Learn About Prehistoric Life | BBC Timestamp

0:00 Well, this is it.

0:01 This is the place because this is where

0:06 the earliest human remains in the entire world were discovered.

0:11 It's been really difficult to find it.

0:13 It's taken us 4 hours to walk here and we've been a circuitous

0:16 route through the bush and it seems really strange that there's nothing

0:22 to mark it because this is such an important place in our story

0:29 and it's as close as I can get to where we all began.

0:36 Amazing.

0:48 [music] And this is what the archaeologists discovered.

0:57 This is a cast of the skull that was

0:59 found here and which was dated to 195,000 years ago.

1:05 I think considering it's so old, it's remarkably complete.

1:10 Okay, the fragile face bones are missing, but most of the brain cases here,

1:14 we can see the size of the brain,

1:16 and we can see this very characteristic forehead.

1:21 No other remains of our species, even approaching this age,

1:25 [music] have been found anywhere else on the planet.

1:36 [music] This is as near as we can get to the origin of our species.

1:49 There's something very special [music] about

1:51 sitting here looking out at the OMO.

1:54 I could be on the banks of any African river.

1:57 Apart from the fact we know that this landscape has been home to humans,

2:03 people like you and me, for nearly 200,000 years.

2:12 I'm heading along the South African coast to a place called Pinnacle Point.

2:18 [music] Today, [music] it's a playground for the rich.

2:26 But during the construction of this golf course,

2:29 archaeologists [music] discovered something amazing deep beneath the fairway.

2:46 This could be the oldest known dwelling of our species anywhere in the world.

2:57 So, this is where you've been digging.

2:59 This is the oldest part of the cave.

3:01 Um, what are the dates here then as we go down through these layers?

3:04 Uh, these layers dates from 130 to 167,000 years ago.

3:09 It's just so incredibly ancient.

3:11 It's amazing.

3:12 Did you know how important what you were excavating really was?

3:17 Not until we got those dates.

3:18 Um, but yeah, amazing.

3:21 Stunning.

3:27 The evidence in this cave reveals that those ancient families

3:32 were behaving in ways quite unlike previous species of human.

3:38 Well, Kyle, that's not from this cave, is it?

3:40 Cuz I recognize this.

3:41 This is a handex, isn't it?

3:42 That's correct.

3:43 Now, that's more typical of what you would find from about

3:45 a million and a half years ago to about 300,000 years ago.

3:48 So, what sort of thing were you finding in the cave then?

3:51 Um, okay.

3:52 Okay.

3:52 Well, tools like these blades and points are much

3:55 more typical of what we find in this cave.

3:57 Made on quartzsite, locally available on the beach down here.

4:01 And in our oldest levels here, alongside these types of tools,

4:05 we also have these very small bladelet tools.

4:08 These are tiny.

4:09 What could such minute blades have been used for?

4:14 Obviously, these weren't used just in your hand like this.

4:17 So, how would they have been used?

4:19 It's more likely that those were set in some

4:21 kind of a handle to make a compound tool.

4:24 Maybe something more like this.

4:25 This is a a series of small blades set into a handle for use as a knife.

4:31 Yes, I think that would work.

4:33 So, you think that's how these stone tools are used then?

4:36 As a as a knife?

4:37 Um, that's one possibility.

4:39 Um, and it's also possible they would have been used for hunting weapons.

4:45 Kyle and his team have discovered you

4:48 can make some lethal weapons with these bladelets.

4:52 This one looks particularly vicious.

4:53 I think this is one interpretation of how

4:56 those small back blades might have been mounted.

4:59 [music]

5:02 The advantage to this would be that there's these barbs that would prevent

5:05 the tip from pulling out immediately um and would inflict a greater injury.

5:15 Well, I'm going to be spending the night out here in the bush.

5:18 Presumably something our ancestors did all the time.

5:21 But years of living in civilization have softened me.

5:26 I've got a big torch here so that uh if anything comes

5:29 by, I can get a better look at it in the dark.

5:32 And [clears throat] I've got this little camera so I can make

5:36 a video diary throughout the night and uh talk about what comes along.

5:42 I'm doing this for real.

5:43 I'm going to be out here all night.

5:44 And I really am quite scared.

5:59 [singing] We are.

6:16 It's just amazing the amount of noises you suddenly hear.

6:19 About half an hour ago, there was the sound,

6:22 really distinct sound of something lapping water.

6:27 Maybe an hyena.

6:28 Maybe a leopard.

6:28 It sounded like a big cat.

6:31 Literally like a cat lapping at milk.

6:35 Hopefully nothing can get through that.

6:45 Suddenly feel really vulnerable as an animal which

6:48 is designed to be out in the daylight.

6:51 I mean, can't see very well at night.

6:55 Earrings.

6:56 All right.

6:57 Just about enough to get you feeling scared and sense of smell as well.

7:04 Compared to all those other animals, might as well not have it.

7:15 Did you hear that?

7:19 I'm scared now.

7:30 Is that a Is that a lion?

7:32 Is that a leopard?

7:40 Is that Is that a hyena?

7:51 Oh, I don't like that noise.

7:54 That's really spooky.

8:07 That's got to be one of the most frightening nights of my life.

8:13 I did get some sleep, but then I got woken up by these horrendous noises.

8:19 Sometimes it was hyenas.

8:21 And then there was something that sounded like

8:24 a standoff between a hyena and a leopard or something.

8:26 I don't know what it was.

8:28 Awful noises.

8:30 Really, really scary.

8:40 With the return of the crew, I pluck up my courage and look for signs

8:45 of the animals that I heard in the night.

8:52 Gorgeous.

8:52 Look at this.

8:53 This is a big male leopard paw print.

8:57 And there are large hyena prints as well.

9:02 So these predators, these carnivores were literally here about 25

9:08 m away from where I was sleeping underneath that tree.

9:12 They sounded really close during the night and I can see

9:16 now that they were the former imperial [music] capital of Russia.

9:25 [music] The Hermitage is one of the world's greatest museums,

9:33 home to some of the most celebrated works of art.

9:46 [music]

9:45 But there's something else here, too.

9:47 It's not on display, but it's every bit as precious.

9:56 Here in the store rooms are a few objects that could unlock

10:00 the secrets of those Siberian families struggling in the depths of the ice age.

10:10 What is really striking about these objects from the height of the last ice

10:14 age is that they're found in just a few places in the south of Siberia.

10:19 Which is interesting because it suggests that as the climate worsened,

10:22 these prehistoric people [music] retreated into refues

10:26 where it still would have been very cold,

10:29 they would [music] have been just able to survive.

10:32 People vanished from the frozen wastess of northern Siberia.

10:37 To the south, one of the refues they gathered in is now called Maltar.

10:45 So, can the few remains found here tell us anything about what happened?

10:52 Just look at these tiny blades from the ice age.

10:56 They are unusually small and the archaeologists think this is

11:00 because the appalling cold made it difficult to reach the quaries.

11:04 So the stone itself was such a precious resource that they were using

11:08 it to its utmost getting as many blades as they could out of it.

11:13 So the blades themselves got smaller and smaller.

11:19 And something extraordinary was happening during this period

11:23 in spite of that struggle for survival.

11:26 There was a blossoming of art.

11:29 Now, we may never know the meaning of this beautiful

11:35 pair of swans to the people that made them,

11:38 but archaeologists have suggested that they might be hunting charms,

11:43 that when the first swans flew, the first deer would appear,

11:46 and it was the beginning of the spring hunting season.

11:50 And how they must have longed for spring.

11:56 Many of the objects in this collection are mysterious.

11:59 This unique plate is made from mammoth ivory.

12:04 Some have suggested it's a map showing the physical and spiritual worlds

12:10 with a connection between them symbolized by a hole in the middle.

12:21 These precious bone figurines are amongst

12:24 the earliest depictions of people wearing fur.

12:28 Further proof that plenty [music] of these Asian

12:31 pioneers could sew clothes by this time.

12:39 [music] [music] And finally,

12:49 there are these delicate and beautiful little statues [music] of women.

12:53 And some of them are pierced,

12:54 so they may have been worn as pendants, perhaps amulets.

13:01 It's possible that they're fertility symbols,

13:03 really underlining the importance and difficulty

13:06 of producing children during such harsh conditions.

13:09 [music] And in fact,

13:13 some archaeologists see this entire very beautiful collection as a cry

13:18 to the spirits in a time of stress and struggle.

13:22 Finally, I'm allowed in to see the plaster casts

13:24 of the homo erectus skulls from the lower cave.

13:28 And Professor Woo has a surprise waiting.

13:32 You see, this is the original specimen.

13:35 That's the original.

13:36 Yes, original.

13:37 As you know, most of the original specimens lost during the war.

13:42 I didn't know any of it any of it had survived.

13:44 Yeah.

13:44 After the war, we we have done some new excavation and got some new specimens.

13:53 Can I Can I hold it?

13:54 Yes.

13:54 Yes.

13:57 I honestly thought all the specimens had been lost, but this is this is

14:01 an actual fossil of Homerus in China.

14:03 It's found in 1966.

14:06 So this is hundreds of thousands of years old, isn't it?

14:11 Mhm.

14:11 So this is another piece.

14:18 It's just amazing for me to I mean to be holding

14:21 in my hand this actual fossil which is hundreds of thousands of years old.

14:24 I honestly thought all I would see is casts,

14:28 is reconstructions and this is the actual you origin.

14:33 That's amazing.

14:38 But even more important is what Professor Woo has spotted in these fossils.

14:45 First, he shows me some features of the ancient

14:48 erector skulls that he believes [music] are typically Chinese.

14:53 The face is flat.

14:55 The the nose is flat.

14:57 Not very protrude as in Europe.

15:01 Yeah.

15:01 Yeah.

15:02 and and this part is also flat.

15:07 So this part of the cheekbones is sort of rotating

15:08 for example in the end.

15:10 Then he shows me the much more recent upper

15:12 cave skulls and picks out the same distinctively Chinese features

15:18 but it also have the more flat face and not very protruding nose.

15:24 So the features that you're looking at in these skulls

15:26 [music] are really the features which characterize modern Chinese people today.

15:31 Mhm.

15:31 And the sort of differences between your skull and my skull.

15:34 Yes.

15:35 Yes.

15:35 So, so your face here is like this in my And yours is like flatter

15:42 and your name is flatter.

15:44 We inherited uh some features from our ancestor.

15:50 Professor Woo sees a clear line.

15:52 Homo erectus evolving into upper caveman becoming today's Chinese.

15:59 For him, these fossils prove that the Chinese come

16:02 from a completely different branch of the human family.

16:08 But I can see significant differences between the skulls.

16:14 The whole skull shape [music] of Homo

16:16 erectus is quite different from modern humans.

16:20 And even those features that Woo pointed out,

16:23 the nose and the cheekbones [music] don't seem that similar to me.

16:34 for me.

16:35 I mean, you spent a lifetime studying [clears throat] these skulls,

16:38 and I'm a complete novice in comparison, but I look at this modern skull here,

16:44 this 30,000y old skull from Jacodian,

16:48 and this looks quite similar to me to other

16:52 skulls from from Europe at the same time.

16:54 So I I don't think it it doesn't look Chinese to me.

16:57 No, but the profile in Europe is different.

17:02 Quite subtle though, isn't [music] it?

17:11 I'm still not convinced that [music] the Chinese

17:14 are so fundamentally different from the rest of us.

17:18 Professor Wi is so knowledgeable and his arguments are so persuasive.

17:23 So maybe I'm missing something.

17:24 [music] What was it that turned hunter gatherers into empire builders?

17:31 [music] I'm traveling through the all inspiring landscape of Guin

17:38 in South China in search of the key to their success.

17:44 [music] This is the [music] Dongpian cave.

18:04 Excavations here tell us it was once lived in by hunter gatherers.

18:10 And in 2001, a wonderful discovery was made.

18:22 These fragments are so precious that I'm not even allowed to touch them.

18:28 They are what remains of one of the oldest pots in China.

18:33 In fact, one of the oldest pots in the world.

18:42 [music] So, who made this pot?

18:48 Well, the people living in this cave so many

18:51 thousands of years ago would have been nomadic hunter gatherers,

18:55 still living an ancient lifestyle in many ways.

18:58 But those insignificant looking crude pieces

19:02 of pot mark a great technological leap forward.

19:08 So prehistoric pottery has also been found in this cave.

19:11 Pots are something we take for granted.

19:14 But for those ancient hunter gatherers,

19:16 pottery was part of a completely new way of life.

19:23 So how did they do it?

19:29 I'm meeting a team of experimental archaeologists

19:32 who think they might have the answer.

19:35 The first breakthrough must have been finding out how

19:38 to stop the pots cracking when they were fired,

19:40 tempering them by mixing calsite rock with the clay.

19:44 And they even have an idea how the pots might have

19:47 been shaped thousands of years before the invention of the potter's wheel.

19:53 This is very clever.

19:54 They've dug a pit here to basically give us

19:56 the form of the pot, almost like a mold.

19:58 And then we're pressing this clay in little slabs down into the

20:03 preformed pit.

20:06 Transforming clay into hard pottery requires firing at a high temperature.

20:11 Today, this is done at a,000° C in a kiln,

20:15 way beyond the capabilities of those hunter gatherers.

20:24 They would have had open fires which only produce temperatures of about 250°.

20:30 I'm quite doubtful this is going to be enough.

20:38 So, how's our pot?

20:42 I think that's it.

20:43 I think that's I think that's our pot there.

20:45 And it looks okay.

20:51 [music]

20:55 Fantastic.

20:58 There are many different theories about why

21:00 the Chinese hunter gatherers might have started making pots.

21:02 Some people say it was a symbol of prestige,

21:05 but the Chinese archaeologists think that the explanation is much more simple.

21:10 Cooking pots meant that a wider range of food could be cooked and stored,

21:18 vital in hard times.

21:20 And by 9,000 years ago, there was another innovation, farming.

21:27 One of the things that those early Chinese

21:30 pots would have been eating was wild rice.

21:33 Now, it certainly wouldn't have been the main source of food because

21:36 it was hard to collect and actually didn't give much energy in return.

21:40 But despite the availability of other vegetables,

21:42 it was rice that became more and more important

21:46 and even crucial to the early success of the Chinese.

21:52 Oh, I've seen pictures of the great cave at Nia,

21:56 but nothing really prepares you for the sheer scale of it.

22:02 [music] [music] [music]

22:20 [music] [music] Heat.

22:30 Heat.

22:31 [music] This part of the excavation was known as Hell Trench.

22:50 And stepping down into it,

22:51 it's easy to see why because it's suddenly very hot and humid.

22:56 But all the hard work and the discomfort paid

22:58 off because the archaeologist found something that was quite phenomenal.

23:05 It's a human skull.

23:07 It was in many pieces when it was first found,

23:10 which have been carefully fitted back together like a jigsaw.

23:15 And this is the top of the skull.

23:17 It's unmistakably a modern human.

23:19 It has a high domed forehead.

23:22 The skull has been dated to nearly 40,000 years old.

23:27 The oldest confirmed remains of our species in Southeast Asia.

23:36 But near cave also offers us a clue as to how

23:39 these people survived in the challenging environment of the rainforest.

23:50 As you move just a little bit deeper into the cave,

23:52 it becomes significantly cooler and more pleasant.

23:55 And it just feels like an ideal place for those hunter gatherers to have

23:58 set up their camps and then they could have gone off roaming into the forest.

24:02 The archaeological evidence shows that they were bringing

24:05 back a huge range of different foods to eat.

24:08 From monkeys and pigs and lizards to shellfish, yams and sego palm.

24:15 Compared with other species, we're incredibly adaptable.

24:19 To survive, we humans will eat just about anything.

24:24 And as if to make exactly that point,

24:26 in another corner of the cave, something really unusual is going on.

24:33 I've arrived at harvesting time for the ingredient

24:36 used in the Chinese delicacy bird's nest soup.

24:39 It's made from the nests of rare swiftlets.

24:42 And today, these men are attempting a deathdeying feat to gather them.

24:48 But this is human ingenuity, isn't it?

25:02 Sweet little tiny swiftlets nest which has just been built

25:05 out from the wall of the cave made of saliva.

25:10 It feels a bit like resin or something.

25:12 It's very odd.

25:14 This is a reconstructed Neanderal skeleton and generally

25:18 speaking the skeleton is very similar to ours.

25:22 Having said that, there are definite differences.

25:25 the the shape of all the bones

25:27 is subtly different and anywhere that muscles attach

25:30 on this skeleton is much more prominent than it would be in a modern human.

25:36 So this would have been a person who is much more heavily muscled,

25:39 generally much more rugged looking than us today.

25:47 They would have been formidable competitors.

26:06 [music] So, Neanatiles were tougher and better cold adapted than us.

26:11 And some of them even had bigger brains than modern humans.

26:14 On the face of it, then it seems quite

26:16 surprising [music] that our species lasted very long at all.

26:21 So, how did we overcome the Neanderls?

26:27 [music] Maybe our tools and weapons were just better than theirs.

26:33 Well, for decades, that's exactly what the experts thought.

26:41 But this idea hadn't been thoroughly tested [music] until now.

26:48 How you doing?

26:50 Oh, doing all right.

26:54 Bruce Bradley and Metin Erin spent over

26:56 a year making thousands of basic cutting tools.

27:04 So, we got these two tools.

27:05 This one a basic tool made by a Neanderl and this one

27:09 a basic tool made by a modern human at the same sort of period.

27:13 Correct.

27:13 Now they're obviously very different looking.

27:15 This one's long and thin and this one is round.

27:17 But are they different in terms of function in terms of what they're used for?

27:21 They were used for the same kind of tasks mostly cutting tasks.

27:25 So for example, I mean both are really sharp.

27:27 If you want to use both of those to cut some pretty thick leather here.

27:31 This is the typical Neanl tool.

27:33 Exactly.

27:34 You can see that it just cuts through this really thick leather very easily.

27:37 That is incredibly sharp.

27:39 Look at that.

27:40 Wow.

27:41 And this is really tough leather.

27:44 Effective, isn't it?

27:45 That's brilliant.

27:46 Now, let's try the blade.

27:47 Hold it very carefully.

27:49 This is the sort of thing that was made by modern humans.

27:53 Exactly.

27:56 anything I would say that flake is a bit I mean that's cutting

28:00 but just you know just picking up the tool and using it

28:02 immediately I'd say the flakes actually a little bit easier to use

28:06 when we created thousands of tools um we found

28:09 that the technology of the Neanderthalss um actually produced more cutting

28:14 edge overall it wasted less raw material and you could

28:18 produce more tools than the blade cores of modern homo sapiens

28:22 I imagine that's very new, isn't it?

28:24 That's quite remarkable because you're telling me

28:26 that the Neanderl technology is just as good,

28:29 in fact, if not better than the modern humans.

28:32 I mean, that gays against everything that people

28:34 have said for the last few decades.

28:36 That's true.

28:36 And it was it was a very exciting um result.

28:43 It's just one study on one aspect of tool making,

28:48 but I still think it's important.

28:53 This is fascinating and it means that the long-standing theory about modern

28:59 human technology being superior to Neanderl stone tools just doesn't stand up.

29:07 [music] I'm in Gibraltar, a naval stronghold for centuries.

29:13 And new evidence from these rocky shores suggests that thousands

29:18 of years after they disappeared from the rest of Europe,

29:21 the Neanderls were clinging on here.

29:26 When Neanderls lived here, sea levels were up to 100 m lower.

29:31 So much of the evidence from that time could be underwater.

29:35 Let's go for it now.

29:39 A team of specialists is probing the ocean

29:42 floor looking for traces of the Gibralta Neanderls.

29:50 We've come to a stop now because we are over the archeological site.

29:53 It's about 20 m below the surface of the sea below us.

29:57 Divers are all getting ready.

29:59 Um, and these are divers, but also archaeologists.

30:01 So, they're going to be excavating the sea bottom in search of Neanderls.

30:12 These divers are up against poor visibility with a limited oxygen supply.

30:17 Underwater archaeology is always challenging.

30:24 But Clive Finson has already made a series

30:28 of significant discoveries [music] in the sea caves nearby.

30:33 This is where the last Neanderthalss made their last stands,

30:35 if you like, 44,000 years ago.

30:43 We get the feeling is the nearest thing

30:44 to Neanthal city you're going to find anywhere.

30:46 We've got fossils, stone tools, uh animals that have been butchering,

30:50 all kinds of evidence, hearths, you know, Neanthal barbecues if you like.

30:53 It's a very, very special site.

31:03 They think that Neanderals may have held on here long

31:07 after they've been wiped out in the rest of Europe.

31:15 But after the Neanderals finally disappeared from Gibralta,

31:19 there was a gap of 5,000 years before we turned up.

31:25 [music] So, it looks as though whatever finally killed Neanderls off,

31:32 it wasn't [music] us.

31:37 What do you think eventually wiped them out?

31:40 It may have been a numbers game.

31:41 There's so few left, as would happen to populations of endangered species today,

31:45 like a panda or a tiger.

31:47 Just random fluctuations in numbers can bring it down to zero,

31:50 and there's no recovery from zero.

31:52 So, it could have been that, it could have been disease, inbreeding.

31:55 um a whole range of factors that can affect

31:57 a small population and knock them over the edge.

32:07 I find it very moving to think that one day the last Neanderal might have

32:12 been sitting here staring out to sea

32:16 and perhaps waiting for their companions to return.

32:19 Or maybe he or she knew that they were the last of their tribe or their family,

32:24 but they can't have known that they were the last of their entire species.

32:34 So that was the end of the Neanderls.

32:40 Or was it?

32:44 Some scientists believe their descendants are still walking around today.

32:53 If our ancestors interbred with them, some of us could be part Neanderal,

33:04 but they may not have survived at all had it not been [music] for this.

33:13 the [music] rock shelters and caves that riddle the landscape.

33:20 [music] And deep underground, they left something that we still marvel at today.

33:34 [music] [music] [music] I'm in a cave called Peshmer,

34:01 which is stunningly beautiful naturally, but look at this.

34:05 This is real artistic expression, something that defines us.

34:10 and sets us apart as a species.

34:13 And Peshmemell is unusual because artists were coming here to paint

34:17 these images both before and after the peak of the last ice age.

34:22 Generations of them returning to the cave as the world outside froze over.

34:31 This is a very beautiful image and it uses the contours of the rock.

34:37 The horse's back sort of curves along a bulge in the rock.

34:41 And there's an echo of the horse's head on this right side there.

34:45 And it's obviously a very stylized horse as well.

34:48 And I love the way those spots carry on into the background

34:51 as though the horse is sort of camouflaged against the rock.

34:56 And there's a hand placed against the rock just above the horse's back.

35:00 I mean, that is amazing, isn't it?

35:01 That's a an ice age hand.

35:09 Michelange has devoted his life to studying the art found in caves like Peshmer.

35:27 Think I naively imagined that you'd just take a mouthful of charcoal bit

35:31 of water and just spit it at the wall and that would be it.

35:34 But of course, all that would happen would be that the mess would

35:37 run down the wall and obscure the stencil that you were trying to do.

35:41 So, you have to do it like this, using an almost dry mouth.

35:44 And just building it up very gradually with a fine spray.

35:56 Blanche did a recreation of the horses at Peshmel using this technique.

36:00 Took him a whole week.

36:02 Is it finished?

36:03 Yes, it's finished.

36:05 Yes, that's right.

36:07 But what drove these people struggling just to survive to paint?

36:13 The vast majority of these images seem to be animals.

36:17 There don't seem to be many representations of humans.

36:20 No, that's true.

36:21 They are mainly animal figures.

36:24 And for them of course animals were

36:27 were not only game but also spirits symbolic.

36:33 So the animal figure are in fact symbolic figures.

36:37 And going into Peshmel I mean it's such

36:39 a beautiful cave with with all the stallites

36:42 hanging down and it it does feel as though it was I don't know almost a temple.

36:48 Yes that's right.

36:49 It's a natural temple if you like.

36:51 They are sacred sites.

36:53 They are not painting just for for fun.

36:56 By painting a cave and having a sanctuary,

37:01 it is a way for them to to say here is our sacred place.

37:07 A painted cave is a a symbolic of the the whole tribe.

37:14 Being bound together in this way may have helped our ancestors [music]

37:19 survive the kind of climate change that only haunts our imaginations today.

37:24 [music] The discovery was made by a young Aboriginal Australian.

37:29 [music] A young girl just stumbled across him and she

37:34 invited this professor over and he had a look

37:36 at it and people started getting exciting when

37:38 they thinking it could be a really major find.

37:43 [music] so major that as soon as it was revealed,

37:45 the site was buried again to protect it.

37:47 [music] It's still secret today.

37:50 Yeah.

37:50 And it will remain secret forever and a day according to the elders.

37:54 This site is very precious.

37:56 It's their past.

37:56 We're going to preserve and protect them for the future generations.

38:03 [music] But I've come here on a special day

38:07 because for the first time since the site was reeried,

38:10 [music] local Aboriginal people and archaeologists are gathering

38:14 once more to check on their [music] discovery.

38:21 [music] Over 500 human footprints.

38:28 This is the heel here.

38:30 And you can see the way that the foot sort of lifts up here.

38:33 That's where the arch of the foot would be.

38:35 And then the big toe is just there.

38:36 So this is a right foot.

38:39 It's amazing to see something which is so ephemeral.

38:42 Sort of normally here today gone tomorrow.

38:46 This is looking like a pretty big footprint.

38:48 It's well fed.

38:49 [laughter] It's incredibly hard this layer, isn't it?

38:54 It feels really stony.

38:55 Is it a type of clay?

38:57 It's just like pottery.

38:59 And it must feel pretty personal as well because you know

39:01 this is I mean this is your own heritage isn't it?

39:04 One of the oldest cultures in the world.

39:06 So it's very special and unique.

39:16 But who [music] do the footprints belong to?

39:20 Tanya Charles was here [music] when they were found.

39:25 other people that was with us, they were saying, "No,

39:27 they belong to the farmers that were here." And we're like, "No, they're ours.

39:32 You fellas wear shoes.

39:33 We don't.

39:34 We didn't back [laughter] then.

39:37 We just knew in our hearts we knew they were."

39:42 Scientists and Aboriginal trackers have interpreted the prints of men,

39:46 women, and children walking and running around the edges

39:49 [music] of what was once an ancient lake.

39:52 The most bizarre track seems to have belonged to a one-legged man.

39:58 Like we sort of knew that he only had one foot,

40:00 but we didn't want to believe it.

40:03 Yeah.

40:03 Cuz you know, one footed man way back in them times is like,

40:06 "Oh, scary." And he was chasing a kangaroo.

40:09 And um on his first throw, he actually missed a kangaroo.

40:14 Yeah.

40:14 On his second throw, he got him and dropped him down to one knee.

40:19 How long ago did these people live?

40:28 With a new technique called luminescence dating,

40:31 scientists could measure the tiniest glow when

40:34 grains of sand from the footprints were analyzed.

40:37 And from this, they could calculate how

40:40 long the footprints [music] had lain buried.

40:44 The results were stunning.

40:47 The footprints were around 20,000 years old.

40:59 There's something really intimate about this because there just

41:01 a moment in somebody's life when they walked across this landscape

41:08 and it just looks like it could be a footprint

41:10 made yesterday and yet it's about 20,000 years old.

41:19 So is this when people first reached

41:22 Australia long after we colonized Europe and Asia?

41:28 It would certainly make sense given how far away Australia is.

41:33 Today on Flores, local people still tell stories of strange humanlike creatures.

41:40 The cave dwelling a bugo.

41:45 So I'd really really like to know more about the story of Ibuog.

41:53 According to our ancestors, there were Ibuogo in our land,

41:56 in our village a long time ago around the 15th century.

42:01 Are they humans?

42:02 I mean, are they are they like us?

42:05 They had two distinctive characteristics.

42:08 They were like monkeys, but also like humans.

42:15 Their physical features were short, hefty with long hair on the head and chest.

42:25 And the femal's breasts were big and long.

42:31 If they wanted to walk,

42:33 they usually threw their long breasts over their shoulders.

42:42 But nobody's seen one for a couple of hundred years.

42:47 They really did exist and they were

42:50 destroyed by our ancestors about seven generations ago.

43:00 There were two reasons for their elimination.

43:03 Firstly, because they stole food

43:05 and secondly because they kidnapped our children.

43:09 door.

43:12 This sounds like the sort of spooky myths you might hear anywhere.

43:18 But believe it or not, this story may actually have some truth to it.

43:29 Archaeologists were excavating in this cave on the island,

43:33 looking for signs of the earliest modern

43:35 humans when they made a startling discovery.

43:40 A smallbodied, smallbrained creature,

43:43 a type of human that nobody had ever seen before.

43:48 It quickly became known as the hobbit.

43:54 So this is the skeleton of this minute woman that the archaeologists

43:59 found in the cave of Leang Bua on the island of Flores.

44:02 And she is just absolutely tiny.

44:05 When she was standing at her full height,

44:07 she would have reached to about a meter tall.

44:10 She seems like an odd combination.

44:12 Some bits look like us, but in miniature,

44:15 other parts look like more ancient human species.

44:19 people still are unsure about exactly who she is.

44:23 Most people believe that she is indeed a different species.

44:26 So, it really does make us rethink what we think about

44:29 ourselves and what we think about the whole human family as well.

44:35 Could the hobbit have affected our ancestors journey?

44:38 Dating of the bone shows they were here around

44:41 the time of the migration of our ancestors [music] through Indonesia.

44:47 So, would they have encountered this race, this population of very tiny people?

44:53 And what would have happened if they did?

44:56 I don't know what they would have thought about homo sapiens.

45:03 If they really were the vicious augo,

45:07 our ancestors might have been best advised to avoid flores.

45:20 So, it looks as if small groups of men, women,

45:23 and children made that first push into America

45:26 about 13 and a half thousand years ago.

45:30 Using their sophisticated tools, they made the most of their new home

45:35 and spread right across the continent from coast to coast.

45:40 [music] Until recently,

45:44 this was the version of American prehistory that most experts agreed on.

45:48 But a new discovery here in Texas is threatening to rewrite the entire story.

46:06 Archaeologist Mike Collins is a very patient man.

46:18 [music]

46:17 For 15 years, he's been digging away in this small field near Austin,

46:24 and he's found something that no one expected.

46:29 So, Mike, what sort of dates have you got coming out here?

46:32 We have the entire prehistory of Central Texas represented at this site.

46:36 The kinds of artifacts we find and the few absolute dates that we have

46:41 tell us that people were here from 500 years ago back 13,500 years ago.

46:48 Even more importantly, we have stuff below that

46:52 below Clovis.

46:52 Say older than older than Clovis.

46:54 Pre-Clovis right right here at this site.

46:59 But for years, archaeologists have thought that Clovis

47:01 was the first culture in the Americas.

47:03 You know, most archaeologists have thought that, but there's

47:05 a few of us that have known better.

47:07 And over on the other side of the site,

47:09 you can see the Clovis level and you can see artifacts below it.

47:12 You want to see that?

47:13 I'd love to see it.

47:14 Let's go see it.

47:25 Mike, this is an incredibly deep test pit.

47:27 Yes, it's a deep test pit.

47:28 And we're really interested in this part of it

47:30 right here because right through here we get Clovis artifacts.

47:34 But as we dug down, we continue to get

47:36 artifacts below that for about 20 or 25 cm more.

47:42 Nice flake here, for example, with a platform and good flake scars on it.

47:47 We have one date from down here of 14,400 years.

47:53 14,400.

47:54 Yeah.

47:54 So that's pre-clavis by a thousand years.

47:58 I mean, that's amazing because that makes us

48:00 rethink all of our theories about early Americans.

48:04 Yes, we have to rethink our paradigm.

48:07 We have to come up with a new accounting of the peopleing of the Americas.

48:11 Mike, how sure are you about the date of these artifacts?

48:15 It's just one date, so you need to corroborate it with further evidence,

48:19 and that's what we're working on.

48:22 [crying] Yay.

48:32 [music] Now, we can only draw

48:37 tentative conclusions from the evidence emerging here,

48:40 but our grand theory about how humans first got

48:44 into North America is starting to look decidedly dodgy.

48:48 Because if there really were people living here

48:51 at Goul as early as Mike says there were,

48:54 then there must have been another route into the Americas

48:57 because the ice free corridor wasn't open yet.

49:01 But what I need is more proof.

49:03 And if the claims coming out of South America are to be believed,

49:07 then they may have even earlier and more

49:10 compelling evidence than I've seen here in Texas.

49:15 The finds from Monty Verde are nothing short of miraculous.

49:26 [music] It's quite strange.

49:30 There's no evidence at all of it ever having been an archaeological site.

49:34 There is sheep grazing.

49:36 There's nothing obvious at all.

49:39 But a few years back,

49:41 local villagers came across something strange sticking out of the riverbank.

49:47 Bones from a mastadon, a prehistoric relative of the modern elephant.

49:55 It was a bank just like this that the animal bones were originally

49:59 found in that alerted people to the fact that this was an archaeological site.

50:08 [music]

50:06 As experts dug down, they discovered much more than just ancient animal bones.

50:17 Layer by layer, the remains of [music] an entire human settlement emerged.

50:24 Home to a community [music] of perhaps 20 or 30 people with shelters,

50:30 work areas, and rubbish tips.

50:33 a unique relic of our prehistoric past.

50:41 The main structure on this site was a very long hut, 20 m long.

50:46 I'm going to have a go at measuring it out,

50:48 but uh I think I might come into some difficulties because of where

50:52 the stream is today because this log is actually around about 7 m long.

51:01 10 meters is going to take me up to there.

51:03 Um, I don't want to go any further because I

51:05 don't want to end up in that very cold stream.

51:07 But you can imagine how far this hut extended.

51:12 And amazingly, we know how this hut was built because the remains of the wooden

51:17 stakes and the animal hides that covered

51:19 it were preserved in the waterlogged ground.

51:24 And inside this long hut, the archaeologists found hs and in them the remains

51:29 of nuts and berries and seeds that people have been eating.

51:32 The hs were lined with clay.

51:35 And in part of this clay that presumably was wet at some point,

51:39 there was somebody's footprint.

51:46 About [music] 30 m away was this strange

51:52 outline of what was perhaps another much smaller hut.

51:58 Outside it there were butchered masttodon bones,

52:01 but inside it there were some very intriguing finds indeed.

52:05 Some plant remains, a few of them seaweeds that are

52:08 still used by the Mapuchi Indians today as medicines.

52:14 Incredibly, the team even discovered the remains of potato [music] skins.

52:20 It's the first evidence anywhere in the world of humans using eating potatoes.

52:26 It's amazing to have this degree of preservation on an archaeological site.

52:31 This really is a treasure trove.

52:40 Monty Verde gives us an incredibly rare

52:43 and wonderful window into our ancestors daily lives.

52:48 But for all that, what's most astonishing [music] about Monte Verde is its age.

52:58 But that's nothing compared with the ice-free

53:01 corridor 13 12,000 [music] years ago.

53:06 Any families coming through that corridor

53:11 would surely have faced a hellish journey.

53:16 Huddled against the howling wind in a land

53:19 of torrential rivers and floating ice.

53:32 So did anyone try?

