We talk about a discovery that changed the fate of world paleoanthropology. In 1856, in the little-known German town of Neanderthal, bones were discovered that served for the first time to describe a human fossil species. The difficult history of the recognition of Neanderthals by the scientific community is in our material.
Johann Karl Fuhlroth
https://de.wikipedia.org/
Johann Karl Fuhlroth was one of those discoverers who, misunderstood by his contemporaries, never lived to see the day of his triumph. Fate treated this German scientist especially unfairly: the dramatic story of his discovery, which made a huge contribution to the development of anthropology, never received sufficient publicity. But it was Johann Karl Fuhlroth who discovered the Neanderthals for science.
Ironically, the man whose discovery eloquently rejected the theory of the immutability of species began precisely as a theologian. Fulroth was born on December 31, 1803, and after the death of his parents, at the age of 10, he was raised by his uncle, a Catholic priest, which probably forced the future discoverer to receive a church education. But, obviously, young Fulroth did not have any passion for theology, because already at the age of 25 he demonstrated to the public his interest in the natural sciences by publishing a work on the taxonomy of plants. As a rule, articles on Neanderthals say that Fulroth was a teacher, which is true, but not entirely complete. It should also be noted that he took an active part in research, publishing more than 60 works in various fields of natural sciences: zoology, botany, meteorology, but, above all, geology and paleontology. In addition, Fuhlroth created various scientific communities, and all this together made him a fairly well-known figure in the part of Germany where workers discovered Neanderthal bones in August 1856. Therefore, the fact that they decided to give the bones to Fulroth was quite natural. The most interesting thing is the wording with which the naturalist was invited to Neanderthal: the workers said that they had discovered the bones of a cave bear. At first, of course, they assumed that in front of them were human remains, but the reluctance to take on the sin of desecrating the grave and the visible oddities of the skull turned the human skeleton into a bear one. As we see, even people far from science noticed that the found remains do not belong to an ordinary person.
But scientists were in no hurry to admit this. To understand why, we need to remember the historical context of the discovery.
Skeleton Neanderthal 1
The year is 1856. There are three years left before the publication of Darwin's famous work on the origin of species, and even more until its recognition. The prevailing theological theory in scientific circles is the immutability of species, which does not explicitly imply the existence of any other species of humans. All this was perfectly understood by Fulroth, who, having examined the bones, came to the conclusion that this was not just another species of man, but another species of man who lived around the time of the mammoths. The vast majority of scientists were clearly not prepared for such a turn, but Fulroth was in no hurry to shock them. He collected all the available bones, interviewed the workers in detail and began to test his theory: yes, the remains are clearly human (this was confirmed by a doctor he knew), but they differ from the skeleton of modern people: curved femurs, a powerful eyebrow, a flat, sloping forehead... Meanwhile , newspapers managed to trumpet the news throughout Europe, and Fulroth had to provide a report. He was lucky: the theory of the immutability of species began to lose its position even before Darwin, so he was able to find an ally in the person of a professional anthropologist, Hermann Schaffhausen. Later they were joined by the Englishmen Charles Lyell, Thomas Huxley and William King (who coined the scientific name for Neanderthal) and the German Carl Fogg. They began to publish articles in which they spoke directly about both the status of the discovery and its age, citing significant evidence. Their opponents, who had so far prevailed in numbers, responded with very strange versions. Thus, the anatomist Mayer believed that the found bones belonged to “a Mongoloid Russian Cossack, who in 1814 during the war with Napoleon was wounded, crawled into a cave and died.”
The curved femur supposedly indicates a mounted warrior, the skull cap - a Mongolian.
This version amazed Fulroth and his comrades so much that they asked Mayer if he was joking. But the Bonn anatomist was too ardent a fan of the theory of immutability of species, so he was not joking. Another adherent of the same views, Professor Rudolf Wagner, believed that the bones belonged to the old Dutchman. The Englishman Blake said that the remains belonged to a mentally retarded man who suffered from dropsy. And this is only part of the theories proposed by scientists to replace Fulroth’s explanation. But none of them, of course, had serious evidence. Even the famous Berlin surgeon and anthropologist Rudolf Virchow put forward the unviable hypothesis that the bones belonged to an old disabled man who once suffered from rickets, then from arthritis, and, incidentally, received a traumatic brain injury. Later, however, he softened a little and took a more neutral position.
Skull Neanderthal 1
An interesting fact is that Darwin did not use the message about the discovery in Neanderthal in any way in his work, although his supporters were the same people as Fulroth's supporters. The German paleontologist did not live long enough to be recognized: in 1866, similar finds began to appear in other places (and bones of fossil animals were also found next to the remains, which made it possible to speak with certainty about their age). But the decisive argument was the remains discovered in Belgium in 1886. These were entire skeletons, the analysis of which clearly indicated the independence of Neanderthals as a biological species. Stone tools and bones of ancient mammals discovered nearby also definitely indicated the significant age of the finds. In 1891, the German anatomist Gustav Schwalbe put an end to the long-standing dispute with the release of the book "Skull from Neanderthal", which contained his (later classic) descriptions of Neanderthals. Their authenticity and considerable age were proven worldwide almost half a century after their discovery. Johann Karl Fuhlroth might have turned 88 in 1891, but he did not live to see his triumph for 14 years.
Yulia Popova
Existence time: 130 thousand years ago. — 28 thousand years ago
Neanderthal man (lat. Homo neanderthalensis or Homo sapiens neanderthalensis; in Soviet literature also called paleoanthrope).
A variant of humans specialized for predation. They had many completely human features of structure and behavior, but were still noticeably different from us - including the significant massiveness of the skeleton and skull. Probably, many of the features of the Neanderthals of Europe were formed under the influence of the harsh conditions of the Ice Age about 70-60 thousand years ago. Interestingly, some representatives of Homo neanderthalensis had brain volumes that exceeded values typical for modern humans.
Homo neanderthalensis. The reconstruction was carried out by Oleg Osipov specifically for ANTHROPOGENES.RU
Neanderthal bones were historically the first hominid fossils discovered (the first Neanderthal remains were found in 1829, although the significance of this find was appreciated much later...). To date, Neanderthals are the most thoroughly studied species of fossil humans. The history of the study of Neanderthals can be found here.
The term "Neanderthal" has not entirely defined boundaries. Due to the vastness and heterogeneity of this group of hominids, a number of terms are also used: “atypical Neanderthals” for early Neanderthals (period 130-70 ka), “classical Neanderthals” (for European forms of the period 70-40 ka .), “survival Neanderthals” (existed later than 45 thousand years ago), etc.
Homo neanderthalensis.
Neanderthal
Girl. The reconstruction was carried out by Oleg Osipov specifically for ANTHROPOGENES.RU
There are also many hypotheses about the reasons for the extinction of Neanderthals (here, for example, one of the latest versions).
According to the latest data, Neanderthals may have interbred with modern humans, and modern non-African populations of Homo sapiens have approximately 2.5% Neanderthal genes.
3D model of a Neanderthal skull. Made by Sergei Krivoplyasov’s 3D project
especially for ANTHROPOGENES.RU
See also:
Neanderthal(lat. Homo neanderthalensis) is an extinct species from the genus People (lat. Homo). The first people with Neanderthal features (protoanderthals) appeared in Europe about 600 thousand years ago. Classic Neanderthals formed about 100-130 thousand years ago. The latest remains date back to 28-33 thousand years ago.
