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Richard Lewontin's Disappearing Act

The octogenarian bête noir of biological determinism reviews three new books about why we should be proud of our ancestry--or just be quiet about it. "There is a certain irony," he writes, "in claiming an undemonstrated biological superiority for a group, six million of whom were slaughtered for their claimed natural degeneracy." If your dynosaur feathers are not ruffled yet, read on. 

"Is There a Jewish Gene?"

by Richard Lewontin

December 6, 2012,

The New York Review of Books


Legacy:  A Genetic History of the Jewish People
by Harry Ostrer
Oxford University Press, 264 pp. $24.95


The Genealogical Science:  The Search for Jewish Origins and the Politics of Epistemology
by Nadia Abu El-Haj
University of Chicago Press, 311 pp., $35.00



Zionism and the Biology of the Jews (Zionut Vehabiologia Shel Hayehudim
by Raphael Falk
Resling, 2006 (not yet published in English)

The question of ancestry has been of human concern in virtually all cultures and over all times of which we have any knowledge. Whether it be a story about the origin of a particular tribe or nation and its subsequent mixture with other groups, or curiosity about a family history, there is always the implication that we understand ourselves better if we know our ancestors and that we, within ourselves, reflect properties that have come to us by an unbroken line from past generations. As treasurer of the Marlboro Historical Society in Vermont, I am the recipient of requests for printed copies of the Reverend Ephraim Newton’s mid-eighteenth-century history of our town, 70 percent of whose pages consist of “Genealogical and Biographical Notes” and a “Catalog of Literary Men.” Over and over our correspondents write of the “pride” they have in descending from these early settlers.

Surely pride or shame are appropriate sentiments for actions for which we ourselves are in some way responsible. Why, then, do we feel pride (or shame) for the actions of others over whom we can have had no influence? Do we, in this way, achieve a false modesty or relieve ourselves of the burdens of our own behavior? As a descendant of late-nineteenth-century Eastern European immigrants I cannot depend on Reverend Newton’s pages to explain my frequent contributions to The New York Review, but neither have the extensive “begats” in Genesis 10 or Matthew 1 been more enlightening.  Read More...

As often happens in the annals of science, two research teams independently reached the same groundbreaking results, and publication to the scientific world occurred simultaneously. The breakthrough in the present case concerned the mutation rate of DNA and has profound implications for human evolution as well as for DNA Consultants' new offerings in autosomal DNA ancestry analysis, specifically our Rare Genes from History Panel.

The following two studies are already much cited by geneticists, though they have garnered little attention in the press. They appeared in online versions on the same day, August 23.

James X Sun et al., "A Direct Characterization of Human Mutation Based on Microsatellites," Nature Genetics 44/10 (October 2012): 1161-65.

A. Kong et al., "Rate of de novo Mutations and the importance of Father's Age to Disease Risk," Nature 488 (2012):471-75.  

 
A table summarizing their findings and older data is provided below for DNA testing customers' convenience.

 

DNA Mutation Rates

Study or Source	Type of DNA	Sample or Method	Rate per Generation	Time Depth in Years
Sun 2012	autosomal microsatellites	2,477 mutations in Icelanders	.001- .0001	25,000 to 250,000
Kong 2012	single nucleotide polymorphisms	4,933 mutations in Icelandic trios	63.2 or .000000012	Very great
Butler 2009	Core CoDIS STRs (microsatellites)	compiled from studies	.0028-.0001	9,000 to 25,000
Zhivotovsky 2004	Y chromosome STRs	Y haplogroup comparisons	.00069	36,000
Heyer 1997	Y chromosome tetranucleotides	42 males in forensic database	.002	12,500
FamilyTreeDNA 2004	Y chromosome STRs	Estimated from customer base	.004	6,250
Brinkmann 1998	STRs (CoDIS markers)	10,844 Father-son comparisons	0-.007	3,500 to Very Great
Parsons  1997	mitochondrial DNA	134 mtDNA lineages	.000029	862,000
DNA Consultants	Rare Genes from History	average estimate across loci	.001325	19,000

 
From this it can be seen that mutation rates vary from a low with SNPs to the high rate of Y chromsome STRs (as much as 0.4 % per generation). DNA keeps surprising us by proving to be more stable than we would tend to expect, dutifully transcribing its original values from generation to generation without many mistakes or changes. Only Y chromosome seems to be highly changeable, depending on the father's age (Kong 2012). Autosomal STRs mutate at a rate between SNPs and the Y chromosome, between every 19,000 or 25,000 and 250,000 years. 

