When Early Humans Failed to Escape Africa
Jun 23, 2025
By: Greg Schmalzel
Hidden under the wind-blown sands of the Middle East, are the footprints of ancient travelers. Early humans walked these grounds seeking respite, exploring worlds beyond their homeland. There was so much potential outside of Africa and these groups were motivated to discover it. Maybe they were in search of new habitats or new food sources. It’s hard to put ourselves in their shoes, but they were still humans, with goals and desires. Yet, despite their hopes and struggles, many vanished. And we are only now beginning to rediscover their traces.
Archaeologists have uncovered the fragile remnants of people who dared to cross the boundary of Africa’s cradle. In more recent times, these treks were successful. After all, we now blanket the entire plant. But, it took many attempts, many failed attempts, before we established permanent residency.
The remains of these failed attempts are scattered across the Middle East and southeastern Mediterranean. This part of the world is truly a migration graveyard. It’s an ancient purgatory sitting between humanity’s deep past and eventual future. In this video, we’re stepping into that graveyard to see what archaeologists have found. We’ll try to answer some deeply interesting questions. Why did these migrations slip into oblivion? What forces conspired against them? And why did they want to leave Africa in the first place? Hopefully, some clues can be found in the bones and artifacts these people left behind.
Welcome to one of our story’s greatest trials—when early humans first tried, and first failed, to escape Africa.
To watch the full YouTube video, click HERE.
The First Humans
Illustration by Jay H Matternes
Anatomically modern humans first emerged around 300,000 years ago at Jebel Irhoud in Morocco. These early Homo sapiens, though still bearing some archaic traits, lived as mobile hunter-gatherers—crafting stone tools, cooking with fire, and moving seasonally in small kin-based groups. Their way of life required adaptability, social cooperation, and growing curiosity about the landscapes beyond their home range.
That curiosity, combined with shifting climates, eventually pushed them outward. Earlier human species like Homo erectus and the ancestors of Neanderthals had already left Africa, driven by the same environmental forces. As green corridors opened during wetter periods, and as populations grew, small bands of Homo sapiens began testing the unknown. It wasn’t just survival—it was exploration. And around 200,000 years ago, they made their first, fragile steps beyond Africa’s edge—a prelude to the global journeys that would follow.
Archaeology and Failed Migrations
Apidima Cave, Greece
In the limestone cliffs of southern Greece, two skull fragments—Apidima 1 and 2—sat undisturbed in breccia stone for thousands of years. Excavated in 1978 and reanalyzed in 2019, these fossils delivered a shock to the timeline of human migration. Apidima 1, dated to 210,000 years ago, is now considered the oldest known Homo sapiens fossil found outside Africa—pushing back our presence in Eurasia by over 150,000 years. Its companion, Apidima 2, dated to 170,000 years ago, belonged to a Neanderthal.
Using CT scans and digital reconstructions, scientists revealed two very different human stories preserved in the same cave: one of early Homo sapiens who vanished without a trace, and another of Neanderthals who later claimed the site. There’s no evidence the first group survived or passed on their genes—only the silent suggestion of a short-lived migration, possibly ended by climate, isolation, or misfortune. Unlike the usual narrative of modern humans replacing Neanderthals, Apidima flips the script. Here, Neanderthals were the successors, and Homo sapiens the fleeting visitors. It’s a haunting reminder that our early attempts to explore the world were filled with trial, error, and disappearance.
Misliya Cave, Israel
Between the early Homo sapiens at Apidima and later Neanderthal occupations, another group made it farther—into what’s now Israel. In Misliya Cave, a single upper jawbone was found in its original layer, surrounded by a sophisticated Levallois toolset. Anatomical details of the jaw—like its rounded cheekbone placement and parabolic tooth row—clearly identify it as Homo sapiens, not Neanderthal. Dating techniques place it between 194,000 and 177,000 years ago, making it the oldest known modern human fossil outside Africa—until Apidima was reanalyzed.
These early humans brought advanced African technologies into the Levant, but their story ended as quietly as it began. No genetic material links them to living humans, and there’s no archaeological continuity after their time. Misliya tells the tale of a brief foothold—an ambitious migration that never took root. Like Apidima, it stands as another early failed dispersal, a moment when our species reached out into the wider world—only to retreat back into obscurity.