53:34 And if so, did they make it?

53:40 The answers to all these questions lie in that direction.

53:48 [music] Because right across North America,

53:52 archaeologists have been finding thousands of objects like this.

54:00 They're called Clovis points.

54:10 [music] and they date from just a few hundred

54:12 years after the corridor in the ice appeared.

54:19 So this could have been the way in.

54:23 [music] But what kind of a world would

54:27 these pioneers find on the other side of the ice?

54:43 The tools themselves are important clues and to find

54:46 out how I'm meeting archaeologist Andy Hemmings.

54:50 So these are these really classic stone Clovis spear points.

54:55 Yeah, it's important to understand about Clovis

54:57 though that they aren't just stone points.

54:59 They also made some very lethal and effective bone and ivory points as well.

55:03 These are state-of-the-art lethal uh killing machines from 13,000 years ago.

55:08 And what sort of animals do you think they would have hunted with them?

55:11 The most common that we've found them directly associated with are mammoths,

55:16 bison, and mastadon in that order.

55:18 But at clover sites across the New World,

55:21 we found uh more than 125 species of plants and animals.

55:25 So there's they're general hunters,

55:26 but you you really think they were hunting mammoths?

55:29 Oh, absolutely.

55:30 Um the best example probably is a site in southeast

55:33 Arizona where eight Clovis points were found with one mammoth body.

55:37 Five of them were found behind the back

55:38 of the head and and in front of the shoulder blades.

55:41 Any one of which probably would have been about a lethal wound.

55:44 Andy shows me how he thinks they did it.

55:49 [music] Andy, that doesn't look much like a mammoth to me.

55:55 There's no animal in the ply scene that had a hide that tough.

55:58 And if we can poke a hole in that, if you can poke

56:01 a hole in that, we could have eaten anything just like the Clovis people did.

56:05 Right.

56:05 So, I've got my spear throw.

56:06 Let's see what you can do.

56:11 A glancing blow.

56:12 You've slowed him.

56:13 Got his feet.

56:14 Try again.

56:19 scratched it.

56:21 Do you want to show me how it's done, Andy?

56:23 I'll give it a try.

56:25 [music]

56:26 Oh my god, that's made a hell of a dent in this metal door.

56:33 I hit it pretty cleanly and you can see I just destroyed the end of my spear.

56:37 It would have stuck in the hide of a mammoth or a mastadon.

56:39 Yeah, [music]

56:42 the mammoth and mastadon, two of the mighty animals roaming this vast landscape,

56:51 [music] but little match for people with a weapon as deadly as the Clover Point.

56:59 [music] Some think that these pioneers of the new frontier plunged

57:07 into an orgy of slaughter wiping out ice age animals like the mammoth.

57:15 The evidence is questionable, but that image of the mighty hunter has stuck.

57:23 Taken a lot of bravery to go in [music] and stab

57:25 something the size of a mammoth time and time again.

57:33 It's really interesting to see what

57:34 those Neandertos were eating and potentially hunting.

57:37 And they would have had to have been very robust to deal with that.

57:40 Oh, absolutely.

57:41 You know, it's a it's a lifestyle that required incredible strength.

57:44 But there is something else when we look

57:45 at these armbones because they're different side to side.

57:47 They're asymmetrical.

57:49 Yeah.

57:49 When you look at the armbbones,

57:50 you can see really visually that the right

57:52 is larger and more robust than the left.

57:54 So the question is, what were Neanderals doing differently

57:58 with their right arms compared with their left arms?

58:01 George, can you help me out?

58:02 Well, there are a couple of things that we

58:04 can try out that might offer some clues.

58:07 Now, we've got a a fine specimen of a hunter here.

58:10 Now, Colin, you he's wired up onto a machine.

58:13 What What are we hoping to to show with this?

58:15 Well, what we're trying to do is test

58:16 a theory that explains that asymmetry they were talking about.

58:19 You need intensity and you need frequency to cause bone change.

58:23 The prevailing theory is that when you spear thrust that back arm,

58:26 the right arm provides the majority of the force

58:29 and the front is simply steering somewhat like a snooker pool.

58:35 Okay.

58:34 And so what we're going to do is we're

58:36 going to measure the muscle activity during spear thrusting.

58:39 The key is that the muscles attach onto the bone and change their shape.

58:43 It's one of the things that that influences the bone structure.

58:45 Okay.

58:46 So when when our our hunter here stabs prey,

58:48 these electrodes here will will be activated.

58:52 Exactly.

58:52 Well, the muscles will be active.

58:54 It will measure the energy that it produces.

58:56 What we're going to get him to do is to do some spearing activities to measure

58:59 the activity of the muscles that might give us

59:01 clues as to how the bones are being influenced.

59:04 Okay?

59:04 So, you you have to be a really fierce hunter.

59:08 Yeah.

59:07 We want some serious intensity cuz this thing

59:09 is either your dinner or your death.

59:11 So, get in there.

59:12 Nice stance.

59:14 And we're going to get three hard stabs.

59:16 So, go ahead.

59:17 Nice.

59:18 And again.

59:18 And out.

59:19 One more.

59:21 One more time.

59:23 Excellent.

59:23 Excellent.

59:24 Okay, perfect.

59:25 You just have a seat over there.

59:27 Now, what we see here exactly is that you'd expect

59:31 from the theory that the right has more activity than the left.

59:34 And what we're seeing is exactly the opposite.

59:37 This is the right.

59:38 This is the left.

59:40 Wow.

59:39 Yeah.

59:39 It's it's the left is the other way around.

59:42 Yeah.

59:42 And the reason for that, we think, is that it's not simply like playing pool.

59:47 It's much more that you have a full body uh flexing.

59:50 The hips shift, the shoulders shift, and your arms go right into the target.

59:56 The ground reaction force comes back along the spear and the muscles

59:59 of the left arm are taking the majority of the load.

1:00:01 And as a result, they're far more active,

1:00:03 which is the opposite way is what for what you'd

1:00:05 expect for explaining what you see on the skeleton over there.

1:00:09 So, how come the asymmetrical armbbones if the right arm

1:00:14 is is actually not doing as much work as the left?

1:00:16 It's [clears throat] a wonderful question.

1:00:17 Neandertos live in a cold climate.

1:00:19 They needed to stay warmer than just their physiology would allow for.

1:00:22 So clothing might have been part of the equation.

1:00:25 To produce a hide to to take something like this, a skin,

1:00:28 and produce a hide that you can construct uh

1:00:31 clothing out of takes a great deal of processing.

1:00:33 In fact,

1:00:34 it has to be scraped, cleaned, and and

1:00:36 you're completely right.

1:00:36 It takes approximately 8 hours per hide of scraping.

1:00:40 That's a great deal of of scraping.

1:00:42 So, if you remember,

1:00:43 you need intensity and you need frequency to cause bone change.

1:00:46 How many hides would you need for one suit?

1:00:48 Perfect question.

1:00:49 You need five to six and each individual needs a new suit per year,

1:00:53 right?

1:00:53 That's a lot of scraping.

1:00:55 Absolutely.

1:00:55 John, you're going to be scraping now.

1:00:56 Yeah.

1:00:56 So, what we want you to do is grab a grab a stone tool.

1:00:59 This is a side scraper that these are the types

1:01:01 of things that are found predominantly in Neanderl stone tool assemblages.

1:01:05 So, go ahead and give it a give it a scrape for us.

1:01:09 Perfect.

1:01:10 And if you keep doing that, I'm going to move over to here.

1:01:13 Again, this is the right shoulder.

1:01:15 This is the activity from the right shoulder, the one that's active.

1:01:18 If this type of activity is intense

1:01:20 enough and frequent enough to cause bone adaptation,

1:01:24 then this could explain what we see.

1:01:26 And they would have been doing this for hours and hours and hours.

1:01:30 The explanation is that if one person was doing it for their family,

1:01:33 they could remain busy for half a year of scraping.

1:01:36 It might explain the the right side dominance

1:01:39 and the massive asymmetry you see in Neandertos.

1:01:42 It's very clear, Alice.

1:01:44 This might be the answer.

1:01:45 It could be something as mundane as scraping hides all day.

1:01:49 I really love this idea.

1:01:50 I love the fact that we think of Neanderls as big game hunters.

1:01:53 And yet here we are looking at them and saying,

1:01:55 "Well, actually, what's really shaped their bones is not hunting,

1:01:58 but making clothes." People from outside Africa can trace

1:02:02 up to 4% of their DNA back to Neanderals.

1:02:07 What might that Neanderl DNA mean for us today?

1:02:10 What sort of effects might it be having in our genomes?

1:02:13 Well, it's very difficult to say,

1:02:14 but I have some results from you two which which can shed some light on it.

1:02:20 So, this is a gene on chromosome 16 called WFDC1,

1:02:24 and it's controlling cell growth.

1:02:27 We don't know what ities at the moment,

1:02:31 but we're starting to understand the implications

1:02:34 of having some Neanderl genes in our genomes.

1:02:37 And actually, we do know something about Neanderl genes,

1:02:40 which is very interesting,

1:02:41 and that's that we know that at least some Neanderls had red hair,

1:02:45 and that's very useful for Victor.

1:02:49 So, catching up with Victor again.

1:02:53 Hello.

1:02:52 This is great.

1:02:53 So, we've actually got hair color.

1:02:55 What's great about working in this nature is that it

1:02:58 gives you the ability to test out different looks,

1:03:01 different hair, and different skin color before you commit.

1:03:04 This is grounded in science.

1:03:05 Okay, it's it's looking quite artistic,

1:03:07 but there's there's science at the base of it.

1:03:09 And also, the skin color, I see, you've done really pale skin.

1:03:13 So, this is somebody who lived in a northern climate,

1:03:16 right?

1:03:16 Much like us.

1:03:17 He's really starting to come together.

1:03:20 Now, there's one question I want to ask is,

1:03:22 can we tell how this individual died?

1:03:25 It's a great question, and usually we can't,

1:03:27 but in this case, the skeleton gives us some really interesting clues.

1:03:30 On the outside of your bones is a membrane,

1:03:32 and you can see here where it's roughened.

1:03:34 That membrane was laying down new bone

1:03:37 at around the time that this individual died.

1:03:39 And it's at the distal end of the tibia.

1:03:41 It's also in the distal femora.

1:03:43 And the real the key thing about this is

1:03:44 that it's on both sides and it's symmetrical.

1:03:47 And actually that is pretty indicative of one particular type

1:03:50 of disease and it's called hypertrophic

1:03:53 pulmonary osteoarthropathy and it basically means yeah in English.

1:03:59 Okay.

1:03:59 So it basically means you're laying down new bone but you're

1:04:01 doing it in such a way that we know that that's related

1:04:04 to lung and sometimes heart disease but it makes it very probable

1:04:07 that this individual had either a bad lung infection or lung cancer.

1:04:12 Yeah.

1:04:12 It's one of the very rare cases where we have a fossil

1:04:15 where we can actually make some indication of the cause of death.

1:04:19 So from these few bones we started

1:04:21 with, we've established that nanotiles were strong,

1:04:24 adaptable, and possibly had an emergent culture and budding language.

1:04:29 They were well suited to their ice age home.

1:04:31 And given they were such a successful species, they survived for 350,000 years.

1:04:37 Yet when the crunch came, they may simply have been unlucky.

1:04:41 It is very sad that they're no longer with us,

1:04:44 but we have been able to bring Laafarasi1 back to life

1:04:48 with the help of all of this scientific evidence and our amazing model makers.

1:04:55 We started with a composite skeleton based

1:04:57 [music] on Lafarasi 1 and other finds.

1:05:00 And over 2 months, we've carefully been reconstructing him.

1:05:05 With extraordinary attention to detail,

1:05:07 the muscles were painstakingly added to rebuild his body.

1:05:13 His face was recreated using forensic techniques.

1:05:18 Then the skin and hair were added.

1:05:22 Now he's finished and he's here.

1:05:26 So, should we go and have a look?

1:05:27 I can't wait.

1:05:28 Yeah.

1:05:28 This is so exciting.

1:05:29 We [music] have literally never seen this before.

1:05:32 Under a sheet.

1:05:33 Go on in Victor.

1:05:37 Wow.

1:05:38 Wow.

1:05:38 Oh my goodness.

1:05:40 Wow.

1:05:40 His hair.

1:05:41 He's really lifelike.

1:05:42 The nose is really just fantastic.

1:05:45 Still trying to get my head around the fact

1:05:46 that this guy is in my ancestry and not that far back.

1:05:50 John, what do you think?

1:05:51 Give me a break.

1:05:52 You looked like twins.

1:05:54 [laughter] Isn't he wonderful?

1:05:56 I mean, this just looks like a living, breathing.

1:05:59 I'm slightly freaked out by him, actually.

1:06:02 I just think he's going to start moving.

1:06:04 That is unbelievable.

1:06:06 It's uncanny.

1:06:08 What do you What do you reckon?

1:06:09 You know, it's it's just got this sort of humanizing effect to put the flesh on.

1:06:14 And uh and it's the challenge is to make something that's different

1:06:18 from us look different when in fact the details point to great similarity.

1:06:22 Oh,

1:06:22 I could just imagine him striding off.

1:06:25 What do you What do you reckon?

1:06:26 Is he musly enough?

1:06:28 He's got to be.

1:06:28 But it's really impressive, isn't it?

1:06:31 It's a case where focusing on bone doesn't give the whole picture.

1:06:34 Yeah, Vixer, such a good job.

1:06:37 He's absolutely brilliant.

1:06:40 The African savannah, keeping cool is crucial to survival.

1:06:46 Many animals insulate themselves against the harmful exposure

1:06:49 of the sun with a protective layer of hair.

1:06:54 They rest at the hottest times of the day to avoid overheating,

1:06:58 but that means they have less time to travel and hunt.

1:07:02 If Homo erectus was out running in the heat of the day,

1:07:06 what stopped them overheating?

1:07:09 Could this be the time that our early ancestors lost their hair?

1:07:16 Well, I'm with Professor Peter Wheeler from John M's University.

1:07:19 Would Homo erectus have been hairy?

1:07:22 That's something we don't know.

1:07:24 But what we can say is that there are good reasons to think

1:07:27 that it would have been advantageous for homo erectus not to have been hairy.

1:07:31 Tell me more, Peter.

1:07:32 Yes, we got these two volunteers who are not too

1:07:35 dissimilar in physique from what the narcotic boy might have looked

1:07:37 like had he survived to be an adult and they're

1:07:41 identical twins and they've trained to a similar level of fitness.

1:07:44 And we've had them standing under

1:07:46 these heat lamps which emulate the African sun.

1:07:49 One of the advantages of retaining body hair is that it acts as a shield.

1:07:54 It prevents a lot of the heat from the sun getting through to the body.

1:07:57 And we selected clothing which is similar in its

1:08:00 thermal properties to that of the hair of living primates.

1:08:03 So in essence we have a hairless homminid and and a hairy one.

1:08:08 Yes.

1:08:08 Now although the surface of the hair does get very hot in this case clothing

1:08:13 because it's insulating most of it will

1:08:15 be reflected and radiated back to the environment.

1:08:18 It's the lighter colors that are the warmest areas.

1:08:21 The surfaces on the naked skin volunteer are hot.

1:08:27 They are the skin be hot itself.

1:08:29 Therefore, the heat is being absorbed directly by the body.

1:08:33 So, when animals are standing still,

1:08:35 their fur keeps them cool by reflecting heat away from the body.

1:08:40 But John's bare skin is absorbing it.

1:08:42 So, he he is getting hotter.

1:08:44 Well, let's see how you fare when you start to run.

1:08:47 We'll turn on fans to create a similar air flow to when you're actually running.

1:08:52 We have a health care professional here.

1:08:54 If you don't feel comfortable, you stop at any time.

1:08:57 Okay, start running.

1:09:06 Now, our volunteers have been really working up a sweat on these treadmills.

1:09:10 So, now I want to see who's keeping their cool.

1:09:13 How are you feeling?

1:09:14 Oh, insulate, Thomas.

1:09:16 Tough.

1:09:16 Yeah.

1:09:17 And our naked skinned human.

1:09:20 Okay.

1:09:21 Well, he could keep going.

1:09:22 Yeah.

1:09:22 He He obviously dissipating the heat load

1:09:24 that his muscles are producing much more easily.

1:09:26 And there are two distinct reasons why he's able to do this.

1:09:30 The loss of his body hair means that heat can

1:09:32 flow from his body more easily out into the environment.

1:09:36 The second advantage is the loss

1:09:38 of body hair makes sweating much more effective.

1:09:41 When the sweat is secreted onto the skin surface,

1:09:44 the increased air flow over the skin means

1:09:46 that sweat is evaporated at a greater rate.

1:09:48 I'm worried about you guys.

1:09:49 I think you should switch the machines off now cuz

1:09:51 I'm I'm worried that you're about to have heat stroke.

1:09:56 Now, hold up your shirt there.

1:09:58 Look at that.

1:10:00 Now, all that heat has been trapped inside.

1:10:02 His core, his insides are really heating up.

1:10:07 John on the on the left there is is not nearly as hot underneath.

1:10:12 So the advantages are are quite clear.

1:10:15 Advantages are very clear particularly during activity either

1:10:19 through long distance persistence walking through the heat

1:10:21 of the tropical day or short burst of intense

1:10:24 activity such as our volunteers have done here.

1:10:26 There's one other problem with exposed skin in the sun of course

1:10:29 that that you would have to have dark skin protected by melanin.

1:10:32 And what about hair on the head?

1:10:34 Well, one of the reasons we think hair is retained

1:10:36 on the head is that it is actually shielding those areas

1:10:38 of the body in a biped which are most exposed

1:10:41 to the strongest fluxes of solar radiation when the sun is overhead

1:10:45 and it protects your brain.