For our new autosomal ancestry markers, that is confirmation that the alleles we are examining on a statistical basis are pretty much unchanged for the past 20,000 years. That's about twice the length of what we call world history, hence a meaningful enough time frame for valid inferences about population patterns and ancestry of individuals.

See also:  Rare Genes from History:  DNA Consultants’ Next-Generation Ancestry Markers

Rare Genes from History Panel Now Available for $289

Prelaunch of New Autosomal Products

Emerging Prehistory of Ethnic Groups

Technical Literature on Genotyping, including autosomal DNA and Forensic Literature

 

DEFINITION:  mutation   A change in a DNA sequence, either spontaneous within a generation or inherited, sometimes from a very distant ancestor. Mutations usually do not affect our health or cause any differences in our appearance. In other words, they are not genes proper and do not “code” for new proteins. Even though they are non-coding genes, though, they are useful in tracing lineages.             From A Glossary of Common DNA Terms

 

 

Were They Possibly Denisovan Hybrids?

The Cherokee called them the Moon People. The Utes and Paiutes spoke of a hideous race of cannibals ten feet tall living in caves. And the Choctaw also have an account of the race of giants that first colonized the Ohio Valley. 

From Old World Roots of the Cherokee, chapter 5, "America's Middle Ages," pp. 78-79, we read:

What kind of Indians lived in the territory the Choctaw and Chickasaw carved out for their new home? According to their traditions, reports Cushman, as confirmed by excavations of bones in Tennessee, it was a “race of white giants”:

[T]he tradition of the Choctaws . . . told of a race of giants that once inhabited the now State of Tennessee, and with whom their ancestors fought when they arrived in Mississippi in their migration from the west, doubtless Old Mexico. Their tradition states the Nahullo (race of giants [literally, wizards]) was of wonderful stature; but, as their tradition of the mastodon [which used to be found on the Great Plains], so this was also considered to be but a foolish fable, the creature of a wild imagination, when lo! Their exhumed bones again prove the truth of the Choctaws’ tradition (151).

These giants could have been Rafinesque’s Atlans.

Cushman then recounts the discovery in 1880 at a burial mound site near Plano, Texas, of human bones “of enormous size . . . the femoral bones being five inches longer than the ordinary length, and the jaw bones . . . so large as to slip over the face of a man with ease.” Cushman goes on to identify them with the older occupants of North America called Allegewi or Taligewi (Talegans). Many historians, moreover, speculate they were the builders of the Adena mounds.

As for the Chickasaw, Cushman notes that they have no record of their history before the colonial period, although it is assuredly "the same as the Choctaws, being one tribe and people until the division made by their two chiefs Chikasah and Chahtah many years after their arrival and location east of the Mississippi River" (p 358). Of the Natchez, Cushman records that they, "if tradition may be believed, also came from Mexico where they had lived for centuries" (p 440).

