Naia Reborn: See the Surprising Face of a First American
By Alan Boyle
Researchers
and artists have reconstructed the face of a teenage girl who lived
12,000 years ago in Mexico, and it's not the kind of face a person might
typically associate with Native Americans.
The remains of the girl, nicknamed Naia (after the Greek term for a water nymph), were recovered from an underwater cave on Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula.
Naia is regarded as one of the earliest known residents of the Americas
— but her skull has a shape associated with African or South Pacific
populations rather than the typical Siberian look.
Despite that different
look, researchers say Naia is genetically related to Native Americans
who came to America later, from Siberia via the Beringia land bridge.
What's behind the facial
differences? Anthropologist James Chatters, one of the leaders of the
research team behind Naia's discovery, suggests that the earliest
"Northern Hemisphere wild-type" populations may have been distinguished
by robust-looking males and softer-featured females — and that natural
selection eventually favored the more robust features that are
associated with later populations of Native Americans.
That's a controversial
claim. Other anthropologists say the differences may merely be due to
natural variations within a given population.
The facial
reconstruction is based on Chatters' scientific work and sculptor Tom
McClellan's artistic flair. The same duo collaborated on a similar reconstruction based on the remains of Kennewick Man, a Paleoamerican who lived 9,000 years ago in present-day Washington state.
To learn more about Naia's reborn face, and about the First Americans, check out the cover story in the January issue of National Geographic magazine.