1:10:46 Shielding the brain from Steven, how do you feel?

1:10:49 It was really hard.

1:10:50 That was really hard.

1:10:52 Yeah.

1:10:53 Good.

1:10:52 You could you could have kept going, I reckon.

1:10:57 Under the [music] savannah sun,

1:10:59 Naraktomi boy could only run during the day if he could keep cool.

1:11:03 Sweating is the most efficient way of losing heat.

1:11:07 And to do that, he would have needed very little body hair.

1:11:11 This is really interesting and I find it really intriguing that we could

1:11:13 be looking at the point in our story where our ancestors lost their fur.

1:11:17 Cage, the rib cage is not as broad or wide

1:11:19 or flared out as some of our earlier ancestors.

1:11:21 And so what that means is the space in between the pelvis

1:11:24 and the diaphragm where our guts live is uh seems to be a smaller volume.

1:11:29 We have smaller guts which suggests that he was eating better quality food.

1:11:33 The shorter the gut the better quality the food.

1:11:36 So meat could be an explanation for that.

1:11:38 But there could be another explanation as well

1:11:40 why guts and teeth are getting smaller.

1:11:43 It could have been that these guys were cooking their food.

1:11:47 It's controversial because until recently it was thought

1:11:49 humans didn't control fire until around 400,000 years ago.

1:11:54 But new chemical analysis techniques may have just put a match to all that.

1:12:02 Cooking with fire is a uniquely human behavior.

1:12:04 [music] Today, homo sapiens are the only species to do it,

1:12:08 but that hasn't always been the case.

1:12:14 In Williamstown, Massachusetts, Dr.

1:12:16 Anne Skinner has been analyzing tiny fragments

1:12:19 of ancient animal bones that have been burned.

1:12:22 They were found at a site used by Homoerectus.

1:12:26 And Anne made an extraordinary [music] discovery.

1:12:31 Using a technique known as electron spin resonance,

1:12:34 she can analyze changes in bone protein.

1:12:39 These reveal what temperature the bones were burned at.

1:12:45 Natural fires from the time of Homo erectus [music]

1:12:47 would have been grass fires that burn at 300° C.

1:12:54 [music] But man-made fires created in a hearth reach much higher temperatures.

1:13:00 So if I have bones that are heated above 300

1:13:04 and especially above 400 to give us a little leeway here,

1:13:08 then I can be sure that they were not heated in a grass fire

1:13:12 and hence they have to have been heated in a fire constructed by hominids.

1:13:20 Anne used her technique to analyze burnt fragments of antelope

1:13:24 bones found in Svart Cran's cave in [music] South Africa.

1:13:29 This was a cave where Homo erectus remains had also been found.

1:13:34 Remarkably, she found that the bones had burned 350° C and believes

1:13:40 this shows they [music] must have been burnt in a half.

1:13:44 I can show that these bones were burnt in a fire that must have been created

1:13:50 and controlled at the cave and that dates

1:13:52 to somewhere between 1 and 1.5 million years,

1:13:55 which is older than any other site that has ever been found.

1:14:00 Scientists [music] believe that the only species to have the mental

1:14:03 ability to use fire at this time was Homo erectus.

1:14:08 the idea that these entities had the ability to even conceive that they

1:14:14 might control their environment rather than

1:14:16 just letting the environment control them.

1:14:19 I mean, instead of seeing a burning bush

1:14:21 and running in the other direction to conceptually say,

1:14:24 "Hey, we could use that even if we weren't cooking.

1:14:27 We could use it to scare away the leopards.

1:14:30 We could use it to keep warm." Just thinking that there's something that you

1:14:34 could use in your environment is is uh takes more effort than you might think.

1:14:43 Anne's findings have rewritten the timeline

1:14:45 on Homoctus' [music] ability to harness fire.

1:14:50 Evolutionary biologist Dr.

1:14:52 Rachel Cardy has studied the research.

1:14:55 She believes that the early use

1:14:57 of fire could even have accelerated their development.

1:15:02 This kind of work is really showing us that humans were controlling fire

1:15:07 and were possibly using it for things

1:15:10 like cooking very early on in human evolution.

1:15:15 Cooked food means a more varied, higher energy diet.

1:15:18 [music] This reduces the workload for the gut and leaves

1:15:21 calories spare for [music] the rest of the body.

1:15:25 A fifth of the calories we consume are used to fuel our [music] brains.

1:15:29 And there's a theory that a switch to cook food is

1:15:32 one of the things that encouraged an increase in brain size.

1:15:37 What we see at this point in human evolution is

1:15:40 the beginning of a trade-off where gut size gets smaller.

1:15:44 So you save energy by having a smaller gut,

1:15:46 but humans seem to have been able to reallocate

1:15:48 that saved energy toward fueling a larger brain.

1:15:53 So is there a link between a better diet and growing bigger brains?

1:15:58 I find this really intriguing and slightly

1:16:00 unsettling because for me this is evolution

1:16:03 turned on its head because we're saying

1:16:05 that we are saving some energy somewhere.

1:16:07 So that means we can grow a bit of ourselves bigger.

1:16:10 George, what do you think?

1:16:12 Chimpanzeee spends 47% of his time chewing and eating

1:16:15 and processing food whereas humans only spend 4.7.

1:16:18 So you've got all this extra time and energy to do something with it.

1:16:22 Why not cooking?

1:16:23 human walking along.

1:16:24 And we can see that we walk with a nice straight leg.

1:16:28 And one of the really key bits of anatomy is up here.

1:16:30 These are the abductor muscles on the outside of your hip joint.

1:16:33 And they stop your hips swinging from side to side as you're walking.

1:16:37 Robin, I think that's a chimp over your end, isn't it?

1:16:41 Y completely different gate.

1:16:41 So that's um very bent, very bent hip, bent knee.

1:16:44 Well, really what you can see in the chimpanzeee

1:16:46 is is the strong flexure of of the knee

1:16:50 bringing all the the force of the body down

1:16:52 behind the knee and in front of the foot.

1:16:54 Now, this is is actually continually flexing the knee joint.

1:16:57 And this is what makes that sort of walking so inefficient.

1:17:00 That looks very inefficient with this sort of rotating hip.

1:17:04 It's very it's very hard to do.

1:17:06 One of the reasons is if you stand stand in this sort of posture,

1:17:09 gravity's continued to flex your knee and you your muscles in front

1:17:13 of the thigh work harder and harder and harder to stop you

1:17:16 bending more and more and it becomes very tiring.

1:17:19 It's very tiring and your knees start to shake and Yes.

1:17:22 Oh, so it's much more efficient to actually straighten your legs.

1:17:25 It's more efficient to stand that way and it's

1:17:26 more efficient to walk this way as well.

1:17:28 And so who's this in the middle then?

1:17:30 That's a Lucy.

1:17:31 So this is this is how Lucy would have walked.

1:17:33 I I I would say a bit a little bit more straight straight leg than that too.

1:17:36 I think even more straight leg

1:17:38 even more straight straight leg than that.

1:17:40 She's slight swing in the hips, isn't there?

1:17:41 There's a little

1:17:42 Yes, you've got a basically a broader hip than we would have had.

1:17:45 I think again we have to emphasize the fact that you know

1:17:47 chimpanzees are not our ancestors and we're using them as a comparison.

1:17:52 But it seems that what we've got here

1:17:53 in Austin's apherensis is something which is almost

1:17:56 halfway between a very chimpanzeee like way

1:17:59 of walking and a modern human way of walking.

1:18:03 Well, looking at the anatomy of Lucy's feet, knees, and pelvis,

1:18:07 it suggests she's spending lots of time walking on the ground.

1:18:11 But some new research has been looking at another bit of her anatomy, her hands.

1:18:16 And this may shed some light on how much she was using them for climbing.

1:18:20 [music] It may seem surprising, but the way we use our hands in [music] climbing

1:18:27 a tree or gripping a tool is recorded in our wrist bones.

1:18:32 Powell Cotton House in southern [music] England is one

1:18:35 of the most important primate study centers in the world.

1:18:39 [music] Our ancient ancestors spent more time in the trees than we do.

1:18:45 But new research conducted here is beginning to shed [music] light on when

1:18:49 they decided to trade life in the trees for life on the ground.

1:18:54 Paleoanthropologist Professor Gabrielle [music] Macho has

1:18:58 been studying the wristbones of modern chimpanzees and humans and comparing them

1:19:03 with wristbones from Lucy's species oropythecus apherenis.

1:19:07 [music] We have been looking at the capitate.

1:19:11 It's the biggest bone of the wrist and it's sitting right in the middle here

1:19:16 and it's along the main load transfer from the middle finger to the upper arm.

1:19:24 [music] Gabrielle has been putting capitate bones into a CT

1:19:27 scanner to reveal [music] the internal structure of tbacular bone.

1:19:32 In a little bone like this, you get a very

1:19:34 complex [music] arrangement of tracular bone and it's no coincidence.

1:19:40 It's also called the [music] spongy bone.

1:19:46 Having made [music] CT scans of capitate bones,

1:19:49 Gabrielle applied the same computer modeling that aircraft manufacturers

1:19:52 [music] use to analyze stress in the wings of airplanes.

1:19:56 This showed where the spongy [music] bone had been

1:19:58 reinforced to cope with the forces applied to them.

1:20:02 The difference between the two bones is quite striking.

1:20:05 [music] In the gyen sea, you see the red loads travel towards the left side

1:20:11 and this is the side where you have your little finger.

1:20:13 in modern humans sit quite nicely.

1:20:16 It is traveling towards the thumb side.

1:20:19 So chimps show evidence of reinforcement on the little finger side of [music]

1:20:23 this bone because that is where the loading is greatest when they climb trees.

1:20:30 But in humans [music] who use their thumbs far more,

1:20:32 the loading is on the thumb side of the bone.

1:20:37 This technique could reveal how much [music]

1:20:40 time ancient species spent in the trees.

1:20:45 Next, Gabrielle looked at capitates from Oralopythecus apherenis,

1:20:49 [music] the same species as Lucy.

1:20:52 She also analyzed capitates from another slightly older species,

1:20:56 Oralopythecus [music] animemensis.

1:20:59 Her findings suggest that a dramatic change was taking place.

1:21:04 The older one, [music] Oropeticus Anamensis, behaves more like a chimpanzeee.

1:21:09 So you have the load transfer towards the little finger and this is

1:21:14 what you expect if you're moving up a tree if if you're climbing.

1:21:19 Whereas the later osteolopiticus apherenesis has more of a humanlike pattern.

1:21:24 So it definitely used its thumb um

1:21:28 much more regularly um than the older specimens

1:21:32 and it is maybe some indications that they

1:21:35 have largely abandoned and a boreal lifestyle.

1:21:38 So they have come to the ground.

1:21:40 Our ancient ancestors [music] choose to walk upright.

1:21:43 The forests were retreating,

1:21:45 but out on the savannah they were [music] easy prey.

1:21:51 But walking meant they could travel further to find

1:21:54 food and it freed up [music] their hands.

1:21:57 Walking on two legs clearly has advantages,

1:22:00 but it comes at a price and [music] it's one we are still paying today.

1:22:05 Well, over here we have Professor

1:22:07 Karen Rosenberg from the University of Delaware,

1:22:10 and she's been studying this part of Lucy's anatomy very carefully.

1:22:14 So, this is a modern human pelvis,

1:22:16 and it's a completely different shape from the chimpanzeee.

1:22:20 Completely different.

1:22:20 And it's completely different because of the way that we walk.

1:22:24 As bipeds, we've had to modify our pelvis

1:22:26 completely in order to walk on two legs, which a chimpanzeee doesn't do.

1:22:30 I mean, this is like a blade.

1:22:31 I mean in fact we do call this the iliac blade don't we?

1:22:35 Exactly.

1:22:34 And in us it's formed a kind of basin shape.

1:22:38 Right.

1:22:37 It's a completely different shape.

1:22:39 Completely different.

1:22:40 And the birth canal is completely different as well.

1:22:42 Um in humans the birth canal which is here is wide at the top.

1:22:48 Yeah.

1:22:47 And then long at the midplane in the middle

1:22:50 and then approximately round at the outlet.

1:22:53 And chimpanzees are long in all dimensions.

1:22:56 So it's quite a different shape.

1:22:58 So, do chimpanzees have any problems giving birth?

1:23:01 Apparently not.

1:23:02 Apparently, they have a pretty easy time.

1:23:04 Um, the baby's head is much smaller than the birth canal,

1:23:07 and it seems to go through in a pretty

1:23:09 straightforward way without a lot of difficulty.

1:23:12 So, do you think that the changes to the the human pelvis that have come about

1:23:16 because of this adaptation to walking on two

1:23:18 legs have had a knock-on effect for child birth?

1:23:21 Huge effect for child birth.

1:23:22 And not just the modifications for locomotion,

1:23:25 but it's because we give birth to babies with large brains.

1:23:28 Yeah, that was a bad that's a bad bit of design, isn't it?

1:23:31 It [laughter] is a very bad design.

1:23:33 Okay.

1:23:33 So, so babies with big brains would have

1:23:35 come along a bit later after Lucy's kind.

1:23:39 But over here, we've got reconstructed Lucy's pelvis

1:23:43 because I think it's very useful to be able

1:23:46 to see the pelvis in the round with the with the sacrum at the back as well.

1:23:49 Now, first of all, it's very, very tiny,

1:23:51 but I think if I put it in the middle there,

1:23:53 I mean, I think that looks much more like

1:23:55 a modern human pelvis than it does like a chimpanzeee.

1:23:58 In fact, it looks almost nothing like a chimpanzeee pelvis.

1:24:00 Absolutely.

1:24:01 The modifications that happened because we walk on two

1:24:04 legs had taken place obviously by the time of Lucy.

1:24:07 And so, the pelvis looks much more similar to a modern human,

1:24:10 but it doesn't look exactly like a modern human.

1:24:13 And that's because the birth canal didn't have

1:24:15 to give birth to a large brain baby.

1:24:18 So do you think Lucy would have still

1:24:19 been able to give birth relatively easily then?

1:24:23 Relatively easily but differently than in a chimpanzeee.

1:24:26 So how have you been able to work that out and and how differently?

1:24:29 Well quite differently.

1:24:30 So um if we look at the way that modern humans give birth.

1:24:34 So this is a newborn baby by the way [laughter] a model of a newborn baby.

1:24:37 Um in modern humans the the fit between the baby's head and the baby's shoulders

1:24:42 and the birth canal is quite tight

1:24:44 as lots of people know from personal experience.

1:24:46 Yes, I know it from personal experience.

1:24:48 [clears throat and laughter] So, the baby's head typically enters the birth

1:24:52 canal facing to the side like this.

1:24:54 Yeah.

1:24:54 But then it usually gets stuck and so it usually turns,

1:24:57 rotates 90° and emerges like this so that the back

1:25:04 of the baby's head is facing to the front of the mother's body.

1:25:08 So, the mother can't easily reach down and clear the baby's

1:25:11 breathing passage or move the umbilical cord if it's around the neck.

1:25:15 Those are things that in other animals the mother can do for herself,

1:25:18 but it's more difficult for humans to do.

1:25:20 So, humans are typically almost always born with another person helping.

1:25:25 So, with Lucy's pelvis then, do I mean,

1:25:27 why do you think it would have been difficult to get a a baby out

1:25:30 through Lucy's pelvis because uh her babies would

1:25:33 have had much much smaller heads than ours?

1:25:35 Yes.

1:25:35 But Lucy's pelvis and Lucy's birth canal in particular

1:25:38 is different from both modern humans and a chimpanzeee.

1:25:41 It's like a modern human in that it's wide from side to side,

1:25:46 but then it has that shape all the way through.

1:25:48 So, her baby wouldn't have twisted around in the same way.

1:25:51 It exactly.

1:25:51 It not only didn't need to turn and twist, it probably couldn't turn and twist.

1:25:56 So, this is really interesting.

1:25:58 It means that in order to stand and walk upright on two legs,

1:26:02 Lucy was paying a price.

1:26:04 She was paying a price and that it made child birth more difficult.

1:26:09 Absolutely.

1:26:09 Many people still think of the Neanderles as a simple-minded, thuggish people.

1:26:16 But recent, quite often unexpected discoveries

1:26:19 are forcing us to confront that perception.

1:26:33 Archaeologist Clive Finlesen and his team are convinced

1:26:37 that this simplistic [music] impression of Neanderls is wrong.

1:26:45 We've been working in these caves in Gibralta now for over 25 years.

1:26:48 [music] We have dates in these caves now

1:26:50 with Neanderthalss as recently as 32,000 years ago.

1:26:53 That would make this the last site where Neanderthalss lived.

1:26:58 This the last known refuge of a lost tribe

1:27:01 of Neanderals has produced [music] thousands of bones and artifacts.

1:27:07 It presents us with almost a total picture

1:27:10 of Neanderthal life in this part of the world.

1:27:13 Families were living here,

1:27:14 sleeping here and going out to hunt and forage from here.

1:27:18 In my view, the stereotype of the the ape-like Neanderthal I think is changing.

1:27:22 People are realizing even anatomically that there may

1:27:25 be physical differences between our ancestors and them,

1:27:29 but they're not as huge as we thought once upon a time.

1:27:33 What is really changing our view is the cultural evidence,

1:27:36 the evidence of the abilities that we thought only

1:27:40 we had and caused our expansion uh across the globe.

1:27:44 And we're beginning to realize that Neanderthalss were not that different.

1:27:47 In the past, experts suggested that Neanderls were incapable of planning,

1:27:52 of thinking two or three steps ahead.

1:27:55 That's not true at all.

1:27:56 These people knew their environment very well.

