The history of the origin of the peoples of the world. Ethnic history of ancient peoples We ourselves are locals

Became people, comes from Marxist linear theory of socio-economic formations, in which staging formations was specially emphasized. But we need to understand that there were no steps between the stages, since the category “stage” is a speculative thing. There are no decisive criteria for separating hominids from humans, and in anthropogenesis there can only be a phylogenetic systematics, according to which the probable ancestors of the genus Homo are australopithecines.

1.3. Tell me exactly when it started it is forbidden, if only because people did not invent it themselves - they already had it hominid ancestors of humans in the form of STAI. - this is a long period of biological transformation of hominids into primitive people, since PACK-TRIBE this and hominid species units and, in which over millions of years hominids evolved into humans.

1.4. I believe that any story about origin of tribes must begin, at least, with a cooling of the climate on our planet, which led to a decrease in the area of ​​tropical forests, in which monkeys occupied the niche of inhabitants of the upper tiers.

1.6. With the cooling that began about 50-40 million years ago, latitudinal zonation began to form, and the seasonality of climate that we have today began to take shape. Therefore, on both sides of the equatorial strip of tropical forest, zones of subtropical forests appear, turning into savannas.

1.7. Periodically, glacier caps creep up from the poles, but it is thanks to the glacier that the great steppe appears across all of Eurasia. On the mainland, at the edge of the glaciers, a tundra zone appears, and between the steppe and the tundra, deciduous forests begin to appear, which are unproductive due to glaciations. And what the reader should pay attention to is that the Mediterranean Sea dried up more than once during the Ice Ages, so that there were no barriers for animals to migrate on a virtually single continent - Africa-Europe-Asia. But hominid migrations from Africa to Eurasia were still a long way off when, about 9 million years ago primates ancestors of humans separated from the ancestors of modern chimpanzees.

1.7. Most likely this separation occurred when hominids ancestors of humans came out to the savannas in eastern and southern Africa. So far, this version is confirmed by the remains of the most ancient australopithecus (Latin Australopithecus, from Latin australis - “southern” and other Greek πίθηκος - “monkey”), which were found mostly in South and East Africa.

1.8. Why did savannahs become the homeland of australopithecines? - can be explained by the fact that the savannas of Africa are not bare steppe, but rather sparse forest-steppe with solitary trees. Probably, tall trees nearby played a huge role during the period when the higher primates mastered the terrestrial lifestyle in the savannas, where there were many large predators.

Chimpanzee troop structure

2.1. Lifestyle of great apes, ancestors of humans - above ground, but under trees- we can imagine using the example of our closest relatives, which are two species of chimpanzees. The choice of chimpanzees is explained not so much by kinship, but by the fact that chimpanzees lead way of life on the ground, but under the canopy of trees, while gorillas and orangutans chose the path of narrow specialization. (After all, the path chosen by gorillas is rather the path of transformation into purely herbivorous Gigantopithecus, and the return of orangutans to an exclusive life on tree branches is a consequence of the characteristics of the forests of Southeast Asia, which became the habitat of this species of apes.)

2.2. The basis of the chimpanzee group is made up of males, who are in varying degrees of relatedness to each other, but the females are aliens. Among males, the strictest linear hierarchy reigns, which is called ordinal, since every male knows who is higher and who is lower than him on the ladder of privileges. Status is very important for any male, since the queue, and sometimes the volume of consumption, depends on it. Therefore, there is a constant struggle for a higher place, because the higher the male’s place, the more females there can be in his clientele. A special place in the hierarchy of consumption belongs to the leader and several of his associates (), whose place is usually taken by the leader’s half-brothers, who helped him in the struggle for the place of leader.

2.3. Female individuals, upon reaching sexual maturity, usually move to neighboring flocks. The place in the female hierarchy of envy depends on the status of a male who has shown interest in a young female and accepted her into his clientele. At the same time, the clientele of a high-ranking male itself has a hierarchical structure; it represents an embryo, since the hierarch-male satisfies his sexual instinct among his clients. However, there are no strict mating relationships, so the male does not know whether he is the father of a particular child. The fact is that low-ranking males can also get sex with a female, but, as a rule, they achieve favor through a gift to the female. Therefore, the initial position of a young male in the STAI hierarchy is determined by the status of his mother.

2.4. The structure of the STAI is important not so much for defense from predators (here it is easier to jump into trees), but for the protection of the territorial-natural complex from other chimpanzees. If groups of chimpanzees had the structure of a HERD, as it should have been according to Marxists, it would be difficult to expect the HERD to organize at least some kind of defense. And chimpanzees already have a distribution of roles and everyone is confident in the support of other members, because each member of the STAI has something to lose, since outside the pack and the consumption and security of even a low-ranking member will be less. The beginnings of the division of labor - at least in the form of division of responsibilities in defense - increase both the security of all members and, indirectly, the volume of per capita consumption.

2.5. It is not so much their origin from a common ancestor that allows us to consider chimpanzees as an example of the behavior of extinct species of primitive people, but rather the fact that today’s chimpanzees are at the stage of mastering terrestrial life under the canopy of trees. Were there any attempts by other monkeys to master a terrestrial lifestyle? - obviously they were and, even today, baboons should be distinguished from the marmoset family, which can be considered full-fledged inhabitants of savannas. But when we take modern baboons as a prototype of the lifestyle of those first human hominids who took a step from the lifestyle of chimpanzees on the ground, but under the canopy of trees to full life on open plains without any shelter, we must remember that baboons rarely use tools. While chimpanzees “follow” a humanoid path of development, since they solve their problems not so much through changing the structure of their bodies, but by inventing and improving tools, baboons have already acquired some predatory aromorphoses.

2.6. Of course, the question of the possibility of modern primates to evolve into a new species of people is purely rhetorical, but the study of baboons shows that it is impossible to acquire intelligence without the stage of apes, which is a “school” for handling tools. Intelligence is an evolutionary adaptation on the “human” path, when problems are solved through the invention of a new tool, while baboons have the opportunity to become only a new predator of the savannas.

How hominids mastered the steppes

3.1. If the question is - WHY did hominids come out to the steppe?- the answer is simple: - the monkeys could not help but try to master the new habitat that replaced the tropical forests, then to answer the question - WHY did hominids come out to the steppe?- we need to look at the differences between savannas and forests. The first difference between the steppes is the herbaceous vegetation, and this immediately created a problem for hominids. After all, primates could not eat herbaceous plants, since over millions of years of evolution they specialized in eating leaves and fruits of trees. But in the steppe, grass is precisely the richest resource. Even then, countless herds of herbivores migrated to the steppes, which flourished thanks to the ability to eat this very grass.

3.2. Of course, primates are capable of consuming succulent roots and seeds of cereals, but in dry steppes this resource would clearly not be enough to survive. Here, the traditional method for monkeys - COLLECTING, as the appropriation of all easily accessible resources, the effectiveness of which apes enhanced through tools, could not ensure the existence of hominids that were larger than baboons. If GATHERING could still feed hominids somewhere in the floodplains, then it is difficult to imagine how hominids could survive in the real steppes. But we know that the first representatives of the genus Homo became the most prosperous species precisely in the vast expanses of the steppes.

