Lands of ancient globalisation

But the story of Afghanistan begins long before the defining centuries of the Silk Road. Archaeological digs have revealed the region to be home to some of the earliest modern humans, with tools unearthed that date back tens of thousands of years to the Paleolithic Age or earlier. The indigenous people of Afghanistan (estimated by anthropologist Louis Dupree to have populated the land from at least 50,000 BC) were likely small herders and farmers who existed in tribes. Their exact origin has been washed away with the tide of time, but they developed some of the earliest farming communities. As early as 7000 BC farmers and herders settled in the foothills of the Hindu Kush, making it one of the first places on earth where animals and plants were domesticated.