1:27:58 They knew what they had here and they exploited it very well.

1:28:00 And that that's probably the key to the success

1:28:02 and their survival for such a long time.

1:28:06 The Neandertos were not only an immensely successful European species,

1:28:11 but we're starting to realize that they were cultured in a way

1:28:15 that we'd thought was the sole preserve of modern humans.

1:28:20 The clues are hidden amongst the many bird bones buried in these caves.

1:28:27 More and more we found that the evidence is

1:28:29 in the form of cut marks on the bones.

1:28:32 And what we realized was that a lot

1:28:33 of the marks were on the wing bones of these birds.

1:28:37 Using stone tools and dead birds found on the shoreline,

1:28:41 Clive's team have been exploring what the Neanderls might have been doing.

1:28:45 If you dissect the wing bone of a vulture or an eagle,

1:28:49 what you find is a bone and a tendon and the feathers attached to the skin.

1:28:53 There's no meat because you have to be lightweight to be able to saw.

1:28:56 So if you're cutting these wing bones in birds of prey,

1:29:00 it has to be something to do with feathers

1:29:03 and certainly has nothing to do with meat or food.

1:29:06 [music] In parallel, we realized that a lot of the species

1:29:10 of bird of prey being brought in were birds

1:29:12 of prey with dark feathers and we showed that they

1:29:15 seem to be a discrimination in terms of color.

1:29:18 Neanderthals preferred black for some reason.

1:29:22 The conclusion that we came to after a lot of analysis is that there

1:29:25 were getting the feathers for ornamentation to wear them in some [music] way.

1:29:32 Many cultures across the globe historically [music] and today use bird feathers.

1:29:36 North American Indians for example.

1:29:39 Because of this close relationship that they had with birds,

1:29:42 we [music] decided to call them the bird people of Europe.

1:29:51 [music] [music]

1:29:57 Deeper in these caves, the team have found evidence suggesting that these bird

1:30:01 people had the capacity for abstract thought.

1:30:05 Something else which was believed to be exclusive to modern humans.

1:30:10 We have found this incredible engraving on the rock made by Neanthals

1:30:14 and it's the only one that is known today [music] anywhere.

1:30:20 It took us 2 years of intensive study and we came to the conclusion

1:30:24 that it took them at least 2 hours

1:30:26 to do because we replicated the whole procedure.

1:30:29 So it wasn't something it wasn't a doodle.

1:30:31 They actually thought about it and it wasn't marks

1:30:34 done for butchery for example if you're cutting through skin.

1:30:38 We tried to replicate that with with skin

1:30:40 and and the lines go all over the place.

1:30:42 This was something that wasn't functional.

1:30:44 It was sending a message to somebody and it was

1:30:47 done very very deliberately and it took a long time.

1:30:50 This is not mere survival.

1:30:53 This looks like art.

1:30:55 It's the next step if you like uh the smoking gun in terms of neandal behavior.

1:31:02 So contrary to the popular perception of them,

1:31:06 we're now realizing that Neanderals exhibited many

1:31:09 aspects of what we call modern human behavior.

1:31:13 Janet Kelso, a colleague of Santa Barbara at the Maxplank Institute,

1:31:17 has been studying the history of humans through comparative genetics.

1:31:25 in terms of diversity in the Neandal population that was

1:31:28 much lower than what's what we see in present day populations.

1:31:31 [music] So if you look around this tram

1:31:33 carriage there's more diversity in this tram

1:31:35 carriage perhaps than there was in the population

1:31:38 of Neanderls that we know about.

1:31:40 We think that that's probably [music] because

1:31:41 they were living in rather small populations.

1:31:49 When we got the first really high quality neiander genome,

1:31:54 one surprise was where the two versions of the genome that this individual

1:31:59 had inherited from its mother and its father had no differences between them.

1:32:04 And this obviously suggests that the mother

1:32:06 and father of these individuals were closely related.

1:32:10 They are on a level of half siblings or double first cousins.

1:32:15 We don't know if this is typical of Neandertold societies at that time

1:32:19 or if it's something special that happened in this cave at this point in time.

1:32:26 What's certain is that low genetic diversity is not good for a population.

1:32:33 It is known that populations that are

1:32:35 more inbred [music] that have less diversity

1:32:37 have less ability to respond to say a new pathogen or um a changing environment.

1:32:44 So this diversity kind of provides a buffer for the environment.

1:32:47 And if [music] the Neanderals were less diverse,

1:32:48 then it's quite possible that that may have contributed to why they died out.

1:33:00 But it turns out that Neanderls may not have died out completely.

1:33:05 After all, genetic research can tell us a great

1:33:07 deal about who we are and where we come from.

1:33:10 And it is completely reshaping our idea of what it is to be a modern human.

1:33:22 While our homo sapiion's ancestors were sharing

1:33:24 the planet with the various lost tribes,

1:33:28 there was of course the chance that they might have interbred with them.

1:33:34 This meant that there was a possibility, however unlikely it seems,

1:33:38 that there might be a remnant of some archaic

1:33:40 [music] DNA hanging around in the genomes of present-day humans.

1:33:46 So, the geneticists and Leipzig went digging for it.

1:33:52 What we wanted to look at was whether

1:33:54 there was interbreeding from Neanderals into modern humans.

1:33:57 And [music] our expectation was that there was none.

1:34:01 And when we got the first result

1:34:02 that suggested that [music] there had been interbreeding,

1:34:05 we were very skeptical, all of us.

1:34:09 Comparing modern human DNA to the [music] detailed

1:34:11 Neanderl genome seemed to suggest some sharing of genes.

1:34:17 We all kind of spent a lot of time looking at the [music]

1:34:19 data trying to figure out how this could be an error.

1:34:23 But the evidence was there.

1:34:26 Certain modern human genomes from different parts of the world

1:34:29 [music] contain sections that matched the Neanderal DNA.

1:34:36 So what we're looking at here is a region of chromosome 4.

1:34:40 At the top we have two neanderals and then we

1:34:44 have a denisan and then here we have Asian individuals,

1:34:48 European individuals, South American individuals, Papwans,

1:34:53 Australians and then a group of Africans and if you look

1:34:56 down you can see that at most positions everyone is very

1:34:59 similar and that's because we're very closely related right modern humans

1:35:02 and Neanderals are not that different from one another which makes it

1:35:06 really hard to to work out where are the interesting differences

1:35:09 and so what we do is instead we mask out we

1:35:12 remove all the sites where everyone is the same and we

1:35:17 only look at the sites where individuals differ from the reference genome.

1:35:21 And so what you see here now is the Neanderls and the Denisven carry

1:35:24 a difference from the modern human reference

1:35:27 at this position and here and there and there.

1:35:31 And some of those differences are shared

1:35:33 by a number of populations including the African individuals.

1:35:37 And some of those differences are shared just by a few individuals.

1:35:40 So here and there and there.

1:35:45 When we went through the genomes of of Africans and of Europeans and of Asians

1:35:50 and counted how many DNA bases in each

1:35:53 of the genomes matched the Neandal genome,

1:35:56 we saw very consistently that all the groups outside of Africa

1:36:00 shared more Neanderl DNA than the groups inside of Africa.

1:36:05 [music] Once upon a time,

1:36:08 we shared this planet with many other species of human.

1:36:15 To us today, it would seem like a strange, fantastical world, only it was real.

1:36:21 For our new series, human,

1:36:23 we wanted to bring some of these prehistoric humans [music] to life.

1:36:27 And we did it through a high-tech process called photoggramometry.

1:36:30 We had to select real life models and capture them from all angles with cameras.

1:36:36 An obscene number of cameras, 154.

1:36:39 Then we stitched all those photos together to create a 3D model.

1:36:44 Finally, we could manipulate the model

1:36:47 with CGI and create our [music] ancient humans.

1:36:50 We used the most up-to-date information to create these long extinct beings.

1:36:58 Imagine [music] being famous for standing upright on two legs.

1:37:07 Well, that's the claim to glory of Homo erectus,

1:37:09 [music] Latin for upright human.

1:37:12 Only embarrassingly, they weren't the first ones to do it.

1:37:15 Bipedalism actually evolved earlier, like millions of years earlier.

1:37:20 Only to start with, it was a combination.

1:37:22 They were sometimes walking upright and other

1:37:25 times they were still up in the trees.

1:37:27 So, what makes Homo erectus so special?

1:37:29 Well, they were the first human species to leave

1:37:31 Africa and possibly the first to control fire.

1:37:35 And to be fair, as much as they weren't the first species to stand upright,

1:37:40 it's possible that they were the first species of human to walk

1:37:44 entirely upright and not be in [music] the trees at all.

1:37:47 In the body shape of Homo erectus, we can see similarities to [music] our own,

1:37:52 but they also had a large but short rib

1:37:54 cage rather than the longer flatter chest of modern humans,

1:37:58 making them [music] appear much stockier.

1:38:01 And some of the most interesting differences come in the head.

1:38:05 So this is a replica,

1:38:06 a copy of a Homo erectus that lived about 1.8 million years ago.

1:38:11 And you can see that brow ridge is not something you would see on someone today.

1:38:17 and see the face.

1:38:18 See how it jutts outwards in a way that ours doesn't tend to.

1:38:23 You can especially see it [music] around here.

1:38:26 And you'll notice in our render, no chin.

1:38:29 Now, this lack of chin might seem really unusual to us,

1:38:33 but actually all the other species, [music] they're the chinless majority.

1:38:38 We're the oddity, actually.

1:38:40 As for why we have this [music] chin, well, the jewelry is out.

1:38:44 It's kind of a mystery.

1:38:45 People have put forward all kinds of suggestions including [music] speech,

1:38:49 chewing, even sexual selection.

1:38:50 But truthfully, we don't know.

1:38:53 [music] Now, you might be thinking, what about hair?

1:38:55 Why is our homo erectus hairless?

1:38:58 Well, the fact of the matter is we have no idea

1:39:01 how much hair they had or how they might have styled it.

1:39:05 There's nothing [music] in the fossil record that tells us.

1:39:08 So, with all these models, we've gone with a hairless [music] look.

1:39:11 Anyway, back to Erectus.

1:39:15 You might be wondering what led to their extinction.

1:39:18 Some scientists believe that the very last Homo

1:39:21 erectus met their demise because of climate [music] change,

1:39:24 which shifted the environment from woodland to more dangerous rainforest.

1:39:28 But I would suggest that we're asking the wrong question.

1:39:32 They gave rise to many other species, including eventually us.

1:39:37 And they stuck around for 2 million years.

1:39:39 We've only been around for [music] 300,000 years.

1:39:42 So honestly, I think they did just fine.

1:39:45 I mean, we should be so lucky.

1:39:50 I want to talk about hands down the most

1:39:52 unexpected human [music] species to ever be discovered.

1:39:56 It sent shock waves through the scientific community.

1:40:00 And amazingly, this species came to about this tall.

1:40:04 Now, you might not be familiar with Homo Floresenzis,

1:40:07 but you're probably familiar with the nickname.

1:40:10 These people were so fantastical that we named them after Lord of the Rings,

1:40:15 hobbits, and their discovery was a fascinating tale in of itself.

1:40:19 In 2003, archaeologists discovered a skeleton on the island of Flores

1:40:24 in Indonesia that stood at about 106 cm or 3t 6 in tall.

1:40:31 They initially believed this belonged to a modern human child,

1:40:36 but upon further investigation,

1:40:38 they realized that the skull contained fully developed and erupted wisdom teeth.

1:40:44 So many argued loudly that it was a homo sapiens adult

1:40:48 whose smallness was actually just a result of some kind of pathology.

1:40:52 But they found others hundreds of thousands of years apart.

1:40:58 Scientists came to the conclusion that Bilbo Baggins or in our case Mrs.

1:41:02 Bilbo Baggins here was in fact an entirely separate species of archaic human.

1:41:08 However, it was so unbelievable to so many scientists the idea of a small

1:41:13 statured human with a small brain who was still capable of making stone tools.

1:41:20 Precisely when they originated is unclear,

1:41:23 but we know that some of the remains on the island

1:41:26 of Flores in Indonesia are at least 700,000 years old.

1:41:30 And these tiny humans shared the island

1:41:33 with giant maribou stalks that were taller than me,

1:41:38 giant rats and komodo dragons.

1:41:41 So apparently some of the creatures on this island

1:41:43 were kind of huge, just not them.

1:41:47 And it's the remarkable size

1:41:49 of these hobbits that's continued to fascinate scientists.

1:41:53 Some scientists think that homophoresensis is an offshoot of Homo

1:41:57 erectus who somehow landed on this secluded island and they

1:42:02 underwent something which we call island dwarfism which is when

1:42:06 large animals get small and strangely small animals get big.

1:42:11 It's just a process that we know happens on islands.

1:42:14 However, other scientists think that Homo floresientis evolved

1:42:18 from a far older and smaller species that predates Homo erectus,

1:42:24 but there's no evidence of any

1:42:25 earlier hominins before Homo erectus leaving Africa.

1:42:30 So, scientists disagree.

1:42:32 Beyond their stature,

1:42:33 these humans had wider hips proportionately compared to our narrower

1:42:37 bodies and a much smaller skull and brain case,

1:42:41 protecting a brain that was roughly a third of the size of ours.

1:42:46 In fact, their brains were closer in size to an adult chimpanzeee.

1:42:51 I mean, look at the difference.

1:42:54 They're absolutely tiny.

1:42:56 Homozyis became extinct [music] around 50,000 years ago.

1:43:00 around the same time that Homo sapiens arrived on Flores

1:43:03 and also during a period of major volcanic activity on the island.

1:43:07 Much like their unusual height,

1:43:09 the last days of this species remain a [music] mystery.

1:43:16 If I was to ask you to conjure up in your mind the image of a Neanderthal,

1:43:20 you might imagine a knuckled dragging brutish creature.

1:43:25 And after years of anti- Neanderthal propaganda, you'd kind of be forgiven.

1:43:30 But how convenient is it that we

1:43:32 have portrayed our closest relative in this light,

1:43:36 especially when they're not around to defend themselves?

1:43:39 Well, it turns out the truth is far more interesting.

1:43:44 Now, Neanderthalss show up about 130,000 years before us homo

1:43:48 sapiens and evolved outside of Africa in Europe or Asia,

1:43:53 spreading all the way from Wales to the mountains of Siberia.

1:43:57 [music] An interesting question in bringing a Neanderthal to life is skin color.

1:44:02 Now, this would probably have varied Neanderthal to Neanderthal,

1:44:05 but DNA samples of Neanderthal specimens from modern Europe found

1:44:10 that those individuals probably had pale skin and some possibly even red hair.

1:44:16 It seems that some Neanderthals might

1:44:17 have adapted [music] to the European environment,

1:44:20 which is a higher latitude, [music] and therefore you have less sunlight.

1:44:25 A lighter skin means that you can produce more

1:44:28 vitamin D [music] even if you have less sunlight.

1:44:31 So essentially before Neanderthalss there was no

1:44:33 need for [music] lighter skin and that's why we didn't have white people until

1:44:38 then because they hadn't been invented yet.

1:44:41 Physically you can see that Neanderthalss

1:44:43 looked markedly different to modern humans.

1:44:46 They were stockier with shorter arms and legs and a more muscular body.

1:44:51 You can see we enlarged the nose of our model.

1:44:54 This is because Neanderthalss adapted to their colder environment and needed

1:44:59 a wider nose to regulate the cold, dry, ice age air.

1:45:04 As for the skull, well, their brain size was similar to ours.

1:45:07 So, what does that tell us [music] about Neanderthal's smarts?

1:45:11 Obviously, they definitely didn't achieve as much as Homo sapiens.

1:45:15 They didn't [music] write or paint the Mona Lisa,

1:45:17 or for that matter, create catastrophic global weather conditions.

1:45:21 But they were definitely smarter than we used to think.

1:45:24 They crafted tools, cooked with fire,

1:45:27 decorated [music] objects that may have been used as jewelry,

1:45:31 and some may have even buried their dead.

1:45:34 And finally, they're receiving someostumous decent PR.

1:45:42 Visualizing these species up close [music] reminds us of a stark fact.

1:45:46 It was only 300,000 years ago that at least

1:45:50 six species of human occupied this planet.

1:45:53 Folks, we were not alone.

1:45:59 And while [music] other species interbred with our own,

1:46:03 only we homo sapiens remain.

1:46:06 Surviving on planet Earth has long been an arduous challenge.

1:46:10 And 99.9% of species that have ever lived are now [music] extinct.

1:46:17 And these lost ancestors and relatives are a reminder [music] that we

1:46:21 Homo sapiens shouldn't forget just how fragile life on this planet can be.

1:46:28 How can we tell the story of our species,

1:46:31 Homo sapiens, over 300,000 years across seven continents?

1:46:37 Well, let's try doing it using six objects,

1:46:40 because these objects tell a tale that spans

1:46:42 all the way back to the distant past.

1:46:45 First off, a skull that transformed our understanding

1:46:49 of how and when we came into existence.

1:46:52 [music] Here's a question we should all probably know the answer to.

1:46:57 When did our species begin?

1:46:59 Like, how old are we?

1:47:01 Well, until recently, we got that completely wrong.

1:47:03 [music] For a long time, our species, Homo sapiens,

1:47:06 were thought to have emerged about 200,000 years ago, probably in East Africa.

1:47:11 But then, research conducted at one site warped our understanding completely.

1:47:15 Back in the 60s, in a remote cave in Morocco,

1:47:18 a mining operation stumbled across a fossilized skull.

1:47:22 Soon the site was full of archaeologists and over the years

1:47:26 they discovered human remains that were frankly kind of weird.

1:47:31 This is a replica of Jebel Hudwan which is one

1:47:34 of the fossils that was found in that Moroccan cave.

