The Birth of the Europeans
E-book, Czech
The Birth of the Europeans
No one has ever written a history book quite like this. It doesn't mention a single king, any religion, and only two revolutions—the Neolithic and the DNA reading revolution. The second of these took place in the last ten years, and thanks to a hundred-million-fold acceleration in genome sequencing, it finally answers the questions that have fascinated us for centuries: What makes us human? Where do we come from? And how did we become who we are today?
This captivating narrative connects findings from many seemingly unrelated fields. The authors describe the contribution of ancient hominid interbreeding to the health of modern humans and the influence of prehistoric migrations on the dairy products you get for breakfast in different places today. They clarify the three genetic pillars of Europeans while incidentally showing just how closely people from all over the world are related.
## You might be surprised to learn:
- What partner and neighbourly relations were like between modern humans, Neanderthals, and Denisovans.
- That the domestication of the wolf was a major innovation and how dogs, alongside humans, learned to digest carbohydrates.
- European hunter-gatherers had dark skin and blue eyes—fair skin was brought to Europe by agricultural migrants from Anatolia.
- How the bacteria responsible for the plague, TB, and other diseases that have threatened our lives since prehistoric times are evolving, and how we are changing because of them.
- That you can meet living human genetic fossils in Sardinia.
Jan Melvil Publishing s.r.o., Roubalova 383/13, 602 00 Brno 2, Česká republika, www.melvil.cz
