. And
4:19 it's remarkable to think that a cave
4:22 like that shows us some of the
4:25 beginnings of the behaviors which we,
4:27 you and I, and every single person on
4:30 the planet know so well. Christmas, Eid,
4:33 birthdays, Glastenbury. We are obsessed
4:36 with ritual and this cave shows us that
4:39 we have been for a very, very long time
4:41 now. A piece of technology that helped
4:51 The rainforest, dynamic, dangerous, and
4:53 full of predators. You would think it
4:56 would be a bad place for squishy bipedal
4:58 apes like us. And it does seem like all
5:00 the other species of human avoided the
5:04 rainforest and yet we took it on by
5:08 adapting our technology so that we could
5:10 thrive there. Now when I say technology
5:13 be honest you're imagining weapons,
5:16 bows, arrows, spears and that's a huge
5:18 part of the story. But deep within the
5:20 Sri Lankan rainforest we also see
5:24 something else. the teeth of monkeys who
5:28 lived in the canopies of this rainforest
5:30 which had been sharpened and modified
5:34 perhaps to puncture materials like
5:36 animal hides. This might have allowed
5:38 humans to string together plant and
5:41 animal materials perhaps creating things
5:44 like clothes, bags, shelter. And all of
5:46 this would have been fundamental to
5:48 living in the challenging environment
5:50 that is a rainforest where clothes could
5:52 protect humans from insect born
5:54 diseases. Shelter would keep them safe
5:56 from the rain and bags could be created
5:59 to carry equipment over long distances.
6:02 You can imagine grandparents sitting
6:04 there with their grandchildren teaching
6:07 them how to use these tools, teaching
6:10 them how to perfect the techniques. They
6:12 show us something amazing about our
6:16 species. How we adapted technology and
6:18 passed it on so that we could take on
6:20 environments once thought to be impenetrable.
6:22 impenetrable.
6:25 Next, some fossils that show we were a
6:28 lot more intimate with other species of
6:31 human than we once thought. Most of you
6:33 watching this have about 2% Neanderthal
6:36 DNA, which basically means that one of
6:38 your great great great great go a lot of
6:40 great grandparents
6:48 in the early 2000s. These fossils were
6:51 discovered in a cave in Romania. Now, if
6:53 you look at these replicas, they do
6:56 clearly look homo sapiens, but if you
6:58 look really closely, there are some
7:00 features on them which are kind of mysterious.
7:02 mysterious.
7:06 The large mers and notice the forehead,
7:09 it recedes. Those features are
7:13 Neanderthal. This led the team to wonder
7:15 if this was evidence of Neanderthalss
7:18 and Homo sapiens interbreeding.
7:21 Thanks to a revolution in ancient DNA
7:22 technology, we now know that
7:25 Neanderthalss and Homo sapiens did
7:28 interbreed and that one of those awas
7:32 fossils was in fact definitely a hybrid.
7:35 They had a Neanderthal relative about
7:38 four to six generations earlier. This
7:40 Neanderthal genetic legacy in us is
7:42 really interesting. Not just because it
7:43 tells us something about the private
7:45 lives of our ancestors, but because it
7:48 tells us something about our DNA today.
7:52 See, that Neanderthal DNA within us is
7:56 associated with both positive and
7:58 negative things. On the plus side, the
8:00 Neandthal DNA is associated with things
8:03 like immunities and even increased
8:05 fertility. And on the negative, it's
8:08 associated with things like increased
8:10 severity of CO. The Neanderthalss have
8:14 died out, but for better or worse, a
8:17 part of them still lives on within us.
8:19 Now, onto a remarkable prehistoric
8:23 weapon that helped humanity triumph in a
8:26 whole new continent.
8:28 Imagine being the first humans to set
8:31 foot in the Americas. No other species
8:34 of human had. And so, it was a land mass
8:37 that was untouched by human activity,
8:39 including hunting. So imagine the
8:41 creatures you would have encountered
8:45 there. Mammoths, giant bison, mastadons.
8:46 So isn't it amazing that these
8:47 prehistoric humans looked at these
8:50 animals and thought, "Yum." This is a
8:53 Clovis spearhead. These artifacts are
8:56 around 13,000 years old, and they are
8:59 extraordinarily wellcrafted. Long and
9:01 narrow, thinning towards the end with
9:04 sharp edges, allowing them to pierce the
9:07 hides of enormous animals. But there's
9:10 another version of the Clover spearhead
9:13 that is mysterious, striking, and
9:16 beautiful. This is a spearhead made of
9:20 crystal quartz. Quartz crystal is
9:22 beautiful to look at, but vulnerable to
9:24 shattering. So, if it wasn't used as a
9:28 weapon, what was it used for?
9:31 Maybe it was ceremonial. We also know
9:33 that a boy from this period was buried
9:37 with about a hundred clovislike tools.
9:40 Again pointing to this idea that this
9:43 technology had deep cultural meaning.
9:46 Finally, a small written document that
9:50 exemplifies the power and scale of human ambition.
9:52 ambition.
9:54 What if I was to tell you that the first
9:56 of the great pyramids of Giza, one of
9:58 the most astonishing achievements in
10:02 human history, was built thanks in part
10:04 to a boring spreadsheet. Day 24,
10:06 Inspector Merror spends the day with his
10:09 file hauling stones. Day 25, Inspector
10:12 Merror spends the day with his team
10:15 hauling stones. Riveting read. So, how
10:22 It was here on the Red Sea coast that
10:25 archaeologists discovered fragments of a
10:30 text dating back over 4,500 years. This,
10:31 thought to be the world's oldest known
10:34 papyrus, is the diary of Mea, a time
10:36 capsule for the reign of the pharaoh
10:39 Kufu. Kufu is best known for overseeing
10:41 the construction of the first of the
10:44 great pyramids of Giza. Amra, the author
10:46 of this diary, was an inspector, an
10:48 official involved in the transportation
10:51 of things like limestone and food
10:53 supplies. And his journal describes just
10:56 that. It is a bit amusing, but one of
10:59 humanity's oldest known texts is
11:01 essentially a spreadsheet. A dull list
11:04 of goods and transportation details, the
11:05 kind of thing that you would hate to be
11:07 given at work, but it's the kind of
11:10 thing that you need to actually build
11:13 the pyramids. You see, humanity by this
11:15 point were much more numerous and
11:17 writing allowed us to communicate with
11:20 each other and organize these huge
11:22 numbers of people. And maybe there's
11:23 some comfort in the diary of mirror.
11:25 It's nice to realize that boring
11:28 spreadsheets are not a uniquely modern thing.
11:35 So hopefully these six objects give you
11:39 a sense of our 300,000y old story. But
11:41 if you want another object, just look in
11:44 the mirror because you are a byproduct
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