Article: Neanderthals Hunted, Raped And Ate Humans

Apparently we owe our current nastiness as a grown-up species to being bullied by cat eyed, pongid nosed killer Neanderthals in school. Be prepared to see some pretty terrible reconstruction artwork when clicking through that link too. Ugh. I'm not even going to bother trying to pick apart the assumptions presented as facts in this article. It doesn't bode well for the book. I fear many stupid people are going to jump all over this one and claim it proves their respective points of view regarding bigfoot and we're gonna be hearing about it for a long time...

"“Not only have we had the wrong impression of the nature and behaviour of Neanderthals”, argues Vendramini, “but we have been fed sentimental, anthropomorphic visuals of them as well. Neanderthals”, he says, “were primates and would have looked like primates. There is no reason to suppose they were clean-shaven with protruding noses and curly hair. These guys”, he expounds, “came from the frozen north—they had flat, ape-like noses, large nocturnal eyes, were covered in thick hair and were six times stronger than the average human. They were not a pretty sight.”

Sound familiar? I am still not sure about all this, but perhaps the Neanderthal became extremely cautious of "humans" much like the Grizzly did?

Wow, I'm surprised to see Arturo Balseiro did the recreations. I've followed his artwork for a while now. He's usually very good and sticks to the anatomy in his hominid recreations. People might recall his sasquatch and yeti sculptures. Here is Arturo's own Neanderthal recreation:
http://dharmaestudio.foliosnap.com/?goto=s...ures&img=22

I'm thinking here that the author must have heavily edited Arturo's artwork.

The link states that the author and artist followed known anatomy of Neanderthals, yet we know by the position and angle of the bridge of the nose of Neanderthal skulls that they did have protruding noses like humans, and apes do not have night vision. How or where the author got any support for his theories is beyond me, I think this would be best left as a fictional novel.

"Australian independent scholar Danny Vendramini"

Yeah.


This is a load of horsecrap.

True, however, I have to agree with them that there has been such a swing away from the brutish animalistic image of the earliest years of Neanderthal discovery, that it has gone too far. The facts of the matter are that indeed there were processed Homo sapiens remains found in Neanderthal living areas, just as there have been in some altogether human cultures. Primates are not very nice creatures, and we are omnivorous predators that indeed do hunt in packs. Even today encountering previously unreached tribes can be a very scary thing to do, and it does go both ways in that unreached people groups do not have a survival advantage in getting together with us, either.

I've read of Neanderthals eating other Neanderthals, and humans eating Neanderthals, but I haven't heard of Neanderthals eating humans.

Weren't the homo sapiens supposed to have mass-murdered the Neanderthals?

official page: http://www.themandus.org/

I don't know what to think of this...

I believe h.sapiens and h.neanderthalensis ate each other, but the raping? How does he know that? And how does he know that the human population dwindled down to 50 specimens? Those are very specific claims made out of little data.

I think some giant leaps of assumption were made in that article without any proof to back them up, much the same way leaps in assumption are made by some sasquatch enthusiasts.

I guess I'll just go ahead and get it out of the way since I find it incredibly amusung when it is said.... Sounds like some of Norcal's dates in the 70's




I do believe you hit the nail on the head Teresa

(edited by moregon to fix quotes)

Here's a bit on the author.

And the book (edit - which I just saw was also included a couple of posts above...)

I find it interesting anyway, mainly because of one thing: their opinion on the physical appearance of neandertals. Bernard Heuvelmans speculated also that neandertals didn't look like humans but more like apes. He thought that the Minnesota Iceman was a relic neandertal.

Conclusion: If they did look apelike, aren't they good candidates for sasquatch? maybe some offshot that grew bigger while wandering the tundras of Russia and crossing the Bering Strait? Just a thought...

Interesting guy, neat (though nonsensical) idea. Straw man arguments, e.g., the notion that natural selection is the only evolutionary driver. Please do not use the word "theory" to describe this guy's ideas.

It always amuses me how self-taught amateurs think they've got it right and the "scientific establishment" is a bunch of rubes, going about their daily activities of taking measurements, analyzing data, and publishing papers like so many lemmings. Sure amateurs have made many great contributions to science, but this whole "I've figured out what all the thousands of biologists couldn't" thing is silly and annoying. Would you trust a person so-trained to perform surgery on you or even work on your car? I wouldn't.

Always proceed with caution when someone outside of a particular area of expertise claims to have some special, revolutionary knowledge of that area. It's possible that he could have that revolutionary knowledge, but far more likely that he's full of crap. (And he's usually selling a book, btw.)

In most of the research areas of life, there will be those who just have to get in your face, grab your shoulders and shove their newfound information down your throat, as the real truth. They're so excited about being in the know, and you aren't, and can't understand why you just don't get it. They will build a following of people who are just as needy in their lives, of being part of something special. Then another one comes along, and everyone turns to this guy. Napoleon Syndrome, with it's regular group of sheep, who flow with the tide of new revelations. It all falls apart eventually, when it dead ends.

With new findings in primate/homo research, the whole community in all areas, are getting confused and spreading out in all directions. Which is rather showing, of what I think about this research. The " out of africa " Darwinian model has been tunnel visioned about homonids, and it just won't work in the long run. Too many variables, and too little real facts to work with. I personally think, that every skeleton, or piece of bone found, is it's own separate species, without a branch to connect to. The commonalities can't be pegged onto some tree, by the place found, or the strata found in. I don't take any of this kind of research seriously. It's just a mind game.

As an attempt to create the illusion of science, the author seems to state all scientist in Australia have reached this conclusion. When in reality only one Australian seems to expouse this notion and what are his credentials?

True, and even today in the most civilized and modern societies humans hunt, rape, and eat other humans, (as sick as it is) so it's not too outrageous to surmise that the same things happened among Neanderthals and H. sapiens.

With his claim, “that many physical, social, and psychological characteristics now seen as uniquely human are direct results of Neanderthal predation on our ancestors ... " he zooms in way too specific, IMO. Surely Neanderthal predation would be a part of teaching us that we have to either get tough or die, but that should be considered among a plethora of other environmental factors.

It would be interesting to learn exactly which "countless different threads of scientific evidence" he references in his book.

Hmm, you're name ain't Sue by any chance?

Amusing to you maybe, to me it was downright traumatizing!!!!! (little laughing dude (computers messed up so have to type it out))

The book sounds less than authoritative but if one wishes to spin some wool, have at it.
Also, the word "rape" like the word "murder" is a socio/legal term and not really very usefull when speculating how agreeable the process of procreation is for either party, let alone presuming what their state of mind might have been. cheers.

Fascinating article, thanks for the link! I read the first three chapters of the book, and had to buy the whole thing.

The argument he puts forward is simple, well-researched, and explains alot of things science has yet to explain. The majority of his argument conforms to scientific evidence. About the only thing that doesn't is his characteristics of Neanderthal, an unsettled area that I feel science has yet to explain (see Scientific American August 2009 cover story on Neanderthals: "Their demise remains a mystery, one that gets curiouser and curiouser").

His theory is that Neanderthal was larger, stronger, and a better hunter than modern humans. They both competed for food. Neanderthal was a pure meat eater who started hunting modern man for food and to eliminate competition. That is as far as the first 3 chapters go, but he summarizes the rest to say that modern man then evolved in response and overcame Neanderthal and made them extinct. These evolutions are the things we attribute to moder man: art, music, culture, language, etc.

His premise rests on the fact that modern man existed for 500,000 years, but didn't develop art, music, culture, etc until about 50,000 years ago, which he places as the time (and place: the "Levant") that modern man and Neanderthal collided. Something happened. Unless you believe a black obelisk from outer space came down (2001 Space Odessy), then it must have been something. Natural selection through predation is the most likely reason.

Intersting to note for Sasquatch followers is that Neanderthal was larger than modern man (up to 6' tall), six times stronger than modern man, and whose skeleton more closely resembled a gorilla than modern man. Sound familiar?

Incidently, I have always thought that they get the recreations of "cave men" wrong. I believe (as does the author) that all hominids, except man, were hairy. Only man evolved hairless. I believe it was a response to clothing, but the author says it is in response to Neanderthal predation. I haven't read that part of the book yet, but when I do, I will post a summary.

LOL Nope, and I don't even have an old guitar and an empty bottle of booze either.

Give it a year or maybe less and this image will pop up somewhere as a real deal photo of a sasquatch.

Wanna bother one?


and yeah Bitter, I give it 2 mos before someone drops that pic here as legit.

dav

Yep....probably on searchingforbigfoot.com

Underneath it will read something like, "we have received this from a contact and have not had a chance to verify it yet, however, we present it as we think it interesting....etc. etc."

Thanks Jheard for your review. I'll keep my views open on it until read more. As for Neanderthals being 6 times stronger...maybe..it is a long held and interesting concept. Do you know on what he bases that notion? Mechanical advantage or has he taken into consideration the most recent thought on that which attributes human relative lack of muscular expression as a result of the human's neurological feedback system involving the kind and proportion of muscle to fine-control nerve system? It's pretty evident that when subjected to chemical(adrenalin for example) or electrical (high amps) shock the human is quite as strong as a chimp and equally able to lift heavy weights and launch themselves through the air even to the point of damaging their structure, since we're not adapted to use that kind of strength, but technically we are capable of generating it. I don't know if a chimp on adrenalin is stronger than one that's not...anybody?

