Neanderthal Behaviour

Question 0

What is Mousterian Tradition?

Answer 0

• 200,000- 400,000 mya

- handaxes, choppers, scrapers, backed knives, denticulates, points

Question 1

Neanderthals Material Culture

Answer 1

• Middle Paleolithic tools
• prepared core technique
• more small, flaked tools
• Mousterian tradition

Question 2

What is a denticulate tool?

Answer 2

A denticulate has one or more notched edges that is used like a saw

Question 3

What is a backed knife?

Answer 3

A backed knife has one sharp edge and a natural cortical surface opposite

Question 4

Material Culture in Anatomically modern Homo Sapiens

Answer 4

• Upper Paleolithic tools
• Blade-based technology
• more refined flaking techniques
• increase in variety of tools

Question 5

Coping with cold

Answer 5

• Neanderthals have typical cold-adapted bodies
• Neanderthals were mobile and occupied sites for short periods of time
• temporary hunting, camping, food processing sites
• Mobility was limited. 5-80 km.
• distances necessary to exploit scarce resources
• Neanderthals used fire.
• charcoal deposites, ashy dump spots
• used skins & hides for cold protection
• no sewing implements found
• Moldova, Ukraine
• ring of mammoth bones
• 5-8 m in diameter
• dense concentration of artifacts, bones, ash
• Neanderthals more successful in colder climates than earlier hominins
• lived farther north during interglacial periods
• lived farther south during glacial periods
• never lived as far north as anatomically modern humans eventually did
• 5 cave sites in Israel show alternate use of the area between Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans
• Neanderthals during cold spells
• modern humans during warm spells
• – Or could this represent one single, highly variable species?

Question 6

Hunting and Subistence

Answer 6

• Diet heavily reliant on meat
• used various hunting strategies
• dependent on local conditions
• dependent on game available in area
• may have opportunistically scavenged
• little evidence for scavenging on broad scale
• competent hunters of large game
• engaged in coed hunting strategies

-Neanderthal diet included plants, berries, nuts

Question 7

Cannibalism

Answer 7

Krapina, Croatia: 130,000 BP

• no intact long bones
• split open for marrow?
• many bones burned
• some bones with cut marks

Moula- Guercy, France: 100,000 BP

• 78 Neanderthals bone fragments mixed in with several hundred animal bone fragments
• numerous cut marks
• all crania animal & hominin bones treated in the same manner

Question 8

Burial sites

Answer 8

Neanderthals are considered to be the first to have ritualistic burial

• Spy, Belgium
• 2 fully articulated & complete adult skeletons
• La Ferrassie, France
• several adults & subadults buried at a single cave site. Intentionally buried together.
• Amud Cave, Isreal
• infant burial with red deer upper jaw bone
• La chappelle- aux- Saints (50,000 BP)
• articulated adult skeleton
• bones unbroken

Question 9

Neanderthal Burial behaviour

Answer 9

• Behavioural development of Middle Paleolithic
• No evidence of deliberate archaic H. Sapiens burial
• Neanderthal burials significantly different from UP burials of modern H. sapiens beginning 40,000 BP
• Neanderthals not buried with grave goods
• Neanderthal burials always occur in caves

Question 10

Ritual & Symbolic Neanderthal Behaviour

Answer 10

• Neanderthal burials
• ritual activity?
• ritualistic beliefs?
• corpse disposal?

*Investment of times & energy into selecting site, preparing grave, placing body in grave, covering grave

• little evidence of Neanderthal symbolic behaviour in archaeological record
• strongest evidence is for personal adornment & other engraved items
• Most evidence is 55,000 BP or later

*Could have also just been a corpse disposal method

Question 11

Th fate of the Neanderthals

Answer 11

• Disappeared from Asia by 45,000 BP
• Disappeared from Europe by 30,000 BP
• Popular explanations was that modern humans had:
• better clothing, shelter, & hunting technology
• more diverse subsistence strategies
• enhanced mobility
• larger social networks

Deteriorating climate conditions

• unstable conditions 25,000-40,000 BP
• most severe 30,000 BP

Diminishing food resources

• extinction of large herd animals
• proportion of reindeer in diet increased; horse, bison, red deer decreased
• famine
• population density decrease

*Modern human population increased tenfold