Neanderthals developed technology on their own

While it was long believed that Neanderthals developed `modern' tools and ornaments solely through contact with Homo sapiens, a new study from the University of Colorado Denver has revealed that these sturdy ancients could adapt, innovate and evolve technology on their own.

The findings by anthropologist Julien Riel-Salvatore challenge a half-century of conventional wisdom maintaining that Neanderthals were thick-skulled, primitive `cavemen' overrun and outcompeted by more advanced modern humans arriving in Europe from Africa.

"Basically, I am rehabilitating Neanderthals. They were far more resourceful than we have given them credit for," said Riel-Salvatore, assistant professor of anthropology at UC Denver.

The study was based on seven years of studying Neanderthal sites throughout Italy, with special focus on the vanished Uluzzian culture.

About 42,000 years ago, the Aurignacian culture, attributed to modern Homo sapiens, appeared in northern Italy while central Italy continued to be occupied by Neanderthals of the Mousterian culture which had been around for at least 100,000 years.

At this time a new culture arose in the south, one also thought to be created by Neanderthals. They were the Uluzzian and they were very different.

Riel-Salvatore identified projectile points, ochre, bone tools, ornaments and possible evidence of fishing and small game hunting at Uluzzian archeological sites throughout southern Italy.

Such innovations are not traditionally associated with Neanderthals, strongly suggesting that they evolved independently, possibly due to dramatic changes in climate.

More importantly, they emerged in an area geographically separated from modern humans.

"My conclusion is that if the Uluzzian is a Neanderthal culture it suggests that contacts with modern humans are not necessary to explain the origin of this new behavior. This stands in contrast to the ideas of the past 50 years that Neanderthals had to be acculturated to humans to come up with this technology. When we show Neanderthals could innovate on their own it casts them in a new light. It `humanizes' them if you will," he said.

Thousands of years ago, southern Italy experienced a shift in climate, becoming increasingly open and arid, said Riel-Salvatore. Neanderthals living there faced a stark choice of adapting or dying out.

The evidence suggests they began using darts or arrows to hunt smaller game to supplement the increasingly scarce larger mammals they traditionally hunted.

"The fact that Neanderthals could adapt to new conditions and innovate shows they are culturally similar to us. Biologically they are also similar. I believe they were a subspecies of human but not a different species," he said.

The study has been published in December's Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory.