prefer the second explanation to the first. Further, the second explanation also gives us a model for understanding the hunter/gatherer lifestyle lived by the earliest humans as they escaped the confusion of Babel. The advantages of the first explanation are considerable, however, particularly in the possibility of accounting for the takeover of H. sapiens, and we therefore remain open to being corrected by future studies. C. Early Post-Flood Human Variation At this point, one might wonder whether there is any confirmatory evidence of this account in the scientific record? If all hominin forms are post-Flood, they all descend from Noah’s family, yet when we encounter Abraham in Genesis, he appears to be firmly culturally rooted in the Bronze Age (Bimson 1980; Kitchen 1995; McClellan 2012), a time when H. sapiens are the only humans known in the archaeological record. As a result, our model implies that all of these other human forms, including widespread Neandertals and H. erectus, emerged after the Flood, dispersed after Babel, and were replaced by H. sapiens prior to the time of Abraham. Creationists have a variety of answers for this challenge. The most widespread perspective among YEC writers posits that H. sapiens was always the dominant form and that other human forms are most likely localized, inbred populations with congenital deformities (Bergman et al. 2020; Lubenow 1992, 2004; Rupe and Sanford 2017). We question this on the basis of the ongoing studies of hominin genomics, which repeatedly show that Neandertals, Denisovans, and H. heidelbergensis lie considerably outside the range of modern human genetic variability. Further, repeated sequencing of Neandertal genomes from across their geographic range reveals a range of genetic variability within Neandertals that rivals the genetic diversity observed within the global H. sapiens population (e.g., Bokelmann et al. 2019). Inbred populations would be expected to show less genetic diversity, not more. Finally, the widespread geographic range of Neandertals and H. erectus do not comport with isolated, inbreeding families that produce aberrant morphologies. These people were anything but isolated. That is not to say that localized inbreeding cannot account for any human forms. Indeed, the oddness of H. floresiensis and its location on Flores Island may well be explained in part by inbreeding. But as a general explanation for the appearance of Neandertals or other more widespread hominin forms, inbreeding and isolation do not account for what we observe. If other hominin forms do represent a human group descended from Noah but distinct from H. sapiens (which they seem to be), then we might expect that the earliest descendants of Noah’s family would exhibit a high degree of anatomical variability, some forms of which may not have persisted long enough to found a family lineage and thereby leave more widespread evidence. We might also expect that the earliest human remains would be in some geographic proximity to the Levant or the ancient region of Urartu, where Genesis identifies the ark’s landing site and well within the area of immediate travel after the incident at Babel. Without being dogmatic about it, we nonetheless might expect to find a site of great antiquity in the Levant/Urartu region, where the human remains exhibit a high degree of anatomical variability. We believe that such a candidate site has already been found at Dmanisi in the Republic of Georgia. Archaeological investigation of the site of medieval Dmanisi uncovered some of the most enigmatic hominin remains known to anthropology. The hill itself was formed from a 70 m thick basalt flow called the Mashavera Basalt and dated to some 1.85 Ma by conventional 40Ar/39Ar dating. The Mashavera flow is narrow here, following the course of the Mashavera River (Messager et al. 2011). Above the basalt, 2.5 m of ashfall deposits are cut by pipes and gullies, in which the hominin fossils and remains were deposited in a very small area of just 25 m2 . The lower ashfall deposits, designated Layer A, contains no hominin remains or tools and overlays the Mashavera Basalt with no evidence of erosion into the basalt below. Layer A itself is eroded by pipes and gullies into which ashfall material from Layer B has been deposited, along with hominin remains and artifacts (Gabunia et al. 2000). Stone tools recovered from the site exhibit simple knapping of stone cores (Baena et al. 2010). The hominin remains include both skeletal material as well as major portions of five skulls. Two of the skulls (D2280 and D2282) exhibit traits typical of H. erectus, including cranial capacity, a supraorbital torus, and a thick cranial vault (Gabunia et al. 2000). A third skull and associated mandible (D2700 and D2735) from a juvenile individual and a fourth skull and mandible (D3444 and D3900) from an aged, edentulous individual possessed similar traits to the first two and all were initially considered to be the same species, H. erectus (Vekua et al. 2002, Lordkipanidze et al. 2006). The latest skull reported from the site differs substantially from not only the other four Dmanisi skulls but from every other known hominin. Skull 5, consisting of cranium D4500 and mandible D2600, possesses a small cranial capacity, heavy supraorbital torus, and thick, prominent jaws (Lordkipanidze et al. 2013). The discovery of this skull sparked debate over the taxonomic identity of the five Dmanisi skulls: Should they be referred to a single, extremely variable species, perhaps H. georgicus, or should they be divided into multiple species? Accompanying the publication of Skull 5 was a multivariate shape analysis of hominin crania that included four of the Dmanisi skulls. Skulls 2 and 3 (D2282 and D2700) closely resemble H. erectus specimens such as KNM ER 3733 and Sangiran 17, along with “early” Homo crania KNM ER 1813 and KNM ER 1470. Dmanisi Skull 4 (D3444) resembles Neandertals and the Kabwe and Steinheim skulls more closely. Skull 5 was not closely similar to any particular skull or set of skulls (Lordkipanidze et al. 2013). More importantly, the range of variation seen in the Dmanisi skulls is comparable to the range of variation seen in modern H. sapiens skulls, and also comparable to the range of variation among modern chimpanzee skulls (Pan troglodytes), which suggests that the entire set of Dmanisi skulls came from a single species. The challenging part of this result is that all fossil hominins included in the study, from H. habilis to H. erectus to Neandertals, would thus fall in the same species with Dmanisi. Some researchers prefer to see Skull 5 as a different species from the other Dmanisi skulls rather than collapsing all hominin forms into a single species (e.g., Schwartz et al. 2014). Our human origin model provides a unique solution to the confusion of Dmanisi. We note first that these fossils are likely post-Flood. The limited extent of the Mashavera Basalt flow indicates that it followed regional landforms and was deposited atop Mesozoic limestone, unROSS, BRUMMEL, AND WOOD Human History: From Adam to Abraham 2023 ICC 77
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