Skhul and Qafzeh Caves, Isreal
Two caves in Israel—Skhul near Mount Carmel and Qafzeh near Nazareth—hold the remains of early Homo sapiens who ventured beyond Africa between 120,000 and 90,000 years ago. At Skhul, ten individuals were buried in shallow graves, some with symbolic objects like wild boar mandibles. One, Skhul 5, showed robust, almost Neanderthal-like traits, but was confirmed to be a modern human. Beads made from sea shells, brought from the coast and perforated for ornamentation, hint at some of the earliest known personal adornments in human history. These flourishes—burials, beads, pigments—suggest a growing awareness of identity and meaning, long before Homo sapiens would conquer the world. And yet, their lineage ended here. Like Misliya and Apidima before them, their stories faded.
Qafzeh Cave revealed a larger population—at least 28 individuals, many of them children, buried with extraordinary care. One adolescent, Qafzeh 11, lay in a bedrock-carved grave, deer antlers on his chest and signs of head trauma that may have shaped his final days. Qafzeh 12, a toddler, suffered from hydrocephalus. Red and yellow ochre stained the bones and shells found at the site—clear signs of symbolic funerary rituals. Perhaps the most haunting is the double burial of Qafzeh 9 and 10, once thought to be a mother and child, later revealed to be a young man and a child, their connection still a mystery. These were modern humans in mind and body, but their story ended too soon. The children of Qafzeh represent a generation lost to time, caught between climate shifts and the limits of their world. They remind us that even the earliest sparks of humanity’s symbolic mind were not enough to guarantee survival.
Can the climate explain why?
Groucutt, H., et al. 2021. “Multiple hominin dispersals into Southwest Asia over the past 400,000 years.” Nature 597, 376–380.
A 2021 study reveals that the deserts of Southwest Asia—once thought to be impassable—were actually a series of climate-controlled gateways. During the Pleistocene, these barriers opened temporarily during wet periods known as “green Arabia” phases, allowing bursts of migration from Africa into the Arabian Peninsula and beyond. Lake sediments in Saudi Arabia point to at least five major humid windows: around 400,000, 300,000, 200,000, 130–75,000, and 55,000 years ago. Each one coincided with a wave of human movement, often visible through Acheulean handaxes or Middle Paleolithic Levallois tools—like those linked to early Homo sapiens at Misliya.
The 200,000-year-old dispersal stands out. Stone tools at Khall Amayshan match the style used by early modern humans in Africa, suggesting a real push into Arabia. But like earlier efforts, these populations disappeared when the climate shifted back to arid conditions. Later pulses between 130 and 75 kya show even more Homo sapiens movement, but again, each attempt was cut short by drought. Only during the relatively stable humid phase around 55,000 years ago did a group finally succeed—marking the migration that seeded the global population outside Africa. The study’s authors describe this pattern as one of “pulsed dispersals, local adaptation, and eventual collapse.”
In short, climate wasn’t just a backdrop—it was the gatekeeper of human expansion. These wet phases offered rare windows of opportunity, and likely shaped the timing of all the early dispersals discussed throughout this story.
What about the DNA evidence?
If we define a successful migration as one that left a lasting genetic legacy outside Africa, then the clearest evidence comes from our own DNA. Studies of the Y chromosome and mitochondrial DNA—which track paternal and maternal lines—show that nearly all non-African humans today descend from a single migration event between 47,000 and 52,000 years ago. Despite earlier migrations, only this wave endured. Genetic simulations suggest the pioneering group may have been shockingly small—possibly just 15 men and 25 women.
This migration lines up closely with the final Arabian green phase, a brief period of increased rainfall that opened a viable path out of Africa. Previous attempts were likely blocked or erased by shifting climates. In reality, Homo sapiens didn’t pour out of Africa in a single grand exodus—we tested the edges over and over, waiting for the world to open a door. Only when it did, around 50,000 years ago, did our ancestors finally walk through—and stay.
Sources:
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