Neanderthal

An illustration of a Neanderthal father and his daughter

Ancient DNA Reveals the First Known Neanderthal Family

The lived with a small community in a Siberian cave some 54,000 years ago

Hand axes made of quartzite from between 100,000 and 40,000 B.C.E. at the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen. 

Neanderthals and Modern Humans May Have Shared Ideas for Tools

Modeling research provides a “good starting point” for finding where these species overlapped

Svante Pääbo poses with a model of a Neanderthal skeleton after winning the 2022 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

Svante Pääbo Wins Nobel Prize for Unraveling the Mysteries of Neanderthal DNA

The Swedish geneticist used 40,000-year-old bones to sequence the early humans' genome

Skull of a Neanderthal, or Homo neanderthalensis

What's the Difference Between a Human and Neanderthal Brain?

One small variation in DNA may have helped Homo sapiens out-compete our ancient relatives

The tooth from Laos thought to belong to a Denisovan girl

Ancient Molar Found in Laos Could Help Fill in a Gap in Human History

Researchers believe the tooth belongs to a Denisovan girl, making it the first fossil evidence of these hominins in Southeast Asia

Scientists tested 16 hearth locations inside Lazaret Cave near Nice, France, to determine how early humans used fire.

Why Early Humans Built Fires in the Center of Lazaret Cave

A new study suggests pre-Neanderthals carefully placed their hearths to minimize smoke exposure while maximizing room for activities

Neronian points found in Grotte Mandrin

Discovery of Ancient Baby Tooth Places Humans in Western Europe 10,000 Years Earlier Than Previously Thought

The archeologists also uncovered a number of Neanderthal artifacts suggesting the two species coexisted in the area

Archaeologists unearthed the body of a female infant at a 10,000-year-old burial site in the Arma Veirana cave in Italy.

Baby Buried With Care 10,000 Years Ago Found in Italian Cave

The rare interment suggests that some hunter-gatherer societies imbued female infants with full personhood

New research suggests these human-like footprints found in Crete may by 6.05 million years old.

New Research Suggests Human-Like Footprints in Crete Date to 6.05 Million Years Ago

The findings could upend scientists' understanding of human evolution—but the paper has proven controversial

Neanderthals, our closest human ancestor, went extinct 35,000 to 40,000 years ago.  

To Understand Neanderthal Night-Hunting Methods, Scientists Caught Thousands of Birds With Their Bare Hands in Spanish Caves

Researchers captured more than 5,000 birds to learn how our now-extinct ancestors foraged for food

Whether the ten hand and footprints constitute art is up for debate, scholars say.

These 200,000-Year-Old Hand and Footprints Could Be the World's Earliest Cave Art

Found at a hot spring on the Tibetan Plateau, the impressions were likely left by hominin children

The dig site at Castel di Guido in Italy featured numerous skeletons of straight-tusked elephants, from which many of the bone tools were produced.

Hand-Carved, 400,000-Year-Old Bone Tool Used for Smoothing Leather Found in Italy

Found near Rome, the utensil is 100,000 years older than previous finds of this kind

The bone carving shows a deliberate pattern.

Is This 51,000-Year-Old Deer Bone Carving an Early Example of Neanderthal Art?

Made at least a millennium before modern humans' arrival in what is now Germany, the engraved object may reflect abstract thinking

A recreation of Dragon Man

A 146,000-Year-Old Fossil Dubbed 'Dragon Man' Might Be One of Our Closest Relatives

A mysterious Middle Pleistocene skull from a Chinese well has inspired debate among paleoanthropologists

A close-up of fossilized plaque on an ancient human tooth.

Neanderthals Ate Carb-Heavy Diets, Potentially Fueling Brain Growth

Study finds evidence that ancient humans and their Neanderthal cousins ate lots of starchy, carbohydrate-rich foods

Recent research unearthed a trove of remains at a site that first yielded a Neanderthal skull in 1939.

Remains of Nine Neanderthals Butchered by Hyenas Found in Italian Cave

The fossilized bones appear to belong to one woman, seven men and a young boy

Researchers discovered 87 Neanderthal footprints, as well as a number of tracks left by prehistoric animals.

100,000-Year-Old Fossilized Footprints Track Neanderthals' Trip to Spanish Coast

Some of the imprints appear to have been left by a child "jumping irregularly as though dancing," researchers say

Researchers identified seven prehistoric human footprints at Alathar, a dried-up lake bed in Saudi Arabia.

Human Footprints Found in Saudi Arabia May Be 120,000 Years Old

If confirmed, the footfalls would represent the oldest evidence of Homo sapiens' presence on the Arabian Peninsula

New research suggests a genetic mutation some humans inherited from Neanderthals may make them more sensitive to pain than their peers.

Neanderthals May Have Been More Sensitive to Pain Than Most Humans

Modern humans with this Neanderthal-inherited gene report 7 percent more pain than other people

A set of 120,000-year-old shells from the Qafzeh Cave in northern Israel. Ancient humans collected these shells, which had natural perforations, and arranged them on lengths of string.

New Research Suggests Humans Invented String at Least 120,000 Years Ago

Marks found on ancient shells indicate that they were laced together to create necklaces

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