Opening
The remains of H. neanderthalensis were first discovered in 1829 by Philippe-Charles Schmerling in the caves of Engie (modern Belgium); it was the skull of a child. In 1848, the skull of an adult Neanderthal was found in Gibraltar (Gibraltar 1). Naturally, neither of these finds was considered at that time as evidence of the existence of an extinct species of people, and they were classified as the remains of Neanderthals much later.
The type specimen (holotype) of the species (Neanderthal 1) was found only in August 1856 in a limestone quarry in the Neanderthal Valley near Düsseldorf (North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany). It consists of the skull vault, two femurs, three bones from the right arm and two from the left, part of the pelvis, fragments of the scapula and ribs. The local gymnasium teacher Johann Karl Fuhlroth was interested in geology and paleontology. Having received the remains from the workers who found them, he paid attention to their complete fossilization and geological position and came to the conclusion of their considerable age and important scientific significance. Fuhlroth then handed them over to Hermann Schaafhausen, professor of anatomy at the University of Bonn. The discovery was announced in June 1857; this happened 2 years before the publication of Charles Darwin’s work “The Origin of Species.” In 1864, at the suggestion of the Anglo-Irish geologist William King, the new species was named after the place of its discovery. In 1867, Ernst Haeckel proposed the name Homo stupidus (i.e., Stupid Man), but in accordance with the rules of nomenclature, priority remained with King's name.
In 1880, the jawbone of a child of H. neanderthalensis was found in the Czech Republic, along with tools from the Mousterian period and the bones of extinct animals. In 1886, the perfectly preserved skeletons of a man and a woman were found in Belgium at a depth of about 5 m, also along with numerous Mousterian tools. Subsequently, the remains of Neanderthals were discovered in other places on the territory of modern Russia, Croatia, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Iran, Uzbekistan, Israel and other countries. To date, the remains of more than 400 Neanderthals have been found.
The status of the Neanderthal as a previously unknown species of ancient man was not immediately established. Many prominent scientists of that time did not recognize him as such. Thus, the outstanding German scientist Rudolf Virchow rejected the thesis of “primitive man” and considered the Neanderthal skull to be just a pathologically altered skull of a modern person. And the doctor and anatomist Franz Mayer, having studied the structure of the pelvis and lower extremities, put forward the hypothesis that the remains belonged to a person who spent a significant part of his life riding a horse. He suggested that it could be a Russian Cossack from the Napoleonic Wars era.
Classification
Almost since the discovery, scientists have been debating the status of Neanderthals. Some of them are of the opinion that Neanderthal man is not an independent species, but only a subspecies of modern man (Latin: Homo sapiens neanderthalensis). This is largely due to the lack of a clear definition of the species. One of the hallmarks of the species is reproductive isolation, and genetic studies suggest that Neanderthals and modern humans interbred. On the one hand, this supports the point of view about the status of Neanderthals as a subspecies of modern humans. But on the other hand, there are documented examples of interspecific crossings, as a result of which fertile offspring appeared, so this characteristic cannot be considered decisive. At the same time, DNA studies and morphological studies show that Neanderthals are still an independent species.
Origin
A comparison of the DNA of modern humans and H. neanderthalensis shows that they descended from a common ancestor, dividing approximately, according to various estimates, from 350-400 to 500 and even 800 thousand years ago.
Neanderthal (Homo neanderthalensis)
The likely ancestor of both of these species is Homo Heidelbergensis. Moreover, Neanderthals descended from the European population of H. heidelbergensis, and modern humans – from the African one and much later.
Anatomy and morphology
Men of this species had an average height of 164-168 cm, weight about 78 kg, women - 152-156 cm and 66 kg, respectively. The brain volume is 1500-1900 cm3, which exceeds the average brain volume of a modern person.
The cranial vault is low but long, the face is flat with massive brow ridges, the forehead is low and strongly inclined back. The jaws are long and wide with large teeth, protruding forward, but without a chin protrusion. Judging by the wear on their teeth, Neanderthals were right-handed.
Their physique was more massive than that of modern man. The chest is barrel-shaped, the torso is long, and the legs are relatively short. Presumably, the dense physique of Neanderthals is an adaptation to the cold climate, because. due to a decrease in the ratio of body surface to its volume, heat loss by the body through the skin is reduced. The bones are very strong, this is due to highly developed muscles. The average Neanderthal was significantly stronger than modern humans.
Genome
Early studies of the H. neanderthalensis genome focused on mitochondrial DNA (mDNA) studies. Because mDNA under normal conditions is inherited strictly through the maternal line and contains a significantly smaller amount of information (16,569 nucleotides versus ~3 billion in nuclear DNA), so the significance of such studies was not very great.
In 2006, the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology and 454 Life Sciences announced that the Neanderthal genome would be sequenced over the next few years. In May 2010, preliminary results of this work were published. The study found that Neanderthals and modern humans may have interbred, and every living person (except Africans) carries between 1 and 4 percent of H. neanderthalensis genes. Sequencing of the entire Neanderthal genome was completed in 2013, and the results were published in the journal Nature on December 18, 2013.
Habitat
Fossil remains of Neanderthals have been discovered over a large area of Eurasia, which includes such modern countries as Great Britain, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Germany, Croatia, Czech Republic, Israel, Iran, Ukraine, Russia, Uzbekistan. The easternmost find is the remains discovered in the Altai Mountains (Southern Siberia).
However, it should be taken into account that a significant part of the period of existence of this species occurred during the last glaciation, which could have destroyed evidence of Neanderthal habitation in more northern latitudes.
No traces of H. neanderthalensis have yet been found in Africa. This is probably due to the adaptation to the cold climate of both themselves and the animals that formed the basis of their diet.
Behavior
Archaeological evidence shows that Neanderthals spent most of their lives in small groups of 5-50 people. There were almost no old people among them, because... most did not live to be 35 years old, but some individuals lived to be 50. There is plenty of evidence of Neanderthals caring for each other. Among those studied, there are skeletons that have traces of cured injuries and diseases, therefore, during the healing, the tribesmen fed and protected the wounded and sick. There is evidence that the dead were buried, with funeral offerings sometimes found in the graves.
It is believed that Neanderthals rarely met strangers in their small territory or left it themselves. Although there are occasional finds of high-quality stone from sources more than 100 km away, these are not sufficient to conclude that there was trade or even regular contact with other groups.
H. neanderthalensis made extensive use of a variety of stone tools. However, over hundreds of thousands of years, their manufacturing technology has changed very little. Besides the obvious assumption that Neanderthals, despite their large brains, were not very smart, there is an alternative hypothesis. It lies in the fact that due to the small number of Neanderthals (and their number never exceeded 100 thousand individuals), the likelihood of innovation was low. Most of the Neanderthal stone tools belong to the Mousterian culture. Some of them are very sharp. There is evidence of the use of wooden instruments, but they themselves have practically not survived to this day.
Neanderthals used various types of weapons, including spears. But most likely they were used only in close combat, and not for throwing. This is indirectly confirmed by a large number of skeletons with traces of injuries caused by large animals that Neanderthals hunted and which made up the bulk of their diet.