A story was told by the Comanches in 1857: 

Innumerable moons ago, a race of white men, ten feet high, and far more rich and powerful than any white people now living, here inhabited a large range of country, extending from the rising to the setting sun. Their fortifications crowned the summits of the mountains, protecting their populous cities situated in the intervening valleys. They excelled every other nation which was flourished, either before or since, in all manner of cunning handicraft—were brave and warlike—ruling over the land they had wrested from its ancient possessors with a high and haughty hand. Compared with them the palefaces of the present day were pygmies, in both art and arms. They drove the Indians from their homes, putting them to the sword, and occupying the valleys in which their fathers had dwelt before them since the world began. At length, in the height of their power and glory, when they remembered justice and mercy no more and became proud and lifted up, the Great Spirit descended from above, sweeping them with fire and deluge from the face of the earth. The mounds we [i.e. the speaker Chief Rolling Thunder and his Spanish listener] had seen on the tablelands were the remnants of their fortresses, and the crumbling ruins that surrounded us all that remained of a mighty city.[i]

The word Nahoolo or Nahullo “is now emphatically applied to the white race and no other . . . The Nahullo were of white complexion, according to Choctaw tradition, and were still an existing people at the time of the advent of the Choctaws to Mississippi,” concludes Cushman (p 153) . In agreement, the Indian trader Adair often refers to the Nani Ishtahoolo as departed white ghosts vested with spiritual powers whose descendants were priests and magicians. Their cries and magic spells could still be heard in the mounds like those at Ocmulgee.[ii] These references contribute to the suspicion that the “Indians” who preceded Asiatic tribes from Mexico were, as we would say today, Caucasian.

About exactly a year ago on this blog, we published a post about "Neanderthals in America," mentioning also the peculiar archaic skeleton that is now a roadside attraction in Arizona, called The Thing. In the meantime, we acquired a copy of Fritz Zimmerman's book, The Nephilim Chronicles, which reproduces over 300 historical accounts of Giant skeletons. Many are associated with the earliest mound sites in America, but Zimmerman's survey of this worldwide phenomenon ranges from the Hunter-Fisher People of northeast Europe and Red Paint People whose movements were circumpolar to the giants of the Bible, noted by the Babylonian Talmud as having double rows of teeth, and "Giants' Remains in the British Isles" (pp. 157-65).

Navajo legends speak of the Starnake People, a regal race of white giants endowed with mining technology who dominated the West, enslaved lesser tribes and had strongholds all through the Americas. They were either extinguished or "went back to the heavens." The name may be a corruption of the Biblical race known as Anakim (Num. 13:33, Deut. 1:28). The name Og (Hebrew "chief") appears to be characteristic (see Zimmerman, pp. 188-91). The ogham alphabet is attributed to this cultural founder. 

Certainly, many of the mound sites uncovered in the nineteenth century tell a story of constant warfare by incoming Asiatic tribes  against the giants occupying the land. One grisly scene showed thousands of skeletons, male, female and young heaped in a mass grave, with warriors' skulls pierced by arrows. It would appear that as these aboriginal inhabitants of the Ohio Valley were gradually displaced, some members of their society went over into the ranks of the new conquerors, bequeathing a strain of great stature still noticeable, for instance, in the Mobilian chief Tuscaloosa and DeSoto's Indian queen Cofitachiqui, both of whom were said to be seven feet tall.

We are struck by the following traits of this giant race or ethnic group from human prehistory:

• Mother Goddess religion
• Copper (not bronze) axes 
• Polished slate tools including fishing plummets, which were apparently regarded as sacred
• Belief that the Grandmother Moon was the repository of souls
• Diet emphasizing shellfish (for which the double row of teeth probably was selected as an evolutionary advantage in their beachcomber origin out of Africa?)
• Building of fish weirs in North American rivers to trap migrating eels
• Certain vegetarian habits (wild rice, for instance)
• Inscriptions on artifacts, especially pipes, often buried with the dead
• Use of coal and petroleum
• Weaving and looms
• Knowledge of seafaring, mathematics and engineering, including canals and irrigation
• Burying of a dog with a child to guard the latter in the afterlife
• A language apparently Afro-Asiatic and close to Semitic tongues
• Kingcraft:  nobles were buried in seated positions on thrones surrounded by a coterie of their retainers

   

PRESS RELEASE
Rare Genes from History:  DNA Consultants’ Next-Generation Ancestry Markers

PHOENIX -- (Oct. 1, 2012) -- DNA typing has gone from successes in the criminal justice system and paternity testing to new heights in mapping genetic diseases and tracing human history. John Butler in the conclusion to his textbook Fundamentals of Forensic DNA Typing raised an important question about these trends. How might genetic genealogy information intersect with forensic DNA testing in the future?

