Neanderthals are the members of the genus Homo and are known extinct relatives of Homo sapiens. A large amount of fossils and other archives have been collected that has substantiated the presence of these mysterious beings. The first skeletal fossils of Neanderthals were discovered in Germany in 1856, in the Neander Valley, where a group of quarrymen found 16 bone pieces including a skull, which they thought to be a bear. The bones were analyzed to determine that the fossils belonged to ancient relatives of humans. It has been close to 150 years since the accidental discovery of Neanderthals, however, scientists are still not unanimous as to whether Neanderthals were a separate species belonging to the genus Homo (Homo Neanderthalensis), or simply a variant of human species.
Neanderthals have been demonstrated to inhabit the earth between 200,000 years to 30,000 years ago during the Pleistocene era. They are a group of large brained hominids that have similarities of features to hominids that originated 500,000 years ago in Europe or Western Asia. However, by 150000 years ago Neanderthals were the only successfully surviving Hominids. It is believed that Neanderthals and Homo sapiens originated from a mutual ancestor, Homo rhodesiensis and that Homo sapiens evolved from the African branch of H. rhodesiensis, while Neanderthals developed from the European branch. They inhabited across Eurasia, ranging from Britain to the west to Middle East and Uzbekistan to the east. Some scientists believe that at their peak the Neanderthals population was 70000-80,000, however others refute this number and suggest that there were fewer of them.
Anatomy and Behavior. Neanderthals had a very distinct anatomy as compared to Homo sapiens. They were strong and had a more healthy build and had morphological features distinct from Homo sapiens. It has been established based on the length of 45 bones from Neanderthals’ that they had shorter height compared to the first modern human beings (cro magnons). This provided them a survival advantage in the cold weather they existed. They grew to be approximately 1.65 m tall and aged faster than the cro magnons. The Neanderthals had short legs (specifically shin bones) and a large trunk. They had their faces also shaped such to survive in the weather. They had large projecting noses and cheek bones that were pushed to sides. The brain size of Neanderthals has been demonstrated be larger and a bigger cranium as compared to Homo sapiens. It has however not been established whether their brain sizes correlated to intelligence (Andrews, &Peters, 1989). The Neanderthals lacked evolved speech and had limited vocal capacity as they lacked modern pharynx. Cro magnons on the other hand had smaller teeth than Neanderthals, smaller faces and vertical foreheads. They had a more advanced skull than Neanderthals with highly developed frontal lobes and reduced occipital lobes. The cranial capacity of Neanderthals was about 1500-1600 cc and was greater than cro magnon (modern humans). (Delson, Tattersall, Couvering, & Brooks, 1999).
The Neanderthals were adept at tool-making and have been demonstrated to have used the Acheulean and Levallois methods and developed some other methods like the diskcore method. (Constable, 1973). They were also stone-crafters and designed specialized tools, which were discovered with their fossils. They had a better understanding of animal behavior and hunted more efficiently than other species like the Homo erectus. They also used animal skins to prepare clothing and shelters. It is now accepted that practiced some form of religion and performed various rituals. Burial sites have been discovered in the Neanderthal caves. It has been established that the early Neanderthals were scavengers who later became expert hunters. Neanderthals were generally carnivores and some studies have suggested them to be exclusively meat eating. However, a study demonstrated presence of cooked vegetable matter in the teeth of Neanderthal skulls, suggesting that they consumed cooked vegetables as well (Henry, Brooks, & Piperno, 2010).
Habitat and range. The Neanderthals lived for a period of 100000 years in the last glacial age. The glacial era had a damaging effect on the sites where Neanderthals are believed to have lived, as a result very little is known about the early Neanderthal hominids. The Neanderthal remains have been found in countries in most of Europe. Their remains have been confirmed in areas south of the glaciation line, laterally along the latitude 500 north . They are believed to have inhabited most of Western Europe as well as South Britain, Balkans and Central Europe, some parts of Ukraine and Russia. Their eastern boundary extended to Altai Mountains in Siberia and southern boundary extended to eastern Mediterranean region and Indus River. The fossils of classic Neanderthals have been excavated from northern Germany, Spain, Italy, Israel, England, Portugal and Uzbekistan. It is believed that these area were not inhabited in the same period. However, there has been no remains of Neanderthals found in Africa. There are some parts of the Levantine or region to the east of Mediterranean where remains of Neanderthals have been discovered, which were also previously inhabited by Homo sapiens. This suggests that when the weather became cold, the Neanderthals displaced the Cro magnon humans and that they were better adapted to the cold weather (Andrews, Stringer, 1989 .