Previously, it was believed that H. neanderthalensis fed exclusively on the meat of large land mammals, such as mammoths, bison, deer, etc. However, later discoveries showed that small animals and some plants also served as food. And in the south of Spain, traces were also found that Neanderthals ate marine mammals, fish and shellfish. However, despite the variety of food sources, obtaining sufficient quantities was often a problem. Proof of this are skeletons with signs of diseases caused by malnutrition.
It is assumed that Neanderthals already had a significant command of speech. This is indirectly evidenced by the production of complex tools and the hunting of large animals, which require communication for learning and interaction. In addition, there is anatomical and genetic evidence: the structure of the hyoid and occipital bones, the hypoglossal nerve, the presence of a gene responsible for speech in modern humans.
Extinction hypotheses
There are several hypotheses explaining the disappearance of this species, which can be divided into 2 groups: those associated with the emergence and spread of modern humans and other reasons.
According to modern ideas, modern man, having appeared in Africa, gradually began to spread to the north, where by this time Neanderthal man was widespread. Both of these species coexisted for many millennia, but Neanderthal was eventually completely replaced by modern humans.
There is also a hypothesis linking the disappearance of the Neanderthals with climate change caused by the eruption of a large volcano about 40 thousand years ago. This change led to a decrease in the amount of vegetation and the number of large herbivorous animals that fed on vegetation and, in turn, were the food of the Neanderthals. Accordingly, lack of food led to the extinction of H. neanderthalensis itself.
PALEOANTHROPES
PALEOANTHROPES(from paleo... and Greek anthropos - man), a generalized name for fossil people, who are considered as the second stage of human evolution, following the archanthropes and preceding the neoanthropes. Paleoanthropes are often incorrectly called Neanderthals.
NEANDERTHAL IS NOT OUR ANCESTOR
Bone remains of paleoanthropes are known from the Middle and Late Pleistocene of Europe, Asia and Africa. The geological age of paleoanthropes is from the end of the Mindelris interglacial and almost to the middle of the Würm glaciation. The absolute age is from 250 to 40 thousand years. Morphologically, paleoanthropes are a heterogeneous group. Along with primitive forms similar to archanthropes, among paleoanthropes there are representatives close to neoanthropes. Paleoanthropic culture - Middle and Late Acheulean and Mousterian (Early Paleolithic). They were mainly engaged in hunting large animals (cave bear, woolly rhinoceros and others). Social organization is the “primitive human herd.”
Although in general paleoanthropes were the predecessors of modern humans, not all paleoanthropes are his direct ancestors. Many of them, due to specialization and other reasons, did not develop into modern humans and became extinct (for example, the “classical Neanderthals” of Western Europe). Others (for example, the Central Asian paleoanthropes) followed the path of progressive evolution and gave rise to modern fossil humans.
Where were the oldest human remains found? The remains of an ancient Neanderthal man were found for the first time in
Where were the oldest human remains found?
I would never have thought that there was so much controversy surrounding the discovery of the oldest man. Basically, they are of a purely technical nature, i.e. the question is raised: can a humanoid creature that did not fully possess the necessary qualities be attributed to ancient man? For example, the creature walked upright, made tools, but it did not yet speak.
The first discovery of ancient man
First of all, it is necessary to figure out who is considered a person? A reasonable person must meet at least three characteristics:
- Upright walking.
- Availability of speech.
- Ability to think.
The third characteristic includes the ability to handle fire, and the ability to make tools, and the use of hunting skills, etc. Based on these characteristics, scientists identify the extreme highest stage in human evolution and call it Homo sapiens sapiens (homo sapiens sapiens). ).
It was previously believed that the oldest remains of this species were discovered in 1947 in the Sterkfontein caves of South Africa and this place was called the “Cradle of Humankind.”
Latest data on ancient man
In 2011, a group of archaeologists from Germany and Morocco analyzed the remains of humanoid creatures found back in the 60s. The bones were discovered in northern Africa (Morocco) at the paleontological site of Jebel Irhoud in one of the caves. The remains found belonged to five individuals, including a child and a teenager. The technology of that time did not allow scientists to thoroughly study the bones, so they believed that they had found the skeletons of Neanderthals. Using computed tomography, modern archaeologists reconstructed and created three-dimensional models of the skulls of the discovered people. When comparing them with previously found samples of the skulls of Neanderthals, Australopithecus and Erectus, it turned out that the facial part is more similar to modern humans.
Thus, their belonging to the genus Homo sapiens sapiens was proven. These relics dated back to 300,000 years ago. BC e. Finds in southern Africa dated back to 195,000 years ago. BC e.
Ancestor bone. The most ancient human remains found in Siberia | Science | Society
The authoritative scientific journal Nature published the work of an international group of scientists, which included six Russians. It was thanks to their enthusiasm that the scientific community received at its disposal a unique find, and with it the most ancient genome of homo sapiens.
Nobody believed it!
This story is full of wonderful coincidences, and just plain luck. It began with the fact that in 2008, Omsk artist Nikolai Peristov, who specialized in bone carving, wandered along the banks of the Irtysh in search of working material - the remains of a bison, mammoth and other prehistoric animals. He organized such forays regularly: the banks of the river are destroyed, the earth reveals what has been hidden in it for centuries and millennia. That day, Peristov noticed a bone sticking out of the washed layer, threw it into a bag and brought it home. Yes, just in case.
For two years, the bone lay in the artist’s storerooms until his acquaintance Alexey Bondarev, a forensic expert from the regional police department, drew attention to it. He is a biologist by training, and paleontology is his hobby. Bondarev carefully examined the bone. From its appearance it was clear that this was not an animal or even a Neanderthal. 35 cm long, the bone most closely resembled a human femur. But how old is this person?
Alexey turned for help to Yaroslav Kuzmin from the Institute of Geology and Mineralogy of the SB RAS in Novosibirsk. He took the find unusually seriously. “Simply put, he believed that the bone could be very ancient, tens of thousands of years old,” Bondarev recalls. — The fact is that in our area the remains of a person from the Paleolithic era (over 10 thousand years ago) have never been found. And no one expected that they could be found at all. This never even occurred to scientists! Archaeologists knew only ancient sites of homo sapiens with stone tools and animal bones discovered on them. In general, it was believed that the first people came to the territory of the Omsk region no earlier than 14 thousand years ago.”
Yaroslav Kuzmin is a well-known specialist in radiocarbon dating (this is one of the methods for determining the age of biological remains). He sent the bone for examination to the University of Oxford, with which he has been collaborating for a long time. The British were delighted: the analysis showed that the bone material is 45 thousand years old! To date, these are the oldest human remains dated directly, and not by indirect evidence (i.e.
NEANDERTHAL IS NOT OUR ANCESTOR
not by the environment in which they were found: tools, household items, etc.). The man from Ust-Ishim (he received his nickname from the name of the nearest village) is the oldest representative of the genus Homo sapiens discovered outside of Africa and the Middle East. And even in the north, at latitude 58! Scientists believe that it was the cold climate that helped preserve this bone.
Omsk artist Nikolai Peristov found a sensation on the river bank. Photo: From personal archive/ Alexey Bondarev
Cradle in Siberia
The discoveries didn't end there. Yaroslav Kuzmin involved geneticists in the case: the precious bone, accompanied by Russian scientists, went to Germany, to the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. They know firsthand about sensations from Siberia: it was at this institute that the DNA of the now famous “Denisovo” man from a cave in Altai was studied.
German anthropologists confirmed their colleagues’ conclusions about the age of the bone, and in addition, they found perfectly preserved DNA in it - the oldest at the moment. It took more than a year to assemble and read the genome. It turned out that Ust-Ishim man has 2.5% of Neanderthal genes - just like modern inhabitants of Eurasia. But the fragments of these genes are longer; foreign DNA is not as widely distributed throughout the genome as ours. Hence the conclusion: the Ust-Ishimets lived shortly after the crossing of humans with Neanderthals, and it happened somewhere 50-60 thousand years ago, along the road of Homo sapiens from Africa to Siberia.
“It is now clear that the history of the settlement of Asia was somewhat more complicated than previously thought,” emphasizes Yaroslav Kuzmin. — Coming out of Africa, some of our ancestors soon turned north - unlike those who settled in southern Asia. We also managed to find out the diet of the ancient Siberian. He was a hunter. His food was mainly ungulates - primitive bison, elk, wild horse, reindeer. But he also ate river fish.”
“I think this man looked almost the same as you and me,” adds Alexey Bondarev. - Dress him up, comb his hair, put him on a bus - no one will think that this is an ancestor who lived 45 thousand years ago. Well, maybe the skin will be darker.”
And most importantly, the man from Ust-Ishim turned out to be equally related to Europeans, Asians, and even residents of the Andaman Islands - aborigines who are hiding from the outside world and do not want to make contact with civilization. They, according to the theory of anthropologists, belonged to the early wave of migration from Africa. This means that, even if the Ust-Ishimite did not leave direct descendants (scientists do not exclude this), Siberia can safely be called one of the cradles of humanity.
15. The remains of the oldest person were found in
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Stone Age
1. Archaeological scientists divide the Stone Age into three main periods; the Paleolithic period includes
2.5 million - 12 thousand years BC e.
2. Scientists divide the Stone Age into main periods and 2.5 million - 12 thousand years BC. e. refers to
Paleolithic.
3. The Lower (Early) Paleolithic period covers time
2.5 million - 140 thousand years BC
4. Scientists divide the Stone Age into main periods and 2.5 million - 140 thousand years BC. covers time
Lower Paleolithic.
5. The Upper (Late) Paleolithic period covers time
40-12 thousand years BC
6. Scientists divide the Stone Age into main periods and 40-12 thousand years BC. covers time
Upper Paleolithic.
7. The Middle Paleolithic (Mousterian) period covers time
140-40 thousand years BC
8. Archaeological scientists divide the Stone Age into three main periods; the Mesolithic period includes
12 - 5 thousand years BC e.
9. Scientists divide the Stone Age into main periods and 12 - 5 thousand years BC. e. covers time
Mesolithic.
10. Archaeological scientists divide the Stone Age into three main periods; the Neolithic period includes
5-3 thousand years BC e.
11. Scientists divide the Stone Age into main periods and 5-3 thousand years BC. e. covers time
12. A sharp cooling on Earth occurred around
100 thousand years ago
13. A sharp cooling on Earth occurred about 100 thousand years ago, the melting of the glacier began approximately
13 thousand years ago.
14. Archaeological scientists date the Copper-Stone Age (Chalcolithic) to the period
3000-2800 BC
16. The remains of the oldest person were found in 1974 in Kenya, scientists called him
"skillful man"
Lower Paleolithic.
18. The most ancient people Pithecanthropus and Sinanthropus in science were called
"humans erect"
19. One of the oldest people was Pithecanthropus, his remains were found for the first time
on the island of Java.
20. The remains of an ancient man - a Neanderthal - were first found in
Germany
21. After the Neanderthals, about 35-40 thousand years ago, the
"reasonable man"
22. The first dwellings of ancient people were
23. Pebble stone, processed and sharpened on both sides, was called
24. Man reached the highest level of stone processing in the era
25. What distinguished ancient man from the animal world was, first of all, his ability
make tools.
26. The most ancient Stone Age sites found in the Karatau Mountains belong to
Lower Paleolithic
27. Scientists call the ancient man who lived in the Middle Paleolithic
Neanderthal.
28. An ancient man whom scientists call a Neanderthal lived during the period
Middle Paleolithic.
29. The most ancient sites of the Stone Age, which date back to the Lower Paleolithic, have been found
in the Karatau mountains
30. The formation of “homo sapiens” occurs in the era
Upper Paleolithic.
31. Scientists call Homo sapiens by location
Cro-Magnon.
32. Scientists attribute the origin of religious ideas, the appearance of rock and cave paintings to the era
Upper Paleolithic.
33. A permanent group of relatives - the clan community appears during the formation period
"Homo sapiens."
34. During the period of formation of “homo sapiens”, a permanent team appears -
tribal community.
35. Scientists attribute the beginning of the formation of plants and animals of the modern type to the era
Mesolithic.
36. One of the main features of the Mesolithic era is the invention
microliths.
37. One of the main features of the Mesolithic era is the invention
bow and arrows.
38. Bow and arrows were invented during the period
Mesolithic.
39. Scientists attribute the beginning of the domestication of wild animals and the cultivation of some plants to the end of the era:
Mesolithic.
40. In the Mesolithic era, man learned to make thin stone plates, 1-2 cm long, which are called
microliths.
41. In the Mesolithic era, people were forced to often change their habitats due to
animal migration.
42. The original collective of people for joint food production and protection from animals
Primitive herd.
43. For the first time, the remains of “homo sapiens” were discovered
in France.
44. Man made the first tools from
45. One of the first activities of ancient man
Gathering.
46. On the territory of Kazakhstan, the largest number of Paleolithic sites were found in:
Southern Kazakhstan.
47. The first tool of ancient man made of stone
48. The first people appeared on the territory of Kazakhstan during the period
Early Paleolithic.
49. Tool of labor of ancient man, which was used for catching fish
50. Cave paintings first appear during the period
Upper Paleolithic.
51. On the island of Java, archaeologists discovered the remains of an ancient man -
Pithecanthropa.
52. In China, archaeologists discovered the remains of an ancient man -
Sinanthropa.
53. In France, archaeologists discovered the remains of “Homo sapiens” for the first time -
Cro-Magnon.
54. People first created new tools: axes with handles, hoes, millstones in the era
55. One of the features of the Neolithic era is the manufacture
pottery.
56. Ancient people learned to make pottery during the period
Neolithic
57. The first metal that ancient people learned to use:
copper.
58. Man first began to use metal tools during the period:
Chalcolithic.
59. The era of the appearance of the first metal products made of copper
Chalcolithic
60. The first social division of labor, the replacement of matriarchy with patriarchy dates back to the period
Chalcolithic.
61. A striking monument of the Eneolithic period is the settlement of Botai
in the north of Kazakhstan.
62. The word Chalcolithic means
Copper-Stone Age.
63. The primitive loom was invented in the era
64. We learn about the unique worldview of the people of the Neolithic era, about their belief in the afterlife from the ancients
burial grounds.
65. The Neolithic era is sometimes called
"The Age of Clay Pots"
66. Productive labor appeared in the era
67. Archaeological scientists date the Copper-Stone Age (Chalcolithic) to the period
3000-2800 BC
68. Ancient people passed on their knowledge through a picture letter called
pictography.
69. Form of religion, belief in kinship with some animal, which was considered the patron of the clan
totemism.
70. Evidence of the existence of the cult of mother earth and the maternal family among ancient people is found
figurines of women.
71. Evidence of the existence of the cult of mother earth and the maternal clan among ancient people is found
figurines of women.
72. During the Chalcolithic era, decay occurs
Matriarchal family
Who are Neanderthals?
During the third ice age, the outlines of Europe were completely different, not the same as now. Geologists point out differences in the position of land, seas and coastlines on the map. Vast areas to the west and northwest, covered today by the waters of the Atlantic, were then dry land, the North Sea and the Irish Sea were river valleys. The ice cap that covered both poles of the Earth pulled huge amounts of water from the oceans, and sea levels continually dropped, exposing vast areas of land. Now they were under water again.
The Mediterranean was then probably a vast valley below the general level of the sea. In the valley itself there were two inland seas, cut off from the ocean by land. The climate of the Mediterranean basin was probably moderately cold. The Sahara region, located to the south, was not then a desert with hot stones and sand dunes, but a humid and fertile area.
Between the thickness of the glacier in the north and the Mediterranean valley and the Alps in the south stretched a wild, dim region, the climate of which varied from harsh to relatively mild, and with the onset of the fourth ice age it became harsher again.
The southward advance of the glacier peaked during the fourth ice age (about 50,000 years ago) and then declined again.
First Neanderthals
In the earlier Third Ice Age, small groups of early Neanderthals roamed this plain, leaving behind nothing that could now be evidence of their presence (except for rough-hewn primary stone tools). Perhaps, in addition to the Neanderthals, there were other species of apes and anthropoids who lived at that time and could use stone tools. We can only guess this. Apparently they had a variety of different wooden tools. By studying and using various pieces of wood, they learned to give the desired shape to stones.
After weather conditions became extremely unfavorable, Neanderthals began to seek shelter in caves and rock crevices. It seems they already knew how to use fire back then. Neanderthals gathered around open fires on the plains, trying not to move too far from sources of water. They were already intelligent enough to adapt to new, more complex conditions. As for the ape-like people, apparently, they could not withstand the tests of the onset of the fourth ice age (the crudest, poorly processed tools were no longer encountered).
Not only people sought shelter in caves. During this period, cave lions, cave bears, and cave hyenas were encountered. Man had to somehow drive these animals out of the caves and not let them back. Fire was an effective means of attack and defense. The first people did not go too deep into the caves, because they could not yet illuminate their homes. They climbed just deep enough to be able to shelter from bad weather and store food supplies. Perhaps they blocked the entrance to the cave with heavy boulders. The only source of light that helped explore the depths of the caves could be the light of torches.
What did Neanderthals hunt?
Such huge animals as a mammoth, a cave bear or even a reindeer were very difficult to kill with the weapons that the Neanderthals had: wooden spears, clubs, sharp fragments of flint, which have survived to this day.
It is likely that Neanderthals preyed on smaller animals, although on occasion they, of course, also ate the meat of large animals. We know that Neanderthals partially ate their prey at the site where they were able to kill it, and then took large brain bones with them into caves, split them and ate them. Among the various bone debris at Neanderthal sites, there are almost no backbones or ribs of large animals, but there are large quantities of split or crushed brain bones.
Neanderthals wrapped themselves in the skins of dead animals. It is also likely that their women tanned these skins using stone scrapers.
We also know that these people were right-handed, just like modern humans, because the left side of their brain (responsible for the right side of the body) is larger than the right. The occipital lobes of the Neanderthals' brain, which were responsible for vision, touch and the general state of the body, were quite well developed, while the frontal lobes, associated with thinking and speech, were still relatively small. The Neanderthal's brain was no smaller than that of modern humans, but it was structured differently.
Without a doubt, the thinking of these representatives of the homo species was not similar to ours. And it’s not even that they were simpler or more primitive than us. Neanderthals are a completely different evolutionary line. It is likely that they were absolutely unable to speak or uttered fragmentary monosyllabic sounds. They certainly did not have anything that could be called coherent speech.
How did Neanderthal live?
Homo neanderthalensis
Fire was a real treasure at that time. Having lost the fire, it was not so easy to start it again. When there was no need for a large flame, it was extinguished by raking the fire into one heap. They made a fire, most likely, by striking a piece of iron pyrite against flint over a heap of dry leaves and grass. In England, inclusions of pyrite and flint are found next to each other where chalk rocks and clays are adjacent.
Women and children had to constantly monitor the fire so that the flame did not go out. At times they went in search of dry dead wood to keep the fire going. This activity gradually grew into a custom.
The only adult male in each group of Neanderthals was probably the elder. Besides him there were also women, boys and girls. But when one of the teenagers became old enough to arouse the jealousy of the leader, he attacked his opponent and drove him out of the herd or killed him. When the leader was over forty, when his teeth were worn out and his strength left him, one of the young men killed the old leader and began to rule in his place. There was no place for the elderly near the saving fire. The weak and sick at that time faced one fate - death.
What did the tribe eat at the sites?
Primitive people are usually depicted as hunters of mammoths, bears or lions. But it is unlikely that a primitive savage could hunt an animal larger than a hare, rabbit or rat. It was more likely that someone was hunting a man than he himself was the hunter.
Primitive savages were plant-eaters and carnivores at the same time. They ate hazelnuts and groundnuts, beech nuts, edible chestnuts, and acorns. They also collected wild apples, pears, cherries, wild plums and sloe, rose hips, rowan and hawthorn, mushrooms; they ate the buds, where they were larger and softer, and also ate juicy, fleshy rhizomes and underground shoots of various plants.
On occasion, they did not pass by bird nests, taking eggs and chicks, and picked out the honeycombs and honey of wild bees. Newts, frogs and snails were eaten. They ate fish, live and asleep, and freshwater shellfish. Primitive people easily caught fish with their hands, entangling it in algae or diving for it. Larger birds or small animals could be caught by hitting them with a stick or using primitive snares. The savage did not refuse snakes, worms and crayfish, as well as the larvae of various insects and caterpillars. The most delicious and nutritious prey, without a doubt, were bones, crushed and ground into powder.
Primitive man would not have protested if he had meat that was not the freshest for lunch. He constantly looked for and found carrion; even half-decomposed, it was still used for food. By the way, the craving for moldy and semi-moldy foods has persisted to this day.
In difficult conditions, driven by hunger, primitive people ate their weaker relatives or sick children who happened to be lame and deformed.
No matter how primitive primitive man may seem to us now, it is possible to call him the most advanced of all animals, because he represented the highest stage of development of the animal kingdom.
No matter how the more ancient Paleolithic people treated their dead, there is reason to assume that the later homo neanderthalensis did this at least with respect for the deceased and accompanied the process with a certain ritual. One of the most famous Neanderthal skeletons found belongs to a young man whose body may even have been deliberately buried.
Human and Neanderthal skull
The skeleton lay in a sleeping position. The head and right forearm rested on several pieces of flint, carefully arranged like a pillow. Next to the head was a large hand ax, and many charred, split bull bones were scattered around, as if left over from a funeral feast.
