Neanderthals Stitched Too Little Too Late

[Klingan]

Neanderthals probably froze to death in the last ice age because rapid climate change caught them by surprise without the tools needed to make warm clothes, finds new research.

 

Ian Gilligan, a postgraduate researcher from the Australian National University argues his case in the current issue of the journal World Archaeology. By the time some Neanderthals developed sewing tools it was too little too late, said Gilligan.

 

Neanderthals began to die out just before the last glacial maximum, 35,000 to 30,000 years ago and were replaced by modern humans. Previous studies have argued that one of the key reasons for this is that modern humans had better hunting tools, providing them with the extra food they needed to survive the cold.

 

Read more here.

[caldrail]

This is a little suspect. Neanderthals weren't stupid, despite their heavy browed appearance, and were well aware that if they travelled south the temperature got better, and they didn't originate in the north, nor was the change in weather that abrupt, nor was sewing a prerequisite for survival. Neatly sewed warm clothes were an advantage certainly, but surely neanderthals were well used to the cold weather to devise some way of strapping crude hides on their person, which would have done the same job. It must also be remembered that they didn't live in the coldest regions of ice-age europe, but preferred the areas they could find food, which meant animal herds as well as nuts and berries, so they were definitely living in regions within the habitable sphere of the ice-age cold (and very cold it must have been). Humans, neanderthal or not, are adapatable creatures and survive in some very extreme climates today, plus the neanderthals were physically adapted for life in cold regions anyway.

 

My own suspicion is that they were too rarified as a people, that they were too prone to the illnesses that cro-magnons brought with their wolves/dogs, and that possibly many were caught out by changes in animal migrations and numbers. Effectively, they lost the competition for survival despite their best efforts.

 

One of the last outposts of neanderthals was Portugal, where studies have suggested that the last survivors went off to the nearest cro-magnon camp and asked to live with them - there are both remains on-site and no evidence of conflict.

 

The cro-magnons were probably more aggressive as well as better equipped, and perhaps better communicators?

[Klingan]

Your post makes a whole lot of sense Caldrail but I'm not sure that I agree with at least the last thought about communications. There is nothing to suggest that they would have less advanced communications to my knowledge. Not making the same kind of sounds yes that might be but I reckon that they also had a larger brain volume. If anything I suspect that they had a different but most likely not inferior and possibly even more advanced language and more then that better adapted to the cold climate language. Considering their far longer time in the area and their longer line of origin they should therefor have had more time to develop an effective language. They were probably very far from dumb.

 

Possibly they had less of an effective immune system since they were even less differenced then what we are today as a race. This is still a problem since a new decease can strike very hard on the whole of humanity as we lack genetic differences making us non-incubational.

[caldrail]

Neanderthals are known to have a larger brain volume, a characteristic that may well have developed from having to live in a harsh enviroment. However, its also believed that neanderthals moved around in small family groups. This is an important point. They lived a semi-nomadic life constantly searching for resources or latching on to herds for that purpose, and there's no evidence that neanderthals developed any larger scale social gatherings, though its entirely possible they did for information and social matters such mating etc. However, since they ranged over considerable territory, we cannot assume that. Now the whole point of this is that their need to communicate is focused on day to day matters. In fact, since they moved in small family groups, they had little time to else but focus on survival. Thats the problem with survival - its a tough business and requires your full attention, which is one reason why human beings stick together. As far as I'm aware (and I'm perfectly happy to be put straight on this), the cro-magnons moved in larger tribal groups and possibly had more permanent settlements? If so, their society would have developed to a more sophisticated degree and therefore so would their language, in order to deal with interaction amongst a larger and more diverse group, who would have had more time to be sophisticated since co-operative effort in survival is easier.

 

The thing is, nature eventually discards anything that isn't worthwhile. If you live in a darkened cave, your eyesight will wither. If you live in water, your limbs wither. If you live in zero-g, your muscles and bones wither. Language is no different. If you don't communicate, you forget how to (or become very bad at it). The neanderthals needed to concern themselves with survival first and foremost, although I must admit I have seen one newspaper report (a dubious source I know) that reckoned the neanderthals did indeed have a spiritual life as well as subsistence hunting and gathering.