"At DNA Consultants, that new chapter in DNA testing arrived several years ago," said Donald Yates, chief research officer and founder. "As we approach our tenth anniversary, examining human population diversity continues to be the whole thrust of our research, and it just gets more and more exciting."

The company's DNA database atDNA 4.0 captures and puts to use every single published academic study on forensic STR markers, the standard CoDIS markers used in DNA profiles for paternity and personal identification. In 2009, the company introduced the first broad-scale ethnicity markers and created the DNA Fingerprint Plus.

But its innovations didn’t stop there. In October 2012, the company announced the launch of its Rare Genes from History Panel.

Why CoDIS Markers?

“Theoretically,” noted Butler in 2009, “all of the alleles (variations) that exist today for a particular STR locus have resulted from only a few ‘founder’ individuals by slowly changing over tens of thousands of years.”

How true! Hospital studies have determined that the most stable loci (marker addresses on your chromosomes) have values that mutate at a rate of only 0.01%. That means the chance of the value at that location changing from parent to progeny is once every 10,000 generations.

So the autosomal clock of human history ticks at an even slower quantum rate than mitochondrial DNA. Like “mitochondrial Eve,” its patterns were set down in Africa over 100,000 years ago when anatomically modern humans first appeared on the stage of time.

Though the face value of the cards in the deck of human diversity never changed—and all alleles can be traced back to an African origin—as humans left Africa and eventually spread throughout the world, alleles were shuffled and reshuffled. Humanity went through bottlenecks and expansions that emphasized certain alleles over others. Genetic pooling, drift and selection of mates produced regional and country-specific contours much like a geographic map. 

By the twentieth century, when scientists began to assemble the first genetic snapshots of people, it was found that nearly all populations were mixed, some more than others. The geneticist Luigi-Luca Cavalli-Sforza at Stanford University proved that there is almost always more diversity within a population than between populations.

So if there is no such thing as a “pure” population—a control or standard—how are we to make sense of any single individual’s ancestral lines? Statistical analysis provides the answer. And rare genes are easier to trace in the genetic record than common ones. Their distinctive signature stands out.

Back Story:  It All Began with the Melungeons

About the same time as DNA Consultants' scientists were cracking the mystery of the Melungeons, a tri-racial isolate in the Appalachians, they became aware of certain very rare alleles carried by this unusual population in relatively large doses. The Starnes family, for instance, in Harriman, Tennessee, was observed to have a certain rare score repeated on one location in the profiles of members through three generations. The staff dubbed it “the Starnes gene.”

Soon, company research had characterized 26 rare autosomal ancestry markers—tiny, distinctive threads of inheritance that reflected an origin in Africa and expansion and travels through world history. Genes in this new generation of discoveries were named after some distinctive feature associated with the pattern they created in human genetic history--for instance, the Kilimanjaro Gene after its source in Central East Africa. The Thuya, Akhenaten and King Tut genes were named for the royal family of Egypt whose mummies were investigated by Zahi Hawass’ team in 2010.

The Starnes Gene” became the Helen Gene. Because of its apparent center in Troy in ancient Asia Minor and predilection for settling in island populations, it was named for "the face that launched a thousand ships," in the famous phrase by Christopher Marlowe.  

All 26 of DNA Consultants' new markers are rare. Not everyone is going to have one. But that’s what makes them interesting, according to Dr. Yates.

Coming from all sections of human diversity—African, Indian, Asian and Native American—they are like tiny gold filaments in a huge, outspread multi-colored tapestry, explains Phyllis Starnes, assistant principal investigator and wife of the namesake of the first discovery. But does that mean that her husband has a connection to Helen of Troy? The markers don’t work on such a literal level, but it does imply that Billy Starnes shares a part of his ancestral heritage with an ancient Greek/Turkish population prominent on the page of history.