Neanderthals roamed Europe, camped around campfires, and died over a period that spanned 100,000 years or more. Moving higher and higher on the evolutionary ladder, these people improved, straining their limited capabilities. But the thick skull seemed to fetter the creative powers of the brain, and until the very end the Neanderthal remained a low-browed, undeveloped creature.
There is an opinion among scientists that the Neanderthal type of man, homo neanderthalensis, is an extinct species that did not mix with modern people (homo sapiens). But many scientists do not share this point of view. Some prehistoric skulls are considered by them to be the result of mixing of Neanderthals with other types of primitive people.
One thing is absolutely clear - the Neanderthal was on a completely different evolutionary line.
Last Paleolithic People
When Tasmania was discovered by the Dutch, they found there a tribe isolated from the rest of the world, whose level of development was almost no different from the man of the Lower Paleolithic. The Tasmanians were not the same type of people as the Neanderthals: this is proven by the structure of their skulls, cervical vertebrae, teeth and jaws. They had no ancestral resemblance to Neanderthals. They belonged to the same species as us.
The Tasmanians represented only the Neanderthaloid stage of development in the evolution of modern humans. There is no doubt that over many millennia (during which only scattered groups of Neanderthals were human beings in Europe) somewhere in other regions of the planet, modern humans developed in parallel with Neanderthals.
The level of development, which turned out to be the limit for Neanderthals, was only the starting level for others, but among the Tasmanians it was preserved in its original, unchanged form. Finding themselves far from those with whom they could compete or learn from, living in conditions that did not require constant effort, the Tasmanians unwittingly found themselves behind the rest of humanity. But even on these outskirts of civilization, man did not stop in his development. The Tasmanians of the early 19th century were much less clumsy and undeveloped than their primitive relatives.
Rhodesian skull
1921, summer - a rather interesting find was discovered in one of the caves in the Broken Hill area, South Africa. It was a skull without a lower jaw and several bones of a new species of homo (Rhodesian man), intermediate between Neanderthal and homo sapiens. The skull was only slightly mineralized; as you can see, its owner lived only a few thousand years ago.
The discovered creature resembled a Neanderthal. But the structure of his body did not have specific Neanderthal characteristics. The skull, neck, teeth and limbs of the Rhodesian man were almost no different from modern ones. We know nothing about the structure of his palms. But the size of the upper jaw and its surface show that the lower jaw was very massive, and the powerful brow ridges gave their owner an ape-like appearance.
Apparently it was a human being with a monkey's face. It could well last until the time of the appearance of a real person and even exist in parallel with him in South Africa.
In several places in South Africa, the remains of people of the so-called Boskop type, very ancient, were also discovered, but to what extent they have not yet been reliably established. The skulls of the Boskop people were more similar to the skulls of modern Bushmen than to the skulls of some other peoples living today. It is possible that these are the most ancient human beings known to us.
Skulls found at Wadiak (Java), shortly before the discovery of the remains of Pithecanthropus, may very well bridge the gap between Rhodesian man and the Australoid aborigines.
Stanislav DROBYSHEVSKY,
Anthropologist, Candidate of Biological Sciences, Associate Professor of the Department of Anthropology, Faculty of Biology, Moscow State University named after M.V. Lomonosov, scientific editor of ANTROPOGENEZ.RU:
“Many people wonder: how are Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons related to their ancestors? Where did they come from?
Many people know that there were some Australopithecines, then early Homo (Habilis, Rudolfensis), then there was Homo erectus, then bam - Neanderthals and sapiens appear. And, on the one hand, it turns out that, if you look from afar, the culture of Sapiens and Neanderthals is somewhat similar, but the Erecti have some kind of Acheulean axes, cleavers, and they are completely different. And how this, on the one hand, is interconnected culturally, and, on the other hand, biologically escapes many.
In fact, the contrast between erectuses on the one hand and all others on the other is completely artificial. That is, this is a legacy of the times when Fulroth found a Neanderthal, Dubois found a Pithecanthropus, and others found a Cro-Magnon. And there were three points: erectuses were ancient, then later - the Ice Age with mammoths and Neanderthals, then also the Ice Age with the same mammoths, but with Cro-Magnons. And between them there is a hole. 150 years have passed since these discoveries, and now it is known that in the interim there was a lot more interesting things.
Eugene Dubois - Dutch anthropologist who found and described the remains of Pithecanthropus in 1891
And, in fact, probably the most interesting thing was in the middle. And in the middle between erectus and all the other late humans was Homo heidelbergensis. The name is arbitrary, because the specific name Homo heidelbergensis refers to a specific jaw from the village of Mauer in Germany, which, by the way, is generally not clear who it is, since it is a jaw.
In a broad sense, Homo heidelbergensis or paleoanthropes, or post-archanthropes, are the descendants of erectus, on the one hand, the ancestors of Neanderthals. This is a European lineage that later spread to Asia. And the African ones are also conditionally heidelbergensis - they are called Homo rhodesiensis or Homo helmei, they are all the same. These are the ancestors of sapiens who originated in Africa. At some point, they crawled out of this Africa and began to interact with Neanderthals. Knowing that Homo heidelbergensis existed with their cultures, we see that there is a direct, completely immediate continuity between erecti and later hominids.
That is, erectures came out of Africa several times. The first exit was, strictly speaking, even before erectus. These are the people in Dmanisi in Georgia. In terms of their physical type, if they are similar to anyone, it is to the rudolfensis (Homo rudolfensis), which lived a little earlier in Africa. But this line, most likely, was a dead end and ended in nothing.
Then, probably, the descendants of these Dmanisis, or perhaps some kind of their own line, once again left Africa, reached Asia, settled there all the way to Java, and from there even reached the island of Flores (Indonesia), where the hobbits (Homo floresiensis) arose . In Java, evolution followed its own path: people from Ngandong or Solo (river) arose there. Some branches came to Sulawesi - who was there is unknown, only guns were found there. Someone made it to the Philippines: there is a dwarf metatarsal bone from a leg that belonged to a dwarf man.
Someone evolved in Asia, east and south of at least Altai. The most famous are the Denisovans, they have their own branch, but very little is known about them. This entire eastern part of history is still covered in darkness.
It is well known what happened in Europe and Africa. In Europe, these descendants of erectus were called Homo heidelbergensis. Scientists have a beautiful chain: Sima del Elefante (Spain), Gran Dolina Atapuerca (Spain) and a lot more finds: Sima de los Huesos (Spain), Stenheim (Germany), Swanscombe (England) and much more . Between these people of Europe there probably were their own separate specific groups. More archaic - guys with huge eyebrows and scary backs of their heads. Or people from Ceprano (Italy) and others - there were quite massive citizens there. There were also quite graceful ones, for example, from the same Swanscombe, they were a little simpler. There were a little larger and a little smaller, but one way or another, they were all Homo heidelbergensis. A lot of interesting things happened to them because, on the one hand, in terms of culture, this is also Acheulian, that is, the heritage of African erectuses in its direct form.
