The First Human Family

63:4.1Prim­i­tive man—the An­don­ites—had black eyes and a swarthy com­plex­ion, some­thing of a cross be­tween yel­low and red. Melanin is a col­or­ing sub­stance which is found in the skins of all hu­man be­ings. It is the orig­i­nal An­donic skin pig­ment. In gen­eral ap­pear­ance and skin color these early An­don­ites more nearly re­sem­bled the pres­ent-day Es­kimo than any other type of liv­ing hu­man be­ings. They were the first crea­tures to use the skins of an­i­mals as a pro­tec­tion against cold; they had lit­tle more hair on their bod­ies than pres­ent-day hu­mans.

63:4.2The tribal life of the an­i­mal an­ces­tors of these early men had fore­shad­owed the be­gin­nings of nu­mer­ous so­cial con­ven­tions, and with the ex­pand­ing emo­tions and aug­mented brain pow­ers of these be­ings, there was an im­me­di­ate de­vel­op­ment in so­cial or­ga­ni­za­tion and a new di­vi­sion of clan la­bor. They were ex­ceed­ingly im­i­ta­tive, but the play in­stinct was only slightly de­vel­oped, and the sense of hu­mor was al­most en­tirely ab­sent. Prim­i­tive man smiled oc­ca­sion­ally, but he never in­dulged in hearty laugh­ter. Hu­mor was the legacy of the later Adamic race. These early hu­man be­ings were not so sen­si­tive to pain nor so re­ac­tive to un­pleas­ant sit­u­a­tions as were many of the later evolv­ing mor­tals. Child­birth was not a painful or dis­tress­ing or­deal to Fonta and her im­me­di­ate progeny.

63:4.3They were a won­der­ful tribe. The males would fight hero­ically for the safety of their mates and their off­spring; the fe­males were af­fec­tion­ately de­voted to their chil­dren. But their pa­tri­o­tism was wholly lim­ited to the im­me­di­ate clan. They were very loyal to their fam­i­lies; they would die with­out ques­tion in de­fense of their chil­dren, but they were not able to grasp the idea of try­ing to make the world a bet­ter place for their grand­chil­dren. Al­tru­ism was as yet un­born in the hu­man heart, not­with­stand­ing that all of the emo­tions es­sen­tial to the birth of re­li­gion were al­ready pres­ent in these Uran­tia abo­rig­ines.

63:4.4These early men pos­sessed a touch­ing af­fec­tion for their com­rades and cer­tainly had a real, al­though crude, idea of friend­ship. It was a com­mon sight in later times, dur­ing their con­stantly re­cur­ring bat­tles with the in­fe­rior tribes, to see one of these prim­i­tive men valiantly fight­ing with one hand while he strug­gled on, try­ing to pro­tect and save an in­jured fel­low war­rior. Many of the most no­ble and highly hu­man traits of sub­se­quent evo­lu­tion­ary de­vel­op­ment were touch­ingly fore­shad­owed in these prim­i­tive peo­ples.

63:4.5The orig­i­nal An­donic clan main­tained an un­bro­ken line of lead­er­ship un­til the twenty-sev­enth gen­er­a­tion, when, no male off­spring ap­pear­ing among Son­tad’s di­rect de­scen­dants, two ri­val would-be rulers of the clan fell to fight­ing for su­prem­acy.

63:4.6Be­fore the ex­ten­sive dis­per­sion of the An­donic clans a well-de­vel­oped lan­guage had evolved from their early ef­forts to in­ter­com­mu­ni­cate. This lan­guage con­tin­ued to grow, and al­most daily ad­di­tions were made to it be­cause of the new in­ven­tions and adap­ta­tions to en­vi­ron­ment which were de­vel­oped by these ac­tive, rest­less, and cu­ri­ous peo­ple. And this lan­guage be­came the word of Uran­tia, the tongue of the early hu­man fam­ily, un­til the later ap­pear­ance of the col­ored races.

63:4.7As time passed, the An­donic clans grew in num­ber, and the con­tact of the ex­pand­ing fam­i­lies de­vel­oped fric­tion and mis­un­der­stand­ings. Only two things came to oc­cupy the minds of these peo­ples: hunt­ing to ob­tain food and fight­ing to avenge them­selves against some real or sup­posed in­jus­tice or in­sult at the hands of the neigh­bor­ing tribes.

63:4.8Fam­ily feuds in­creased, tribal wars broke out, and se­ri­ous losses were sus­tained among the very best el­e­ments of the more able and ad­vanced groups. Some of these losses were ir­repara­ble; some of the most valu­able strains of abil­ity and in­tel­li­gence were for­ever lost to the world. This early race and its prim­i­tive civ­i­liza­tion were threat­ened with ex­tinc­tion by this in­ces­sant war­fare of the clans.

63:4.9It is im­pos­si­ble to in­duce such prim­i­tive be­ings long to live to­gether in peace. Man is the de­scen­dant of fight­ing an­i­mals, and when closely as­so­ci­ated, un­cul­tured peo­ple ir­ri­tate and of­fend each other. The Life Car­ri­ers know this ten­dency among evo­lu­tion­ary crea­tures and ac­cord­ingly make pro­vi­sion for the even­tual sep­a­ra­tion of de­vel­op­ing hu­man be­ings into at least three, and more of­ten six, dis­tinct and sep­a­rate races.