Much of human history is not written on paper but in our genes. Some genes show the true, unexpected origins of cultures and the desperate evolution to survive pandemics while others have remained unchanged for thousands of years. Ancient DNA also dispels myths but opens up new mysteries.
人类的大部分历史是被写在基因里而不是纸上的。我们能从一些基因中探索到真实意外的文化起源和那些拼死从流行病里活下来的生命演变，而还有一些则千年不变的基因。古代DNA消除了这些误解，但也揭示了新的奥秘。
10. The Columbian Exchange
10. 哥伦布大交换
The arrival of Europeans in the Americas caused widespread epidemics in native tribes. This first contact tragedy is called the "Columbian Exchange." Everything started in 1492 when Christopher Columbus sailed to the New World.
欧洲人来到美洲地区的时候，也将肆虐的流行病带到了土著部落。由此产生的第一件悲剧便是“哥伦布大交换”。这一切始于1492年——克里斯托弗·哥伦布在这一年发现了新大陆。
Before that, pathogens existed in America, including tuberculosis. But none were as devastating as those that arrived by ship—smallpox, measles, yellow fever, and flu.
在此之前，虽然在美洲地区有包括肺结核在内的病原体的存在。但是这次航行所带来的灾难却是史无前例的——天花、麻疹、黄热病和流感。
In theory, this vulnerability was pinned on Native Americans evolving in isolation for thousands of years. Scientists finally found proof when they studied the Tsimshian nation's DNA in 2016. Comparing two groups, ancient and modern, they found a big change in the genes linked to immunity.
理论上来讲，美洲原住民千百年来都是与世隔绝的。但在2016年，科学家在研究钦西安人（北美洲北太平洋沿岸印第安人）的DNA时发现：现代钦西安人相对于古代钦西安人而言，他们的基因中有关免疫性的一部分有了很大的变化。
There are historical accounts of smallpox tearing into the Tsimshian people after European contact. A drop in genetic diversity shows that smallpox killed 57 percent of the population.
历史记载，欧洲人发现美洲大陆后，天花入侵到钦西安人的生活中。而遗传多样性研究表明：天花造成了钦西安人57%的人口死亡。
Today's Tsimshian are genetically different from their ancestors. The ancient people had a specific sequence adapted to the region's pathogens. Their descendants' genes resulted from selective evolution to survive the arrival of new diseases.
如今的钦西安人，他们的基因有别于他们的祖先：他们祖先的基因里有一种能适应该地区病原体的特殊序列；但是由于现代钦西安人曾遭受新兴疾病而存活下来，这导致他们的基因存在选择性进化，这区别于他们的祖先。
9. 爱尔兰的起源
The roots of the Irish can be found in a Neolithic woman and three men from the Bronze Age. Called the Ballynahatty woman, her 5,200-year-old grave was found in 1855 near Belfast. Her genome was sequenced in 2015 and showed a genetic similarity to people from Spain and Sardinia today. Interestingly, her ancestors hailed from the Middle East.
爱尔兰的起源可以从一位新石器时代的女人和三位青铜时代的男人讲起。这个女人叫做Ballynahatty，她的墓穴建于5200年前，于1855年在贝尔法斯特发现。2015年，科学家对她进行了基因测序，发现和今天来自西班牙和撒丁岛的人具有遗传相似性。有意思地是，她的祖先就是来自中东。
During the Bronze Age, settlers arrived from Eastern Europe. The trio of males had ancestry from the Pontic Steppe, an area touching both Ukraine and Russia. The 4,000-year-old Bronze Age group was genetically closest to the modern Irish, Welsh, and Scottish.
而这三位男人的祖先来自黑海大草原，与乌克兰和俄罗斯接壤。青铜时代，来自东欧的殖民者曾移居到此地。他们生活在4000年前，与现代爱尔兰人、威尔士人和苏格兰人具有最强的基因密切性。
Ireland has notable genetic tendencies—comfortably digesting milk as adults and a condition called hemochromatosis, where iron retention goes overboard. The disorder was found in the woman and one of the men, but each carried a different mutation. The same man, but not the woman, had the genes to consume milk. None of the four individuals fully match modern Irish genomes but rather represent some of the groups that established the Celts.
爱尔兰人具有明显的遗传倾向——成年人可轻松消化牛奶（译者注：可称为乳糖耐受现象）和血色素沉着现象（是一种由于高铁饮食、大量输血或全身疾病造成体内铁质储积过多，铁质代谢障碍所致的疾病），即铁质沉积。前面提到的那位新石器时代的女人和其中一位青铜时代的男人都存在基因紊乱，且携带了不同的变种。那位男子还具有消耗牛奶的遗传因子。四个人中没有一个与现代爱尔兰人的基因完全匹配，反而代表了一些凯尔特人的基因。
8.Koma Land人
The so-called Koma Land people once lived in western Africa in what is today Ghana. If it hadn't been for their one quirk, archaeologists might have overlooked their culture completely.
所谓的Koma Land人曾居住在非洲西部地区——也就是今天的加纳。要不是由于他们怪癖的行为，考古学家可能完全不会注意到他们的文化。
All the Koma Land people left behind were strange terra-cotta figures. The imaginative sculptures depict animal and human characters, sometimes merging the two as hybrids, and were found squirreled away in mounds.
