In last month’s column, I explored Palaeolithic Norfolk and Suffolk, visiting some of the most important prehistoric sites not just in Britain but in the whole of western Europe. Here I will follow up on that review by moving south into Kent and Sussex
Our Neanderthal cousins may now be extinct, but they are rarely out of the news. Writing in The Conversation, archaeologist Steven Mithen tackles the perennial question of why Homo sapiens flourished while Neanderthals died out by examining the differences between the brain cavities of the two species
A set of marks in a cave in central France may be the earliest example of Neanderthal cave-wall engravings found to date. Tens of thousands of years ago, the entrance of La Roche-Cotard cave, which sits on the north bank…
REVIEW BY FRANCIS WENBAN-SMITH This volume presents an interim report on the current research into Middle Palaeolithic Neanderthal occupation on Jersey and in its vicinity, centred on re-investigation of La Cotte de St Brelade rock-shelter and its distinctive mammoth bone…
The assemblage of more than 3,000 elephant bones was discovered in 125,000-year-old lake deposits at the site of Neumark-Nord, in central Germany.
Analysis of more than 3,000 remains of the now-extinct elephant species has revealed the first 'clear-cut' evidence of elephant hunting in human evolution.
A round-up of some of the latest archaeological news from across the globe, including: Etruscan bronze statues found in Italy; a hominin footprint found in Spain; and a study of hunter-gatherer cooking practices.
A glance at some of the latest exciting archaeological stories from across the globe.
The remains found at Boxgrove – consisting of two teeth and part of a tibia – were re-examined by an international team using advanced 3D imaging and virtual reconstruction techniques.
Research suggests that, for Neanderthals and early modern humans, flavour was an important consideration during food preparation.
Svante Pääbo is the second member of his family to be elected a Nobel laureate: his father, Sune Bergström (1916-2004) shared the same Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine in 1982. Is there a gene, one wonders, for Nobel-Prize-winning science?
The 2022 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine has been awarded to Svante Pääbo for his discoveries concerning the genomes of extinct hominins and human evolution.
The find has been dubbed the ‘biggest mammoth discovery for a generation’
Discovered at Denisova Cave in Siberia, the bones have been dated to 200,000 years ago
The young Neanderthal man, known as ‘Krijin’, lived between 50,000 and 70,000 years ago in Doggerland, the prehistoric landscape that lies subsumed in the North Sea.
A team of researchers has identified 140,000-year-old fossilised remains found in Israel as belonging to a previously unknown type of ancient hominin, which may have been an early precursor of Neanderthals that co-existed alongside other prehistoric groups, including Homo sapiens.…
The Les Pradelles hyena bone is ‘potentially the earliest known example of this type of mark-making’, and suggests Neanderthals possessed the cognitive abilities for numeracy.
A quick round-up of news stories from around the globe, including a study of how Neanderthals spoke, an analysis of a chesnut tree from the Battle of Waterloo, and the discovery of stone artefacts in South America dating to c. 24,000 years ago.
Recent analysis of 12 teeth, first excavated at the Palaeolithic site of La Cotte de St Brelade in Jersey between 1910 and 1911, may provide new evidence of cross-breeding between Neanderthals and modern humans in this region. The teeth were…
Neanderthals have long been stereotyped as our less-capable cousins, but advances in archaeological research have given fascinating new insights into the lives of our closest hominin relatives and the world they inhabited, as Dr Rebecca Wragg Sykes explains.
Over the last decade, developments in genetic sequencing, as well as in the successful extraction of DNA from increasingly older and even contaminated remains, have allowed our knowledge of ancient hominins to expand exponentially. But even with these advances, our…