Tony Joseph

Early Indians

1. IDEA 1

   DNA is rewriting Indian prehistory

   Joseph, a journalist, draws on recent studies of ancient and modern DNA to tell the story of who the earliest Indians were. He argues that genetics, combined with archaeology and linguistics, now gives much clearer answers to long-debated questions.

2. IDEA 2

   The first Indians came from Africa

   According to the genetic studies Joseph describes, modern humans who left Africa reached India around sixty-five thousand years ago. Their descendants form a foundation of ancestry that is still found across almost every population in India today.

3. IDEA 3

   Farmers arrived from the Zagros region

   Joseph describes a later movement of people related to early farmers from the Zagros mountains of Iran. Mixing with the earlier population, they contributed to the farming communities that grew in places like Mehrgarh, in present-day Pakistan.

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