Nimble Neanderthals

From Kenyon News - November 8, 2013

Neanderthals had a clue about tools and an eye for small game, Associate Professor of Anthropology Bruce Hardy argues in a co-authored paper published recently in Quaternary Science Reviews.

Working with researchers in France and Spain, Hardy plants himself firmly in that camp of Neanderthal scholars who believe the extinct species with close ties to modern humans was capable of flexible behavior and not solely dependent on big game. Neanderthals used a range of resources, including large and small mammals, fish, ducks, plants, and wood, as well as stone-derived tools. The evidence adds up to “pretty cool stuff,” Hardy said.

The paper is called “Impossible Neanderthals? Making string, throwing projectiles and catching small game during Marine Isotope Stage 4 (Abri du Maras, France)."