Here's a link to the University of Chicago's journal for that article on ape strenth.
http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/...023?cookieSet=1

Than an average modern man, or a modern man who's never spent a day of his life in an office?

Even wimpy me is probably stronger than "average," simply because at 6'2" I'm larger than average. But a modern man of average size who actually works for a living - say, a ranch hand - is most likely way stronger than me. How 'bout those dudes in Papua, New Guinea? They look small in stature, but ripped. I bet those dudes are way stronger than an "average" modern human.

The point? Just be leery of claims about how many times stronger one thing is than something else. Also, remember that, nowadays, there is an enormous spectrum of "modern humans". If we were raised to hunt mammoths for our daily bread, I'm not sure the "average" one of us would be really that much weaker than an average Neanderthal.

The idea is quite interesting. We know that Neanderthal was quite succesful in Europe until Cro-magnon people appeared, and it is quite possible both groups clashed from time to time. But, how to prove such a theory, that Neanderthals almost annihilated Cro-magnon people and then Sapiens stroke back? We cannot know. It is also quite possible that different Neanderthal groups also clashed among themselves, or that Sapiens made war between them.

If we assume the existence of beings like Bigfoot, russian Yetis and Yowies, we can deduce some other interesting things. Primates like Australophitecus, Paranthropus and Homo erectus seemed to be quite intelligent and widespread. Why we do not see Australopithecus nowadays, picking ants with sticks in our backyards? Or Homo Erectus making camping in tents? Or Homo Habilis picking bananas? Because may be, the human ancestors wiped out the smaller ones, but possibly some few were left and they are the Almas, vietnamese "Rock Apes", tibetan mini-yetis and Orang Pendek from today. So they maybe suffered the same destiny that mammoths, sabertooth tigers, moas and tasmanian thylacines: people annihilated them.

Homo Sapiens was succesful and spread all over the world, even in islands far away like Borneo and New Guinea, or remote lands like Amazonia, Siberia and Patagonia. But, what if some primates, the tough ones, survived this creature genocide? Let us think about an ape so big and strong that scares us, living in the wilderness far away from humans, adapted to every climate, including extreme enviroments, and with abilities to survive in the forest quite better than our rangers, green berets and special forces (at least, when they do not carry small children) Living at night, hiding in the forest, swimming in almost any body of water...interesting, isn'it?

I have the following crazy idea. (It is very hypothetical, but I like to think about it?). What if Bigfoot was more widespread before siberian paleohunters crossed the Bering Strait? Some native american legends tell about races of giants which made epic battles against them. What if Bigfoot lived in large groups, like other modern primates, before being "disturbed" by Homo sapiens? What if he hunted in groups, with his tremendous strenght, mammoths, mastodons and bisons also? What if he even had primitive towns and a very primitive cuture, which was destroyed and the few survivors were forced to live hidden in the forests, at night to escape from us?
Greetings.
K. aDAM

That's a really cool pic. It almost resembles what people have said about sasquatch..

UUUhhhhh????? The artwork looks a lot like the old artwork done so long ago, depicting a savage cave dwelling ape like monster, carrying a club. This new artwork flies in the face of EVERY single forensic sculpture ever done of Neanderthal skulls. The "Research, also flies in the face of everything done by well known Anthropologists, and discredits itself, just by it's depictions. Did Neanderthal ever eat human? Probably, just like people are cannibals during survival type situations, which during that time were all of the time. Did Humans eat Neanderthal, see previous answer. All in all, it's pointless to assume, as there are always possibilities, however, it is highly doubtful that either species went out seeking one another for their daily pot roast .

I don't know his source. The article was footnoted and he states there are over 800 footnotes in the book. The article did not contain the actual footnotes, however. As an attorney, I can spot a well-researched logical writing, and this appears to be one.

The only thing I have trouble with is it is well known (and the author admits) that Neanderthal wore clothes. I believe humans are hairless as a result of wearing clothes. THerefore, Neanderthal must be (somewhat) hairless, too. However, this does not have great weight against his main arguments.

Can you itemize the evidence that they wore clothes? I know the flute was discounted as a fragment of hollow bone with a couple of tooth marks from predators that by chance happened to fall in the diatonic scale. There is the shod footprints attributed to Homo heidelbergensis found in Italy on a volcano, but it is only attributed to that species based on the great age of the surrounding substrate--probably predating modern humans in that area (though not in the Levant).