Over the past two decades, geneticists have worked out the macro-history and chronology of human migrations in amazing detail and agreement. The Rare Genes from History Panel is another reminder--in the words of an American Indian ceremonial greeting--that “We Are All Related.”

These rare but robust signals of deep history can act as powerful ancestral probes into the tangled past of the human race as well as unique touchstones for the surprising stories of individuals.

For more information about the science of autosomal DNA ancestry testing, visit DNA Consultants or check out its Twitter or Facebook page. 

Distribution map of the Egyptian Gene shows its African origin, partial presence in Coptic populations today (green dots in Egypt) and scattered incidence around the world. 

The tripartite Asian Model of the peopling of the Americas through "Beringia" was re-asserted with "the most comprehensive survey of genetic diversity in Native Americans so far" in a study published in Nature this week, "Reconstructing Native American Population History," by Harvard's David Reich et al.  If ever there was a blue chip study, this is it. Only it is more like junk bonds in which no one should put stock. 

If you read the fine print of this new issue from the Ivy League anthropological establishment, you may discover:

• Although the authors claim to go beyond examining single loci on the mitochondrial genome or Y chromosome and to analyze instead 364,470 SNPs, they are still stuck on the same biased samples. In one of their feats of prestidigitation, they statistically filter out "West-Eurasian-related and sub-Saharan African related ancestry in many Native Americans" (p. 371). They ignore anything that does not support their preconceived conclusions.
• Anthropologists have always insisted on the Bering Land bridge. Geneticists start with anthropologists' assumptions and test their model. Guess what? After enough manipulations you can make it work!
• Whole genome sequencing was adopted because it has become most economical, but half the samples were just adopted into the new study after doctoring the preexisting data. These biased data (Pima, Inuit etc.) were not reliable when they were collected (as far back as the 1990s), and have only been improved through statistical voodoo. The new Indians' samples (heavily geared to Mexico, Central America and northern South America) were probably subjected to SNP investigation out of interest in biodiversity and possible medical applications anyway. The motives of investigators who mostly belong to medical faculties are tainted.

Yes, according to Bill Tiffee, whose article on Solutreans in America will appear in volume 29 of the series Epigraphic Society Occasional Papers. Titled "Were Ancient Egyptians the Solutreans Who First Settled America?" the new study, he says, "looks at the possibility that the Solutreans who first settled America were from Egypt, and that the genetic marker X is found in the highest concentrations among the Druze (who migrated from Egypt 1,000 years ago)and the descendants of the Moundbuilder Native groups including the Sioux and Algonquin and possibly the Cherokee."

We have previously suggested that the Cherokee incorporate both Greek and Egyptian DNA. Chapter 3 of Donald Yates' new book Old World Roots of the Cherokee is devoted to the DNA story of the so-called "anomalous" Cherokee lines, including haplogroups T and X. 

Several prominent scholars have argued that Europeans known to archeologists as the Solutreans of France and Spain around 18,000 years ago were the first to settle the Americas. Tiffee examines the similarities between Solutrean and Clovis or Paleo-Indian stone technology and reconstructs the Solutrean culture in Egypt beginning 24,000 years ago (p. 119). He links ancient Egyptians with genetic marker E-M78, mitochondrial haplogroup X, Tula and the Spiro Complex mounds in Oklahoma, among other North American sites. He also discusses the Great Flood of about 10,000 years ago, the legends surrounding Osiris and the rise of agriculture in southern Turkey (Gobekli Tepe). 

"Perhaps," he concludes, "Egyptologists need to rethink their paradigms of ancient Egypt. And perhaps modern Native American descendants of the Moundbuilders, the Algonquin groups, Sioux, Cherokee, Chickasaw (and other Native cultures closely related to mound-building) need to reconsider where their most ancient ancestors came from (129)."