1:47:37 This skull was so confusing for archaeologists

1:47:39 because it has a mish mash of features.

1:47:42 So if you look at this brow ridge here that protrudes so much

1:47:46 you would [music] just not find that on a homo sapiens living today.

1:47:49 That is very old.

1:47:51 It's more reminiscent of some

1:47:53 of the older species like Neanderthalss for example.

1:47:56 [music] And yeah, the face that's pretty grassile.

1:48:00 It's very delicate, [music] very similar to our own.

1:48:04 It's kind of all tucked in [music] underneath the brain case.

1:48:09 So, how did this really strange mix fit into the human [music] tree?

1:48:14 It was a complete mystery.

1:48:15 Some people thought perhaps it was an African Neanderthal.

1:48:18 Others thought it was just some [music] strange thing that was

1:48:21 happening in Morocco and had nothing to do with us.

1:48:25 So, this skull that is a strange blend of old and new

1:48:30 is actually [music] around 300,000 years old and a homo sapiens.

1:48:36 So, it pushes back the [music] age of our species by about 100,000 years.

1:48:41 Turns out, thanks to this discovery, we're a lot older than we thought we were.

1:48:46 This fossil was also found in Morocco, remember?

1:48:49 And we used to think our origins were in East Africa.

1:48:52 [music] And so it points to a much more complex

1:48:56 continentwide process that led to [music] the beginning of our species.

1:49:01 Next, a mysterious rock formation that [music]

1:49:05 reveals the awakening of human minds.

1:49:10 If you to meet an early homo sapiens, you might recognize them.

1:49:13 They might look like us, but did they think like us?

1:49:18 Well, there's a cave in the Zadilo

1:49:20 Hills of Botswana that contains [music] a clue.

1:49:22 The rocks were formed in a way which looks

1:49:25 like the body and the head of a snake.

1:49:28 Now, the overall shape is natural,

1:49:30 but there is nothing natural about the detail.

1:49:33 The rock has over 300 man-made indentations [music] all over,

1:49:38 and those indentations end up looking like scales.

1:49:43 So, were the people in the cave trying

1:49:45 to make the rock look even more like a snake?

1:49:49 Archaeologists also found the remnants of prehistoric

1:49:52 tools that were burnt or intentionally smashed.

1:49:56 Why would you go to the trouble of making a tool only to damage it?

1:50:01 Well, some of the archaeologists that have worked

1:50:03 on this material have suggested that it's ritualistic [music] destruction.

1:50:08 Could this be an offering?

1:50:10 All of this points towards a kind of abstract thought.

1:50:14 This cave paints a picture of these people that were able

1:50:18 to see and think beyond what was tangibly in front of them.

1:50:23 Now, that is something that we thought only happened [music] quite recently,

1:50:27 but this site is dated to about 70,000 years ago.

1:50:30 And we can't be 100% sure how they

1:50:33 were thinking [music] and about their belief system.

1:50:36 But it's possible that they were asking for very [music]

1:50:38 similar things to what we would ask for, health, children, food.

1:50:43 And it's remarkable [music] to think that a cave like

1:50:46 that shows us some of the beginnings of the behaviors which we,

1:50:52 you and I, and every single person on the planet know so well.

1:50:56 Christmas, Eid, birthdays, Glastenbury.

1:50:59 We are obsessed with ritual and this cave shows us

1:51:02 that we have been for a very, very long time now.

1:51:06 A piece of technology that helped humans conquer new environments.

1:51:14 The rainforest, dynamic, dangerous, and full of predators.

1:51:19 You would think it would be a bad place for squishy bipedal apes like us.

1:51:24 And it does seem like all the other

1:51:25 species of human avoided the rainforest and yet

1:51:29 we took it on by adapting [music] our technology so that we could thrive there.

1:51:35 Now when I say technology be honest you're imagining weapons, bows,

1:51:41 arrows, spears [music] and that's a huge part of the story.

1:51:44 But deep within the Sri Lankan rainforest we also see something else.

1:51:49 the teeth of monkeys who lived in the canopies of this rainforest

1:51:54 which had been sharpened and modified

1:51:57 perhaps to puncture materials like animal hides.

1:52:02 This might have allowed humans to string together plant

1:52:05 and animal materials perhaps creating things like clothes, bags, shelter.

1:52:11 And all of this would have been

1:52:12 fundamental to living in the challenging environment

1:52:15 that is [music] a rainforest where clothes

1:52:17 could protect humans from insect born diseases.

1:52:20 Shelter would keep them safe from the rain and bags

1:52:22 could be created to carry equipment over long distances.

1:52:26 You can imagine grandparents sitting there with [music]

1:52:30 their grandchildren teaching them how to use these tools,

1:52:33 teaching them how to perfect the techniques.

1:52:36 They show us something amazing about our species.

1:52:39 How we adapted technology and passed it on so that we

1:52:44 could take on [music] environments once thought to be impenetrable.

1:52:49 Next, some fossils that show we were a lot more

1:52:52 intimate with other species of human than we once thought.

1:52:58 [music] Most of you watching this have about 2% Neanderthal DNA,

1:53:01 which basically means that one of your great great great great go a lot

1:53:05 of great grandparents got busy with a Neanderthal [music] in the early 2000s.

1:53:14 These fossils were discovered in a Was cave in Romania.

1:53:18 Now, if you look at these replicas, they do clearly look homo sapiens,

1:53:22 but if you look [music] really closely,

1:53:24 there are some features on them which are kind of mysterious.

1:53:28 The large molers [music] and notice the forehead, it recedes.

1:53:35 Those features [music] are Neanderthal.

1:53:37 This led the team to wonder if

1:53:40 this was evidence of Neanderthalss and Homo sapiens interbreeding.

1:53:43 [music] Thanks to a revolution in ancient DNA technology,

1:53:48 we now know that Neanderthalss and Homo sapiens [music] did interbreed

1:53:53 and that one of those awas fossils was in fact definitely a hybrid.

1:53:59 They had a Neanderthal relative about [music] four to six generations earlier.

1:54:04 This neandthogenetic legacy in us is really interesting.

1:54:08 [music] Not just because it tells us

1:54:09 something about the private lives of our ancestors,

1:54:11 but because it tells us something about our DNA today.

1:54:15 [music] See, that Neanderthal DNA within us is

1:54:19 associated with both positive [music] and negative things.

1:54:24 On the plus side, the Neandthal DNA is associated

1:54:27 [music] with things like immunities and even increased fertility.

1:54:31 And on the negative,

1:54:32 it's associated with things like increased [music] severity of CO.

1:54:36 The Neanderthalss have died out, but for better or worse,

1:54:40 a part of them still lives on [music] within us.

1:54:44 Now, onto a remarkable prehistoric weapon that [music]

1:54:47 helped humanity triumph in a whole new continent.

1:54:53 Imagine being the first humans to set foot in the Americas.

1:54:57 No other species of human had.

1:54:59 And so it was a land mass

1:55:01 that was untouched by human activity, including hunting.

1:55:05 So imagine the creatures you would have encountered there.

1:55:08 Mammoths, giant bison, mastadons.

1:55:11 So isn't it amazing that these prehistoric

1:55:13 humans looked at these animals and thought, "Yum." This is a Clovis spearhead.

1:55:19 These artifacts are around 13,000 years old,

1:55:22 and they are extraordinarily wellcrafted.

1:55:25 long and narrow, thinning [music] towards the end with sharp edges,

1:55:30 allowing them to pierce the hides of enormous animals.

1:55:34 But there's another version of the Clover spearhead that is mysterious,

1:55:39 striking, and beautiful.

1:55:41 This is a spearhead made of crystal quartz.

1:55:45 Quartz crystal is beautiful to look at, but vulnerable to shattering.

1:55:50 So, if it wasn't used as a weapon, what was it used for?

1:55:55 Maybe it was ceremonial.

1:55:56 [music] We also know that a boy from this period

1:55:59 was buried with about 100 clovislike [music] tools.

1:56:04 Again, pointing to this idea that this technology had deep cultural meaning.

1:56:10 Finally, a small [music] written document that exemplifies

1:56:14 the power and scale of human ambition.

1:56:19 What if I was to tell you that the first of the great pyramids of Giza,

1:56:23 one of the most astonishing [music] achievements in human history,

1:56:27 was built thanks in part to a boring spreadsheet.

1:56:30 Day 24, Inspector Merror spends the day with his file hauling stones.

1:56:35 Day 25, Inspector Merror spends the day with [music] his team hauling stones.

1:56:40 Riveting read.

1:56:41 So, how did this lead to that?

1:56:48 It was here on the Red Sea coast that archaeologists

1:56:50 discovered fragments of a text dating back over 4,500 years.

1:56:56 This, thought to be the world's oldest known papyrus, is the diary of Mea,

1:57:00 a [music] time capsule for the reign of the pharaoh Kufu.

1:57:04 Kufu is best known for overseeing the construction

1:57:07 of the first of the great pyramids of Giza.

1:57:10 Amra, the author of this diary, was an inspector,

1:57:13 [music] an official involved in the transportation

1:57:15 of things like limestone and food supplies.

1:57:18 And his journal describes just that.

1:57:21 It is a bit amusing,

1:57:23 but one of humanity's oldest known texts [music] is essentially a spreadsheet.

1:57:27 A dull list of goods and transportation details,

1:57:30 [music] the kind of thing that you would hate to be given at work,

1:57:33 but it's the kind of thing that you need to actually [music] build the pyramids.

1:57:38 You see, humanity by this point were much more numerous and writing allowed

1:57:42 us to communicate with each other and organize these huge numbers of people.

1:57:48 And maybe there's some comfort in the diary of mirror.

1:57:50 It's [music] nice to realize that boring

1:57:52 spreadsheets are not a uniquely modern thing.

1:57:57 [music] So hopefully these six objects give

1:58:02 you a sense of our 300,000y old story.

1:58:06 But if you want another [music] object,

1:58:08 just look in the mirror because you are a byproduct of that journey.

1:58:14 Everyone's like, "Oh, it's our bigger brains." And I'm like, "Yeah, absolutely.

1:58:17 It's part of the story." But like Wales could be

1:58:19 making this show if that was if it was just that.

1:58:21 I'm Ella Alami.

1:58:22 I'm a paleo anthropologist, an evolutionary biologist,

1:58:25 and I'm the presenter of human.

1:58:27 We were not destined for greatness.

1:58:32 And I think that shocks a lot of [music] people.

1:58:33 A lot of people think that we were the new kid on the block.

1:58:36 As soon as Homo sapiens turned up, it was game over for all the other species.

1:58:39 And let me tell you, it was not game over for all the other species.

1:58:41 The evidence kind of alludes to potential showdowns with the other species.

1:58:46 Potential, it's still very controversial and as not necessarily succeeding.

1:58:50 [music] Like for example, around the same time,

1:58:54 there was one cave that was filled with homo sapiens

1:58:56 and there was another cave that was filled with Neanderthalss.

1:58:59 That basically means they were both living there at the same time.

1:59:02 [music] And it looks like only the Neanderthals continued living there.

1:59:06 We quite likely became locally extinct.

1:59:10 It's not a story of a species that turns up and is immediately brilliant.

1:59:13 [music] We had to evolve quite a bit.

1:59:16 And I think we had a bit of luck on our side.

1:59:23 You know that image of one species

1:59:27 leading to another species leading to another species.

1:59:30 I have a problem with that for two reasons.

1:59:32 One is obviously, you know, where are the women?

1:59:34 The second problem I have with that image is

1:59:37 that it gives the impression that evolution is just really linear.

1:59:41 So one species dies out, gives rise to another species, etc., etc.

1:59:46 And we now know that is just not the case.

1:59:48 Human evolution is so much more complicated that there were

1:59:50 loads of us living on the planet at the same time.

1:59:53 Different groups were into breeding.

1:59:55 We actually only know the tip of the iceberg

1:59:59 of how many human species are out there.

2:00:02 Since I've been a paleo anthropologist, we have discovered so many more species.

2:00:08 Like our family tree got a lot bigger in the last few years.

2:00:11 And so it's funny that that image that is so ingrained in people's

2:00:15 minds when they think of human evolution is just actually quite inaccurate.

2:00:24 [laughter] Epic question.

2:00:25 I'd marry the Neanderthal.

2:00:28 This is kind of controversial, but I would probably avoid Homo erectus.

2:00:34 They were kind of earlier and and therefore, I'm assuming a bit more primitive,

2:00:37 and I don't know how much I'd trust them.

2:00:40 This is the one I make out with.

2:00:42 It's not PG-13.

2:00:43 What I was about to say, this is Homo Feresianis,

2:00:46 who a lot of us nickname the Hobbit after Lord

2:00:48 of the Rings because they're basically about 1 meter tall.

2:00:51 It's like the brain size of a chimpanzeee and yet it was bipedal,

2:00:55 so standing upright on two legs making stone tools.

2:00:58 It it had the behavior of a human and yet is this size.

2:01:02 And this is just in my opinion the most bizarre find.

2:01:07 I just want to know them.

2:01:08 you know, in a makeout session,

2:01:09 you you'd have a certain amount of time where you could chat.

2:01:12 Just tell me about yourself.

2:01:13 Suddenly realized that it looks like a kink.

2:01:17 They're never going to be able to include this.

2:01:23 When people um think about our large brains,

2:01:26 they think that the size of the brain is what makes us brilliant.

2:01:30 Truthfully, Neanderthalss had very similar sized brains to us.

2:01:33 Elephants, whales, they have big brains, too.

2:01:36 and yet they're not watching this series.

2:01:38 [laughter] It's about the organization in my opinion of that brain.

2:01:42 We seem to have a capacity to copy each other and learn

2:01:46 from each other and also we had the advantage of many many people.

2:01:51 Look all of these are theories right?

2:01:52 There was a lot of homo sapiens compared to well for example the Neanderthalss.

2:01:57 That means you have a bigger source

2:01:59 of people inventing copying perfecting the technology.

2:02:02 If you have 50 people in your group,

2:02:05 you've all got to get really, really good at everything,

2:02:08 hunting, gathering, etc., etc.,

2:02:09 because you've all got to work really, really hard to survive.

2:02:12 If there's 500 of you in your group,

2:02:14 suddenly you can start specializing all of those people inventing,

2:02:19 perfecting, and tinkering.

2:02:21 Everyone's like, "Oh, it's our bigger brains." And I'm like, "Yeah, absolutely.

2:02:23 It's part of the story." But like Wales could be

2:02:25 making this show if that was if it was just that.

2:02:32 I don't think we fully understand how hard life [music] was.

2:02:36 The Neanderthalss were contending with some really really cold climates.

2:02:39 I would really struggle with that.

2:02:40 Life as any kind of of human before agriculture was very very difficult.

2:02:46 That's why I always laugh at people that talk about the Paleo

2:02:48 diet cuz I'm like they were all dead by my age.

2:02:51 The Neanderthalss towards the end of their time were

2:02:54 just kind of riddled with diseases because of inbreeding.

2:02:57 So I think if if you had to be a Neanderthal,

2:03:00 you'd probably want to be an early Neanderthal because yeah,

2:03:02 life got pretty bleak.

2:03:08 I am quite moved by certain [music] things about the other species.

2:03:12 I have seen up close uh Neanderthal handprints

2:03:17 and I can't even say that without getting goosebumps.

2:03:20 That image that we have of the Neanderthal that kind

2:03:22 of like I don't know knuckle dragging eight man.

2:03:24 You don't imagine them putting their hands in red

2:03:28 paint or red ochre to create these impressions.

2:03:31 [music] In that same cave, there were kitty handprints.

2:03:35 The kids of these neanderthals were also learning it.

2:03:38 And that I think [music] is something that we relate to so much.

2:03:42 Like what other species walks up to a wall and thinks I want to leave a mark?

2:03:47 It's bonkers.

2:03:48 It's like that is something that is so us.

2:03:55 I've been so so lucky.

2:03:58 Oh, I was really really excited by the island of Satra,

2:04:01 which they describe as like the most alien looking place on Earth.

2:04:04 It's full of like species that exist there on nowhere else.

2:04:06 The thing that I found really really

2:04:07 fascinating about that place was that [music] lots

2:04:10 of people um on the island have roots that are very very linked to caves.

2:04:16 [music] and we turned up to this one place where people literally lived in front

2:04:20 of the caves that they were born in and they

2:04:22 actually still retreat to them during the monsoon.

2:04:24 [music] You just think, oh my god,

2:04:25 if people were living in those caves like 20 years ago,

2:04:28 that means there's probably really really good archaeology in those caves.

2:04:31 So I would say Satra just in terms of the science of it,

2:04:34 just the beauty of it and just how alien it looked.

2:04:39 [music] [laughter] So I will say I love caves.

2:04:45 have really really love caves.

2:04:48 Like for me, they're like a bit of a spiritual experience.

2:04:50 I appreciate it.

2:04:50 It makes me sound like an idiot, but anyway.

2:04:52 What are any of us looking for in a home, right?

2:04:54 You want somewhere which is safe, protected from the elements.

2:04:58 With caves, they come in all shapes and sizes.

2:05:01 Oh, and the one thing you actually do want if you're going

2:05:03 to get a cave is if it's like kind of high up,

2:05:05 and it gives you a good vantage point

2:05:06 on the landscape because then you can be like,

2:05:09 "Oh, you know, that enemy's coming or you know, Mary's coming." Good views.

2:05:13 Good views.

2:05:14 You know, just what you're looking for in a flat in London.

2:05:16 In terms of things inside that cave,

2:05:18 it'd be super helpful if there was like some running water.

2:05:21 You want to be able to set a fire and not die from the smoke.

2:05:24 So, you want there to be good aation.

2:05:26 You also sometimes bury your dead there.