3.3. The task looked almost impossible, and so the hominids chose a completely unique way to solve it. Since they could not repeat the success of ungulates, which were the first to acquire the ability to digest grass, and therefore succeeded so much that countless herds migrated to the savannas of Africa and the steppes of Eurasia, the only way left for hominids to develop the steppes was - transformation into predators. After all the only resource that could attract hominids to the steppe was the meat of herbivores, fortunately, hominids, like primates, were omnivorous. But the entire previous evolution of hominids blocked the path for them to acquire predatory aromorphoses in their bodies. Their straight back did not allow them to run quickly on all fours; small sizes not only did not allow killing a large animal, but in tall grass even the hominids themselves did not provide safety from predators. Against the background of these problems - the absence of fangs and claws - looked like a completely solvable problem, as the dog-headed baboons, which acquired huge fangs, confirm to us.

Baboon troop structure

4.1. The apes have their northernmost range, but I am interested in the baboons' lifestyle, which can be explored as a possible hominid lifestyle during the period of their development of life in the savannahs. “Baboons are quite slow and live in savannas where there are no natural refuges from predators. Under these conditions, they created a complex flock structure that enabled collective defense.” This structure turns a FLOCK of baboons into a fighting force, making its way through savannas full of predators that are deadly to baboons. Only a single individual straying from the flock can become the object of a predator’s attack. Even for humans, an encounter with a group of baboons is the most dangerous situation you can find yourself in on the savannas.

4.2. Baboons live in warm regions where there are enough resources on the surface of the earth for food, and it is the feeding of baboons that shows what the same COLLECTING (as a type of appropriating economy) that is attributed to the ancestors of people could look like.

4.3. A flock of baboons during feeding stretches into an echelon line of females and young animals. Children are close to their mothers and thus learn that edible things can be found or caught in the grass. Adult males are located on the sides, forming a protective belt, as they rush at any approaching predator without hesitation. Such an organization of gathering turns the line into catch net, because if a small animal gets in the way of combing, then it has no chance of escaping. At the same time, gathering by baboons is a way for each individual to provide food for itself INDEPENDENTLY.

4.4. In Marxist anthropology, the thesis about COLLECTION was popular as the main method by which primitive people ensured their existence. But baboons show us that in savannas full of predators, GATHERING is not free grazing one by one, but there is a clearly organized coordinated behavior the whole group.

4.5. Of course, among baboons, the STAI structure primarily serves to ensure safety. Redistribution of resources is carried out only from the mother to her children, or during hunting, which baboons organize quite regularly, especially during the dry season.

4.6. Although the hunt is organized by adult males, often the entire flock participates in the hunt as a beater. Since baboon hunting objects are small animals, then consumption of prey meat is a privilege of males with high status in the hierarchies of the pack. Comparing gathering and hunting, we can conclude that it is in hunting that it manifests itself, which is a consequence of the entire hierarchical structure of the STAI. If among baboons the redistribution of prey meat is limited to high-status males, then among steppe hominids the redistribution of meat reached the very last members in the hierarchy of the human pack, because the victims of hunting among primitive people were large animals.

4.7. The similarity in the behavior of chimpanzees and marmosets in packs allows us to imagine the lifestyle of australopithecines, like the lifestyle of a baboon, but with the amendment that fangs and claws were replaced by sticks and stones (tools of labor) in their hands. It would seem that this is such a trifle - a stone or a stick in the hands of an australopithecus, but it was the tools that took these anthropoids beyond the scope of natural evolutionary development. No, the ancestor hominids did not escape the influence of the evolutionary law that the natural way of adapting to a new environment is to change the shape of the body, including the acquisition of progressive aromorphoses. The bodies of people's ancestors did not stop transforming, but not for the sake of adaptation to a specific environment, but for the sake of turning the body into a manipulator tools. And since any object could become a human tool, the whole body (and especially the hand) in the role of a manipulator had to be universal. As a result of such an indirect - through tools - approach to adapting to the environment, australopithecines did not need to grow fangs, like baboons; rather, on the contrary, the size of the fangs they inherited from monkeys noticeably decreased.

Transition to upright walking

5.1. And here the thought involuntarily comes about the notorious upright walking, which is popularly considered the most important difference between humans and monkeys. However, people did not invent locomotion on two hind limbs, since upright walking - in the sense of walking on 2 limbs - is an ability that many animals, and almost all primates, possess.

5.2. In Marxist anthropology, upright walking was explained by the need to raise the head above the grass in order to have a sufficiently large overview, on which the safety of hominids in the steppe depended. Marxists consider this explanation sufficient for the average person, and for themselves, since the consequence is more important to them - after all the transition to upright posture freed up my hands. Why explain if such a rational consequence explains everything, as if by itself - the ancestors of people initially had the goal of freeing their hands for tools.

5.4. Upright walking in the narrow sense - only like walking- would hardly have ensured survival for hominids on the plains of the steppes if it were not itself a special case of RUNNING (running upright). It was in RUNNING that the advantage of upright walking manifested itself, as constantly falling, since movement is carried out due to the force of gravity of the Earth.

5.5. A body leaning forward falls spontaneously - a person only needs to constantly substitute his legs to prevent the fall. Human running did not provide hominids with an advantage in speed in hunting, but its low energy consumption (due to the flight phase) made hominids hardy stayers. If the objects of the hunt were animal sprinters, capable of only a short run, then a running person could pursue a victim, especially a wounded one, for hours. Australopithecus, which was quite small in size, did not have the strength for a decisive blow, so that with one blow of even the sharpest weapon, it could kill a large ungulate on the spot. The straight position of the body intensified the blow, but in any case, a series of blows was required, for which the hominids simply followed the tracks of the wounded animal.

5.6. By the way, the loss of hair is confirmation that people did not strive for upright walking, but rather for RUNNING. After all, during a long run, the muscles generated a lot of heat, and a person needed to quickly remove heat from the body to the external environment. With the body in an upright position while RUNNING, the best cooling radiator could only be the skin, which, to increase efficiency, also began to be moistened with sweat. Of course, with this air cooling method - through the surface of the skin - the hair only got in the way. In addition, the need for effective heat removal has led to the elongation of the legs in body proportions, since in humans the surface of the skin of the thigh + thigh has the largest area.

5.7. The reader probably understands that if I do not provide periodization, I forgot about it. I must admit that I was hoping for a coherent presentation, but the article is divided into chapters devoted to individual problems. It turned out that to present sequentially emergence of TRIBES- in the form of a story - it doesn’t work, because we simply don’t know much, for example, when a person lost his hair. Most likely, the late australopithecines were already hairless, but it seems that the hair on the head, which no one had cut since childhood, covered the body from the sun’s rays like a cloak. However, the loss of hair raises the question of clothing and the time of mastering fire, since even in the savannas the nights can be cold, especially for people who can sweat a lot. However, clothing and the taming of fire were milestones in the development of high latitudes, while emergence of redistribution was a milestone for the emergence of humanity as such.

The emergence of redistribution

6.1. I have already substantiated the position that gathering using the baboon method, even in warm savannahs, could not ensure the livelihoods of australopithecines, so they could only become a thriving species on the plains as predators. But strangely, the bodies of australopithecines, as they moved to the top of the food chain, lost any predatory characteristics. The reason was that the superpredator of the shroud was not an individual, but a group of hunters. This collective predator had fangs and claws replaced by sharpened sticks and stones in the hands of hunters. But we are interested redistribution process products between members of the PACK-TRIBE, and I mention hunting only for the sake of redistribution of meat in a troop of baboons, which occurs through the leader to status males.

6.2. Actually, moving on to Australopithecines, if you don’t come up with some other redistribution mechanism meat, then only understandable remains. But, if everything is more or less clear with meat, then another question arises: - How did redistribution come about? other products from one member to all the others, and related to this - the division of the entire PACK-TRIBE into groups of producers of one product. The POSSIBILITY of separation can be explained by an increase in the body size of Australopithecus and the improvement of their weapons, so that from some point during the day they stopped being afraid of predators. But the question remains - why and how did the product pass from one member to another?

