Abstract

Many scholars have sought to uncover the mysteries relating to the origins of the earliest Native Americans. Among many hypotheses, the Beringian Standstill Hypothesis and the Kelp Highway Hypothesis claim that the first Native Americans stayed in Beringia during the Last Glacial Maximum, before migrating to the New World by boat as the climate warmed. Unfortunately, neither hypothesis was devised with tangible supporting evidence, such as archaeological artifacts; as such, both remain controversial. To address this issue, this paper compares and analyzes the genetic data related to the first Native Americans and the data of six archaeological artifacts from the Stone Age. The results show that both hypotheses are correct, but the first Native Americans stayed in Southern Korea rather than Beringia on their journey to America. Genetic and archaeological data converge to show the first Native Americans came from Southern Korea.