2:05:28 Not just not go too far.

2:05:29 [laughter] Living and cooking in one place without turning it

2:05:32 into a cemetery as well is the way I'd like to live personally.

2:05:39 I can't always admit to some of [laughter] them which is bluntly

2:05:43 kind of annoying because it would give me some serious street credit.

2:05:46 The ones that I can like admit to I went to the island of Satra

2:05:49 which was between Yemen and Somalia and we got there via a cement cargo

2:05:52 ship and just sailed through pirate waters for a few days and it was really

2:05:56 a ship that was not fit for purpose but it was the safest of options.

2:05:59 Properly bonkers that expedition this [snorts] series I slept in a rat's nest.

2:06:05 No joke.

2:06:05 An actual rat's nest.

2:06:06 They would not leave me alone all night.

2:06:08 I I got to the point where I was like, "Lads, you can be here.

2:06:10 I just need you to BE QUIET CUZ LIKE in 4 hours I've

2:06:13 got to be on camera." I got infested with fleas in this series.

2:06:17 [laughter] [gasps] That was the whole team.

2:06:21 We came down with fleas only because I'm the presenter.

2:06:24 There's an issue with continuity.

2:06:26 So, basically, there were these trousers that were clearly infested with fleas

2:06:29 and I like had all these bites on me and they were like,

2:06:31 "You're going to have to be in it for a few hours long." [laughter]

2:06:35 So, not Lara Croft, more just like me and all the insects and animals.

2:06:39 There's a scandal in your family tree.

2:06:41 It's a scandal that's in a lot of our family trees.

2:06:43 Some of our ancestors had sex with Neanderthalss.

2:06:47 I'm Elahi and here's everything you got wrong about Neanderthalss.

2:06:55 Let's be honest, if somebody calls you a Neanderthal, they're not being nice.

2:06:58 They are probably insulting you.

2:07:00 There are all these stereotypes about Neanderthalss, right?

2:07:02 that they're knuckle dragging eight men, that they're brutish,

2:07:05 that they would just hit you over the head with a massive club.

2:07:08 [music] But actually, we now know Neanderthalss were incredibly intelligent.

2:07:12 They even had bits of symbolism in their culture.

2:07:15 There's this one incredible site where they

2:07:17 have these stallagmite stallctites in these circles.

2:07:21 It's kind of mysterious,

2:07:22 but you can imagine it was potentially some kind of cultural meaning.

2:07:25 They [music] had impressive stone tools.

2:07:27 In fact, some of their technology we stole off them.

2:07:30 They walked upright as upright as you or I.

2:07:32 They like to decorate themselves kind of like iridescent feathers.

2:07:37 The kind of feathers that are shiny.

2:07:39 You can imagine they maybe beautifying themselves

2:07:42 in these incredible feather headdresses and clothes.

2:07:45 [music] I get that some of us today are

2:07:48 wearing jewelry because we also want to look nice.

2:07:54 Some of our ancestors had sex with Neanderthals.

2:07:58 It's just kind of nice to know that there are

2:08:00 some skeletons in the [music] family closet that are quite scandalous.

2:08:04 It's kind of wild to think about.

2:08:06 Today, we're the only species left.

2:08:09 We're not going to interbreed with anyone other than ourselves.

2:08:11 And yet, for the ancestors, they had that choice.

2:08:14 Our ancestors and the Neanderthalss were close

2:08:17 enough that they were able to have children.

2:08:19 So, that means that you have Neanderthal DNA in you.

2:08:23 If I was to guess, most of you have about 2% Neanderthal DNA.

2:08:26 Some of you don't have any at all, but most of you have it.

2:08:29 There is a good chance that [music] the Neanderthal

2:08:31 DNA in us has helped us survive and be successful.

2:08:35 When we interbred with them,

2:08:37 we were entering into environments that we were not used to.

2:08:40 And we [music] would have been facing pathogens,

2:08:43 diseases that were quite alien to us.

2:08:46 And yet, these Neanderthals had spent hundreds

2:08:49 of thousands of years adapting to their environment.

2:08:52 It's really likely that we picked up immunities from them,

2:08:56 but it's also likely that we picked up some technologies

2:08:58 from them or we just picked up knowledge from them.

2:09:01 Their legacy is all around us.

2:09:08 A lot of people ask why the Neanderthals went extinct.

2:09:11 That's a really fair question that we don't actually fully know the answer to.

2:09:14 The Neanderthals were probably around a lot longer than we've been around.

2:09:19 Neanderthals existed for about 400,000 [music] years

2:09:23 and we've existed for about 300,000 years.

2:09:26 We would have to be around for quite a few more years before we're as successful

2:09:31 as they were in terms of just how long we we've been on this planet.

2:09:39 Neanderthalss were not the only species of human that we shared the planet with.

2:09:43 We were originally really kind of an African species.

2:09:46 You had the Neanderthalss in Asia and Europe.

2:09:49 You had the Denisvens who were further into Asia.

2:09:52 You had Homo Floresenzis, affectionately nicknamed the Hobbit after the Lord

2:09:56 of the Rings characters because they're about a meter tall.

2:09:58 When I think about that world, it kind of captures my imagination cuz

2:10:04 we have [music] nothing to compare that to.

2:10:06 Our closest living relatives are like the chimpanzees.

2:10:10 We don't look into their eyes and see ourselves.

2:10:14 Whereas if we looked into the eyes of let's say this French Neanderthal,

2:10:23 you can't wonder how much would we be able to communicate.

2:10:27 [music] We know we made love with them.

2:10:29 Did we potentially make war with them?

2:10:31 There are so many unanswered questions because it is so outside

2:10:35 of our reality today to think that we weren't the only ones.

2:10:39 But this is quite literally the only time in our history

2:10:43 that we're the only species of human to wander [music] this planet.

2:10:50 Biggest misconception that people have about our species, Homo sapiens,

2:10:54 is that we were amazing from the very beginning.

2:10:58 And it's because we're the only ones left, right?

2:11:00 So we're looking around and going, "All right, well,

2:11:01 we made it and the others didn't." And that is

2:11:03 a huge thing that our series really delves into.

2:11:06 I would call it a revisionist history [music] of our species.

2:11:10 Many of those other species were much

2:11:13 better adapted to their environments than we were.

2:11:15 So then the question is, how did we make it when they [music] didn't?

2:11:20 You want to see us as a protagonist?

2:11:22 We're this protagonist that started off as the underdog and somehow

2:11:25 went on to not just outservive all the other species.

2:11:29 We thrived.

2:11:30 built the pyramids, invented writing, invented cities.

2:11:33 [music] We invented technology the likes of which

2:11:35 could destroy us and the whole planet.

2:11:38 It's kind of incredible that a species that started

2:11:42 from so little was just one of many, has become this.

2:11:46 Our story begins with an Anglo-Saxon tradition that predates Christmas itself.

2:11:53 The wasel, a fertility ritual rooted in pagan magic.

2:12:04 Hello.

2:12:04 Hello Lucy.

2:12:05 Welcome to our was alle.

2:12:06 Thank you.

2:12:07 Thank you.

2:12:07 We're going to bless the apple tree as part of our was alle.

2:12:10 Hello tree.

2:12:11 We are going to sprinkle some cider on the roots.

2:12:14 Yes.

2:12:14 We're going to put some toast on the branches.

2:12:16 We're going to sing our wasel song just to make

2:12:19 sure that there'll be a good crop of apples next year.

2:12:24 Brilliant cider from this loving cup.

2:12:26 Too much for mortal man to s about thy roots

2:12:30 the goodness spread and help you in the year ahead.

2:12:36 We take some of the bread.

2:12:37 Here you go, Mr.

2:12:38 Tree.

2:12:39 Here we [singing] come.

2:12:43 And here we come [singing] to bring good cheer and fair.

2:12:48 Love and joy come to you [singing] and to you your words so true.

2:12:53 And God bless you and send you a happy new [singing] year.

2:12:58 And God send you a happy.

2:13:02 And the last thing we must do is

2:13:03 scare off the evil spirits from around the orchard.

2:13:07 One, two, three.

2:13:10 YAY.

2:13:13 [cheering] The orchard was part of a much bigger mid- winter blowout

2:13:27 and it had a surprising influence

2:13:28 on the timing [music] of today's Christmas celebrations.

2:13:33 Why is it that there always seems to have

2:13:34 been a special festival in the middle of winter?

2:13:37 It's just the perfect time for a party.

2:13:39 Number one, there's no work, no fighting, no trading, no farming.

2:13:45 Number two, it's the dreest time of year, so you really need cheering up.

2:13:49 Put the two together and it's the festive season.

2:13:52 And what happens to the pagan mid-inter festival when Christianity comes along?

2:13:57 Quite simply, Christianity takes it over gloriously and makes it Christmas.

2:14:01 If you read the Gospels,

2:14:03 there's nothing in them to say exactly at what time of the year Christ was born.

2:14:08 Although if it's when shepherds watch their flocks by night,

2:14:11 it's most likely to be May or September.

2:14:13 By the 4th century, when Christianity is becoming dominant,

2:14:17 Christmas settles at mid-inter with this glorious

2:14:21 symbolism of the rebirth of the sun,

2:14:23 su n, becoming that of the rebirth of the sun, s o n.

2:14:27 And it's just a wonderful time for a festival.

2:14:30 And do you was yourself?

2:14:32 Have you got an apple tree?

2:14:33 I have an apple tree and I was it myself every year.

2:14:36 I'd never bore any fruit till I started wasling.

2:14:38 Had a bumper crop ever since.

2:14:40 It's such a lovely idea, isn't it?

2:14:42 And it's fun to the pub.

2:14:45 Everyone [cheering]

2:14:48 over the years was sailors started visiting homes and ale houses.

2:14:53 Here [singing] we come on.

2:14:58 And here we come to bring good cheer and cast all care.

2:15:03 Love and joy come to you in return for a blessing.

2:15:07 They expected some food or money or a drink.

2:15:12 Happy new year.

2:15:16 Is this what you after?

2:15:24 [laughter] And that's the origin of doortodoor cowl singing.

2:15:38 [screaming] [music] In 1816, a young curate arrived at his first

2:15:48 posting [music] in a small village near Saltsburg.

2:15:52 Joseph Moore had lived through turbulent times.

2:15:56 The Napoleonic [music] Wars had torn Austria apart.

2:16:01 In 1816, just as Moore was beginning his first job,

2:16:05 things settled down with the defeat of Napoleon.

2:16:08 Now, these walls had completely devastated this part of Europe.

2:16:13 Half a million Austrians had died.

2:16:15 And with this in mind, Moore was inspired to write a poem.

2:16:20 His motivation comes out in the ending of the first verse.

2:16:23 It concludes with the words, "Sleep in heavenly peace.

2:16:31 [singing and music] [singing] [music] I sh [singing] [music] [singing]

2:16:55 It was a simple, heartfelt response to the recent conflict,

2:17:01 but it would become one of the most popular carols in the world.

2:17:12 [singing] [music] [singing]

2:17:30 Joseph Moore went on to become the [music] parish priest here in Obundorf.

2:17:38 But he hadn't forgotten [music] about his poem.

2:17:40 And the story goes that on Christmas Eve 1818,

2:17:44 Moore walked across town to find the [music] local church organist, Mr.

2:17:48 Gruber.

2:17:49 He wanted to ask Gruber to write a tune to go with his words.

2:17:52 But here's the challenging part.

2:17:54 He wanted it done that day so that they could perform it that night.

2:18:03 This is the Silent Night Chapel.

2:18:07 It was built to commemorate the first performance

2:18:10 of the carol which was accompanied by guitar at midnight mass.

2:18:17 What have you brought to show me?

2:18:21 This is the oldest written record of Silent Night melody by France Kafa Goober

2:18:32 Goober and text from Joseph Moore in 1816

2:18:35 that says Christmas song Christmas song by Is it true this story of how

2:18:41 the music for Silent Night was written in one afternoon?

2:18:44 We think that's exactly what happened.

2:18:45 It is quite plausible because the song itself it's not too complicated.

2:18:49 The chord progression is quite simple.

2:18:52 What can you tell me about the first performance?

2:18:55 Well, according to the eyewitness, Mr.

2:18:57 Gruber himself, um, he was the bass and, uh, Yseph Moore,

2:19:03 his friend, the priest, uh, sang the top line of the song on Christmas Eve.

2:19:08 On Christmas Eve, 1818.

2:19:11 Why do you think that they chose the guitar?

2:19:13 That's not an an instrument that I associate with the church.

2:19:16 That's where the guitar um actually comes in is

2:19:20 it's a song for the people from the people.

2:19:22 It was a instrument that you would find

2:19:24 in taverns and bars and I think that's what made

2:19:28 it connected the people up because the guitar was

2:19:30 something that they knew from outside of the church.

2:19:33 Now this song Silent Night has made

2:19:35 this little town famous all over the whole world.

2:19:39 Why do you think that the song works globally?

2:19:42 The simplicity is what uh translates into any language and into any culture.

2:19:47 Um and that's what works with pop songs in general.

2:19:51 You would describe it as a pop song.

2:19:53 Exactly.

2:19:53 I think um it's uh in the top rank of the Christmas charts.

2:19:59 Silent [music] night, holy [singing] night is [singing] all

2:20:14 [music] round your [singing] virgin mother.

2:20:25 Silent night went around the world.

2:20:27 It's been translated into more than 230 different languages [singing]

2:20:36 and its place in history was secured during the First World War.

2:20:42 It happened in Northern France on Christmas Eve 1914.

2:20:48 [music] By this time, the Germans and the British had dug themselves

2:20:52 into their trenches about a stones throw apart.

2:20:56 Some soldiers families had sent them tiny

2:20:58 little Christmas trees made out of pipe cleaners.

2:21:01 They had these in the trenches.

2:21:03 They lit candles.

2:21:04 They'd done everything they could to make themselves feel a bit better.

2:21:07 One man who was there in the trenches that night was called Albert Morren.

2:21:13 It was a Christmas card Christmas Eve.

2:21:16 There was a white, beautiful moonlight,

2:21:18 frost on the ground, almost white everywhere.

2:21:22 And round about I think about 7 or 8 or in the evening we heard this singing

2:21:27 a lot of commotion and we saw some lights we I don't know what they were some

2:21:31 lights and later we heard them singing still

2:21:35 a silent night still and now silent night I

2:21:39 shall never forget it's one of the highlights

2:21:41 of my life absolutely I thought what a beautiful tune

2:21:45 and then Albert and the British soldiers sang

2:21:48 back it turned into an impromptu cowl service [singing]

2:21:58 across northern France and Belgium.

2:22:00 It's been estimated that around a 100,000

2:22:03 soldiers took part in this spontaneous Christmas truce.

2:22:07 Some soldiers from both sides climbed out

2:22:10 of the trenches and met up in the middle.

2:22:13 They sang carols.

2:22:14 Some gave each other Christmas presents, things like tobacco.

2:22:18 Some even played football, while others took the opportunity to bury the bodies

2:22:23 of their comrades who'd fallen in no man's land.

2:22:28 Of course, the troops didn't last for long,

2:22:30 but the carols had worked their magic just for a little while.

2:22:35 They'd brought comfort and comradeship and a little bit of peace.

2:22:43 [singing] with sleep [singing] [music] in heaven.

2:22:56 In December 1785, a rather unusual royal wedding took place.

2:23:04 Can I have the rings, please?

2:23:08 The groom was the Prince of [music] Wales,

2:23:11 George, the heir to the British throne.

2:23:15 I now pronounce you man and wife.

2:23:21 George has just got [music] married to the love of his life, Maria Fitz Herbert.

2:23:26 She is six years older than him, and she has been married twice before.

2:23:30 These things needn't be obstacles to true love, though.

2:23:33 Yet, there is something a bit strange about this ceremony.

2:23:37 It's all happening so secretly in Maria's own drawing room.

2:23:42 None of his family have turned up.

2:23:44 And that chaplain's a bit dodgy.

2:23:46 He's got a criminal record for unpaid debt.

2:23:50 My most fervent wish is realized.

2:23:52 My darling, you are my wife.

2:23:55 The wife of my heart and my soul.

2:23:59 And in the eyes of heaven will ever be.

2:24:04 It's a bit sad because they may be married in the eyes of heaven,

2:24:08 but not in the eyes of the law.

2:24:11 Legal impediment number one, the king, the prince's father,

2:24:14 hasn't given his permission for the marriage.

2:24:17 Legal impediment number two, Maria is a Catholic.

2:24:22 This could cause a huge constitutional problem.

2:24:26 Under the act of settlement, the husband of a Catholic could never become king.

2:24:33 So George wanted to keep his wedding

2:24:35 a secret from the public and the British Parliament.

2:24:41 But that [music] was going to be difficult.

2:24:44 Soon members of Parliament were demanding to know if

2:24:46 the prince had forfeited his right to the throne.

2:24:52 Wig MP Charles James Fox, a close friend of the prince,

2:24:56 stood up in Parliament to answer them.

2:25:01 Fox said that this rumored marriage not only could never have happened legally,

2:25:06 but in fact had never happened in any way whatsoever,

2:25:10 and that to suggest [music] otherwise was a malicious falsehood.

2:25:14 George had lied to Fox and told him that the marriage would never happen.

2:25:20 And that's because George [music] wasn't just the Prince of Wales,

2:25:23 he was also the Prince of Fibs.

2:25:30 George's lie helped keep the course of royal history right on track.

2:25:35 The wedding was brushed aside as legally invalid.

2:25:39 George could still one day be king.

2:25:44 And this wouldn't be the only time royal

2:25:47 secrets would be covered up in this volatile era.

2:25:55 Matio, what's happening in this picture?

2:25:58 This is the portrait of Marian Twanet with her children.