But the Acheulean is quite beautiful, because if the Acheulean ones in Africa are all crooked, oblique and clumsy, then the European late Acheulean is beautiful. There the chops were of perfect symmetry, smooth and perfectly done. That is, typologically this is also Acheulian, but it is clear that this is a new level. It’s like a cart and a normal car - it also seems to have wheels and drives on the road, but this one is all crooked, askew and withered, but this one shines and you want to drive it. And these European heidelbergensis are coming up with a lot of great innovations, and they've been actively burning fire since about 350,000 years ago or a little earlier. They begin to use fire a lot, that is, before this, somewhere around 20 times in a million years they burned it, and then suddenly they begin to actively use it. They begin to build normal homes. True, many archaeologists argue here: many of their traces have been found. They have composite tools, where several elements are connected to each other and the idea appears of attaching a tip to a shaft, smearing it there with resin, tying it with ropes, etc. They develop some kind of rituals, complexes arise where it is clear that something was going on in their heads, that they were being clever, putting stalactites in circles, burning bear skulls and doing something else. In the end, they have children's toys when the small-sized tool is also made using Acheulean technology.
And so, little by little, by the time of 150,000 years ago, all this flows into the Neanderthals. A couple more ice ages - and now the ready-made Neanderthals are already on the way. They are improving their weapons, which are reaching a new level of Mousterian. Everything is completely new, decorations, normal burials and much more interesting things appear. But all this is a direct heritage of these same European Heidelbergensis. And then they “cook” in Europe, go to the Middle East, reach Altai and then begin to have fun.
At the same time, when Heidelbergensis lived in Europe, in Africa their closest relatives, who were almost no different from them in appearance, slowly evolved into sapiens. This is the culture of the so-called Middle Stone Age of Africa, which is not the Middle Paleolithic, but the Middle Stone Age. Oddly enough, these are different words. These are cultures that are also the heirs of Acheul, and they also sometimes have quite beautiful axes, but at the same time they begin to make a lot of tips, actively use ocher, somehow more actively use environmental resources: they have plants, almost hunt seals and whales etc. They began to develop bone tools en masse and, at some point, individual decorations.
And in the interval from 200,000 years ago, when the influence of Acheul was still quite felt, to 50,000 years ago, when it completely disappeared, sapiens appeared. From these same erectoid original forms: muzzled, with terrible eyebrows, with huge backs of heads, with large jaws without a chin, and the face became smaller, the back of the head was rounder, the eyebrows were weaker, the forehead was more convex, the jaw began to protrude... And 50,000 thousand years ago he was already quite a sapiens, maybe even a little earlier, with a chin and smaller teeth. And the tools change.
Then, when they move to the Middle East, the Pre-Aurignac culture arises. Here, however, the story is also a little dark, because there are different ideas about it, but in a broad sense it remains pre-Aurignac. And what is characteristic is that there are transitional cultures from the Middle Stone Age in Africa to the Classical Paleolithic in Europe. For example, in the Middle East there is the Acheulian-Yabrudian culture. It is, as it were, Acheulean - Acheulean-Yabrud, and, on the other hand, Yabrud, and there are already plates there. That is, on the one hand, these are choppers - scary and quite erectoid, and, on the other hand, plates, although clumsy, are plates, and plate technology is the basis of the culture of the Upper Paleolithic. That is, completely sapient. Then these axes disappear completely, only the plates remain. That's it - here we have a beautiful, wonderful transition from the classical Acheulean to the classical Upper Paleolithic. Plus 150,000 years of the Middle Stone Age in between where something else changed. Moreover, there were many different cultures, and they were not always similar to each other.
There is a transition in morphology and a transition in culture. They are in the Middle East - these emerged sapiens meet with Neanderthals. Neanderthals disappear quite quickly, in just 10,000 years, and only sapiens remain on the entire planet. That's all interaction."
It is unlikely that there will be a person who will take the liberty of drawing an unambiguous conclusion about whether Neanderthals died out or were assimilated into subsequent species and generations of representatives of the human race. The name of this subspecies was determined by the Neanderthal Gorge in Western Germany, where an ancient skull was found. At first, people working in this place suspected criminal implications of the find, and therefore got scared and called the police. But the event turned out to be more significant for history.
Period heyday of Neanderthal man(Fig. 1), who lived in Europe and Western Asia (starting from the Middle East - and ending with Southern Siberia), is considered to be a period of time of 130-28 thousand years, going back centuries. Despite the many signs of the structure of the body and head, as well as behavioral features that make Homo neanderthalensis similar to modern humans, the harsh living conditions left a peculiar imprint in the form of a massive skeleton and skull. But this fellow countryman of ours from the past, specialized in a predatory lifestyle, could already be proud of his brain volume, which in its value exceeds the average indicators characteristic of even many of our contemporaries.
Rice. 1 - Neanderthal
The discovery did not produce the desired success at first. The significance of this discovery was realized much later. It so happened that it was this type of fossil people that scientists devoted the greatest amount of work and time to. As it turned out, even among representatives of the human race of non-African origin living in our time, 2.5% of genes are Neanderthal.
External features of a Neanderthal
Upright, but stooped and stocky representatives of this subspecies of Homo sapiens, who experienced all the hardships of existence during the period of total glaciation, had a height of: 1.6-1.7 meters - in men; 1.5-1.6 - in women. The heaviness of the skeleton and solid muscle mass were combined with a volume of the skull of 1400-1740 cm³ and the brain - 1200-1600 cm³. It seemed that the short neck was bending forward under the weight of the large head, and the low forehead seemed to be running back. Despite the size of the skull and brain, almost the same as that of all of us, inhabitants of the 21st century, the Neanderthal is distinguished by some flattening, large width and flatness of the frontal lobes. The largest part of the brain is the occipital lobe, which extends sharply backwards.
Rice. 2 - Neanderthal skull
Forced to eat rough food, these people could boast of very strong teeth. Their cheekbones would surprise us with their width, and their jaw muscles with their power. But despite the size of the jaws, they do not protrude forward. But there is no point in talking about facial beauty by our standards, since the unflattering impression of heavy brow ridges and a small chin is enhanced by the sight of a huge nose. But such an organ is simply necessary to warm cold air during inhalation and protect the upper and lower respiratory tract.
There is an assumption that Neanderthals had pale skin and red hair, and men did not grow beards or mustaches. The structure of their vocal apparatus is such that there is every reason to draw a conclusion regarding their conversational capabilities. But their speech was partly like singing.
The resistance of people of this type to cold can be explained not only by the characteristics of their body, but also by the hypertrophied proportions of the body. The impressive width at the shoulders, the width of the pelvis, the power of the muscles and the barrel-shaped chest turned the body into some kind of ball, which worked to increase the intensity of warming and reduce heat loss. They had not only short arms, more like paws, but also a shortened tibia, which, given their dense build, inevitably led to a decrease in step and, accordingly, to an increase in energy consumption for walking (compared to people of our time - up to 32%).
Diet
The increased need to replenish energy reserves is easily explained by the hardships of life at that time. Based on this, it becomes clear why they could not do without regularly eating meat. For many millennia, Neanderthals collectively hunted mammoths, woolly rhinoceroses, bison, cave bears and other large animals. Another item on the menu was roots obtained using digging knives. But they did not eat milk, since German anthropologists were able to discover a gene belonging to a Neanderthal, due to which this product was not absorbed by the body of a mature person.
Dwellings
Of course, the most reliable and safe housing were caves, where one could distinguish a kitchen area with the remains of eaten animals, a sleeping place next to a large fireplace, and also a workshop. But often they had to build mobile dwellings (Fig. 3) in the form of huts from large mammoth bones and animal skins. Neanderthals usually settled in groups of 30-40 people, and marriages between close relatives were not uncommon.