6.3. Here it is necessary to point out the methodological helplessness of orthodox anthropology, which cannot, in principle, explain the redistribution, since it accepts as an axiom the position that the community of primitive people, respectively, and australopithecines, was a HERD, and not a Flock with a hierarchical structure.

6.4. But explain emergence of redistribution we can only recognize the main organizing force of the PACK-TRIBE of primitive people. After all, the main hierarch of the STAI could simply take away any product from any member, and he himself would happily - in the hope of praise from the leader - be glad to present him with part of the product remaining after personal consumption. If we admit that the hierarchical instinct had such strength that every member he himself strove give the leader the surplus of his consumption, then the leader of the STAI-TRIBE constantly had an excess amount of various products, which, after personal consumption, he could distribute among his associates - high-ranking males and females from his personal clientele. Distribution scheme from the leader in other respects it was similar to the distribution of meat, but the main secret of the redistribution system was the appearance of an excess of food among the leader himself, which could only be formed thanks to the hierarchical instinct that each breadwinner had.

Tribal site as a site of redistribution

7.1. The transition from combing to the use of point sources of resources was a revolutionary breakthrough, as there was a transition to a new level of division of labor, because now the TRIBE was daily divided into groups of producers of only ONE product. After all, the entire Flock simply physically could not run around all the sources of vital products during the day. After the transition to separation, the PARKING PLANT became a place for the redistribution of products. If for monkeys, the parking lot is only a place to spend the night, which the Flock leaves in the morning full staff, since predators did not allow dividing the Flock into small groups, then in Australopithecus the camp turns into a permanent body, where part of the tribe remained for the day: - young animals under the supervision of old people, lactating and pregnant females.

7.2. Actually, there is nothing unusual in the parking lot, since many animals have dens, but among the Australopithecines the STANDING began to acquire the features of an economic cell. Each detachment brought one product to the PARKING, but after redistribution- members received all other vital products. allowed each hominid to obtain the entire range of products by engaging in only one type of activity - the extraction of one product. An increase in consumption will appear later, as a consequence of specialization, i.e. assigning the same hominids to the production of one product.

7.3. There is something similar in a beehive or anthill, where the specialization of insects HAS REACHED adaptation of body shape to type of work, so that different classes of individuals of the same species appeared. People avoided this, but in any case, specialization created a certain caste, since a descendant could only obtain labor skills from his parent, as a result of which specialization was passed on from generation to generation. In the narrow circle of a small tribe, the specialization of each member only increased consumption, but in doing so we destroyed myths about the succession of leaders or some kind of riots against leaders, which appeared under the influence of the theory of class struggle.

7.4. Most likely from some point the place of leader generally became hereditary, since the bearer of knowledge about managing the economy of the TRIBE could only be a descendant of the leader. There could be no talk of any change of leader, even more so - with the death of the leader, who did not have a trained successor, the TRIBE disintegrated, and the members transferred to other tribes where there were leaders.

7.5. However, the emergence of PARKING as an economic category raises the question - what then is the territory that the TRIBE owned. In terminology, there is a name for such a territory.

Territorial natural-economic complex

8.1. Earlier I already spoke about the important role of the hierarchical structure of the STAI for defense against the claims of other packs, but now let's fight - what is a natural-economic complex. Equally - a Flock of baboons or a TRIBE of hominids - daily uses a certain territory that can be called daily a territorial natural-economic complex, which is only part of the territory owned and controlled by a SPECIES UNIT (at least for an annual period). We cannot study the specific territory of a specific UNIT, but with the advent of the Australopithecus SITE, it becomes possible to imagine MODEL of the territorial natural-economic complex. In theory - territorial natural-economic complex A hominid Flock is a circle, the radius of which is equal to the path that a hominid can cover in the morning to the border of the complex and return back to the camp by night. After all, even a group of armed hunters could not stay overnight outside the fortified camp, since its small number did not ensure its safety, and the main camp without defenders was in danger of being attacked by predators. As a result of reasoning, we come to the conclusion that the ideal territorial natural-economic complex of the TRIBE is a circle of land, the center of which is the PARKING PLANT.

8.2. Even if we believe some studies that ancient people moved faster than modern people, we still must admit the existence of a physical limit to the distance of a hominid from the STANDING POINT during daylight hours. It seems that the radius of the circle of the territorial complex did not exceed 20-30 km, because from such a distance it is quite problematic to bring any amount of resource to the PARKING PLANT. But if the size of the territorial natural-economic complex is a fixed thing, then how is it related to the number of people in the tribe?

Tribe size

9.1. Up to a certain point population growth members of the PACK-TRIBE led to an increase in consumption, since it is clear that the more getters, the more product. But the size of the complex cannot be increased, therefore, over time - more often from the influence of the people themselves or for other reasons, resources began to decrease, which led to a drop in the volume of per capita consumption. Then - either the whole flock had to change the PARKING POINT, since it was moving to a new natural complex, or THE FACK has budded if the reason was overpopulation.

9.2. It must be understood that Australopithecus had a consumption level much higher than those hominids who decided to conquer the savannas. Otherwise, they could not develop into people (Homo), but even modern people for a short time can maintain their physical existence at the level of hominid consumption. Therefore, the number of members in the PARKING could vary, but within strict limits, and under normal conditions it directly depended on the wealth of available resources of the natural complex. However model of territorial natural-economic complex shows that people's limited speed of movement does not allow increasing its size. Therefore, we must admit that there were objective LIMITATIONS FROM ABOVE on the number of TRIBE members who could live in one STAND, in the sense of having the level of consumption that corresponded to the level of their development.

9.3. The upward trend in numbers was maintained, so that more and more people could live in one site. However, starting from a certain critical number - about a thousand individuals in accordance with Parkinson's Law of a THOUSAND - the community of people loses controllability. The leader can no longer recognize ALL the members by sight, so he involves assistants (tribal nobility) in the management and, as a result, finally loses the idea of ​​the real state of affairs.

9.4. On the other hand, if we imagine that the list of vital goods of human ancestors was limited to a dozen products, then to produce this dozen, a minimum of ten capable members is required. Of course, the TRIBE had more links, but even so - we understand that the TRIBE as a UNIT OF HUMANITY - could exist if its number was on the order of several dozen members (if less, then the TRIBE turned into a UNIT OF THE SPECIES OF HOMINIDS - A PACK). From the point of view of the division of labor system, a large number was a condition for the production not so much of the volume of the product as of the assortment. Hominid development required constant growth in the number of products, and therefore the number of units of their type tended to increase. As Australopithecus and the first Homo developed, the number of their units also grew steadily, which is confirmed by archaeological discoveries of Neolithic sites, where about 250 people already lived. So, the number of the STAI-TRIBE had LIMITATIONS and BOTTOM, so if for some reason the number fell below a certain minimum, then the entire Flock-TRIBE simply died out if it did not meet another TRIBE in time, capable of accepting members of the starving tribe into its composition.

9.5. My reasoning refute the popular ones fantasies of wars of extermination, which were fought between packs and tribes of people during the period. Clashes between pack-tribes occurred only due to the division of natural complexes, but single individuals quite easily passed from one unit of humanity to another. A special need for members of other units, as carriers of other genes, will come after nomadic hunters go out into the steppes, where many tribes will find themselves isolated (at great distances from other tribes). After all, only this need can explain the fact that the Cro-Magnons who entered Eurasia will pick up the remnants of the population of Neanderthals and Denisovan man, because otherwise it is difficult to explain the presence of a significant percentage of their genes in the genome of Europeans and Asians.