2:26:01 And it's very important because it is a political representation of the new

2:26:06 queen of France because first she was considered as a selfish woman.

2:26:12 So with this portrait, she decided to be represented as a queen of France.

2:26:16 Mhm.

2:26:17 And we can see here her eldest uh daughter who was born in 1778.

2:26:23 And here the first dolphin on the right who died just before the revolution.

2:26:29 And here in the middle, the new dolphin.

2:26:34 Marian Twinet was also looking for other creative ways to improve her PR.

2:26:41 Marian Twinet loved children and she took some orphans at court.

2:26:45 She paid for their education

2:26:48 and she did that partly through sincere feeling and partly

2:26:52 it must have helped her image as a selfish person.

2:26:55 I think both both she uh I think she

2:26:59 was very sincere when she paid for these children

2:27:03 and probably she had on her mind uh the image she had all around the public.

2:27:10 Modern historians are reappraising Marian

2:27:12 Twinet's role in the French Revolution.

2:27:15 Increasingly, she's seen as an active

2:27:17 participant rather than just a passive victim.

2:27:21 She became much more political [music] than her husband during

2:27:26 the revolution because she understood at that time what really happened.

2:27:32 Uh and she took some decision probably not the good one.

2:27:38 [music] her husband didn't take any decision.

2:27:42 So he didn't know what to do.

2:27:44 But she became at that time the real queen of France.

2:27:50 The queen's critics called her madame

2:27:53 deficit and said she [music] bankrupted France.

2:27:57 But this was another myth.

2:28:01 The French had built up huge debts [music] during the American

2:28:04 War of Independence when France supported the rebels against the British crown.

2:28:10 The war had ended just four years

2:28:11 earlier and France still couldn't balance the books.

2:28:16 [music] France supports the independence war of America and it costed about 1.5

2:28:23 billions and the budget of France was about 600 millions a year.

2:28:28 So that it's to say about two and a half more than annual budget of France.

2:28:36 Oh wow.

2:28:37 So it's very important and the the Americans after

2:28:42 their 1783 they decided not to reimburse the France people.

2:28:49 So we have the revenue of France.

2:28:53 Yes.

2:28:52 We have the cloves of Marantinette.

2:28:55 Yes.

2:28:55 But then we have the cost of the war to help America up here somewhere.

2:28:59 Yes, France did not recover from this deficit.

2:29:03 So maybe it's um it explain the revolution.

2:29:09 So it wasn't so much Marantinet's extravagance that bankrupted France.

2:29:14 It was France's support for the American War of Independence.

2:29:18 Thomas Jefferson neglected to mention that a key cause

2:29:21 of the French Revolution was the birth of the United States.

2:29:27 [music] Marian Twuinette was an Austrian princess.

2:29:31 For decades, France and Austria had been enemies.

2:29:34 But at the age of 14, Marianette had been married to the French

2:29:38 crown prince to forge a political alliance.

2:29:43 But her foreignness would always make her unpopular in France,

2:29:48 as would her lavish lifestyle.

2:29:51 It is a terrible thing to be bored.

2:29:55 I fear it more than anything in the world.

2:30:01 Puzzles.

2:30:02 Marian Twinette was notorious for her love of shoes and dresses and parties.

2:30:09 Beautiful.

2:30:10 A dress with a bow.

2:30:17 Exaggerated, ludicrous accounts of Maran

2:30:20 Twinet self-indulgence are circulating everywhere.

2:30:25 She's become a sort of poster girl for everything

2:30:28 that's wrong with a discontented and starving France.

2:30:33 In fact, the US ambassador who's Thomas

2:30:36 Jefferson will come to say this about her.

2:30:40 Had there been no queen, there would have been no revolution.

2:30:49 Marian Twinette is supposed to [music] have come up

2:30:52 with one of the most famous phrases in history.

2:30:56 She addressed her hungry [music] subjects and proclaimed, "Let them eat cake."

2:31:07 [music] The words are still taught to almost every school child in the world.

2:31:13 They used to prove the queen's indifference to her people.

2:31:17 But did she really say, "Let them eat cake?" For a start,

2:31:22 the phrase in French is kilos de la brios, meaning bos, a kind of an eggy bun.

2:31:29 But let them eat a kind of eggy bun isn't quite so catchy in translation.

2:31:33 But there's a more fundamental cake fib than that.

2:31:37 There's absolutely no evidence that Marantinet ever said those words.

2:31:42 No documents, no eyewitness reports, no nothing.

2:31:47 [music] The phrase had been reported as coming

2:31:50 out of the mouth of a different French queen,

2:31:53 the wife of Louis the 14th a century earlier.

2:31:59 It wasn't [music] until 50 years after Marian Twinette's death

2:32:03 that the phrase was first written down and ascribed [music] to her.

2:32:06 And even then, they said it was a rumor that wasn't true.

2:32:12 But politicians and historians around the world were

2:32:15 still trying to explain the cause of the revolution.

2:32:19 Their narratives needed a royal scapegoat.

2:32:23 And by the 20th century, the myth had become a fixture.

2:32:27 This is an [music] American history primer from 1918.

2:32:31 And they've put it like this.

2:32:33 When at last the court, overwhelmed with debts had so far crushed the people

2:32:38 with taxes that they had no bread to eat, Marian Twinette cried out,

2:32:43 "If they have no bread,

2:32:45 let them eat cake." The words have been put into her mouth

2:32:49 to show how thoughtless and out of touch she was.

2:32:52 But worse than that, they've been used

2:32:54 [music] to justify the bloody events that follow.

2:32:58 And Berlin arrived at Henry's court fired up with radical ideas.

2:33:03 [music] She grew up here at Hea Castle in Kent,

2:33:07 the daughter of Lady Elizabeth Howard

2:33:09 [music] and an ambitious diplomat, Thomas Berlin.

2:33:16 [music] Thomas secured his younger daughter a coveted position

2:33:19 as maid of honor in the French [music] court.

2:33:24 And it was there that Anne was introduced

2:33:27 to the new ideas that were transforming Europe.

2:33:35 [music] During those years she came

2:33:38 in contact with evangelical protestant people who were

2:33:43 rethinking old varities who were coming up

2:33:47 with new ways of approaching everything including faith.

2:33:51 What were these perhaps contentious new religious

2:33:54 ideas that an was picking up in France?

2:33:56 A key one is the source of authority.

2:33:59 So when you're making decisions about religious matters,

2:34:02 who do you look to as the authority on that matter,

2:34:06 whether it's the Bible, scripture,

2:34:08 which is what these evangelicals were arguing,

2:34:11 or whether you turn to the wisdom of the church

2:34:14 and followers of Luther said that actually the church was flawed,

2:34:21 that the pope was fallible.

2:34:23 Do you think Henry would have taken these ideas about the authority

2:34:26 of the pope to heart if it hadn't been for Anne?

2:34:30 I think Anne's pivotal because we know that Henry hates Luther.

2:34:35 Anne obviously had a real hold on his heart and so

2:34:38 could introduce ideas to him that other people couldn't possibly say.

2:34:42 And this is something that's been downplayed by the people

2:34:45 who see her as just a sex pot.

2:34:46 I think that comes down to pretty misogynistic

2:34:49 ways of seeing Henry's wives in the past actually.

2:34:52 and that it's much easier if you can sort of boil them

2:34:55 down to to being a bit of skirt and not really anything more.

2:34:58 And actually with an we do have something more.

2:35:02 She is somebody who makes a massive difference in terms of English history.

2:35:07 We could argue that Henry VIII would not have broken

2:35:11 with the Roman Catholic Church if it weren't for Anne's influence.

2:35:19 [music] Anne was at court for several years before she turned the king's head.

2:35:24 [music] But when she did, Henry became besid with her.

2:35:33 They weren't lovers yet.

2:35:37 Instead, in the private moments [music] they had together,

2:35:39 Anne took the opportunity to introduce Henry to a radical Protestant book.

2:35:50 [music] The book and showing Henry is called the obedience

2:35:53 of a Christian man by William Tinddale the Protestant scholar.

2:35:57 Now this book is controversial.

2:36:00 You might even call it sedicious.

2:36:05 Tinddale [music] seen as a heretic by the Catholic Church because

2:36:10 his book implies that kings have lost their power to the church.

2:36:15 Anne's taken a serious risk smuggling this book

2:36:18 out of France and [music] into England.

2:36:21 And then she's been bold enough to put it under Henry's nose.

2:36:25 She's even marked a special passage for him to read.

2:36:33 Kings, they are but shadows, vain names and things [music] idle,

2:36:40 having nothing to do in the world.

2:36:42 But if our holy father needeth their help,

2:36:48 this is a book that me and all kings should read.

2:36:51 [music] The little interaction shows [music] an beginning

2:36:57 to persuade the king that maybe not all

2:37:00 radical Protestants are bad [music] and that maybe

2:37:03 breaking with Rome could hold advantages from them both.

2:37:12 [music] Anne was winning Henry round to some Protestant ideas and [music] she

2:37:17 refused to sleep with the king until he'd made her his new queen,

2:37:23 but there were [music] many obstacles in her way.

2:37:25 Henry was still married and his wife had many supporters at court.

2:37:34 [music] Eustace Shapi was devoted to Charles V who just

2:37:37 happened to be the nephew of Catherine of Araggon.

2:37:40 [music] Shapoui really loved Catherine of Araggon.

2:37:43 It was said that he venerated her like a saint and partly

2:37:48 as a result of this he really hated [music] Anne Bolin.

2:37:52 In his letters to Charles V,

2:37:54 Shepri described Anne as more Lutheran than Luther and he slutshamed her.

2:38:00 He called her the concubine [music] and the And Chapri

2:38:05 really set up this image of Anne that does survive to this [music] day

2:38:10 as the wicked evil seductress as the original other woman.

2:38:15 Anne's [music] genuine intelligence and sense of political strategy just

2:38:20 don't fit into this soap opera version of the story.

2:38:23 In 1532, Thomas Cromwell became Henry's chief minister.

2:38:29 Unlike Henry, he was a radical Protestant who saw Lufer as a progressive force,

2:38:36 an ally of Anne Berlin.

2:38:38 He saw [music] the king's great matter

2:38:40 as an opportunity to advance the Protestant cause.

2:38:46 So Cromwell began to weave some expert [music] political propaganda.

2:38:51 He assured Henry that there was a way to get him his divorce,

2:38:55 improve his finances, and enhance his political power.

2:39:01 It would just take two acts of parliament.

2:39:04 The first was drafted in 1533.

2:39:12 This is the real actual act in restraint of appeals.

2:39:16 And because this act banned appealing to the pope in ecclesiastical matters,

2:39:21 it meant that Catherine was now banned from appealing

2:39:24 to the pope in her and Henry's great matter.

2:39:28 From this point onwards, it would be Parliament, not the Pope.

2:39:32 It would be London, not Rome,

2:39:34 that would be the final authority on the constitutional affairs of England.

2:39:41 By this [music] time, Anne had succumbed to Henry's advances.

2:39:45 And in January 1533,

2:39:47 before the act had even been passed [music] and discovered she was pregnant.

2:39:52 To make sure a potential baby boy was legitimate,

2:39:56 they quickly [music] got married.

2:39:58 Henry, who was still married to Catherine, was now a biggamist.

2:40:02 The Pope expelled [music] him from the Catholic Church.

2:40:06 This guaranteed that Henry would burn in hell for eternity.

2:40:12 But Henry didn't seem to mind too much

2:40:16 because with Cromwell busy drafting his revolutionary acts,

2:40:20 Henry seemed to feel that his powers were limitless.

2:40:26 A year later, Cromwell produced a second bill, the Act of Supremacy.

2:40:32 This made Henry the supreme head of a new

2:40:35 Church of England and severed all ties with Rome.

2:40:40 But how could he possibly justify this massive break with Rome?

2:40:45 Well, the first clue comes in the very first line of the act in restraint

2:40:49 of appeals where we begin to see

2:40:51 Cromwell emerging as one of history's biggest fibers.

2:40:55 It says by diverse and sunundry old authentic histories and chronicles.

2:41:04 It's manifestly declared and expressed that this realm

2:41:08 of England is an empire governed by one supreme head and king having

2:41:17 the dignity and royal estate of the imperial crown.

2:41:23 What he's saying here is that Henry rules an empire.

2:41:26 He is an emperor as kings of England have been for centuries

2:41:32 and emperors are beholden to nobody certainly not to the pope.

2:41:37 But where did this whole idea of empire come from?

2:41:41 Who was Cromwell kidding?

2:41:45 The truth is that Henry had no empire beyond the British Isles apart

2:41:50 from a precarious foothold in Cali that was

2:41:52 increasingly expensive to defend from the French.

2:41:58 [music] But Cromwell wasn't about to let facts like

2:42:00 these get in the way of his master plan.

2:42:04 To justify the passage of power from Rome to London,

2:42:08 he manipulated English history.

2:42:13 [music] This is the 12th century book

2:42:16 that Cromwell used as his source and his justification.

2:42:20 It's the history of the kings of Britain

2:42:23 by a Welsh monk called Jeffrey of Monmouth.

2:42:26 And in it, he takes the story of the kings

2:42:28 of Britain right back to one of Britain's bestloved legends,

2:42:32 King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table.

2:42:36 But this is really pseudo history.

2:42:39 It's more like a collection of fairy stories.

2:42:43 But these fairy stories were the diverse

2:42:46 and sunundry old authentic histories and chronicles

2:42:48 Cromwell was relying upon for his claim that England really was an empire.

2:42:57 In November 1588, Queen Elizabeth I held a procession through London.

2:43:06 This was her victory parade.

2:43:11 The queen made her way through the city to St.

2:43:14 Paul's to give thanks.

2:43:16 God and his chosen [music] special monarch together had saved the day.

2:43:21 They were the hero and the heroine at the heart of this narrative.

2:43:26 But in reality though, things weren't quite so heroic.

2:43:33 Elizabeth's promise at Tilbury to reward

2:43:35 her soldiers proved to be empty rhetoric.

2:43:40 The war had drained Elizabeth's coffers.

2:43:44 The sailors who fought for England were hit

2:43:46 by disease and were still fighting for their wages.

2:43:52 The crown threatened prison for those slanderously

2:43:56 suggesting that they hadn't been paid.

2:44:02 William Ceile now rubs salt into the wound.

2:44:05 He said, "Well, if the soldiers die of illness,

2:44:09 then at least the crown won't have to pay them." By the end of 1588,

2:44:14 more than half of the men who'd fought in the Armada campaign were dead.

2:44:18 And they were killed not by the Spanish, but by disease and starvation.

2:44:28 The reality of post Armada England was

2:44:31 economic crisis and an increasingly unpopular queen.

2:44:37 It was time for a royal makeover.

2:44:42 Elizabeth is now in her 50s,

2:44:44 unmarried and too old to produce the allimportant heir to the throne.

2:44:51 Her lustrous red locks have gone.

2:44:54 Her face is pockmarked.

2:44:57 More than ever, Elizabeth must conceal her frailties.

2:45:05 Elizabeth has to manufacture an image of eternal youth.

2:45:10 She needs to present herself as something more than merely mortal.

2:45:15 On goes the white lead makeup to cover up her smallpox

2:45:20 scars and a red wig to cover up her gray hair.

2:45:38 This is Elizabeth the First as the Virgin Queen.

2:45:43 She's married, but only to her [music] country.

2:45:46 And this isn't just an image for her courtiers.

2:45:49 Everyone in England will see this.

2:45:52 It's like a tuda profile pick.

2:45:56 And the handle is gloriana.

2:46:12 What we're seeing here is the creation of an Elizabethan marketing campaign.

2:46:18 Elizabeth had lots of different portraits of herself

2:46:21 commissioned and they were sent out across England,

2:46:23 across Europe and all of them were loaded with propaganda messages.

2:46:29 They said that Queen Elizabeth I is pure,

2:46:34 that she's powerful, that she's going to make England great again.

2:46:42 The queen, who's been remembered as a feeble puppet,

2:46:45 was in fact now ready to dismiss her lifelong friend.

2:46:51 Sarah resorted to blackmail to back up the rumors about an sexuality.

2:46:58 She said she'd publish intimate letters the queen had sent her over the years.

2:47:05 So, what is the truth about an sexuality?

2:47:10 These letters are often taken as so-called

2:47:13 evidence that Queen Anne was our lesbian queen.

2:47:18 What's your take on the on the letters as support for that or not?

2:47:21 Well, I mean, I you know, the letters obviously don't contain anything

2:47:24 that explicit about some carnal relationship.

2:47:27 So, I think the only thing we do know that for which

2:47:29 there is evidence in the letters

2:47:30 is the emotional intensity of their relationship, especially on Anne's part.

2:47:36 Sarah said that Anne's letters were

2:47:38 sometimes full of flames of extravagant passion.

2:47:41 What sort of thing was she referring to?

2:47:43 She was referring to letters like this one.

2:47:45 I have been in expectation of you a long time,

2:47:48 but can stay no longer without desiring to know what you intend to do with me,

2:47:53 for it is most certain I can't go to bed without seeing you.

2:47:56 Could you see my heart?

2:47:57 You would find I have not one thought but what I ought to have.

2:48:00 The dear woman who my soul loves.

2:48:02 A dear woman whom my soul loves.

2:48:06 Such a special feeling to read such an intimate letter.

2:48:10 Yeah.

2:48:10 I truly feel that if you were a royal woman as well,

2:48:12 you would be married off at a young age

2:48:14 to an arranged match that was all about producing the kids really.

2:48:17 So you would naturally seek emotional fulfillment, wouldn't you?

2:48:20 I mean an I think um she did really like love her husbandship.

2:48:25 There's certainly no correspondence like this between her and George.