Rice. 3 - Mobile home of Neanderthals
Attitude towards death
During the time of the Neanderthals, the whole family took part in burying the dead. The bodies of the dead were sprinkled with ocher, and to block access to them for wild animals, large stones and skulls of deer, rhinoceroses, hyenas or bears were piled on the grave, which served as part of some kind of ritual. In addition, food, toys and weapons (spears, darts, clubs) were placed next to dead relatives. It was Neanderthals who were the first in human history to place flowers on graves. These facts confirm their belief in the afterlife and the beginning of the formation of religious ideas.
Tools for labor and cultural purposes
To collect roots, the Neanderthal deftly wielded digging knives, and to protect himself and his relatives, as well as for hunting, they used spears and clubs, since they did not have throwing weapons or bows and arrows. And the decoration of various products was done using drills. The fact that people, surrounded by a hostile world with many hardships and dangers, valued beauty is evidenced by the 4-hole flute of that time. Made from bone, it could produce a melody from three notes: “do”, “re”, “mi”. The ideas of this subspecies of people about art are eloquently illustrated by a find made near the town of La Roche-Cotard in 2003, which is a 10-centimeter stone sculpture in the form of a human face. The age of this product dates back to 35 thousand years.
It is not entirely clear how to perceive the parallel scratches on the bones found near Arcy-sur-Cure, Bachokiro, in Molodova, as well as the pits on the stone slab. And there are no questions about the use of jewelry made from drilled animal teeth and painted shells. The fact that Neanderthals decorated themselves with compositions of feathers of different lengths and colors is evidenced by the remains of different species of birds (22 species), whose feathers were cut off. Scientists were able to identify the bones of a bearded vulture, a falcon, a black Eurasian vulture, a golden eagle, a wood pigeon and an alpine jackdaw. At the Pronyatin site in Ukraine, an image of a leopard from 30-40 thousand years ago was found scratched on a bone.
Neanderthals, considered carriers of the Mousterian culture, used disc-shaped and single-area cores in stone processing. Their techniques for creating scrapers, points, drills and knives were characterized by breaking off wide flakes and using trimming along the edges. But the processing of bone material has not received proper development. The beginnings of art are confirmed by finds with a hint of ornament (pits, crosses, stripes). On the same scale it is worth putting the presence of traces of ocher staining and the discovery of the semblance of a pencil in the form of a piece ground off as a result of use.
Issues of medicine and care for relatives
If you examine it with utmost care neanderthal skeletons(Fig. 4), on which there are traces of fractures and their treatment, then one cannot help but admit that already at this stage of the development of civilization the services of a chiropractor were provided. Of the total number of injuries studied, the effectiveness of medical care was 70%. To help people and their animals, this problem had to be dealt with professionally. The concern of fellow tribesmen for their neighbors is confirmed by excavations in Iraq (Shanidar Cave), where the remains of Neanderthals with broken ribs and a broken skull were found under rubble. Apparently, the wounded were in a safe place while the rest of their relatives were busy working and hunting.
Rice. 4 - Neanderthal skeleton
Genetics issues
Judging by the deciphering of the Neanderthal genome from 2006, there is every reason to assert that the divergence between our ancestors and this subspecies dates back 500 thousand years ago, even before the races known to us spread. True, the DNA similarity between Neanderthals and modern humans is 99.5%. The ancestors of the Caucasoid race are considered to be the Cro-Magnons, who had hostile relations with the Neanderthals, which is confirmed by the remains of gnawed bones from each other at sites. Necklaces made of human teeth, as well as shin bones with a cut-off joint, used as caskets, also serve as evidence of the confrontation.
The struggle for territory is evidenced by the periodic transition of caves from Neanderthals to Cro-Magnons - and vice versa. Judging by the equivalence of technologies of both types, the driving force behind their development could be climatic changes: with the onset of cold weather, the hardy and strong Neanderthal gained the upper hand, and with warming, the heat-loving homo sapiens. But there is also an assumption regarding crossing between them. Moreover, by 2010, Neanderthal genes had been discovered in the genomes of many modern peoples.
As a result of comparison Neanderthal genome with analogues of our contemporaries from China, France, and Papua New Guinea, the likelihood of interbreeding was recognized. How did this happen: did men bring Neanderthals into their tribe, or did women choose Neanderthals known as good hunters? This suggests the assumption that Neanderthals are some kind of alternative branch of human development that has disappeared over the centuries. Who else besides them can be considered super native Europeans? It was the Neanderthal who first populated Europe - and reigned here unchallenged for hundreds of millennia. In terms of their level of predatory nature, only the Eskimos can compare with them, whose diet consists almost 100% of meat dishes.
The fate of the Neanderthals: versions and assumptions
To answer the question regarding the disappearance of the Neanderthals, one can take into account any of the modern concepts. One of them is the opinion of Alesha Hodlicka, an anthropologist from the United States, who considers Neanderthals to be our ancestors at one of the stages of human development. According to his hypothesis, there is a gradual transition of the Neanderthal into the Cro-Magnon group. The theory regarding the extermination of one species by another has the right to life. There is also a version regarding Bigfoot as the last representative of an extinct subspecies. Or maybe Neanderthals continued their race in the form of mestizos homo sapiens.
Neanderthals are an extinct, dead-end branch of people, named after the name of the valley near Düsseldorf (Germany), where they were found in one thousand eight hundred and fifty-six. They lived on Earth about 200 thousand years ago.
What did Neanderthals look like?
Their appearance seems unusual and even ugly to modern people. Average height, shorter than modern adults. Broad-boned, with prominent powerful cheekbones, shorter limbs than those of Homo sapies, sloping cheekbones and chin, overhanging brow ridges. Weighed on average about 90 kilograms. But the volume of the brain and skull was greater than that of modern Homo sapiens. They knew how to speak, although their speech was different from ordinary human speech.
Where did they live?
Neanderthals lived in the pre-glacial zone of the Earth. Their remains were found in Africa, Eurasia, Central Asia, southern Siberia, and also in the Far East. They conquered the highlands and the Tropics. But Neanderthals did not advance far to the North, presumably due to changes in climatic conditions.
What did Neanderthals do?
Neanderthals hunted large animals: deer, mammoths, rhinoceroses. We learned how to make fire to heat our homes and cook food. They knew how to keep the fire going. There were some cultural rituals and the beginnings of art. They were engaged in gathering. They knew how to take care of their fellow tribesmen. Unlike more ancient people, Neanderthals developed a belief about the afterlife and a ritual for burying the dead. The established tradition of seeing off those who have gone to another world lives to this day.
Biological features of the existence of Neanderthals
High mortality and a short life span left Neanderthals little time to pass on experience to subsequent generations. They waged a strong struggle with nature for existence. Those people who managed to survive were distinguished by a stronger physique, progression in the development of the brain and limbs. A kind of natural selection took place.
Almost like people, but not yet human
Neanderthals mastered fire, they had religious rituals, they could create weapons and tools, but outwardly they differ from HomoSapies. There is an assumption that Neanderthals did not become extinct or exterminated, but went high into the mountains and got lost in the tropical forests. The meeting of contemporaries with the so-called Bigfoot is a meeting with a Neanderthal or flathead. And it’s too early to put a definitive conclusion on the relationship between Neanderthals and humans.
