Neanderthal 'face' found in Loire

[SpaceBlondeGirl]

A flint object with a striking likeness to a human face may be one of the best examples of art by Neanderthal man ever found, the journal Antiquity reports.

The "mask", which is dated to be about 35,000 years old, was recovered on the banks of the Loire at La Roche-Cotard.

It is about 10 cm tall and wide and has a bone splinter rammed through a hole, making the rock look as if it has eyes.

Commentators say the object shows the Neanderthals were more sophisticated than their caveman image suggests.

LINK TO REST OF NEWS ARTICLE

I always have thought that they never have givin the Neanderthal man enough credit.

[Tess]

"The standard view of Neanderthals is that they lacked the thought processes capable of producing art - certainly to any real level of sophistication produced by modern humans"----

I guess this find prooves otherwise.

That was a very interesting and informative article SpaceBlondeGirl

[secondhand]

Neanderthals were cool, and SpaceBlondeGirl is right. They're never given enough credit, although the perception of them is changing now,as the article demonstrates. There are some cool pictures of what was thought to be Neanderthal attempts at art. They were pretty crude, and found in France about the time that modern humans "moved in". There's a theory that suggests that the Neanderthals were tying to copy the more culturally sophisticated Moderns, but lacked the necessary processing skills.

What I find interesting about that is that two different species of humans were having close enough contact to see what artwork was being produced. The fate of the Neanderthal fascinates me, people probably think I am incredibly dull though ha ha ha! Personally I wouldn't put it past early Homo sapiens sapiens [us] to have killed them all off.

[bathory]

it is believed that we coexisted and in some cases interbred.

[secondhand]

Yes, that is believed but I don't agree. An American anthropologist, Milford Wolpoff, states that moderns and Neanderthals interbred, and this is part of the reason for differences in racial charateristics in humans today. However, current thinking sways towards the replacement theory, where neanderthals were part of a race that evolved and migrated from Africa. "Our" species then evolved and migrated from Africa around 180 000 years ago, colonising Europe and other areas and gradually replacing Neanderthals.

I am no expert on the subject but I agree with the second theory. I find the first one inherently racist, and as time goes on evidence is mounting to comprehensively disprove it.

It is a very hotly debated topic in archeological and anthropological circles, and has led to a lot of juvenile bickering. My point was though, that I think it is cool that at one point contact was occuring between two human species.

I think there was a possible hybrid skeleton of a small boy found at a place called Lagar Velho, but DNA evidence dscounted this. I'm not totally sure off the top of my head though.

[bathory]

yup that would be the out of africa theory which says modern humans came out of africa a few hundred thousands years ago and replaced everything, the other one is uh, Multi-Regional theory? i think that was it.. which pretty much states that modern humans are the result of gene-flow between the more ancient lines of humanity and that we essentially evolved at a similar rate over most regions (i think)

I don't see the idea that some races evolved because of Neanderthal input as being racist?

(Incidentally, the races that could have come about from neanderthal input would have been the Aryan and Middle Eastern, and even then, the ones from the middle eastern would have been the originals spreading out across the world meaning that in the end we all have some neanderthal in us, and even then, we still all originated from africa:)

As for evidence, the problem is that of what i have read, most of it can be used to prove both theories