Here's one for starters, note that it only says they would have needed clothes, but doesn't consider that they might have had fur:

http://energy.ruc.dk/Energy%20use%20by%20E...eanderthals.pdf

Technically we are no where near hairless, about the only places we don't have hair is our palms and the bottoms of our feet. Granted the proliferation and thickness of our hair has diminished, but as evidenced by anyone who's been to a crowded beach, even that trait is not so diminished in some of us.
We really aren't that far removed from our hairy ancestors as some of us would like to think.

Right. I think the more intriguing thing about human hair is not where we don't have it, but where we still do. We focus way too much on natural selection and far too little on sexual selection. Because I think sexual selection is the real driver, I think the habitats occupied and whether or not clothes were worn are red herrings in the question of human hairiness.

Is our hair essential for survival? No. Why do I say that? Pre-pubescent (note the word!) humans tend not to have very much of it. That changes as we approach puberty, in which we not only gain significant hair growth in our private areas, but also on our arms and legs. The 10 year old boy who lacks a beard usually doesn't have that much for hair on his shins either.

The fact that hair growth patterns are radically different between men and women - and that there is tremendous variability both within and among different ethnic groups - illustrates that sexual selection has been the primary driver of hair growth patterns in our species. I'm not sure of any sexual selection pressures acting on chimps, gorillas, bonobos*, or orangs, so our fellow extant apes don't provide great insight into when such pressures starting having an influence on our appearance. Did it start with Homo erectus? Neanderthals? Cro-Magnons? I dunno. If it started with us, however, there's a good chance that our immediate predecessors were more evenly hairy than usually depicted.


*That said, I've seen photos of wild bonobos that appear to have a differentiation in hair on the head, i.e., it's noticeably longer there than elsewhere on the body. I'm not sure how real a phenomenon this is, or if it's just confirmation bias on my part.

Of course it is not essential, that is why people from the future, and most aliens are completely hairless.

You kid, but there are some really interesting things going on in western societies regarding artificial ideals of what hair should look like, and where it should be. Compare 1969 porn with 2009 porn and you'll see what I mean. The sociological implications of fashions in body hair are fascinating.

I have found the costal ape evolutionary path as an interesting explanation for the lack of hair on humans. It also explains the body fat we carry between our skin and muscle. We are also one of the relatively few mammels that can dive and swim under water. I do believe that we are the only primate to swim underwater.

Yes, I find it very irritating (not to mention time consuming) that western women have to meticulously maintain every single strand of hair on our entire body!! I hope it's appreciated!!!

I look forward to being from the future and not having to worry about stuff like that!

We are talking Western cultures. In many Middle Eastern and eastern European cultures, body/pubic hair is considered unclean, and for matters of both religion and/or good hygiene, women in those cultures have removed their hair for centuries. Persia, Turkey, Albania and Albanian portions of Kosovo, and in many other cultures throughout the Mediterranean. Islam considers the removal of body hair to be a preferred practice. Not that I am a big fan of Islam, but I just wanted to show that this isn't a "porn" issue for many people.



edited to remove personal opinion that might offend some ...

See post #40 here: http://www.bigfootforums.com/index.php?sho...27670&st=33. The Aquatic Ape hypothesis is really cool to contemplate, but isn't gaining any momentum in the mainstream due to issues like a few I include in the post.

Diving monkeys? I'm pretty sure both Japanese and Crab-eating macaques can and do dive, but hopefully Apeman can set me straight if I'm way off the mark on this.

Yes, that is a great idea. I'll conduct some extensive research in this area and have a paper ready by this time next year.

I can just see you justifying this to Mrs. Counselor.....

"Really honey...it's for a paper!"

While the idea of an aquatic ape has been extensively argued and for the most part rejected so has the idea of the dryland savannah hominin scavanging from lion and hyena kills. Most fossil deposits suggest that rather than being creatures of arid plains the associated evidence suggests lacustrine and/or riverine environments; notably hippo bones and their almost inevitable association where H. erectus fossils/tools where-ever they have been found with the exception being Central Eurasia (Georgia) and Northern China.
Those early portrayals of ancestral humans from 200l Space Odyssey and some of the early Nat Geo programs have succeded in embedding some persistent memes which are illustrative to a certain extent but give impressions that also promote less than accurate aspects of the environment for which these ancestral forms were adapted. The Olduvai area, Chad, across the Sahara to the Straits of Gibraltar were much wetter in climate and supported an ecosystem inhabited by crocs, hippos, and big fish for periods of time that dwarf by comparison the relatively brief dry spell with which we identify it in contemporary times. Of course that's only one example of how radically changed our current environment/climate is when compared to the past over even relatively shallow geologic time scale. The future will likely be "interesting" too. And I mean "interesting" as in the old Chinese curse kind of way if the past is prelude to the future.

