Neanderthals: how our cousins really lived
Neanderthals ruled Europe 400 to 40 thousand years ago with bigger brains, fire, burials and art.
Big brains in Ice Age Europe
From 400 to 40 thousand years ago Neanderthals endured winters minus 20 degrees, growing stocky 165-centimeter bodies of 80 kilograms and brains of 1500 cubic centimeters larger than our 1400.
They hunted mammoths and bison with 2-meter wooden spears, controlled fire in 100 hearths at sites like Abric Romani and cared for injured living 20 years with healed fractures.
Tools, burials and living DNA
Neanderthals flaked 60 Mousterian tool types, glued birch tar handles at 200 degrees, wore tailored hides, buried 40 dead with flowers and carved eagle jewelry 130 thousand years ago in Croatia.
Modern Eurasians carry 1 to 2 percent Neanderthal DNA aiding immunity and altitude, and after 10 thousand years of mixing the last groups faded 40 thousand years ago amid climate swings.
- Lived 400 to 40 thousand years ago in Europe.
- Brains 1500 cubic cm bigger than ours.
- 60 Mousterian tool types with fire glue.
- Buried 40 dead with care and symbols.
- 1 to 2 percent DNA lives in Eurasians.