Posted on 01/19/2006 11:28:01 AM PST by blam
Yes, the idea has been tossed around. Perhaps a pandemic type event drastically reduced their numbers, and the now isolated pockets of Neanderthals that remained just slowly vanished over time, since the environment was radically changing around them, and H. sapiens coming north would have added pressure to the groups when competing for food, shelter and resources.
If neanderthals and modern humans coexisted, the likely explanation is that the latter killed off the former. Wonder why that explanation gets avoided in articles like this?
Just be really skeptical of any coin with a B.C. date stamped on it.
Yeah..Liberalism. They adopted the "zero-population growth" stance.
Gee, thanks!
Pre-Neandrethal portrait right? There was a time when early man had no brain.
And, yes, it is nice to get to know people here on FR - even if we do not always agree.
Constant agreement..is..no..fun.
Don't you think they would have interbred?
The gecko is a good slant, but the advertising firm that came up with the caveman stuff ought to receive an award..I'd love to work at a place with that kind of imagination!
Mark
I think that their vanishing has to do with a lot of factors, like the ice age ending, disease outbreaks, competition, and such. Interbreeding may very well be one of them. Like I said, you can't dismiss the idea just because one study was done on it.
Of course, maybe Neanderthals found the concept of mating with homo sapiens to be appaling. Who knows? =P
The Neandertal EnigmaFrayer's own reading of the record reveals a number of overlooked traits that clearly and specifically link the Neandertals to the Cro-Magnons. One such trait is the shape of the opening of the nerve canal in the lower jaw, a spot where dentists often give a pain-blocking injection. In many Neandertal, the upper portion of the opening is covered by a broad bony ridge, a curious feature also carried by a significant number of Cro-Magnons. But none of the alleged 'ancestors of us all' fossils from Africa have it, and it is extremely rare in modern people outside Europe." [pp 126-127]
by James Shreeve
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For Neanderthals, Life Was a Meaty ProblemNeanderthals feasted on meat, meat and more meat, researchers said on Monday in a report that adds to a growing body of evidence that they were skilled hunters and not the grunting, witless cave men they are often portrayed as... Neanderthals ate a diet similar to that of wolves and lions, and probably hunted woolly mammoths... Trinkaus said the new evidence adds to an evolving picture that scientists have of Neanderthals. Just a few years ago they were thought to be primitive offshoots of the pre-human line, who were well-adapted to cold Ice Age conditions but who died out as a species. Anthropologists have since found that Neanderthals lived side-by-side with modern humans as recently as 24,000 years ago, that they made and wore jewelry, had fairly sophisticated tools and weapons and, perhaps most controversially, may have interbred with modern Homo sapiens... Trinkaus said if Neanderthals ate a lot of meat, they would have had to hunt, because they could not have survived by scavenging meat alone... Trinkaus said the diet would have been unhealthful by today's standards, but the Neanderthals were trying to survive in a cold climate where not a lot of plant food was available.
by Maggie Fox
Paper and picture trail from the dig to the auction. :-)
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