Posted on 12/16/2010 12:41:36 PM PST by SunkenCiv
Until now, the first evidence that human bones were used either symbolically or as tools were 30,000-to 34,000-year-old perforated human teeth found at excavations in southwest France. These were apparently used as ornaments.
Now scientists have identified a human skull fragment dating back at least 50,000 years that bears signs it was used as a sharpener. It was found in a Neanderthal deposit -- the first time our relatives were discovered making tools from human bone. (Neanderthals are an extinct kind of human that were anatomically distinct from us modern humans.)
The bone was first unearthed in 1926 at the La Quina site... with artifacts from the Mousterian industry, a method of making flint tools linked with Neanderthals. These fragments did not yield much information about the anatomy of these individuals, so they were mostly ignored at the museum at Lyon, France, for years.
Then paleoanthropologist Christine Verna at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, reinvestigated all the human remains at La Quina. Using microscopic analysis of the bone fragment, she and her colleague Francesco d'Errico at the University of Bordeaux in France found evidence it was used to retouch stone tool edges. They also detected scraping marks on the fragment, possibly resulting from cleaning of the skull before it was broken into pieces. The bone likely came from a Neanderthal, as only they were found at Mousterian deposits at La Quina...
Future research should look carefully at old collections of Paleolithic human remains to look for possible traces of use, as well as ancient animal remains, to look for any human bones possibly hidden among retouchers, "with the hope of finding more examples like this one," Verna said.
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
I read a book about twenty/thirty years ago that posited the huge jump in human development to cannibalism, and more specifically eating brains, by our forefathers of the species.
According to the theory, brains had some sort of inherent ‘smart gene’ or whatever that was ingested and therefore made the braineaters smarter and smarter over the years.
It was jammed with scientific citings to support the theory but I’ve never found it again or been able to remember much other than the theory.
Maybe I need to eat some brains.
No file at wiki—but that’s ok. If the X files scripter read the book and then based a X files show on it, what other form of validation does the theory need?
Next thing you know it will be a series on the History Channel.
Speaking of the History Channel, haven’t you become disillusioned with the corrupttion of a decent cable show into some parody of itself, a New AGe show full of monsters, alien interventions, swamp people chasing gators, Nostrodamus speculations, etc.
Not to mention the history of our modern city gangs.
I love the glasses too. :’)
Actually, IIRC, larger surface area equals higher intelligence, not necessarily size of the brain.
The modern brain has more folds in the surface of the lobes which is believed to allow for greater processing of information.
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