來自於古代DNA的10項驚人的發現(上)

Much of human history is not written on paper but in our genes. Some genes show the true, unexpected origins of cultures and the desperate evolution to survive pandemics while others have remained unchanged for thousands of years. Ancient DNA also dispels myths but opens up new mysteries.

人類的大部分歷史是被寫在基因裏而不是紙上的。我們能從一些基因中探索到真實意外的文化起源和那些拼死從流行病裏活下來的生命演變，而還有一些則千年不變的基因。古代DNA消除了這些誤解，但也揭示了新的奧祕。

10. The Columbian Exchange

10. 哥倫布大交換

The arrival of Europeans in the Americas caused widespread epidemics in native tribes. This first contact tragedy is called the "Columbian Exchange." Everything started in 1492 when Christopher Columbus sailed to the New World.

歐洲人來到美洲地區的時候，也將肆虐的流行病帶到了土著部落。由此產生的第一件悲劇便是“哥倫布大交換”。這一切始於1492年——克里斯托弗·哥倫布在這一年發現了新大陸。

Before that, pathogens existed in America, including tuberculosis. But none were as devastating as those that arrived by ship—smallpox, measles, yellow fever, and flu.

在此之前，雖然在美洲地區有包括肺結核在內的病原體的存在。但是這次航行所帶來的災難卻是史無前例的——天花、麻疹、黃熱病和流感。

In theory, this vulnerability was pinned on Native Americans evolving in isolation for thousands of years. Scientists finally found proof when they studied the Tsimshian nation's DNA in 2016. Comparing two groups, ancient and modern, they found a big change in the genes linked to immunity.

理論上來講，美洲原住民千百年來都是與世隔絕的。但在2016年，科學家在研究欽西安人（北美洲北太平洋沿岸印第安人）的DNA時發現：現代欽西安人相對於古代欽西安人而言，他們的基因中有關免疫性的一部分有了很大的變化。

There are historical accounts of smallpox tearing into the Tsimshian people after European contact. A drop in genetic diversity shows that smallpox killed 57 percent of the population.

歷史記載，歐洲人發現美洲大陸後，天花入侵到欽西安人的生活中。而遺傳多樣性研究表明：天花造成了欽西安人57%的人口死亡。

Today's Tsimshian are genetically different from their ancestors. The ancient people had a specific sequence adapted to the region's pathogens. Their descendants' genes resulted from selective evolution to survive the arrival of new diseases.

如今的欽西安人，他們的基因有別於他們的祖先：他們祖先的基因裏有一種能適應該地區病原體的特殊序列；但是由於現代欽西安人曾遭受新興疾病而存活下來，這導致他們的基因存在選擇性進化，這區別於他們的祖先。

9. Origin Of The Irish

9. 愛爾蘭的起源

The roots of the Irish can be found in a Neolithic woman and three men from the Bronze Age. Called the Ballynahatty woman, her 5,200-year-old grave was found in 1855 near Belfast. Her genome was sequenced in 2015 and showed a genetic similarity to people from Spain and Sardinia today. Interestingly, her ancestors hailed from the Middle East.

愛爾蘭的起源可以從一位新石器時代的女人和三位青銅時代的男人講起。這個女人叫做Ballynahatty，她的墓穴建於5200年前，於1855年在貝爾法斯特發現。2015年，科學家對她進行了基因測序，發現和今天來自西班牙和撒丁島的人具有遺傳相似性。有意思地是，她的祖先就是來自中東。

During the Bronze Age, settlers arrived from Eastern Europe. The trio of males had ancestry from the Pontic Steppe, an area touching both Ukraine and Russia. The 4,000-year-old Bronze Age group was genetically closest to the modern Irish, Welsh, and Scottish.

而這三位男人的祖先來自黑海大草原，與烏克蘭和俄羅斯接壤。青銅時代，來自東歐的殖民者曾移居到此地。他們生活在4000年前，與現代愛爾蘭人、威爾士人和蘇格蘭人具有最強的基因密切性。

Ireland has notable genetic tendencies—comfortably digesting milk as adults and a condition called hemochromatosis, where iron retention goes overboard. The disorder was found in the woman and one of the men, but each carried a different mutation. The same man, but not the woman, had the genes to consume milk. None of the four individuals fully match modern Irish genomes but rather represent some of the groups that established the Celts.

愛爾蘭人具有明顯的遺傳傾向——成年人可輕鬆消化牛奶（譯者注：可稱爲乳糖耐受現象）和血色素沉着現象（是一種由於高鐵飲食、大量輸血或全身疾病造成體內鐵質儲積過多，鐵質代謝障礙所致的疾病），即鐵質沉積。前面提到的那位新石器時代的女人和其中一位青銅時代的男人都存在基因紊亂，且攜帶了不同的變種。那位男子還具有消耗牛奶的遺傳因子。四個人中沒有一個與現代愛爾蘭人的基因完全匹配，反而代表了一些凱爾特人的基因。

8. The Koma Land People

Land人

The so-called Koma Land people once lived in western Africa in what is today Ghana. If it hadn't been for their one quirk, archaeologists might have overlooked their culture completely.

所謂的Koma Land人曾居住在非洲西部地區——也就是今天的加納。要不是由於他們怪癖的行爲，考古學家可能完全不會注意到他們的文化。

All the Koma Land people left behind were strange terra-cotta figures. The imaginative sculptures depict animal and human characters, sometimes merging the two as hybrids, and were found squirreled away in mounds.