Changing the criterion for choosing a leader

10.1. I have already spoken about the place of the LEADER as the top of the linear hierarchy in the TRIBE. Actually, it is strange that it would seem that “class” orthodox anthropology believes the role of the LEADER so much insignificant in the structure of the TRIBE (perhaps Morgan is to blame, who, as an ethnographer, studied more of the TRIBE among the Indians and did not study the role of the leader at all). At the same time, it is surprising how many books and films there are in which the tribal leader is portrayed as a despot. Therefore, most people do not even realize how contradictory the generally accepted ideas about a tribal leader. After all, it is believed that tribal leader it's still the same leader of the pack, which the tribe re-elects at almost every general meeting, but is also full of myths about rebellions of tribe members against the despotism of the leader. All these myths about vibrant political democracy crept into the idea of ​​“primitive communism”, which Marx established in anthropology as the everyday life of tribes. As a result, in modern anthropology everyone avoids the topic of LEADER and leadership, even description of the leader easier to find in children's literature.

10.2. The reader may have already noticed that I constantly criticize the classics of Marxism for their mistake in defining the structure of the first human communities as a HERD. Of course, I am doing this for the sake of enhancing the drama of the crisis in which anthropology finds itself, but in reality Max and Engels could not have known about such a characteristic as controllability, which distinguishes the concepts of PACK and HERD. After all, a Flock, unlike a HERD, necessarily has a certain activity division system(if not labor), in which there is a SUBJECT of managerial labor who has the power to make management decisions.

• 10.3. Management decision- 1)... 2) creative, volitional action of the subject of management,... This action consists in choosing a goal, program and methods of action of the team in the field of solving a problem or in changing the goal.

10.3. Unfortunately, in modern political anthropology there is no intelligible text on the topic TRIBAL LEADER, which could be criticized. Well, perhaps the chapter Leadership in the book of the recognized authority N.N. Kradin. , from which we learn only that “Unfortunately, archeology has little to say about specific forms of leadership.”

• 10.4. Leadership in tribes, as in local groups, is personal. It is based solely on individual abilities and does not imply any formalized positions. However, in tribes there is a certain mechanism for resolving conflicts through mediation and limiting the aggressiveness of the opposing parties. These functions can be assigned both to tribal segments and to their representatives or the most authoritative persons.

10.5. Actually, we again return to the fact that no one in anthropology has really studied the concept of TRIBE, so the unscientific concepts of “tribal segments” and “authoritative persons” are invented, which does not clarify anything, but only creates terminological leapfrog. It is clear that the reason for power, the role and functions of the LEADER must be considered in, but orthodox anthropology has not yet reached this point.

10.6. It is believed that leader roles and the leader are equivalent, which is partly true in terms of their position in the hierarchy, but orthodox anthropology still recognizes that leader selection criteria PACK and TRIBE leader are rather opposite. When “selecting” a leader, the main criterion is physical strength contender, which is typical for schooling mammals. After all, a certain male, in a personal struggle with the current leader, simply achieves victory and takes a place at the top of the hierarchy, but among monkeys we can call this “election” only by the freedom of each member to vote “FOR” with his feet if he remains, or “NO” if he moves to another pack. And when choosing a leader (in the understanding of orthodox anthropology), the main criterion is experience, less strong-willed qualities, and the role of physical strength comes to almost zero. However, we will not find explanations in social anthropology, since it does not even see this change in the criteria for choosing a leader.

10.7. To explain, we will have to remember the hierarchical structure of STAI, in which it sets . Since redistribution occurs through the leader to high-ranking males, then they have a clientele. The volume of consumption of clients depends on the ability of the hierarch male to acquire a SHARE that exceeds that of rivals (redistribution). It seems that the share depends on luck male in the hunt, which allows him, bypassing the leader, to distribute meat among his clients. Better consumption makes other members of the pack want to join the clientele of the successful male, so the successful candidate for the position of leader already has a positive attitude from the majority of members of the pack. But the main role in winning the place of leader is the transformation of the clientele into a CLAN-ROD, when a support group of close males is formed around the clientele hierarch.

10.5. We understand that the contender for the position of leader could only be a high-ranking male, whom the instinct of dominance forces him to compete for a higher status in the hierarchy. After the emergence of the beginnings of a CLINA-CLAN, the applicant in the struggle for the place of leader begins to be supported by males from his clientele, the number of which is greater for the successful applicant. The change of leader, even among modern monkeys, does not end with murder, since each individual is very important in the system of division of labor of the STAI, therefore the fights take on the character of a psychic attack in the form of a demonstration of the seriousness of intentions. If the applicant does not accept defeat, then he can split the Flock by trying to branch off with his CLAN-KIND. Then the result depends on the number of members who will defect to the new STAI. It is this “voting with one’s feet” that is the reason for the change in the criterion for choosing a leader - even if a stronger, but less intelligent and experienced leader could have won over the previous leader, then everything was decided by the result of the “election” - which side the majority of the flock would take. The unlucky leader remained with a smaller part of the pack, in which consumption fell much compared to the consumption of a more numerous pack, so that soon even members initially devoted to the new leader left for the more successful one. Examples of the emergence of politics in the form of bribery and the formation of temporary groups to achieve a goal can be seen in schools of chimpanzees, especially the bonobo species.

10.6. It should be noted that a change in the criterion for choosing a leader occurs during time of appearance of the tribe, but if there is no explanation, then it will be difficult to explain why the position of leader became hereditary. The structure of the TRIBE of primitive people developed, so that new forms appeared - TRIBES of nomads, then TRIBES of farmers, but the economic role of the leader, as the main distributor, was constantly preserved. In the system of division of labor, the place of the leader was allocated to the management level, without which it is impossible to imagine the functioning of the tribal economy.

Origin of peoples

How people, nations and races appeared.

There are a great many hypotheses about the appearance of people on earth. Some say that God created us, others suggest that we were brought by aliens. Every nation, every religion has its own point of view on the origin of man. There is no point in proving the correctness of any theories, nor in refuting them. The fact that without understanding history, without knowing one’s ancestry, it is impossible to foresee our near and distant future does not require proof.

Speaking about genealogy, we assume not only a store of information about our immediate ancestors, but also knowledge of the history of our people, our language. Speaking about history, you often come across the idea that peoples appear out of nowhere, carry out a mission prescribed by no one knows who, and disappear without a trace. This circumstance is especially noticeable in the history of the Indo-European peoples.

The origin of races is nowhere and never linked either to the appearance of Homo sapiens or to the development of ethnic groups. It is assumed that somewhere in distant Africa, in time immemorial, Homo sapiens, undoubtedly white, appeared, populated all continents, and then, for some unknown reason, divided into three main races. Ethnic groups have formed quite recently. Slavs in the 5th century, Germans a little earlier. The oldest in Europe, the Greeks and Romanesque peoples, appeared a thousand years earlier.
Everything seems to be fine and wonderful. It is not clear how the ancestors of the same Slavs and Germans communicated with each other. The answer is something like this: “...in a proto-language or Indo-European language!” Then the question arises, why first the Germans, and then the Slavs, suddenly forgot their speech? Literally, in one or two centuries they switched: some to Germanic, some to Slavic.

Then they lived side by side for a couple of thousand years and each spoke their own language. Despite the pressure of information technology, having survived the horrors of Nazism, already in the era of post-industrial society, many residents of Lusatia speak their native Slavic language. For several centuries, the Volga Germans lived in complete isolation from Germany and spoke their native language. For almost a millennium, Tatars, Chuvash, Mordovians, Mordovians, Mari, and Udmurts lived together with the Russians. They kept their speech.