Homo Sapiens are the only human species that lived in the Nile River region and Neanderthals did not live beyond south of Israel. The increase in temperature associated with climate change made the Neanderthals to relocate to colder northern locations. These change in their site of living occurred prior to the time the modern man (cro magnon) completely replaced the Neanderthals. (Schiller, 2010)
Genome and genetic similarity to modern man. Scientists for the first time in 1997 extracted a small DNA sequence from Neanderthal bone remains that seemed to have lived 30000 years ago. In 2000, mitochondrial DNA was isolated from the Neanderthal remains which demonstrated no indication of human lineage. The Neanderthal genome was sequenced by scientists from the Max Planck institute for evolutionary anthropology and life sciences. The Neanderthals’ genome was expected to be similar in size to human genome. Humans and Neanderthals shared most of the genes and Neanderthals also contained three billion base pairs on their genome sequence. In the analysis performed on approximately 1 billion of the 3 billion nucleotide sequence it was determined that no ‘admixture’ occurred between Cro magnons (modern humans) and Neanderthals. In 2008 the complete sequence of the mitochondrial DNA of Neanderthals was published. It was mentioned in the study that Neanderthals had smaller population than humans but lived over a long time period. Gene sequencing studies demonstrate that the variant of ‘microcephalin’ and ‘MAPT’ that were believed to be from Neanderthals, were found not to be of Neanderthal origin. (Evans, Gilbert, Mekel-Bobrov, Vallender, Anderson, Vaez-Azizi, Tishkoff, Hudson, & Lahn, 2005). There has been ongoing debate about possibility of interbreeding between modern human (cro magnons) and Neanderthals (Tattersall, Schwartz, 1999). They two species coexisted for a period of 10000 years. However, a published report from the same lab demonstrated that it was possible that interbreeding occurred between the two hominids. “People living outside Africa have a small part of Neanderthals”. 1-4% of genes of Homo sapiens have origins from Neanderthals, for people who originated outside Africa. The genome sequences of Neanderthals was compared to the genome of cro magnon (modern humans) from China, France, Papua New Guinea, sub-Saharan Africa. The direction of the gene flow has been suggested to be from Neanderthal population to cro magnons (modern humans) based on the possibility of interbreeding. However, no reverse gene flow has been demonstrated (from humans to Neanderthals) (Green et al, 2010). This occurred as a small population of humans colonized the larger Neanderthal population. However, an alternate explanation for the similarity in the genome can be made based on the hypothesis that the non-African humans were more closely related to Neanderthals than was previously thought. They were not similar to African population of cro magnons (modern humans) due to the genetic separation that occurred in Africa. However it is accepted that humans and Neanderthals have 99.5-99.9% identical DNA. However, it is vital to remember that humans share almost 99% of their DNA with chimpanzees. Another study published in Nature, shows that cro magnons (modern humans) and Neanderthals originated from the same ancestor, however they diverged between 500000-800000 years ago. The controversy regarding interbreeding between humans and Neanderthals is still, ongoing.
Extinction. It has been suggested that the last evident remains from Neanderthals were as recent as 30000-33000 years. However it has now been accepted that the last remaining Neanderthals existed 40000 years ago. The ice age started after this time making the region n completely inhospitable. There have three principle hypotheses proposed to explain the extinction of these hominids. According to this first postulate the Neanderthals were a distinct species from the humans that became extinct and was replaced by the modern humans. A completion for food, living area and other resources might have ensued between modern humans and Neanderthals. Some scientists have suggested that violent encounter happened in which Neanderthals were annihilated. The second theory suggests that Neanderthals were simply a sub species of the Homo sapiens who interbred with them and became absorbed into the growing human population. The last theory is about physical catastrophe, such as volcanoes. It has been demonstrated that a Campanian ignimbrite volcano eruption took place 40000 years ago. Another major volcanic eruption also followed the initial one, a few thousand years later that could have been responsible for the Neanderthal extinction.
It has been demonstrated that at around 55,000 years ago severe weather fluctuations took place. The temperatures shifted from extremely cold to mildly cold in a period of few decades. The Neanderthals have physiology and anatomy more suited for cold temperatures. They were able to retain heat better than modern humans, however weather fluctuations resulted in changes to environment, plants and animals that were familiar to the Neanderthals were replaced by new species. Grasslands replaced the large trees that existed around Neanderthals. All these changes made adapting extremely difficult for Neanderthals resulting in their extinction. Physiological analysis suggests that Neanderthals needed more energy than other Hominids and a shortage of food also resulted in their demise (Appenzeller, 2013).
Neanderthals are an extinct Hominids that who were either a separate species or were a sub-species of Homo sapiens who lived during Pleistocene period 200000 to 40000 years ago. They shared 99.5% of DNA with the modern human and probably co-exited with them for 10,000 years. The exact reason behind their extinction and the possibility of their interbreeding with modern humans is contentious and topic of much debate (Pennisi, 2007).
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