My first professional journalism assignment was to interview Zecharia Sitchin and discuss his many books, especially The 12th Planet. His Earth Chronicle series explores the Sumerian texts which reveal that ETs, known as the Nephalim - from the planet Nebiru - sent their astronaut explorers, called The Annunaki, to Earth to do two things. One, mine gold. Secondly, transform the indigenous population of hominids into Homo sapiens so they could do all the heavy lifting.
That kind of genetic intervention in the development of modern humans continues to this day, and along the way included major interventions such as the installation of expanded frontal lobes so that we would have executive decision-making capabilities, along with advanced speech and communication capabilities. That occurred about 50,000 years ago.
Was ol' Zech legit? I don't know, but his reputation and statements are worth investigating. However, the History Channel is buying it lock, stock, and barrel. Their series on ETs, The Ancient Aliens series is in its 14th Season, I believe, with about 24 episodes in each season, so there is a LOT of data on this angle of human evolution.
Of note: since CC21 is attempting to merge the DBC story with UFOs and Big Foot, this might be the time and place to mention that Bashar said recently that Big Foot is a naturally developed hominid, and did not receive any ET tampering. Hence, Big Foot views humans as "alien." Interesting, eh?