What global processes occurred at the beginning of our era that forced some ethnic groups to die instantly, by historical standards, and gave birth to others. Wars? The Great Migration of Peoples? But weren't there wars earlier or later? There were, and some more. The horrors of the world wars of the twentieth century could not be dreamed of by the ancient inhabitants of Europe even in nightmares. The campaigns of Caesar and Attila were child's play compared to a continuous front, carpet bombing, volleys of hundreds of artillery pieces at every kilometer or crematoria in concentration camps.

Migration of peoples - a myth?

Or maybe there were no sharp transitions? Ethnic groups and languages ​​originated much earlier. And the relocations are somehow not very good. It’s one thing when healthy and strong men travel. With weapons in their hands and on war horses, they make long journeys. Having plundered a foreign country, turned local residents against themselves, and received trophies, the heroes return to the arms of their loved ones to lick their wounds.

It is another thing to invade a hostile country, dragging behind you infants, helpless old people, the sick and disabled. One has to very much doubt the combat effectiveness of such an army, and even more so the advisability of such campaigns. The resettlement of the Goths looks especially funny. From Sweden they moved to the Vistula. Then they moved to the Dnieper and Don. Having plundered the Greek cities of the Black Sea, the Goths took up arms against the Romans. Having defeated Rome, the wanderers finally settled on the territory of the empire. The most interesting thing is that absolutely the entire population moved from one place to another, leaving behind neither cities, nor villages, nor descendants capable of preserving the language and glory of their ancestors.

Really, at the call of their leaders, people abandoned their land, houses, acquired property, put old people and children in carts or on their shoulders and rushed to unknown countries to gain glory for kings and gold for royal wives? In every nation there is a category of people who are ready for adventures at the call of their hearts. Part of the population can be attracted by easy prey and tempting prospects.
On the other hand, there will always be sensible people. There are pathological conservatives who, under no circumstances, are able to change their place of residence or change their usual way of life. In the end, there must be opposition to the leaders. Where is all this? Why should leaders carry a burden with them? What's common sense? There are more questions than answers.

What happens? Relocation is a myth, fairy tales and fiction. There was no sign of him. What happened? There was a collapsing Roman Empire, which had more and more new opponents. There was a written history of Rome. Competent and inquisitive scientists grew up who tried to understand where tribes came from that were capable of fighting on equal terms with the great empire, and sometimes even winning.

Rome and the barbarians

During its heyday, Rome was not strong in the arts or sciences. The strength of Rome is the army. The advantage of the Romans is their ability to fight. They were deeply indifferent to what language their enemy spoke; they were of little interest in the chronicles of the defeated peoples. At the initial stage of their history, the Romans called all their opponents Gauls. The Greeks brought science to Rome. Together with the Greek teachers, the term “barbarians” came to Rome.

The Roman and Greek understandings of the word barbarians were very different from each other. The Greeks called all non-Greeks barbarians. The Romans shortened the meaning of this word, excluding from it the peoples who at that time were part of the empire. In practice, by the beginning of the new era, the Romans called the peoples living in the north or northeast of the empire barbarians.

Conquests and the defense of vast territories constantly required replenishment of manpower. The Roman army was replenished by residents of the border regions. Some legions consisted exclusively of representatives of one tribe. Often the “barbarians” became major military leaders and emperors of Rome. The new nobility needed a pedigree comparable to the chronicles of patrician families. It was at this time that the need arose for descriptions of the exploits of barbarian tribes.

Rome received the histories of neighboring peoples, the peoples were given Roman historians. Historical science acquired written sources. There is no need to talk about the reliability of such sources. They mixed everything: real facts, customer requirements, fairy tales, legends, myths and the outright imagination of the authors. It was in such sources that the first mentions of the Germans and Slavs appeared.

There are no written sources of the existence of the Slavs before the 5th century. One has to very much doubt the objectivity of the existing ones. What is the result of the reasoning? Is the history of our ancestors lost forever and without a trace? There is no need to rush to conclusions. We already have enough information that the history of the Slavs does not begin and end with the 5th century. Every year more and more facts about their existence are collected.

Ancient artifacts appear with writings in which Slavic words are easily guessed. Archaeologists are excavating household items of the inhabitants of ancient cities, in which continuous continuity with the later life of the Slavic peoples can be traced. And finally, the history of a people is deeply intertwined with the history of language. Slavic languages ​​are alive, they contain enough information to learn about the origin, lifestyle, way of life, culture and even religion of the Slavs.

History in Russian

The Russian language is no exception. In order for history in the Russian language to reveal its deepest secrets, it is necessary to understand the code of the language, or, more simply, to calculate the key words or sounds with which the language began. Despite the apparent complexity of the task, figuring out these mysterious building blocks of word formation turned out to be not so difficult.

There are several reasons for this.

1. Primitive languages ​​are quite primitive and laconic. The language of our distant ancestors was no exception. With all the diversity and richness of the modern Russian language, only a few words-sounds lie at its foundation. You can count them on the fingers of your hands, but from them a core or skeleton is built, on which a huge trunk with many twigs, branches and leaves of a mighty tree is supported.

2. All key words-sounds have their roots in omanotopy, i.e. natural onomatopoeia. Initially, this sound denoted an object or phenomenon with which this sound was associated. For the most part, primitive people associated sounds with the animals that made them. An example from modern language. “Koo-Koo” - the cuckoo cuckoos.

3. Some keywords are present in other languages, albeit in a modified form, but denoting meanings that are close in meaning. One of them is the sound “MA”, like the variants “MI”, “ME”, “MO”, “MU”, “WE”. In Russian: “Cute”, “Melky”, “SMALLER”, “SMALL”, “BABY”, “MOM”, “Well done”, “MIGHTY”, “Husband”, “WE”. All these words denote either one of the hypostases of a person or denote a qualitative sign of the same person. Similar words meaning “person” are found in Finnish, Turkic, and Germanic languages.

Speaking about the qualitative attribute, it was not by chance that I arranged the words in a certain sequence. The sound “MA” occupies a neutral position. This sound was one of the first words to enter human use. This is what they called the crying child and the mother he called. If they wanted to say about something smaller, then the vowel “A” was replaced with “E” or “I”, and vice versa, “O”, “U”, “Y” went in increasing order. This technique is applicable not only to the sound “MA”, but also to other words of the Russian language.

Stages of Russian history

Knowing the key words and the basic rules by which our ancestors created the language, you need to mentally transport yourself to the historical era when these words were born. Like many developed ethnic groups of the world, the Russian people have experienced several main stages of their development. Here it should still be clarified that each ethnic group had its own history

1. Primitive hunting and gathering. (First people, mom)
2. Taming and domestication of animals. (Indo-Europeans, human)
3. Plowing. (Slavs, mob)
4. Commercial hunting and trade. (Rus, Russia)

The first stage is common to almost all Eurasian peoples. Not many words from it have been preserved in our language. But the same phoneme “MA”, and with it the words “mother”, “small”, “peace”, “darkness” and some others.

During the second stage, the “Caucasian race” or the “Nordic race” appeared, as you like. The Indo-European language family traces its ancestry back to this time. This period gave the Russian language the following words: “aries”, “faith”, “age”, “evening”, “city”, “genus”. The meanings of some of the above words differ from modern ones.

The third stage is the Slavic stage. Most of the words in modern Russian appeared at this time. At the same time, the everyday culture of the people was formed, which remained intact almost until the beginning of the twentieth century.