In DNA Consultants' Cherokee DNA study, "Anomalous Mitochondrial DNA Lineages in the Cherokee," as well as numerous blog posts since 2009, it was reported that haplogroups U, T, K, J, N, X and L are found in Cherokee descendants in frequencies mirroring those of Egypt. 

We've known or suspected as much for a long time. American Indians and Turkic peoples of the Altai region of southern Siberia share common ancestors. American scientists Thomas Jefferson and Constantine Rafinesque were the first to demonstrate this genetic similarity, long before the days of DNA. Now an article in American Journal of Human Genetics has clenched the argument with mitochondrial and Y chromosomal DNA studies.

The groundbreaking citation is:  Matthew C. Dulik et al., Mitochondrial DNA and Y Chromosome Variation Provides Evidence for a Recent Common Ancestry between Native Americans and Indigenous Altaians, AJHG 90/2, 229-246. The full article may read here.

From Old World Roots of the Cherokee, a book appearing June 15 by Donald N. Yates:

--Thomas Jefferson thought American Indians were Turks and Tartars coming across the Bering Sea from Asia, while his contemporary John Filson believed them to be Phoenicians. (See Boorstin, Daniel J. The Lost World of Thomas Jefferson, Chicago:  U of Chicago P, 1993.)

--(quoting Rafinesque) "Many other empires having begun to rise in the vicinity of Aztlan, such as those of Bali [Indonesia, perhaps Oppenheimer’s Eden in the East?], Scythia [Russian steppes], Thibet, Oghuz [Lake Baikal area], the Iztacan were driven eastwards, north of China; but some fragments of the nation are still found in the Caucasus, &c. such as the Abians or Abassans, Alticezecs [Altai Turks], Cushazibs, Chunsags, Modjors, &c. 

--"The six Iztacan nations being still pressed upon by their neighbours the Oghuzians [Uigur Turks], Moguls [Mongols], &c. gradually retreated or sent colonies to Japan, and the islands of the Pacific ocean; having discovered America at the peninsula of Alasca [Alaska, a Chinese word], during their navigations, the bulk of the nation came over and spread from Alasca to Anahuac, establishing many states in the west of America, such as Tula [Toltec], Amaquemeca, Tehuajo [Tewa, Tiwa, Tawa], Nabajoa [Navajo], Teopantla, Huehue, and many others.

--"After crossing the mountains, they discovered and followed the Missouri and Arkanzas rivers, reaching thus the Mississippi and Kentucky (26-27)."

How long will it take American history books to catch up to this new proof? We predict:  never. The jingoistic Smithsonian has its own versions of things and these are ingrained into anthropological dogma as deeply as Manifest Destiny. Interestingly, Turkish and Muslim historians have already entered it as a basic fact of history. They have long claimed American Indians as their genetic cousins.

The current issue of Science contains three articles that suggest the days of bashing North America's "Moundbuilder Myth" are over . . . maybe.

America's Lost City
Andrew Lawler
New excavations reveal surprising dimensions to North America's oldest city and its great earthen monuments.
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/334/6063/1618

Does North America Hold the Roots of Mesoamerican Civilization?
Andrew Lawler
Ancient settlements in what is now Louisiana may have laid the foundation not only for the great city of Cahokia but perhaps also for Mesoamerican civilization.
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/334/6063/1620

Preserving History, One Hill at a Time
Andrew Lawler
A handful of scientists are scrambling to preserve what they can of pre-Columbian North American mounds and prevent further destruction of structures that hold vital clues to ancient Native American society.
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/334/6063/1623

Geneticists seized the opportunity provided by an international Basque cultural event held in Idaho in 2010 to sample volunteers and study Basque DNA. The result was two studies, including "The Y-STR Genetic Diversity of an Idaho Basque population, published in Human Biology.

It was the first DNA study to document the spread of the Basque male chromosome overseas. The Basque people were renowned seafarers.

