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http://www.carnatic.com/karmasaya/index.php?Graham%20Hancock
Tamil Nadu's Ancient Cities May Predate Mesopotamian Civilization : CHENNAI, INDIA, January 5, 2003: A British marine archaeologist Graham Hancock has been examining a submerged city on the East Coast of Tamil Nadu. Mr. Hancock says a civilization thriving there may predate the Sumerian civilization of Mesopotamia in present-day Iraq and definitely existed before the Harappan civilization in India and Pakistan. He has been excavating the site off the coast of Poompuhar, near Nagapattinam, 400 km south of Chennai. At a meeting of the Mythic Society in Bangalore in early December, Mr. Hancock said underwater explorations in 2001 provided evidence that corroborated Tamil mythological stories of ancient floods. He said tidal waves of 400 feet or more could have swallowed this flourishing port city any time between 17,000 and 7,000 years ago, the date of the last Ice Age. The Gulf of Cambay was also submerged, taking with it evidence of early man's migration. The populations Mr. Wells and Mr. Pitchappan (see previous article) mapped settled on India's East Coast 50,000 to 35,000 years ago and developed into modern man. According to Hancock, "the Poompuhar underwater site could well provide evidence that it was the cradle of modern civilization." Hancock's theory is strengthened by findings of India's National Institute of Oceanography (NIO), which has explored the site since the 1980s. Man-made structures like well rims, horseshoe-shaped building sites are some of the lost city's secrets. At low tide, some brick structures from the Sangam era are still visible in places like Vanagiri. The region, archaeologists say, has been built over and over again through the ages and some of its past is now being revealed. Mr. Glenn Milne, a British geologist from Durham University, has confirmed Hancock's theory.
http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/2002/02/25/stories/2002022503170600.htm
Monday, Feb 25, 2002
`Consanguinity main reason for susceptibility to disease'
By Our Staff Reporter
MADURAI, FEB. 24. Description of mitochondrial DNA and Y chromosome markers has made the migratory pattern of homo sapiens and the causative factors for various diseases, more clear, according to Spenser Wells, of The Welcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics, University of Oxford.
Speaking to presspersons here on Saturday, Mr. Wells said that study in genomics has brought out evidence that diseases spread along with migration. The study has also established that the main cause for affliction of various kinds of diseases was inbreeding or consanguinity, increasing the susceptibility of diseases. This could be reduced by identifying the responsible genes in order to build resistance capacity.
The homo sapiens (the modern man), he said, also evolved in Africa, just like the primitive man, over one lakh years ago and migrated to Australia through Southern India along the coast.
One population, settled in the middle-east, expanded there and further migrated to India while the other branch migrated to Central Asia. The skin colour, he pointed out, was influenced by environmental changes.
Section of the population from South India, who migrated and expanded in South East Asia, following the first wave of migration, migrated to the East, resulting in the formation of the Mongoloid race. Likewise, sections of the Central Asian population dispersed further in three different directions - towards Americas through Bering Strait, Europe and India.
Recent collaborative studies between the Madurai Kamaraj University and the University of Oxford, UK, on Non- recombinant `Y' (NRY) chromosome have generated genomic evidences to establish the reasons behind the expansion of human communities in Central Asia and their migration to America, Europe and India. The studies are in general agreement with the mitochondrial DNA haplogroup studies.
The Head of the Department of Immunology, Madurai Kamaraj University, R.M. Pitchappan, stated that the studies on genes and Human Leucocyte Antigen (HLA) had revealed that different South Indian caste groups had their own HLA profile. Expounding the theory, he said an indepth study on NRY markers on selected South Indian race had pointers to the presence of `m130' NRY marker, characteristic of the ancient, first wave of migration from Africa, revealing the migratory route from Ethiopia to Australia through South India. For instance, the Piranmalai Kallars, who are highly exposed to the risk of HLA (DRBI 1501), possess an ancient M20 NRY chromosome showing their migration from middle-east. The same can be said of the Yadhavas of Tamil Nadu (said to be the descendants of Lord Krishna), who possess high frequency of M172 NRY allele, common in the surroundings of Baluchistan in Pakistan. The Sourashtrian population of Madurai possess M17, characteristic of Indo-Iranian nomadic culture and common in Central Asia, Dr. Pitchappan added.
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