所有遺留下來的Koma Land人都是粘土人物，十分奇怪。這是一些十分富有想象力的雕塑，將動物和人類的特徵刻在黏土上面，有時將二者混合在一起，埋在土堆下面。

Researchers considered lifting DNA from the artifacts to determine their purpose. However, nobody got too excited because the arid environment and the burial of these artifacts for centuries in the hot sand meant that any DNA was most likely too degraded to be of any use.

研究者打算從史前古器物中提取DNA來判斷他們這樣做的目的。但令人沮喪的是，這些史前古器物已經埋在熱砂裏好幾個世紀了，再加上乾燥的環境，任何DNA都很有可能已經降解變成別的東西了。

Incredibly, the clay vessels still contained usable traces of genetic material of what they once held. Most surprising was finding plantain, banana, and pine tree residue, none of which were indigenous during that time (AD 600–1300). The artistic culture must have had well-established trade routes spanning West Africa and the Sahara, the biggest hot desert on the planet.

不可思議地是，研究者在曾經被使用過的粘土器皿上，發現了其中含有可用的遺傳物質的痕跡。最令人驚訝的是，他們還發現了車前草、香蕉以及松樹的殘留物，要知道這些物種在公元600-1300年並非本土植物。一定是由於當時完善的貿易線路，使得這些物種橫跨非洲西部和地球上最大的沙漠——撒哈拉沙漠，來到這裏。

7. Unchanged DNA

7. 不變的DNA

It's rare to find living people with DNA that has been nearly unchanged for 8,000 years. The ancient world migrated madly and shuffled genes all over the place. Mainland East Asia was the exception.

現在很難找到8000年都不發生任何變化的人體DNA。這是因爲古代各地的人們瘋狂遷徙，由此導致基因重組，但東亞大陸卻是個例外。

In 1973, human remains were found in Devil's Gate cave, located in the Russian Far East. Recently, DNA was salvaged from a Stone Age woman. Thanks to little genetic interference since the Neolithic, her genes closely matched certain contemporary ethnic groups in the region.

1973年，在位於俄羅斯遠東的“惡魔之門”洞穴發現了人類的殘骸中，科學家從一位石器時代的女人身上提取了DNA，由於受到自新石器時代以來的一點基因干擾，她的基因和該地區當代的某個族羣是匹配的。

This holds true for Tungusic-speaking groups, including populations from China like the Oroqen and Hezhen. Also still using the Tungusic tongue is the Ulchi people.

同時也與通古斯語人的族羣匹配，包括來自中國的鄂倫春族、赫哲族。

Living where Russia shares a border with China and North Korea, they stand out for two amazing reasons. First, they retained an ancient hunter-gatherer lifestyle until very recently. Second, they appear to be direct descendants of the same population—and it is still basically the same population—of Neolithic hunters to whom the Devil's Gate woman belonged.

現在仍然講通古斯語的是烏爾奇人。他們生活在俄羅斯與中國、朝鮮的國土邊境，有兩點非常引人注目：首先，他們現在仍然保留着古老的狩獵-採集的生活方式。第二，他們似乎是在“惡魔之門”發現的那位女人的直系後代，基本上是和她來自同一羣人。

6. Mota Man

6. 莫塔人

Mota is an Ethiopian rewriting Africa's entire migration tale. He might have died 4,500 years ago, but his genes speak for him. Previously, it was believed that modern humans said goodbye to Africa about 70,000 years ago and spread to the Middle East, Europe, and beyond Asia before farmers from the Middle East and Turkey returned to the Horn of Africa.

莫塔是一位遠古埃塞俄比亞人，是他改寫了非洲的移民史。在發現他之前，人們認爲現代人類是在7萬年前離開非洲，移民到中東、歐洲以及亞洲之外的地區，這一切發生在中東和土耳其的農民回到非洲角之前。但是研究莫塔的基因發現，他死於4500年以前——在人們認爲的亞歐人遷移到非洲以及東非出現農業之前。

The Ethiopian, named for Mota Cave where he was found, provided the first genome sequenced from an ancient African. Mota's age made him older than the Eurasians of the accepted story. Another unknown group returned before them. He didn't have the genes that evolved outside of Africa, those for lighter skins and eye colors, nor could he digest milk like the Eurasians from Turkey and the Middle East.

這位埃塞俄比亞人莫塔的名字取自於發現他的莫塔山洞，他成爲了古老非洲歷史中第一個接受基因組測序的人。莫塔的年齡比歐亞人公認的故事還要老。他沒有非洲之外的人的基因，因爲他既沒有淺色的皮膚和眼睛，也不能像來自土耳其和中東的人一樣能消化牛奶。

Digging deeper into 's makeup for his mystery ancestors, researchers found an interesting ancient match. It was the 7,000-year-old LBK culture from Germany. If Mota's Eurasian ancestry comes from the LBK people, it will change the story of when Eurasians settled and spread throughout Africa.

但是在深入瞭解莫塔神祕祖先的過程中，研究者發現了一件有趣的事：如果莫塔的歐亞祖先是LBK人，這個來自德國的有着7000年曆史的LBK文化。歐亞人移居非洲並在非洲大陸上繁衍生息的故事便不一樣了。