Actually, the last fourth stage is Russian. At this time, the terms “Rus”, “Russia”, “Russian language” appeared. A culture of oral speech was formed. Modern writing appeared.

Based on all of the above, I tried to present my version of events in a series of short articles under the general title “History in the Russian Language.” They do not contain a detailed description of the events. This is a kind of contour map. It will take a lot of time and effort to paint it.

Scientists disagree. On the one hand, tribes are a relic of the past, and modern ethnic associations are not considered tribes in the historical sense. However, in the modern world there are still a number of political unions that meet the basic criteria of a tribe.

Interpretation of the term

There is no common understanding of what a tribe is. Researchers give several definitions.

1. A tribe is a community that is defined by common traits common to all members, such as language, origin, traditions, and customs.
2. Tribe - political alliances with a belief in a common bond, an association of several groups of peoples of different origins. As a rule, they have their own history, a certain legend of the appearance of the tribe.
3. A tribe is a type of ethnic community, a special social organization of society before division into classes. In their original form, tribes arise simultaneously with clans.

Characteristics of an established tribe

Understanding what a tribe is is largely helped by the criteria by which an ethnic association is considered such:

• the presence of a separate territory, delimited from the territory of other tribes by a natural boundary;
• certain economics;
• mutual assistance of fellow tribesmen, community of actions, for example, collective hunting, gathering;
• a single tribal language;
• tribal self-name;
• self-awareness of oneself as a collective unit;
• the presence of common rituals and traditions observed by the tribe.

History of origin

What is a tribe and when was it formed?

Archaeologically, the emergence of tribes was recorded only in the Mesolithic, during the period of the end of their formation as social and ethnic communities.

Unlike the following types (such as nationality and nation), a tribe is based on the same origin of the clans included in it, on the ties of consanguinity between all its members. It is the bond of consanguinity that unites two or more clans that makes them a tribe.

Developed tribes at the end of the era of the primitive communal system already had tribal self-government, which consisted of a tribal council and two leaders - civil and military. Over time, stratification by property develops in the tribe, rich and poor families and tribal nobility appear, and the role of military leaders grows. In later forms, tribal organizations are preserved in class society, where they are intertwined with slaveholding and sometimes capitalist relations (for example, the nomadic tribes of the Arabian Peninsula, the Bedouins of North Africa, etc.).

Ancient tribes

The concept of “ancient tribes” is very complex and multifaceted. On the one hand, they lived in the past, and on the other, peoples who preserved the way of life that was formed many centuries ago.

The way of life of the ancient tribes was formed gradually. In the early Neolithic period, crafts appeared, which became a prerequisite for the emergence of the city. The people who united the community were called priests. At the head of the tribe was a military leader. For a long time, the ancient tribe preserved its traditional way of life, defending it even in collisions with developed civilizations.

Modern tribes

In modern society there are still tribes that have preserved the ancient way of life. Most of them are located in Africa, South America, the Indonesian islands, as well as on the islands of the Philippine archipelago and in the Amazon jungle. Communication with such tribes requires special behavior in a certain culture. You should take into account the fact that among these nationalities you can pay with your life for any mistake in behavior. It is necessary to remember that in these cultures the following values ​​are paramount: decency in personal life, modesty, courage, fearlessness, the ability to endure physical suffering with dignity, chastity and modesty.

The most famous tribes

The most famous ancient tribes are:

• Slavs;
• Drevlyans;
• anta;
• Scythians;
• Varangians;
• Goths;
• Hottentots;
• Celts;
• Teutons;
• Khazars;
• Pechenegs;
• Cumans;
• Huns;
• nomads;
• nomads;
• romances;
• Phoenicians;
• Moors.

Here are some modern tribes that exist today:

• Surma people.
• Pervi tribe.
• Ramapo.
• Brazilian.
• Tribes of New Hawaii.
• Sentinelese.

As we see, the tribe (its definition is ambiguous) as an ancient form of existence has almost not survived. And those unions that tourists discover are more likely ethnic communities than tribes from a historical point of view.

History of the origin of the peoples of the world

For more than 40 years I have been researching the origins of all the peoples of the world. First, I researched this topic using historical materials that are recognized by modern historical science. And this history can be traced back to ancient historical records, which begin in Ancient Egypt, Sumer, Akkad, Babylon, Assilia, Ancient China, Ancient India, i.e. The oldest written sources date back to the 3rd millennium BC. The largest historical monuments about ancient peoples were left by the ancient Greeks and Romans. In the Middle Ages, written sources about ancient peoples became more numerous. But I have researched this history from ancient times to 1648 (ancient world and middle ages). Based on all these sources, I compiled a table and drew maps of the settlement of the peoples of the world only from the 3rd millennium BC to 1648.
My knowledge about the most ancient peoples can be expressed by the following picture... Beyond the yellow line (this is the time of the 3rd millennium BC) there are no written sources about the history of the peoples of the world.

What happened before? After all, I am interested in the history of the emergence of the peoples of the world from the most ancient times (from the very first people on Earth). I began to explore all the archaeological materials. I began to conditionally accept that tribes of one archaeological culture are one people (or a group of related peoples).
Yes, in those ancient times we cannot call any people by any specific name. (no written sources survive). We know that the ancestors of all the ancient Germans were the tribes of the Jastorf culture, the ancestors of the Celts were the tribes of the La Tène culture, the ancestors of the ancient Slavs were the tribes of the Zarubinets, Dneprodvinsk, and Przeworsk cultures. This way you can trace the history of the origin of all ancient peoples. I began to draw new (more ancient) maps and tables of the origin, merger and disappearance of ancient peoples in a period older than the 3rd millennium BC. I compiled tables and maps up to about 30 thousand years BC. The results of my research can be expressed in this figure, where the blue stripe indicates a period of approximately 30 thousand years BC.

After all, even at that time there was a wide variety of archaeological cultures on Earth (and therefore there were many peoples). Further (ancient) archaeologists basically have no information, as if there were no peoples before 30 thousand years BC. This is consistent with modern historical science that people evolved from monkeys about 40 thousand years ago (I don’t believe in this scientific nonsense; at present there is even a large group of alternative historians who claim that man lived already in more ancient times ).
And what to do with numerous artifacts (archaeological finds, which official historical science does not recognize and hides them from the public. And what to do with ancient legends, which historical science also does not recognize. And all these materials say that man existed on Earth even 300-500 million years ago.
I began to study ancient legends, artifacts and articles by alternative historians (in Russia there are also such scientists - Demin, Chudinov, Gorbovsky and others). As a result, I got a harmonious table of the origin of all the peoples of the world, starting from the most ancient times (it includes the Asuras, Atlanteans, and Muans, whom most modern historians do not recognize).
The result of my research can be expressed in this picture

And if we consider that at the beginning of the 20th century in the east of Zaire (Africa) a small tribe of pygmies with cold blood was found (they could not be found after the 1st World War), then it is necessary to include ancient peoples who had cold blood among the ancient peoples (like dinosaurs), then the human history of ancient peoples can “grow older” for a significant period.
And if we take into account that (according to legends) in ancient times other intelligent creatures lived on Earth (completely different from people, perhaps similar to lizards, dinosaurs, large insects), then the history of civilizations on Earth will have to be even more ancient. And the picture of the origin of the peoples of the world can take the following form.
Modern scientific historians (apparently at the direction of the ruling circles) have simplified human history too much so that we do not know the facts that nuclear weapons have already been used on Earth more than once (for the sake of the profits of the ruling circles, for the sake of the complete domination of one people on Earth over others, more weak). History constantly repeats itself, in ever worse versions. Human civilization, with its ugly ideology of profit, constantly seeks to destroy itself for the sake of the wealth of a handful of ruling elites.
It is much easier to rule illiterate people.

