Neanderthal Tool CulturesCourtesy Karen Ruebens
Posted on 05/30/2025 12:38:59 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
Neanderthals seem to have produced a remarkably consistent set of stone tools for hundreds of thousands of years. Two new studies suggest that this presumed lack of diversity and innovation might not be the whole story.
Karen Ruebens, an archaeologist at the University of Southampton, analyzed more than 1,300 stone tools from European Neanderthal sites dated to between 115,000 and 35,000 years ago. She found that they belong to at least two distinct tool-making traditions. West of the Rhine River, Neanderthal hand axes are oval or roughly triangular, while to the east, they are rounded on one edge and flat on the other. Near the Rhine, the traditions seem to overlap, as if two cultures were sharing their techniques.
A separate study, led by Marie Soressi at Leiden University, shows that Neanderthals also may have taught our Homo sapiens ancestors a thing or two. Soressi's analysis shows that Neanderthals were using bone tools called lissoirs to process animal hides several thousand years before the first modern humans arrived in Europe and started making the same type of tool. While it has long been thought that H. sapiens were the progenitors of the practice, Neanderthals may actually have been more creative in their tool-making than was previously thought.
(Excerpt) Read more at archaeology.org ...
Neanderthal Tool CulturesCourtesy Karen Ruebens
CNN reports that stone tools synonymous with Neanderthals were discovered at the Longtan site in southwest China's Yunnan Province -- but no Neanderthal is thought to have ever ventured that far east. The hominins mainly roamed Eurasia for 400,000 years before disappearing around 40,000 years ago. They developed a distinctive style of stone tools that archaeologists refer to as Quina. Neanderthal skeletal remains have been found alongside these objects at several sites in Western Europe. The tools recently unearthed in China, including scrapers, are between 50,000 and 60,000 years old and seem to be identical to ones known to be crafted by Neanderthals. Longtan, however, is several thousand miles from known Neanderthal habitats. "The discovery at the Longtan site is remarkable, as it documents this particular tradition far from the region traditionally associated with this techno-cultural complex," said University of Ferrara archaeologist Davide Delpiano. The experts are still unsure how the tools ended up at the site but have posited several theories. Neanderthals may have actually lived that far east and made them themselves. Alternatively, they might have met other human species such as the Denisovans on their own turf, and this interaction allowed for knowledge of their stone tool technology to disseminate eastward. A third possibility is that the hominins who once lived at the Longtan site simply developed the tool style completely independently in response to similar climatic conditions and needs.
Quina artifacts from Longtan, ChinaQi-Jun Ruan, Hao Li, and Davide Delpiano
“Man” the animal, not man as we know him today, made in the image of God.
Stonemart put all the mom and pop competitors out of business.
Theme song
Well they’ll stone you when you’re trying to be so good;
They’ll stone you just like they said they would.
They’ll stone you when you’re tryin’ to go home;
And they’ll stone you when you’re there all alone.
{Chorus}
But I would not feel so all alone
Everybody must get stoned!
Anybody with half a brain knows that isn't the whole story. Those Neanderthals needed Equity and Inclusion to tell the whole story.
A bunch of Gary Larson’s cartoons feature Neanderthals.
"..Sounds like a setup for a Gary Larsen cartoon..."
Neanderthal turns over the stone tool. "Made in China".. Damn.. d;^D
That looks like the old Indian arrow heads from over here.
“A separate study, led by Marie Soressi at Leiden University, shows that Neanderthals also may have taught our Homo sapiens ancestors a thing or two. “
Well of course they did. Everyone’s smarter than whoever the hell we were back then.
> Neanderthals seem to have produced a remarkably consistent set of stone tools for hundreds of thousands of years.
That’s conservatism! ;-)
There are a large number of cultural habits that distance Homo sapiens from animals. No other organisms, either living or fossil, made tools to make other complex tools, buried their dead, had controlled use of fire, practiced religious ceremonies, used complex syntax in their spoken grammar, and played musical instruments, yet we know from their fossils that Neanderthal engaged in all.
So even back then the Chinese were stealing our technology.
So I can hear them sitting around the fire debating the relative merits of various stones...” well granite is the hardest but hard to flake...the best is obsidian but hard to find... gimme a good flint any time.”
Sad that the Neanderthal de Walts were undercut by cheap Chinese goods...
“That looks like the old Indian arrow heads from over here.”
The white one? It does indeed, but it is most likely the size of an axe head. “Hand Axes” were one of the most common tools for that period.
Not a real surprise-archaeologists find stuff all the time that lets us know that trade with other groups/tribes has always been the way to make a profit and share knowledge at the same time-even in prehistorical times...
Do I or don’t I want to see the poster of the “neaderthal tool time girl”?
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