 

Here's the problem. The neanderthals did not leave traces of their culture. Their crude huts have not lasted - there are traces of camp-sites undersea near the coast but I'm not sure whether these were actually neanderthal or thier successors.

[Gaius Octavius]

Somewhere I read that they did inter-marry. Has that been confirmed?

[Klingan]

Neanderthals are known to have a larger brain volume, a characteristic that may well have developed from having to live in a harsh enviroment. However, its also believed that neanderthals moved around in small family groups. This is an important point. They lived a semi-nomadic life constantly searching for resources or latching on to herds for that purpose, and there's no evidence that neanderthals developed any larger scale social gatherings, though its entirely possible they did for information and social matters such mating etc. However, since they ranged over considerable territory, we cannot assume that. Now the whole point of this is that their need to communicate is focused on day to day matters. In fact, since they moved in small family groups, they had little time to else but focus on survival. Thats the problem with survival - its a tough business and requires your full attention, which is one reason why human beings stick together.

 

I disagree on the conclusion that their hunter/gatherer lifestyle in small groups would leave them little or no time for other then survival. Ethnological studies of small hunter/gatherer societies (groups) today in marginal areas tells us that they spend approximately two hours per day for survival issues (Ahlstr

[Northern Neil]

Somewhere I read that they did inter-marry. Has that been confirmed?

Skeletons have been found in Portugal which have both modern and Neanderthal features. They are dated about 30'000 BC. Origins Reconsidered (Leakey, Lewin) discusses this.

[caldrail]

I disagree on the conclusion that their hunter/gatherer lifestyle in small groups would leave them little or no time for other then survival. Ethnological studies of small hunter/gatherer societies (groups) today in marginal areas tells us that they spend approximately two hours per day for survival issues (Ahlstr

[Kosmo]

Neanderthalians lived in permanent setllements for large periods of time up to thousends of years. They were not nomad unlike Cro Magnon. They also lived in areas were the effect of glaciations was less felt like the Iberic peninsula were the remains in the caves of Gibraltar are the latest.

[caldrail]

Agreed. My information was out of date.

 

Apparently the neanderthals were residents in the colder ice-age regions, where their adaptions to the cold no doubt made them a little more comfortable with the temperatures.

 

The cro-magnons were seasonal migrants who travelled north to take advantage of the grasslands. That would have course have taken them through neanderthal territory.

 

As to whether there was any real conflict between the two groups is uncertain. Given how humans argue about territory its inevitable they sometimes did, and some researchers believe that such conflict was widespread. On the other hand, as previously mentioned, there is also evidence of co-habitation.

[Klingan]

As to whether there was any real conflict between the two groups is uncertain. Given how humans argue about territory its inevitable they sometimes did, and some researchers believe that such conflict was widespread. On the other hand, as previously mentioned, there is also evidence of co-habitation.

 

It should also be taken into consideration how much more less densely the continent were populated. I believe that conflicts by this time were rather unusually and mostly not lethal.

 

To strengthen this point you can notice that the first written campaigns in Mesopotamia that we know of from cuneiform tablets. They are describes as enormous and massive, and yet when we stumble upon the real number later into the text we find that they were no more then 40 ish. Now, those chaps had far larger resources for warfare and armed conflict yet this is the scale needed.

[caldrail]

I'm a little uncomfortable with these sorts of comparisons. I take your point, but then Mesopotamia was a veritable paradise compared with sub-arctic europe. Are the numbers comparable? Not really. There were different enviroments, different social structures, and different styles of organising whatever armed forces existed back then.

 

The main point you raise however is that the size of combatant groups was small. I agree totally. The ability to field thousands on the field of battle requires a more sophisticated culture that can organise such numbers, plus the availability of men to go to war in the first place. Any actions between neanderthal and cro-magnon were therefore of a very small size, numbering in tens perhaps, mostly incidential given that not all of them were settled in one place.