Know Your Hominin: The Dederiyeh Neanderthal Infant

The Dederiyeh Neanderthal infant was found in Dederiyeh Cave, in Syria, in 1993. The skelton is that of a two year old and dates to 50,000-70,000 years ago. Source: Akazawa et al 1995 Neanderthal infant burial from the Dederiyeh cave in Syria

Neanderthal and Human Brain Growth

I was hoping to have a more in depth post on this for the upcoming edition of the Four Stone Hearth but I am not going to get it finished in time. Here is the short version.

Rickets, Neanderthals, And Lubenow: Part Two

In the previous post in this series I looked at vitamin D metabolism and the effects of vitamin D deficiency on the skeleton. So, lets talk about Lubenow and Neanderthals. Lubenows discussion of Neanderthals and rickets occurs in chapter 14. He begins the chapter by invoking the Genesis flood to explain the ice ages, which [...]

Rickets, Neanderthals, And Lubenow: Part One

I have mentioned previously that I was reading Lubenow’s Bones of Contention. In this post I would like to focus on Lubenow’s understanding of rickets and Neanderthal morphology. In order to discuss that I first need to discuss vitamin D deficiency

The Khvalynsk Neanderthal Humerus

I meant to write about this yesterday but got sidetracked and Hawks beat me to it. Except –

Two Million Year Old Artifacts on Sulawesi: The Return of Hominid Catastrophism

That is what this article in the Guardian claims!

Charles Darwin and The Gibraltar Skull

Science has an interesting entry in its Origins: A History of Beginnings series. The entry concerns Charles Darwin and the Gibraltar Neanderthal skull

The (PTC) Bitter Taste Test: Does it Apply To Neanderthals?

The PTC test is well known to the point of annoyance. Practically, every biological anthropology class I ever had mentioned it, as did a number of the cultural anthropology. A new article in Biology Letters – requires a subscription puts a new spin on the question.

Rak and Australopithecus afarensis: A Second Look

Back in April of 2007 I wrote a brief post on a paper by Rak, Ginzberg, and Geffin. I had meant to write a more in depth post about it but kept procrastinating.

Neanderthals and Marine Resources

As both Kambiz and Hawks have mentioned, a new paper is out in PNAS on the subject of Neanderthal exploitation of marine resources (something I touch on here).

Neanderthals, Brain Size, and Maturation: Does Breastfeeding or Fish Eating Have an Impact?

As I mentioned here there is a new article out concerning Neanderthal brain size and life history. In some ways, this is the continuance of a debate started by Trinkaus a number of years ago.

Neanderthals, Brain Size, and Maturation

There is a new paper coming out in PNAS called Neanderthal brain size at birth provides insights into the evolution of human life history (wouldn’t you know it is not open access, so if anybody out there has access can you mail me a copy) that argues Neanderthals grew quickly but reached maturity later. The [...]

The More Things Change, The More They Stay The Same

I’m not sure what the point of this post is, I’m just kind of thinking out loud and I’m sure that those who know a lot more about genetic analysis will be able to point out some errors in all this, but hey, live and learn. I’m sure my readers remember the paper that suggested [...]

Skull Fragments: A Frontal From Mongolia

It was published last month in C. R. Palevol 7 (2008) 51-60.

Neanderthal Children And Flintknapping

Julien Riel-Salvatore over at A Very Remote Period Indeed has a thoughtful and thought provoking follow up to my recent post on Neanderthal children and flintknapping. Here is a small taste to tide you over till you get there: