Neanderthals Controlled Fire 400,000 Years Ago

This debate does gettiresome.  Both types of humanity losttheir robust jaws because they were suddenly able to cook food.  One implies the other and it appears that thetransition is then pretty quick.

The presence of an earlierversion of humanity either implies the use of fire or possibly the retention ofa fur coat as we see in reports of the Sasquatch. Take your choice.

In the event, the Neanderthal wasconducting itself in much the same way as humanity and today we simply do notknow how they truly differed in actual behavior.

My personal choice is thathumanity simply learned superior socialization skills leading to the formationof clans and tribes.  The resultantpopulation expansion then placed them in position to absorb the Neanderthalsinto the human genetic pool as a minority contributor.  We have actually seen this occur in largepart with the East Coast Indians impacted by expanding Europeansettlement.  In practice, it continues tothis day with every interracial marriage.

I would guess that white skin and red hair are key Neanderthal characteristics and the ancient brow ridge and semi robust jaw was simply selected out.  

Neanderthals were nifty at controlling fire: study

March 14, 2011

http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-03-neanderthals-nifty.html

A new study involving the Universityof Colorado Boulder shows clearevidence of the continuous control of fire by Neanderthals in Europedating back roughly 400,000 years, yet another indication that they weren'tdimwitted brutes as often portrayed.

The conclusion comes from the study of scores of ancient archaeologicalresearch sites in Europe that show convincing evidence of long-term fire control by Neanderthals, said PaolaVilla, a curator at the University of Colorado Museum of Natural History. Villaco-authored a paper on the new study with Professor Wil Roebroeks of Leiden Universityin the Netherlands.

"Until now, many scientists have thought Neanderthals had somefires but did not have continuous use of fire," said Villa. "We werenot expecting to find a record of so many Neanderthal sites exhibiting suchgood evidence of the sustained use of fire over time."

A paper on the subject was published in the March 14 issue of the Proceedingsof the National Academy of Sciences.

Neanderthals are thought to have evolved in Europeroughly 400,000 to 500,000 years ago and went extinct about 30,000 years ago.Neanderthals ranged over much of Europe and stretched to Central Asia. Neanderthals were stockier than anatomically modern humansand even shared the same terrain for a time, and there is evidence thatcontemporary humans carry a small amount of Neanderthal DNA. Modern humansbegan migrating out of Africa to Europe some40,000 years ago.

Archaeologists consider the emergence of stone tool manufacturing andthe control of fire as the two hallmark events in the technological evolutionof early humans.While experts agree the origins of stone tools date back at least 2.5 millionyears in Africa, the origin of fire controlhas been a prolonged and heated debate.

Villa and Roebroeks, who together speak and read six languages, havevisited or worked at dozens of the Neanderthal excavation sites in Europe. They also combed libraries throughout Europe andthe United States forresearch papers on evidence for early fire use in Europe,contacting researchers involved in the excavations when possible for additionalinformation and insight. 

As part of the study they created a database of 141 potential fireplacesites in Europe dating from 1.2 million yearsago to 35,000 years ago, assigning an index of confidence to each site.Evidence for the sustained use of fire includes the presence of charcoal,heated stone artifacts, burned bones, heated sediments, hearths and rough datesobtained from heated stone artifacts. Sites with two or more of thecharacteristics were interpreted as solid evidence for the control of fire bythe inhabitants.

The second major finding in the PNAS study -- perhaps even moresurprising than the first -- was that Neanderthal predecessors pushed intoEurope's colder northern latitudes more than 800,000 years ago without thehabitual control of fire, said Roebroecks. Archaeologists have long believedthe control of fire was necessary for migrating early humans as a way to reducetheir energy loss during winters when temperatures plunged below freezing andresources became more scarce.

"This confirms a suspicion we had that went against the opinionsof most scientists, who believed it was impossible for humans to penetrate intocold, temperate regions without fire," Villa said.

Recent evidence from an 800,000-year-old site in England known as Happisburghindicates hominids -- likely Homo heidelbergenis, the forerunner of Neanderthals-- adapted to chilly environments in the region without fire, Roebroeks said.

The simplest explanation is that there was no habitual use of fire byearly humans prior to roughly 400,000 years ago, indicating that fire was notan essential component of the behavior of the first occupants of Europe'snorthern latitudes, said Roebroeks. "It is difficult to imagine thesepeople occupying very cold climates without fire, yet this seems to be thecase."

While the oldest traces of human presence in Europe date to more than 1million years ago, the earliest evidence of habitual Neanderthal fire use comesfrom the Beeches Pit site in Englanddating to roughly 400,000 years ago, said Villa. The site contained scatteredpieces of heated flint, evidence of burned bones at high temperatures, andindividual pockets of previously heated sediments. Neanderthals, like otherearly humans, created and used a unique potpourri of stone tools, evidence thatthey were the ancient inhabitants of particular sites in Europe.

The sites catalogued by the team were dated by several methods,including electron spin resonance, paleomagnetism and thermoluminescence. Someresearch teams also have used microscopic studies of sediment at sites toconfirm the presence of ashes. While some of the best evidence for controlleduse of fire in Europe comes from caves, thereare many open-air sites with solid evidence of controlled fire, they said.

According to Villa, one of the most spectacular uses of fire byNeanderthals was in the production of a sticky liquid called pitch from thebark of birch trees that was used by Neanderthals to haft, or fit wooden shaftson, stone tools.Since the only way to create pitch from the trees is to burn bark peels in theabsence of air, archaeologists surmise Neanderthals dug holes in the ground,inserted birch bark peels, lit them and covered the hole tightly with stones toblock incoming air.

"This means Neanderthals were not only able to use naturally occurringadhesive gums as part of their daily lives, they were actually able tomanufacture their own," Villa said. "For those who say Neanderthalsdid not have elevated mental capacities, I think this is good evidence to thecontrary."

Many archaeologists believe Neanderthals and other early hominidsstruck pieces of flint with chunks of iron pyrite to create the sparks thatmade fire and may well have conserved and transported fire from site to site.

Some anthropologists have proposed that Neanderthals became extinctbecause their cognitive abilities were inferior, including a lack of long-termplanning, said Villa. But the archaeological record shows Neanderthals droveherds of big game animals into dead-end ravines and ambushed them, as evidencedby repeatedly used kill sites -- a sign of long-term planning and coordinationamong hunters, she said.

Recent findings have even indicated Neanderthals were cooking, asevidenced by tiny bits of cooked plant material recovered from their teeth.

Provided by University of Colorado at Boulder(news : web)