Africans With Dark Skin And Unusually Bright Blue Eyes

The Evolution of Human Skin

In the past, anthropologists and biologists believed that as humans migrated to more northern latitudes, their skin evolved to become "lighter" in color. However, recent research on well-preserved 7000-year-old stone-age hunter-gatherer skeletons in Europe is reversing that belief. A skeleton's wisdom tooth underwent DNA testing, and the results showed an unusual mix of racial characteristics, including curly brown hair, dark skin, and blue eyes. The fact that this hunter's skeleton is most closely related to living people in Sweden and Finland makes it even more astounding. Even so, he has African genes that contribute to his skin tone. This has given rise to a new theory that claims that rather than early humans migrating north and becoming whiter to allow them to absorb more sunlight so their bodies could produce more vitamin D, the switch to agriculture and a more sedentary lifestyle is what caused the whitening of skin. Pre-farming humans got most of their vitamin D from eating meat, fish, and eggs, whereas early sedentary agriculturalists would have had to rely more and more on sunlight. Thus, as a result of dietary changes and an increase in sunlight dependence, they would have evolved paler skin.

The Blue-Eyed Gene - What Is It?

As we've seen above, genetic data has revealed that prehistoric European stone-age humans had darker skin and had the potential to have blue eyes. But what about today? Interestingly, geneticists discovered in 2008 that all blue-eyed individuals can be linked to a single ancestor who lived between 8,000 and 10,000 years ago in the northwestern Black Sea regions. It all started with a single gene mutation that happened purely by chance, it seems. Prior to this one mutation, all humans had brown eyes. A lot of people have falsely claimed that images of Africans with blue eyes on social media and the internet are fakes because they still think that the blue-eyed gene only naturally occurs in Europeans. Contrary to popular belief, both blue and green eyes are naturally present in Asian, African, and people of African ancestry.

Gene Mutation - Causes of Blue Eyes

One cause is a gene mutation, and another is when a person of African descent has Caucasian relatives on both sides of their family who also happen to be gene carriers for blue eyes. If both parents' ancestral lines carried the gene for blue eyes, a black couple with brown eyes could give birth to kids with naturally blue eyes.

Black Actresses With Blue or Green Eyes

Black singer Rihanna and black actress Vanessa Williams both have coloured eyes. Terrence Howard, Aishwarya Rai, and Tyra Banks are all actors with green eyes who have appeared in Bollywood. It is not as uncommon as people might believe. But regrettably, there is still a lot of ignorance about this, with some people assuming that blue eyes are exclusively a trait of Caucasians in Africans. Recent evidence actually suggests that it might even be the other way around!

Inspired by kadealo