🇿🇦 Ancient southern Africans were a long-standing lineage

Genomes from southern Africa dating 10,200–1,400 years ago form a distinct ancient southern African ancestry that sits outside today’s variation. This lineage shows ~300,000-year divergence from other human groups and remained stable for ~9,000 years, with little to no incoming gene flow until about 1,300 years ago.

In living people, the least-admixed Khoe-San still carry around 80% of this ancestry, preserving a window into very early Homo sapiens structure on the continent.

Takeaway: Southern Africa acted as a long-term refugium. Ancient southern African ancestry persisted locally and only later mixed with eastern, western, and European sources, leaving a major imprint in today’s Khoe-San.

Source: Jakobsson et al., 2025. Homo sapiens-specific evolution unveiled by ancient southern African genomes.