Out of Africa

What is on the map

• 12 Africa
• 44 Into Eurasia
• 9 Sahul
• 16 The Americas
• 14 The Pacific

Chronology

1. 320,000 BCOlorgesailie: big hand axes give way to small blades and to pigments traded over distancetools▸
2. 315,000 BCJebel Irhoud: the oldest Homo sapiens fossils knownfossil▸
3. 259,000 BCThe Florisbad skull, South Africafossil▸
4. 200,000 BCOmo Kibish, Ethiopia — long the oldest of our speciesfossil▸
5. 185,000 BCMisliya Cave: a jawbone on Mount Carmel, 185,000 years oldfossil▸
6. 164,000 BCPinnacle Point: shellfish are eaten and stone is heat-treated for working. The sea enters the dietsite▸
7. 164,000 BCPinnacle Point: shellfish, pigment and heat-treated stonesite▸
8. 160,000 BCHerto, Ethiopia: Homo sapiens idaltufossil▸
9. 125,000 BCKlasies River Caves, at the southern tip of the continentsite▸
10. 121,986 BCJebel Faya: African toolkits on the far side of Arabiasite▸
11. 120,000 BCSkhul and Qafzeh: an excursion that left no descendantsfossil▸
12. 100,000 BCQafzeh: ochre burials in the Levant. This exodus leaves no descendantsfossil▸
13. 100,000 BCBlombos Cave: cross-hatched ochre, the oldest known drawingart▸
14. 77,000 BCBlombos: a piece of ochre engraved with a lattice. It is the oldest known drawingart▸
15. 77,000 BCBorder Cave, and the oldest known digging sticksite▸
16. 75,000 BCJwalapuram, India: tools above and below the Toba ashsite▸
17. 74,000 BCToba erupts: the largest eruption in two million yearseruption▸
18. 73,000 BCBlombos again, an ochre stroke on a stone flake: the first thing drawn onto a surfaceart▸
19. 70,000 BCThe dispersal that stuck: perhaps a thousand people crossed the straitdispersal▸
20. 65,000 BCMadjedbebe, northern Australia: ground-edge axes, long before anywhere elsesite▸
21. 65,000 BCMadjedbebe, Arnhem Land — contested, and possibly Australia’s oldestsite▸
22. 50,000 BCSahul reached across open sea — no land bridge ever joined itcrossing▸
23. 49,000 BCWarratyi: the arid interior, far from any coastsite▸
24. 48,000 BCNeanderthals and us share Anatolia for a few thousand yearsfossil▸
25. 48,000 BCFa Hien Cave, Sri Lanka: rainforest foragers and bone arrowheadssite▸
26. 48,000 BCDevil's Lair, at the south-western corner of the continentsite▸
27. 46,000 BCTam Pa Ling, Laos: modern humans deep in the mainlandfossil▸
28. 46,000 BCBacho Kiro, Bulgaria: the earliest modern humans in Europesite▸
29. 45,500 BCMaros-Pangkep, Sulawesi: a painted warty pig, the oldest figurative artart▸
30. 45,000 BCThe bone flute of Geissenklösterle and the Venus of Hohle Fels: music and sculpture togetherart▸
31. 45,000 BCUst'-Ishim man: a whole genome from western Siberiafossil▸
32. 44,000 BCGrotta del Cavallo, in the heel of Italyfossil▸
33. 42,000 BCLake Mungo: cremation and ochre burial in the Australian interiorburial▸
34. 40,000 BCThe caves of Timor show deep-sea fishing: they go out for tunasite▸
35. 40,000 BCThe Deep Skull of Niah Cave, Borneofossil▸
36. 40,000 BCPeștera cu Oase: a man with a Neanderthal great-great-grandparentfossil▸
37. 40,000 BCDenisova Cave: a third human lineage, and its genes in Oceaniaadmixture▸
38. 40,000 BCNeanderthal ancestry: 1–2% in everyone outside Africaadmixture▸
39. 40,000 BCTianyuan man, near Beijingfossil▸
40. 39,000 BCL'ultimo Neanderthal scompare dalla penisola iberica. Restiamo soliextinction▸
41. 39,000 BCThe Neanderthals disappearextinction▸
42. 38,000 BCKostenki, on the Don: mammoth-bone dwellingssite▸
43. 36,000 BCDenisova: a third kind of human known almost only from its DNA — which we still carrysite▸
44. 36,000 BCChauvet: lions, rhinos and horses drawn by torchlightart▸
45. 35,000 BCThe Japanese archipelago is settledsite▸
46. 34,000 BCSungir: two children buried with ten thousand ivory beadsburial▸
47. 31,000 BCChauvet: lions and rhinoceroses painted with shading, thirty thousand years before perspectiveart▸
48. 30,986 BCYana Rhinoceros Horn Site: humans inside the Arctic Circlesite▸
49. 28,000 BCMezhyrich: case fatte di ossa di mammut nella steppa ucrainasite▸
50. 26,000 BCDolní Věstonice: clay is fired into figurines. Ceramics begin as art, not as cookwaretools▸
51. 26,000 BCThe Last Glacial Maximum: sea level 120 m lower, ice to the Thamesclimate▸
52. 25,000 BCThe Beringian standstill: a population isolated for millenniastandstill▸
53. 24,000 BCMal'ta-Buret', by Lake Baikal: the Ancient North Eurasianssite▸
54. 23,000 BCWhite Sands: footprints that predate the ice-free corridorfootprints▸
55. 20,000 BCEarthenware pots in southern China: the oldest in the world, for boiling foodtools▸
56. 17,000 BCLascaux: a ceiling painted by people who could never have seen all of it at onceart▸
57. 16,000 BCCooper's Ferry, Idaho, on the Salmon Riversite▸
58. 15,500 BCButtermilk Creek, Texas: tools older than Clovissite▸
59. 15,000 BCLe prime tracce sicure nell'Amazzonia occidentalesite▸
60. 14,800 BCMonte Verde, Chile — the far end of two continentssite▸
61. 14,500 BCPaisley Caves, Oregonsite▸
62. 14,000 BCJōmon pottery in Japan, among the oldest anywhereculture▸
63. 13,000 BCClovis: punte scanalate identiche da un capo all'altro del continente, in pochi secolitools▸
64. 13,000 BCClovis points spread across North America in a few centuriesculture▸
65. 12,800 BCIn two thousand years mammoths, mastodons, giant sloths and American horses disappearextinction▸
66. 11,700 BCThe last ice age ends. The world warms and hunting stops being enoughmilestone▸
67. 11,486 BCCueva Fell, Patagonia: the end of the roadsite▸
68. 9,500 BCGöbekli Tepe: sixteen-tonne pillars carved by people who farmed nothing yetmilestone▸
69. 9,000 BCIn the Levant wheat is sown and goats are kept: farming begins, and everything else with itmilestone▸
70. 8,000 BCRice is domesticated in the Yangtze valleymilestone▸
71. 7,000 BCIn Mexico a grass with a handful of seeds becomes maizemilestone▸
72. 6,000 BCThe first sails on the Persian Gulf: wind becomes an enginemilestone▸
73. 4,000 BCOn the Pontic-Caspian steppe people get on horseback. Distances shrink overnightmilestone▸
74. 3,300 BCÖtzi dies on an Alpine glacier with a copper axe and an arrow in his backfossil▸
75. 3,000 BCThe Austronesian expansion sets out from Taiwandispersal▸
76. 2,500 BCGiza: the great pyramid will be the tallest thing ever built for four thousand yearsmilestone▸
77. 2,200 BCThe Batanes, the first islands south of Taiwanlandfall▸
78. 1,500 BCLapita pottery appears in the Bismarck Archipelagoculture▸
79. 1,200 BCThe Marianas: the longest open-sea crossing anyone had yet madelandfall▸
80. 1,200 BCVanuatu, New Caledonia and Fiji within a few generationslandfall▸
81. 1,000 BCChavín de Huántar: the Andes get their first civilisation, with no writing and no wheelmilestone▸
82. 900 BCSamoa and Tonga: the eastern edge, and then a long pauselandfall▸
83. 800 BCNew Caledonia receives the Lapita and their comb-stamped potterylandfall▸
84. 300The Maya cities of the lowlands hold hundreds of thousands of peoplemilestone▸
85. 700Tiwanaku organizza l'altopiano attorno al lago Titicacamilestone▸
86. 870Madagascar is settled from Borneo, 7,000 km awaylandfall▸
87. 874Iceland: the Norse settlement beginslandfall▸
88. 950The Marquesas, the launching point for the last voyageslandfall▸
89. 1000The Norse touch Newfoundland and leave: the only contact between the two branches of humanity before 1492landfall▸
90. 1000The Society Islands: Tahiti and its navigatorslandfall▸
91. 1000Hawaii, at the northern point of the Polynesian trianglelandfall▸
92. 1200Rapa Nui, the loneliest inhabited island on Earthlandfall▸
93. 1250The Thule reach Greenland, the last stretch of the Arcticlandfall▸
94. 1300In New Zealand the moa are gone within a century of the Māori arrivingextinction▸
95. 1400Aotearoa: the last large landmass on Earth to be settledlandfall▸

