frica was occupied by mostly Bushmen and Pygmies until about two thousand years ago, when the Bantu speaking people of the Congo region developed agriculture, iron, and domesticated animals. Following those advances the small number of Bantu multiplied until they overran half the African continent, pushing the Pygmies and Bushmen into areas unsuitable for farmland. The Bantu peoples thereby founded the entire gene pool of subequatorial Africa anew a mere 2,000 years ago. Europe’s founding fathers came largely within two migrations: one being farmers form the Near East about eight thousand years ago settling largely along the Mediterranean; the second being from Southern Russia about six thousand years ago populating northern and western Europe.The genetic traits of the founders of a population can be positive, negative, or neutral. Negative traits usually destroy founding populations unless the people with those traits die off. If not, then the entire population could die depending upon how severe the trait was, and if it was dominant or recessive. Something such as an enzyme or respiratory deficiency would be considered a negative trait. If the trait were dominant, than it would appear in all offspring of the parent and result in either the death of those people having that trait in the population, or perhaps even the entire population. If a negative trait were recessive than it’s effects would be less exhibited because it would take two carriers to pass the trait on, and even then the chances of having a homozygous recessive genetic code would be only 1:4 for heterozygous parents. (The chances of dominant genetic trait being exhibited in subsequent offspring whose parents were heterozygous both had the trait would be 3:4) A recessive negative trait will usually linger for more generations than a dominant one because it “hides” away, and it’s negative effects will be considerably less than a dominant allow...