所有遗留下来的Koma Land人都是粘土人物，十分奇怪。这是一些十分富有想象力的雕塑，将动物和人类的特征刻在黏土上面，有时将二者混合在一起，埋在土堆下面。
Researchers considered lifting DNA from the artifacts to determine their purpose. However, nobody got too excited because the arid environment and the burial of these artifacts for centuries in the hot sand meant that any DNA was most likely too degraded to be of any use.
研究者打算从史前古器物中提取DNA来判断他们这样做的目的。但令人沮丧的是，这些史前古器物已经埋在热砂里好几个世纪了，再加上干燥的环境，任何DNA都很有可能已经降解变成别的东西了。
Incredibly, the clay vessels still contained usable traces of genetic material of what they once held. Most surprising was finding plantain, banana, and pine tree residue, none of which were indigenous during that time (AD 600–1300). The artistic culture must have had well-established trade routes spanning West Africa and the Sahara, the biggest hot desert on the planet.
不可思议地是，研究者在曾经被使用过的粘土器皿上，发现了其中含有可用的遗传物质的痕迹。最令人惊讶的是，他们还发现了车前草、香蕉以及松树的残留物，要知道这些物种在公元600-1300年并非本土植物。一定是由于当时完善的贸易线路，使得这些物种横跨非洲西部和地球上最大的沙漠——撒哈拉沙漠，来到这里。
7. 不变的DNA
It's rare to find living people with DNA that has been nearly unchanged for 8,000 years. The ancient world migrated madly and shuffled genes all over the place. Mainland East Asia was the exception.
现在很难找到8000年都不发生任何变化的人体DNA。这是因为古代各地的人们疯狂迁徙，由此导致基因重组，但东亚大陆却是个例外。
In 1973, human remains were found in Devil's Gate cave, located in the Russian Far East. Recently, DNA was salvaged from a Stone Age woman. Thanks to little genetic interference since the Neolithic, her genes closely matched certain contemporary ethnic groups in the region.
1973年，在位于俄罗斯远东的“恶魔之门”洞穴发现了人类的残骸中，科学家从一位石器时代的女人身上提取了DNA，由于受到自新石器时代以来的一点基因干扰，她的基因和该地区当代的某个族群是匹配的。
This holds true for Tungusic-speaking groups, including populations from China like the Oroqen and Hezhen. Also still using the Tungusic tongue is the Ulchi people.
同时也与通古斯语人的族群匹配，包括来自中国的鄂伦春族、赫哲族。
Living where Russia shares a border with China and North Korea, they stand out for two amazing reasons. First, they retained an ancient hunter-gatherer lifestyle until very recently. Second, they appear to be direct descendants of the same population—and it is still basically the same population—of Neolithic hunters to whom the Devil's Gate woman belonged.
现在仍然讲通古斯语的是乌尔奇人。他们生活在俄罗斯与中国、朝鲜的国土边境，有两点非常引人注目：首先，他们现在仍然保留着古老的狩猎-采集的生活方式。第二，他们似乎是在“恶魔之门”发现的那位女人的直系后代，基本上是和她来自同一群人。
6. 莫塔人
Mota is an Ethiopian rewriting Africa's entire migration tale. He might have died 4,500 years ago, but his genes speak for him. Previously, it was believed that modern humans said goodbye to Africa about 70,000 years ago and spread to the Middle East, Europe, and beyond Asia before farmers from the Middle East and Turkey returned to the Horn of Africa.
莫塔是一位远古埃塞俄比亚人，是他改写了非洲的移民史。在发现他之前，人们认为现代人类是在7万年前离开非洲，移民到中东、欧洲以及亚洲之外的地区，这一切发生在中东和土耳其的农民回到非洲角之前。但是研究莫塔的基因发现，他死于4500年以前——在人们认为的亚欧人迁移到非洲以及东非出现农业之前。
The Ethiopian, named for Mota Cave where he was found, provided the first genome sequenced from an ancient African. Mota's age made him older than the Eurasians of the accepted story. Another unknown group returned before them. He didn't have the genes that evolved outside of Africa, those for lighter skins and eye colors, nor could he digest milk like the Eurasians from Turkey and the Middle East.
这位埃塞俄比亚人莫塔的名字取自于发现他的莫塔山洞，他成为了古老非洲历史中第一个接受基因组测序的人。莫塔的年龄比欧亚人公认的故事还要老。他没有非洲之外的人的基因，因为他既没有浅色的皮肤和眼睛，也不能像来自土耳其和中东的人一样能消化牛奶。
Digging deeper into 's makeup for his mystery ancestors, researchers found an interesting ancient match. It was the 7,000-year-old LBK culture from Germany. If Mota's Eurasian ancestry comes from the LBK people, it will change the story of when Eurasians settled and spread throughout Africa.
但是在深入了解莫塔神秘祖先的过程中，研究者发现了一件有趣的事：如果莫塔的欧亚祖先是LBK人，这个来自德国的有着7000年历史的LBK文化。欧亚人移居非洲并在非洲大陆上繁衍生息的故事便不一样了。
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