The ethnic history of the peoples of the world did not end with the formation of language families. Already during the period of settlement of speakers of the largest troupes of languages ​​across continents, there was intense interaction between different ethnic groups, their differentiation and assimilation, the disappearance of some peoples and the formation of others. So, for example, when the Indo-Europeans settled in Europe, they met a more ancient population that had lived there, probably since the Late Paleolithic and Mesolithic and spoke languages ​​that have not reached us, which can be conditionally called “Paleo-European”. Many linguists believe that the Germanic languages ​​arose in the process of assimilation by the Indo-Europeans of some pre-Indo-European language substrate (lat. substratum-sublayer, basis). Traces of a similar substrate can also be traced in the languages ​​of the Baltic peoples - the ancient Prussians, Lithuanians and Latvians. It is possible that the last remnants of Paleo-Europeans were those who lived until the beginning of the 2nd millennium AD. e. The Picts of Scotland, mentioned by medieval writers and told in Scottish folk legends.

In the north of Eastern Europe, Paleo-European tribes were apparently assimilated not only by Indo-Europeans, but also by Finno-Ugric peoples, who already in the Neolithic period (III-II millennium BC) spread from the Urals and Volga-Kama region to the north and west, reaching the shores of the Baltic Sea. In the Balto-Finnish languages ​​(Estonian, Finnish, Karelian, etc.), Soviet linguists identify a substrate that may be the same as the Paleo-European substrate of the Letto-Lithuanian languages. Later (most likely only in the 1st millennium BC) the Sami (Lapps), whose ancestors spoke some other language, possibly close to Samoyed, switched to Finnish speech. In Western Siberia, the Ugric and Samoyed tribes, moving north, assimilated an older population in the taiga and tundra, whose languages ​​were perhaps close to the languages ​​of the Yukaghirs. To the east of the Yenisei, the Yukaghirs were largely absorbed by the Tungus spreading from the south, and later (at the end of the 1st millennium AD) by the Turkic-speaking Yakuts, whose ancestors lived in the Baikal region. In the extreme northeast of Siberia, the ancestors of the Chukchi and Koryaks, who adopted reindeer husbandry from the Tungus, in turn assimilated

Monuments of the most ancient civilizations of the world:

a-Ziggurat in the Sumerian city of Ur (III millennium BC). b-ancient Egyptian sphinx and pyramid (III millennium BC)

an older Eskimo population, mainly engaged in hunting sea animals.

The processes of ethnic differentiation and assimilation in the more southern parts of the ecumene proceeded differently in ancient times. With the formation in the IV-II millennium BC. e. on the basis of the agricultural economy of early class societies and ancient states in the basins of the Tigris and Euphrates, Nile, Indus, Ganges and Yellow Rivers, as well as in some neighboring countries, centers of unity of large peoples arose here, which gradually included various ethnic elements. Among these peoples were representatives of various linguistic families: Sumerians, Semitic Akkadians and ancient Egyptians,

Ablution pool at Mohenjo Daro

the Indo-European Hittites of Asia Minor and the Bactrians and Khorezmians of Central Asia, the Dravidian creators of the civilization of Harappa and Mohenjo Daro, the ancient Chinese of the Yin Dynasty (XVII-XI centuries BC). Later, already in the 1st millennium BC. e., Babylonia and Assyria, Elam and ancient Persia, Urartu in Transcaucasia, the states of Northern India in the Ganges basin, Ancient Greece (Hellas), the Hellenistic states of Western and Central Asia, which arose on the ruins of the empire of Alexander the Great, began to play a similar role as centers of ethnic consolidation and, finally, Rome, which united under its rule first all of Italy, and by the beginning of our era, most of the Mediterranean countries.

The neighbors of these ancient states in the strip of steppes and semi-deserts were various pastoral nomadic and semi-nomadic peoples, to which in North Africa and South-West Asia belonged the Libyan (Berber), Cushitic, Jewish and ancient Arab tribes; speaking Semitic-Hamitic languages, in the south of Eastern Europe, in Central Asia and Southern Siberia - the Indo-European (Iranian-speaking) Scythians, Sarmatians and Sakas, and in Central Asia - the Xiongnu (Huns), Xianbi and other ethnic groups who spoke Turkic and Mongolian languages. These tribes constantly disturbed neighboring states with their raids and often invaded deep into their territory, which led to deep ethnic displacements and often caused the formation of new ethnic groups. In the first centuries A.D. e. The Huns, pushed back by the Chinese from the borders of their state, begin to move west, taking with them other Turkic tribes and gradually assimilating the steppe Iranian-speaking peoples.

We know relatively little about the ethnic history of the ancient peoples of the tropical and subtropical regions of Africa and Asia, as well as Australia, Oceania and America. The centers of early class societies, and at the same time the consolidation of large ethnic groups in these parts of the ecumene, arose later, and in many countries did not develop at all before the start of European colonization. However, in North Africa back in the 1st millennium BC. e. there were several independent states: Carthage, founded by immigrants from Phoenicia, who spoke a Semitic language close to Hebrew, Mauritania and Numidia, created by the Libyans. Following the conquest of Carthage by the Romans in 146 BC. e. these states, after a stubborn struggle, became Roman possessions. Several centuries before the new era, the development of class society began on the territory of modern Ethiopia. One of the states that developed here, Aksum, reached its peak in the 4th century. n. e., when his possessions in the west reached the country of Meroe in the Nile Valley, and in the east - “Happy Arabia” (modern Yemen). In the 2nd millennium AD e. strong states emerged in Western Sudan (Ghana, Mali, Songhai and Bornu); later states were formed on the Guinea coast (Ashanti, Dahomey, Congo, etc.), west of Lake Chad (states of the Hausa people) and in many other areas of the African continent. The creators of these states were peoples belonging to different linguistic families and groups, but in all cases there was ethnic consolidation, as a result of which many large nations of Africa began to take shape that exist today.

In India during the 1st millennium BC. e. and the first centuries of the new era, there was intense mixing and interaction between the Dravidians, Mundas and Indo-Aryans. When moving south, these peoples assimilated, apparently, an older aboriginal population who spoke languages ​​unknown to us, in grammatical structure, possibly close to the languages ​​of the Andamanese, Northern Halmaherans and Papuans. The last remnants of these aborigines are probably the Veddas of Sri Lanka, who switched to the language of the neighboring Sinhalese, who are of North Indian origin, as well as some tribes of South India (Chenchus, Mudughars, etc.), who currently speak various Dravidian dialects.

Invasion of India from the north-west by various peoples continued throughout almost its entire history. In the IV-II centuries. BC After the Indian campaign of Alexander the Great, ties were established between India and the countries of the Hellenistic world, accompanied by the penetration of Greek and Parthian (Persian) elements. Later, at the end of the 2nd century. BC e., the resettlement of Iranian-speaking Sakas (Shaks) to India began, whose state included Gujarat, Sindh and part of Rajasthan. In the middle of the 1st century. n. e. There was a new invasion of the Kushans related to the Shakas. The Kushan state covered most of the interfluve of the Ganges and Jamna, Punjab, Kashmir, as well as Afghanistan, many regions of Central Asia, including East Turkestan (Xinjiang).

Thus, many new ethnic elements were introduced into the population of India; as a result of their interaction with the local population, new ethnic groups emerged, such as Gujars, Jats, Rajputs, possibly also Todas, etc. It is very important to emphasize that in the creation of the ancient and medieval states of India, as well as in the development of its vibrant and rich culture, A variety of peoples took part, speaking the languages ​​of different families.