"The idea is to better understand health risks for Basque people, including an increased incidence of both Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases," said Josu Zubizarreta, a Boise State graduate who conducted research with the lead author, Greg Hampikian.

Mitochondrial DNA, which reflects a deeper history, was also studied.

Basques are credited with the invention of the rudder. They provided the crew and navigators for Magellan. Basque names are common on antique maps. The Bay of Biscayne is named for them, and many harbors, points and landfalls on the Atlantic Coast of North America are thought to come from the Basque language, which is known as an isolate and is unrelated to other European languages.

Sculpture of Basque sailor, Victorio Macho, Toledo. Travelpod.

Citation
Zubizarreta, Josu; Davis, Michael C.; and Hampikian, Greg (2011) "The Y-STR genetic diversity of an Idaho Basque population, with comparison to European Basques and US Caucasians," Human Biology: Vol. 83: Iss. 6, Article 2.
Available at: http://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/humbiol/vol83/iss6/2

Yes, Virginia, there is a Neanderthal fossil record in America. And apparently a Neanderthal hybrid fossil record.

No genetics publication has put all the evidence together: the genetics establishment is still in denial about most things Neanderthal. The evidence is scattered and mostly unrecognized, but, in our opinion, conclusive and compulsive. Consider the following article:

Frank L'Engle Williams and Gail E. Krovitz, "Ontogenetic Migration of the Mental Foramen in Neanderthals and Modern Humans," Journal of Human Evolution 47/4 (Oct. 2004) 190-219. 

The mental foramen (literally "mind's little hole") is an anatomical trait very pronounced in Neanderthals, a small dimple in the lower jaw of the skull beneath the teeth, or mandible. It is found sporadically in humans, where it is classified as archaic. Among the places where it has been identified are the Oleniy Islands and Baltic region, Northwestern Russia in Cro-Magnon like Europoid and Mongoloid types, along with "large and massive" torus occipitalis or Anatolian bumps (Alexander Mongait, 1959; Marija Gimbutas, 1956); Bakhehisarai in the Crimea (Alexander Mongait, 1959); the Joman or Ainu of Japan (Carleton Stevens Coon, 1962); and the "race of giants" continually being unearthed in West Coast, Ohio Valley and New England archeological sites, caves and mounds.

Archaic giant skeletons with mental foramina, occipital bumps, double rows of teeth and other Neanderthal features are reported, in fact, all over the Americas. Fritz Zimmerman has gathered a lot of the evidence in a new book titled Nephilim Chronicles, of which a small excerpt was published in Ancient American magazine, issue 91, pp. 24-27. Here is one of the newspaper reports he cites:

Evening News (Ada, Oklahoma), November 8, 1912. PRIMITIVE MEN OF GIGANTIC STATURE.

Eleven skeletons of primitive men, with foreheads sloping directly back from the eyes and two rows of teeth in the front of the upper jaw, have been uncovered at Craigshill at Ellensburg, Washington. They were found about twenty feet below the surface, twenty feet back from the face of the slope, in a cement rock formation over which was a layer of shale. The rock was perfectly dry. The jawbones, which easily break, are so large that they will go around the face of a man today. The other bones are also much larger than those of the ordinary man. The femur is twenty inches long, indicating a man of eighty inches tall [6' 8"]. The teeth in front are worn almost down to the jawbones, due, it is believed, to eating uncooked foods and crushing substances with the teeth. The sloping skull shows an extreme low order of intelligence.

We note that the female mummy clutching a child known as The Thing on display at a roadside attraction on Interstate 10 north of Tombstone, Arizona, has a double row of teeth. It supposedly was one of three skeletons sold to the operator of the original site for $50 by a Chinese gentleman passing through. The Thing is discussed in several works by David Hatcher Childress. (My son and I paid our two bucks and saw it last Christmas on a road trip.)

Photo above:  Archaic skull from Oleniy Island studied by Marija Gimbutas among other archeologists, showing the position of the mental foramen, the result probably of Neanderthal interbreeding.

Photo below:  The Thing.