Aryan Invasion/migration Theories & Debates -2

[dhu]

[size="3"]Husky, this is the article.



Mice Migration and Human Migration: TwoLinked Journeys

by P. Priyadarshi

http://www.scribd.com/doc/55042900/Mice-Migration[/size]

Rajabi-Maham et al (2008) found that after reaching the Fertile Crescent mice expansion toward Europe and Asia Minor took at least two routes, tentatively termed the Mediterranean and the Bosphorus/Black Sea routes. This scenario resembles that of another domesticated species, the goat, and fits with the known progression of Neolithic culture, they note. Migration of both the goat and the domestic mouse took exactly the same routes, at the same time around 12,000 years ago. This cannot be a mere coincidence and is an evidence of Neolithic human migration from India with goat and Mus domesticus.(21)



Protracted commensality of Mus m. domesticus in India indicates that Homo sapiens sapiens was doing some primitive farming or foraging and storing food since much before actual onset of Neolithic migration. Indians of that era had possibly a settled life and home and they depended on cereal, fruit and tuber diet. Initially, population was small, and land abundant. Hence cultivation was not needed. Man used to harvest ripe grains (rice, barley, millets) from wild fields and store them. This stored food kept Mus domesticus tied to the Indian households. Pestering of human households by mice forced man to use more and more burnt clay pottery, and it must have prompted him to invent and use metal pottery much later in history.



..

Cognate words for ‘mouse’ are found exclusively within the Indo-European family of languages (English ‘mouse’, Latin mus, Sanskrit mUSaka, muSika, mUs, muSka, (22) Pahlavi musk), indicating expansion of domestic mouse out of India with migrating Neolithic culture of the Indo-European speakers of north India.

Mus diverged into three principal species, viz. Mus musculus domesticus, M. musculus musculus and M. castaneus by 500,000 years back (Geraldis, 2008; Din, 1996), and all the species continued to live in India.(3) In India, Homo erectus lived then. When Homo sapiens sapiens inhabited India in about 100,000 ybp or earlier, these species became adapted to live in and around human dwellings (Boursot, 1993).(4) Mice probably felt safer there. Tsutim et al (2008) found that human environment gives protection to sparrows from being predated by carnivorous birds and animals.(5) The same applies to mice. It is generally accepted that existence of these mice was so much dependant on human food, that they migrated with man as a passive migrant. “One of the most characteristic features of house mice life history is probably its commensalism in relation to humans. The worldwide colonization by this species is mainly due to passive transport by humans and is a consequence of its ecological dependence on humans.”(6) If not all, most of the Mus species can be found in India. Prager et al identified samples from Afghanistan as Mus musculus musculus and castaneus and samples from Pakistan, North India and Nepal as castaneus.(7) “Genetic data indicated that ranges of musculus, custaneous and domesticus likely correspond to three distinct paths of expansion from the Indian cradle.”(8) In fact later discovery of migration routes and distribution ranges of human male lineages (Y-DNA) R1a1a (Underhill, 2009); O2a (Kumar, Vikrant, 2007) and J2b (Sengupta, 2006; Priyadarshi, 2011) exactly overlap those of the three main Mus species.