Beringia — The Stage For The Final Act

To fully appreciate what the Yana discovery means for the story of Native American origins, it is necessary to spend some time with Beringia: the land bridge that connected Asia and the Americas during the Ice Age, and the geographical stage on which the final act of the migration drama played out.

Beringia was not a narrow bridge.

At its maximum extent, during the Last Glacial Maximum around 20,000 years ago when sea level was roughly 120 to 130 meters lower than today, Beringia was a vast landmass — an area larger than the United States east of the Mississippi — extending from what is now eastern Siberia to what is now Alaska.

It was the westward extension of the same Mammoth Steppe ecosystem that characterized the rest of the far north.