We have already talked about the main stages of the ancient ethnic history of East and Southeast Asia. In the 1st millennium BC. e. here the early class ancient Chinese state continued to develop, in the economic, political and cultural history of which not only the Chinese, but also other peoples took an active part,

Tomb of the Yins King (excavations in Anyang in northern China)"

those who spoke Turkic, Mongolian and Manchu in the north, and Tibeto-Burmese, Thai, Miao-Yao, Mon-Khmer and Indonesian languages ​​in the south and west. The territory of modern China south of the Qinling ridge to the middle of the 1st millennium AD. e. was not ethnically Chinese. Similarly, in the ethnic history of Korea, where a class society also developed in the first centuries BC, southern Yue (Indonesian), northern Paleo-Asian and western ancient Altai tribes took part; the language of the latter became the basis for the development of the Korean language. In Japan, the first states arose even later (already in the 1st millennium AD), their population included the Ainu, Indonesians and the ancient Japanese tribes that migrated from Korea.

In Indochina and Indonesia, class society begins to take shape at the turn and in the first centuries of the new era among the ancient Viet (in Chinese “Yue”) - the ancestors of the modern Vietnamese, the Indonesian Cham, Austroasiatic Khmer and Mon, some Malay peoples of Sumatra and Javanese. In the formation of the first states of Southeast Asia, settlers from India, and partly (in Vietnam) also from Southern China, played a significant role. Later, already at the end of the 1st millennium AD. e., the states of the Burmese and Thais were formed, which advanced into Indochina from the north, pushing and assimilating the more ancient Mon-Khmers and Indonesians. The ethnic composition of mainland Southeast Asia remained extremely diverse throughout history, while in its island part (Indonesia and the Philippines) the majority of people spoke languages ​​of one Austro-Nesian family. From the Philippines and Indonesia in the 1st millennium AD. e. Austronesians settled all of Oceania, forming three language groups here: Melanesian, Micronesian and Polynesian. In Eastern Indonesia, New Guinea and some other islands of Melanesia, they assimilated the older Papuan tribes. According to some researchers (for example, the Norwegian ethnographer and traveler Thor Heyerdahl), separate groups of immigrants from America could have taken part in the settlement of the eastern islands of Polynesia (especially Easter Island).

We know very little about the ancient ethnic history of America. The original population entered this part of the world, as we know, at the end of the Paleolithic from Northeast Asia 30-25 thousand years before our time. There were probably several successive waves of settlement in America; one of the last was the resettlement of the Eskimos in the 1st millennium BC. e., gradually spreading east all the way to Greenland. As for the ancestors of the American Indians, they, settling over a vast space from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego over 12-15 thousand years, broke up into a large number of linguistic families and isolated groups, the relationships between which remain insufficiently studied. In science, the question of possible connections between America and other parts of the world before the voyages of Columbus and the beginning of European colonization has caused a lot of controversy.

Thor Heyerdahl, who performed in 1969 and 1970. two experimental voyages from the coast of Africa to the islands of the Caribbean Sea on papyrus boats “Rz-1” and “Ra-2” suggest that the ancient Egyptians could have used such ships for transatlantic voyages to the shores of America.

To this day, the problem of Atlantis is discussed - a legendary country located, according to the Greek philosopher Plato (V-IV centuries BC), west of Gibraltar on a large island, which in ancient times was the result of some grandiose catastrophe was swallowed up by the waters of the ocean. Proponents of the hypothesis about the existence of Atlantis believe that, long before Columbus, economic and cultural contacts between the peoples of Europe and Africa, on the one hand, and America, on the other, could have been carried out through it. However, data from archaeology, ethnography and other sciences have not yet confirmed this legend.

Opinions have been repeatedly expressed about ancient voyages to the shores of America by the Chinese, Japanese and especially Austronesians, as well as about the return voyages to Oceania of American Indians. For example, the French linguist Paul Rivet, comparing Austronesian and Australian languages ​​with South American ones, put forward a hypothesis according to which the Polynesians reached the western shores of South America, having Melanesians and even Australians on their ships as slaves. Of great scientific interest were the discoveries in 1956 during excavations of Neolithic sites in the town of Valdivia on the southern coast of Ecuador of clay vessels with ornaments characteristic of the ceramics of the Jomon culture in Southern Japan (IV-III millennium BC). It is possible that the carriers of this culture, who most likely spoke Ainu or Austronesian languages, were brought in ancient times by sea drift to the shores of South America. According to Thor Heyerdahl, the ancestors of the Polynesians were carried by sea currents from the shores of Japan to the west coast of North America; they lived there for about a thousand years, and then moved to the Hawaiian Islands, from where they gradually developed all of Polynesia. On Easter Island, the Polynesians met an older population of South American origin, partially exterminated it, and partially assimilated it.

Most Soviet and foreign ethnographers treat these hypotheses with caution, although they do not deny that there may be a certain amount of truth in them. But in the light of the latest historical and archaeological discoveries, it must be considered completely proven that in the 11th

XII centuries n. e. Norwegian sailors (Vikings) from Iceland and Greenland sailed to the shores of North America and even founded settlements in a country they called Vinland (apparently in the area of ​​modern Newfoundland). The further fate of these Scandinavian; oyaonists is unknown, but they had a significant influence on the ethnic history of America they didn't.

The centers of early class society and statehood in America developed much later than in Asia, Africa and Europe; this is largely due to the fact that the ancestors of the Indians, initially very few in number, spent a lot of time and effort exploring this part of the world. Recent archaeological materials suggest that many groups of Indians, especially in Central and South America (in the Andes region), who were well acquainted with agriculture five to four thousand years ago, reached a high level of socio-economic and cultural development by the turn of the new era. In the first centuries of the new era, the Mayan and Olmec states emerged in Mesoamsric; the architectural monuments and written sources that have survived from them speak of a rich and complex civilization. Somewhat later, approximately from the 2nd-3rd centuries. n. e., on the territory of modern Mexico, states of the Nahua peoples began to develop, first the Toltecs, and then the Aztecs. In the region of the South American Andes, there were high cultures in the 1st and early 2nd millennium AD. e. were created by the Chibcha people in what is now Colombia and the Quechua people in what is now Peru, Bolivia and Ecuador. In the XIII-XV centuries. Led by the Inca tribe (from the Quechua group), a strong early class state emerged, subjugating a number of neighboring tribes. All of the listed states of pre-Columbian America were barbarically destroyed by Spanish colonialists in the 16th century.

In addition to the processes of ethnic consolidation that took place in Central and South American states, there were many other important events in the ethnic history of the American Indians. We can mention, for example, the mass migrations of the Athabaskans, who mastered vast areas in the territory of modern Canada, the USA and Mexico, while assimilating a number of tribes who spoke different languages. Very interesting is the process of resettlement from the northern coast of South America to the Caribbean islands of numerous tribes of the Caribs, who exterminated or subjugated

Monuments of high cultures of ancient America:

a-Azten clay figurine of the god Quetzalcuatl; b-human head, ancient Peruvian clay vessel

the Arawaks who previously lived here. Since the victors destroyed almost all the men among the vanquished, by the time Europeans appeared on these islands, a peculiar situation had developed in which men spoke one language (Caribbean) and women another (Arawak). Thus, the majority of the peoples of America (as well as the whole world), long before our time, were ethnically heterogeneous in origin and included descendants of different tribes who initially spoke independent and far but always related languages.