Peter R. Coutros

Abstract The expansion of people speaking Bantu languages is the most dramatic demographic event in Late Holocene Africa and fundamentally reshaped the linguistic, cultural and biological landscape of the continent1,2,3,4,5,6,7. With a comprehensive genomic dataset, including newly generated data of modern-day and ancient DNA from previously unsampled regions in Africa, we contribute insights into this expansion that started 6,000–4,000 years ago in western Africa.

✽ The explosion must have been deafening. Clouds of black and gray likely erased the horizon as the earth and sky thundered violently. As smoldering debris rained down on the Ecuadorian coast, having been ejected from a volcano far to the east, the Jama-Coaque I peoples salvaged what they could of their corn, chilies, and beans. Within hours, ash choked off the river that had swept down from the high Andean mountains, watering their fields for generations.