Routes and campaigns

• 190,000 BCUp the Nile and across Sinai
• 125,000 BCInto an Arabia that was briefly green
• 70,000 BCAcross the Bab-el-Mandeb — the crossing that stuck
• 66,000 BCAlong the shore of the Indian Ocean
• 63,000 BCRound the Bay of Bengal
• 60,000 BCDown the Sunda shelf, dry land in that sea level
• 55,000 BCIsland-hopping across Wallacea
• 52,000 BCInto Sahul: New Guinea and Australia are one continent
• 50,000 BCNorth-west by the Danube into Europe
• 50,000 BCNorth-east across the steppe
• 45,000 BCEast to the Pacific coast of Asia
• 38,000 BCOver the land bridge to the islands of Japan
• 34,000 BCNorth into the Arctic, in the teeth of the ice
• 26,000 BCAcross the Bering land bridge, and a long wait
• 16,000 BCDown the Pacific coast, by boat and by beach
• 16,000 BCInland, once the ice-free corridor opened
• 14,500 BCThe whole length of South America
• 3,000 BCOut of Taiwan: the Austronesian expansion begins
• 2,200 BCDown the Philippines to Borneo and Sulawesi
• 1,800 BCWest through Java and Sumatra
• 1,600 BCLapita pottery reaches the Bismarcks
• 1,500 BCNorth-east to the Marianas, 2,000 km of open sea
• 1,200 BCInto Remote Oceania: Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Fiji
• 900 BCSamoa and Tonga, then two thousand years of pause
• 500West across the Indian Ocean to Madagascar
• 870Norse westing: Norway, Iceland, Greenland
• 950East at last: the Marquesas and the Society Islands
• 1000North to Hawaii, 4,000 km across the equator
• 1000East to Rapa Nui, against the trade winds
• 1000The Thule sweep across the Canadian Arctic
• 1250South-west to Aotearoa, into a colder sea

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