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Series 1: 4. Discovering the Americas

During the height of the Ice Age, one of the coldest times humanity has ever known, Homo sapiens steps into the last habitable continents on the planet: the Americas. \n\nElla Al-Shamahi discovers how humans were confronted by ferocious ten-foot-tall prehistoric bears in this new land and explores the daredevil hunting techniques used to take them down. Deeper into the interior of the continent, Ella traces fossilised footprints, possibly of a mother and her child, who were among the first to set foot in North America.\n\nShe learns how the humans who lived here hunted vast herds of Ice Age mammoths and giant sloths, until a changing climate and innovative hunting techniques combined to push them to extinction. Forced to adapt, humanity's ancestors pioneered new ways to control nature as farming emerged to shape the world.

Source: BBC 2