As the first modern humans began to journey outside of Africa they inevitably came face to face with their archaic relatives, the Neanderthals. Although the Neanderthals seemed to have been physically superior to the newer human version, “year by year, the moderns’ territory expanded and the Neanderthals’ shrank” (Wade 94). In studying the fate of the Neanderthals, behavioral variations were perhaps the primary factors in distinguishing the old human population from the new.
According to the Single-Origin and Replacement Model of W.W. Howell, it is proposed that anatomically modern humans expanded their reign by “competitively displacing all other human populations without interbreeding with them” (Shea 42). The highly innovative behavior of these modern humans is what gave them the upper hand in survival. It is readily arguable that in “virtually every detectable aspect – artifacts, site modification, ability to adapt to extreme environments, subsistence and so forth – the Neanderthals were behaviorally inferior to their modern successors” (Wade 91).
Both human species had similar ways of using the land and hunting, but it was their differing social organization practices which may have aided the modern humans in their long struggle against the Neanderthals. “Neanderthal societies were not structured around the nuclear family, as modern human hunter-gatherers are” (Henry 67). Since the males only visited the female groups to mate, the females and their offspring were left unprotected and were therefore at a disadvantage to modern human societies in the changing environment.
The cognitive capacity of the Neanderthals is relatively contentious, but the emotional, technological, and social capabilities of the modern humans are undeniably superior. This evolutionary change in human behavior is what has made our species an effective rival to all we have encountered from the Middle Paleolithic Period to the present day.
Henry, Donald O. (2003) Neanderthals in the Levant: Behavioral Organization and the Beginnings of Human Modernity. New York: Continuum.
Shea, J. (2001, March). The Middle Paleolithic: early modern humans and Neanderthals in the Levant. Near Eastern Archaeology, 64(1-2), 38-64. Retrieved September 12, 2009, from ATLA Religion Database with ATLASerials database.
Wade, N. (2006) Before the Dawn: Recovering the Lost History of Our Ancestors. New York: The Penguin Press
Wade, N. (2006) Before the Dawn: Recovering the Lost History of Our Ancestors. New York: The Penguin Press
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I find your analysis interesting, but I would have liked to hear more about how modern homosapiens (modern humans) took advantage of Neanderthals' mating patterns.
ReplyDeleteIt seems that you are suggesting that since Neanderthal males abandoned female groups after mating, the females would be left to defend their offspring alone. This is in conjunction with the idea that Neanderthal women may have been enslaved by homosapiens for mating (Wade, 93).
I think there may have been other reasons for homosapiens having an advantage. For one, Neanderthals were clumsy due to the amount of physical damage they took; so many of the bones found are damaged (Wade, 91). All of this pain endured is much less effective than evading injury in the first place.
Also, it is suggested that the conquering of Neanderthals took a lot of time. "Hunter-gatherer societies cannot support standing armies"--modern humans and Neanderthals must have fought over resources and land for a long period of time (Wade, 93).
If indeed the exploitation of Neanderthal mating was a key to modern human domination, it would have certainly been a cruel scene. Such acts would give insight into modern human nature and how humans are able to put their own survival above other animals. It certainly makes sense, considering how we so readily exploit animals as sources of food.
Wade, Nicholas. (2006) "Before the Dawn: Recovering the Lost History of Our Ancestors". New York: The Penguin Press
Previous studies on Neanderthal and modern human mating have put the numbers at around 25%, however, new studies have used genome mapping and mitochondrial DNA evidence to put the number much lower and propose a new model of modern human range expansion.
ReplyDelete"Under this scenario, which explicitly modes the dynamics of Neanderthals' replacement, we estimate that maximum interbreeding rates between the two populations should have been smaller than 0.1%. This extremely low number strongly suggests almost complete sterility between Neanderthal females and modern human males, implying that the two populations were probably distinct biological species."
Currat, M., & Excoffier, L. (2004, December). Modern Humans Did Not Admix with Neanderthals during Their Range Expansion into Europe. PLoS Biology, 2(12), 2264-2274.