Abstract:
The
oldest
contemporary
human
mitochondrial
lineages
arose
in
Africa.
The
earliest
divergent
extant
maternal
offshoot,
namely
haplogroup
L0d,
is
represented
by
click-‐speaking
forager
peoples
of
Southern
Africa.
Broadly
defined
as
Khoesan,
contemporary
Khoesan
are
today
largely
restricted
to
the
semi-‐
desert
regions
of
Namibia
and
Botswana,
while
archeological,
historical
and
genetic
evidence
promotes
a
once
broader
southerly
dispersal
of
click-‐speaking
peoples
including
southward
migrating
pastoralists
and
indigenous
marine-‐foragers.
Today
extinct,
no
genetic
data
has
been
recovered
from
the
indigenous
peoples
that
once
sustained
life
along
the
southern
coastal
waters
of
Africa
pre-‐pastoral
arrival.
In
this
study
we
generate
a
complete
mitochondrial
genome
from
a
2,330
year
old
male
skeleton,
confirmed
via
osteological
and
archeological
analysis
as
practicing
a
marine-‐based
forager
existence.
The
ancient
mtDNA
represents
a
new
L0d2c
lineage
(L0d2c1c)
that
is
today,
unlike
its
Khoe-‐language
based
sister-‐
clades
(L0d2c1a
and
L0d2c1b)
most
closely
related
to
contemporary
indigenous
San-‐speakers
(specifically
Ju).
Providing
the
first
genomic
evidence
that
pre-‐pastoral
Southern
African
marine
foragers
carried
the
earliest
diverged
maternal
modern
human
lineages,
this
study
emphasizes
the
significance
of
Southern
African
archeological
remains
in
defining
early
modern
human
origins.
