MIGRATION OR THE SPREAD OF CULTURE?

MIGRATION OR THE SPREAD OF CULTURE? During the last fifty years there have been debates over whether inventions and influences in the distant past resulted from migrations or from the spread of culture—-for example, by traders. Ancient DNA thus far has provided support for both theories. As an example,”the population of northern Europe was largely replaced by a mass migration…after 5000 years ago.” On the other hand, “farming developed in the Near East more than ten thousand years ago among multiple highly differentiated human populations that then expanded in all directions and mixed with each other along with the spread of agriculture….” (Reich p. xix)