The Little People Of The Andaman Islands

A Negrito Tribe of tiny but fierce Pygmies , the Jarawa Tribe, of the Andaman Islands in the Indian Ocean, provides an excellent example of what modern humans were like when they first emerged out of Africa. Genetic evidence hints at a Negrito presence on the Andaman Islands going back more than 30,000 years, and possibly reaching as far back as 60,000 years. It is thought that the surviving Negritos are a remnant population representing an early ( perhaps the earliest ) migration of modern Homo Sapiens out of Africa .

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THE JARAWA TRIBE OF THE ANDAMAN ISLANDS

Most Jarawas are small to tiny in size. The average height for adult men is just under 150 cm (4′-10.5″) and for adult women 137 cm (4′-6″). Their Paleolithic (old stone age) technology is the simplest and most ancient still in use in today’s world. It is a technology of a sort that was in use in tropical areas around the world 40,000 or more years ago. In spite of their apparent simplicity, their tools are in fact, quite sophisticated and perfectly adapted to their nomadic hunter-gatherer way of life. They make bows and arrows, canoes, simple stone tools, and various types of baskets with high utilitarian and aesthetic value. They also make simple pottery, which is considered remarkable for a people with Paleolithic technology and living as hunter-gatherers. The men hunt wild pigs, and monitor lizards with bows and arrows in the forest, and also fish with bows and arrows in the coastal waters. The women catch fish with baskets, and gather shellfish. In the forest, the Jarawas collect fruits and roots, as well as honey. In their camps, they build temporary huts. The present population of Jarawas Tribe is estimated to be about three hundred.

A Sleeping Jarawa Woman

In the 16th and 17th centuries when Spain, Portugal, and later Holland were exploring the islands of Southeast Asia, they frequently encountered “stone age tribes” of very small black people that they called “Negritos”. (“little Negros” in Spanish). The Negritos were usually found on islands that were considered uninhabited, where they were fierce and aggressive towards anyone who tried to land on their island. If found on inhabited islands, they would be hiding in the most remote valleys and mountains, fearing and avoiding any contact with the “big people” who dominated the island. The Negritos still exist on many islands in Southeast Asia. One such place is the Andaman Islands, a group of islands in the “Andaman Sea” between India, and the Malay Peninsula, where four different tribes of Negritos still exist… From the 1st to the 7th century, Roman Trade Ships, from Roman Egypt, sailed to India and the East Indies. The Roman geographer, Claudius Ptolemeus of Egypt, who made a map of the Indian Ocean in the 2nd century AD, described the Andaman Islands as “the islands of the cannibals”. When Marco Polo returned from China aboard a Mongol Trade Ship near the end of the 13th century, he described these same islands as “the land of the head hunters”… Only four of the dozen tribes that once inhabited the island group still survive. These include the “Jarawa”, who still live in the forest.

Some of The Jarawa Tribe

A team of geneticists led by Erica Hagel of the University of Oslo, in Norway, wrote in the Journal of Current Biology” that, “The Andaman Islanders are arguably the most Enigmatic people on our planet”,,, “Their physical features… short statue, dark skin, peppercorn hair, and large buttocks, are characteristic of African Pygmies. They look like they belong in Africa, but here they are sitting in this island chain, in the middle of the Indian Ocean… Their language belongs to a family that includes those of Tasmania, Papua New Guinea, and Melanesia”… A genetic analysis of the Jarawa Tribe was done using blood samples, and hair gathered almost a century ago by a British Anthropoligist. Genetic analysis of the Mitochondrial DNA, a genetic element passed down through women, shows that the Jarawa Tribe belong to a linage known as “M” that is common throughout Asia. This establishes them as ancient Africans, not modern Africans among whom a different Mitochondrial linage called “L” is dominant… Genetic analysis of the “Y” chromosome, which is passed down through the Men and often gives a more detailed picture of genetic history than the Mitochonrial DNA, showed that the Jarawa carry a special change or mutation in the DNA of their “Y” chromosome that is thought to be indicative of the paleolithic (old stone age) population of Asia, the “hunters and gatherers” who preceded the first human settlements. The mutation known as “marker 174”, occurs among ethnic groups at the periphery of Asia who avoided being over run and absorbed by the population explosion that resulted from the agricultural revolution that occurred about 8,000 years ago. It is found in the Japanese, in the Tibetans of the Himalayas, and among the isolated people of southeast Asia like the Hmong. The discovery of “marker 174” among the Jarawa suggests that they too are part of this relict paleolithic population, descended from the first modern humans to leave Africa… A finding of particular interest is that the Jarawa do not carry another “Y” chromosome signature known as “RPS4Y”, that is common among Australian Aborigines. This suggests that there were at least two separate emigrations of modern humans from Africa.

Map showing Location of the Andaman Islands

The Australian Aborigines are said to have arrived in Australia at least 60,000 to 100,000 years ago or more, and could have only arrived by boat, as there was never a land bridge they could have crossed. This means that man has had sea going boats or rafts for at least 60,000 years, and why would a hunter-gatherer have a boat unless he hunted and gathered food from the sea. They were fishermen.