Could the demise of the Neanderthal been a result of disease that modern man was immune to?

Could modern man and the Neanderthal interbred to create a new hybred human that was strong and smart while the two parent beings dwindled away?

Could the Neanderthals have been forced to live in the higher, and colder elevations, then over time natural selection favored the taller, stronger, fur covered offspring? Over 30,000 years, this highland human grew to 7' tall and weighed 600 pounds that forced smaller, smarter beings to stay out of the highlands. Guess what this sounds like? not too far of a leap............

Does the fossil record allow any of these possibilites?

I believe the current theory for human hairlessness is that it is an adaptation to allow for easier evaporation of sweat, that is, an adaptation for greater cooling during intensive aerobic activity such as running. The theory is that humans adapted in very special ways to being endurance hunters on the savannas of Africa. This explains the unique foot structure also. It does not explain sexual differences in degrees of hairiness, though, or racial differences for that matter. Maybe it began that way and sexual selection plus founder's effect (inbreeding) fixed the trait to be as it is. Seems to me this is still going on.

There are cultural differences and I think you can see they have had an effect. The ancient egyptians considered all body hair to be offensive, shaving everything off, even plucking the eyebrows and eyelashes, then wearing heavy makeup, wigs and even false beards instead. Ancient India, however, considered a unibrow the height of feminine beauty, with all the hairiness that comes along with that. Males were full bearded with long hair and luxurious, curled moustaches.

(warning, link to frontal nudity, mature content)

http://www.martinfrost.ws/htmlfiles/april2007/india4.jpg

Apparently silicone implants were also popular in ancient India . . .

Re: hairlessness and sweat. The "sweaty savanna runner" hypothesis isn't bad - and there's certainly greater empirical support for it than the aquatic ape hypothesis - but it leaves me a little dissatisfied too. Yes we do sweat to an unusual degree and yes I was impressed with how well my sweat cooled me off on my first trip to the Mojave Desert. (A native New Yorker, I've rarely experienced conditions both hot and dry at the same time!) But other species sweat a lot too, e.g., horses, and they seem to have retained their coats.

I suspect the real answer to Homo sapiens' origin is "all of the above." The great selective advantage we had was a combination of greatly increased intelligence combined with remarkable dexterous hands. That combination served us exceedingly well in every environment we colonized. Were our ancestors savanna runners who chased down big game through endurance running? Yes. Did they scavenge kills from other predators? Yes. Did they spear fish in shallow waters? Yes. Did they disperse across vast tracts of inhospitable terrain? Yes. Did they wage war against rival groups and ceremoniously eat their victims? Yes.

The hairless man who keeps cool in Africa makes sense, but the Kenyans were the only tribe that thrived on chasing down prey over long distances. Forest Africans most likely brought down prey quickly like other fur coated animals. Why did humans need a cooling advantage in this case. Besides fur is a good protection against claws and teeth.

Modern man in Europe would need a nice fur coat to survive the winters. What happened here? It seems the Neanderthas would have a survival advantage in Europe.

How does this fit into the discussion?



Could modern man and the Neanderthal interbred to create a new hybred human that was strong and smart while the two parent beings dwindled away?

Just as an aside, evaporative cooling isn't the only aspect of the long distance running with regards to humans versus animals that run on 4 legs. Some 4 legged animals that run can also evaporate cool with sweat, like horses, but can only breath at the rate at which their forelegs stride when running; they inhale and exhale with each stride whereas humans ( and presumably any bipedal ancestral (or existing cryptic) hominin) are different in that they can alter their breathing rate independent of their stride.
Here's link to a youtube of a PBS science program, The Human Spark, with Alan Alda who speaks with Harvard paleoanthropologist Daniel Lieberman regarding this theory of how our big brains came to be, though only indirectly applicable to this topic as the big brain predates Neanderthals and Modern Humans.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICNaSah5bAs

Perhaps the weight of the additional hair, made hairiness a trait that was not selected-for.

Perhaps hairy bodies inhibited sweat evaporation.

Perhaps hair was not required on Altaire 4, the planet from which humans originated.



What we probably can say is that the benefits of the bipedalism trait, outweighed the consequences of exposing our soft underbelly to our enemies, and the consequences of an unweildy childbirth, which was caused by the redesigned Pelvic strucure of the biped.

A few other problems associated with bipedalism are back pain ( specifically lower back) and hernias.