Book Reviewed: A Short History of Humanity: A New History of Old Europe by Johannes Krause and Thomas Trappe

Agriculture and farming lead to genetic changes in Europe Recent studies in archeology and genetics significantly helped our understanding of human evolution in terms of race and culture in Europe. In this book, the authors address the question of how multiculturalism and racial diversity in ancient world gave rise to the Caucasian race, a distinctive feature of modern-day Europeans. Much has been learnt in the last two decades by studying DNA from skeletons of ancient humans. These results suggest that the light skin seen across Europe today is due to the introduction of agriculture 8,500 years ago. Human genome underwent widespread changes, altering their height, digestion, immune system, and skin color. For example, the LCT gene evolved after intense natural selection to make humans lactose tolerant. Before agriculture and farming, humans ate meat and fish, but the need for LCT gene arose after they started consuming milk from farm animals. In the last 200,000 years of human history, Homo Sapiens were dark skinned for about 192,000 years. The hunter-gatherers, human descendants from Africa migrated to Europe 40,000 years ago. They remained dark as recently as 8,500 years ago, but farmers arriving from Anatolia were light-skinned, and this trait spread through Europe. A shift to agriculture reduced the intake of vitamin D, which may have triggered a change in skin color that were found in Anatolian farmers who migrated from West Asia, a region that includes modern-day Turkey, Lebanon, Syria, and parts of Egypt. Later, about 5,000 years ago a second wave of migration of Yamnaya population occurred from the steppes, north of the Black Sea, a region near the modern-day Ukraine. They had the knowledge of using bronze, proto-writing, and other early features of urban civilization. They also brought Indo-European languages to Europe that evolved into various European languages. The Yamnaya population were also pale-skinned and taller than the farmers from Anatolia, and both were even taller than hunter-gatherers. The European hunter-gatherers had dark skin throughout their stay in the cold climate. They had enough supply of vitamin D in their meal that consisted of meat and fish and did not need paler skin to synthesize vitamin D. A change in diet, and in parallel the living style and social factors played a key role in the evolution of modern humans. Farmers lived longer and had more children than hunter-gatherers. Among hunter-gatherers, the natural selection pressure did not arise to change skin color despite the fact they were in northern latitudes in cold climates. But it became dominant when they stopped the intake of meat & fish and started consuming agriculture and dairy products. The skin tone of early farmers came under selection pressure, only those with lighter skin could manufacture enough vitamin D. Several mutations were required to produce lighter skin. The gene variants like SLC24A5 and SLC45A2 lead to skin-depigmentation, and HERC2/OCA2 is also responsible for blue eyes, light skin, and blond hair. Among Anatolians in whom these genes first emerged were healthier, lived longer, and taller than hunter-gatherers. The farmers also had more children and less stressful life. A recent paper in New Scientist claims that social factors played a key role in the evolution of modern humans. The authors strenuously argue that since modern Europeans originated from a melting pot created by the human migration, earlier from Africa and the later two migrations due to Anatolian farmers and Yamnaya population. They observe that one must sustain the current wave of migrations from Africa and the Middles East. But I like to point out that human migration in the past occurred due to natural and environmental challenges, but the current migrations are influenced by politics, West-European colonialism, and religion, mainly Islam and Christianism. Manufactured religions have done much harm to human beings and my impact the evolutionary trends.