The Trade Winds of the Indian Ocean

The secret of sailing the Indian Ocean has always been the “Trade Winds”. These are winds that blow steadly in one direction for six months as the Northern Hemisphere tilts towards the Sun. Then reverse and blow in the opposite direction for six months as the Nothern Hemisphere tilts away from the Sun. One set of Trade Winds blows North and South up and down the east coast of Africa. Another set of Trade Winds blows Northeast and Southwest across the Indian Ocean. These are the winds that bring the monsoon rains in off the Indian Ocean onto the land, then reverse and take the rains back out to sea. The port of Aden on the Southwest corner of the Arabian Peninsula is a large volcanic crater with a gap on one side that is open to the sea. Since prehistoric times, small boats have gathered here for shelter as they waited for the winds to change directions, so they could set sail for India and Southeast Asia. Any boat or raft that sets sail from Aden or the East African Coast when the wind changes, or is blown out to sea accidentally by a storm, will be carried directly to Southern India, The Andaman or Nicobar Islands, Malay Peninsula, or some other Southeast Asian destination, with little or no effort needed from the people in the boat. With a little knowledge, they could steer the boat to any desired destination. Even the most primitive boats or rafts could make the journey, so long as they had food and water. Stone age fisherman could have carried coconuts as a source of food and water, and probably would have known how to live off the sea, eating raw fish and drinking rainwater, perhaps even drinking their urine for water if necessary. Because the Negritos can be found on remote islands far from any other land, they can only have arrived in boats, and because they have no Australian genetic markers, we can assume that their boats or rafts left the coast of East Africa, and were carried East by the Trade Winds. There is also evidence that they sailed the Trade Winds in the other direction as well, sailing from Southeast Asia back to Africa. They were probably an island hopping people, like the Polynesians who much later made long voyages in the open sea between islands in the Pacific Ocean.

The language that the Negritos of the Andaman Islands speak, is a part of the “Malay-Australoid” group of languages, which interestingly is related to the language of the large island of Madagascar, which is located off the east coast of Southern Africa. This shows that there was a linguistic connection to Africa as well as Southeast Asia, and the Australian Aborigines. Recent analysis of the DNA of the “Great Andamanese” (one of the other three tribes of Negritos on the Andaman Islands) shows that they are genetically very close to the “Bushmen’ or “Pygmies” of South Africa. This shows that the Andaman Tribes came from the South of Africa and the island of Madagascar. The Negritos must have originally been the dominate stone culture of Southern Africa, until the “big people” from the North invaded and took over the land, pushing them out. Perhaps they turned to the sea as a source of food because they were unable to compete for food with the “big people”, or because the land was too barren to support them. On the mainland of Southern Africa, they would have been absorbed, driven out, or killed by the “big people”, or forced to live where there were no “big people” like the African Pygmies who survived… But those with boats could have populated Madagascar and been the dominant culture of Madagascar long after the mainland was over run by the “big people”. Then when the “big people” did get boats and began to arrive in small groups, they would not have had the strength of numbers to drive out or kill the “little people”, but instead were assimilated into the population, so that some of the language of the little people lives on in Madagascar, even to this day.

A Young Jarawa Hunter Shapes The String of His Bow

If the Negritos were the first, or one of the first, waves of modern man to migrate out of Africa, and assuming they did it in small boats… They would have been the dominate culture along the coasts and islands of Asia. This seems likely because their language is linked with many ancient languages of the area. They are probably ancestors of the dark skinned peoples of Southern India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, The East Indies, and even the Australian Aborigines. They were probably the dominate culture of many of these area, until once again, invaders from the north over ran and absorbed them, killed them, or pushed them off the mainland, and off the most desirable islands. But on some islands, the Negritos retreated to remote valleys, and mountain refuges, where they lingered on, out of sight of the “big people”. And on some isolated remote islands ( like the Andaman Islands ) that were considered uninhabited , they continued to survive undisturbed.

When the European colonists arrived in the East Indies , and began to settle on islands and establish farms, they encountered the Negritos. The Negritos being “hunter-gatherers”, and seeing all the plants and animals on the farmer’s farms, found the farms a good place to hunt and gather food. The farmers called them “thieving savages” who stole their crops and animals, and the farmers hunted them down with dogs and shot them, to drive them away. The same thing happened to their “relatives”, the Bushmen or Pygmies of South Arfica.

The Negritos were a sea people with boats, and could have even gone as far as the Americas, even without Trade Winds. They could have traveled in boats in small family groups up the East Coast of Asia, across the Bering Strait (or land bridge), then down along the west coast of the Americas, leaving little trace of their passing. If they made it to the Americas, and if they still exist, they would be a small stone age tribe of little dark skinned people, hiding from the “big people” somewhere deep in the Amazon Forest.

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