ANTH 210 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Louis Laurent Gabriel De Mortillet, Marcellin Boule, Gibraltar 1
3 May 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
1
Anthro 201, Winter 2018
The Rise and Fall (and Rise Again) of Neanderthal Intelligence
Transcript
Slide 1: Title (no text)
Slide 2: Gibraltar skull and Georges Cuvier. The first Neanderthal was discovered at Gibraltar
in 1848, but went unrecognized because of the dominance of French Paleontologist Georges
Cuvier, who did not recognize evolution.
Slide 3: Feldhoffer Cave fossils. First recognized Neanderthal: Feldhofer Cave, Neander Valley,
Germany, was found by quarry workers in 1854.
Slide 4: Caricature of Darwin as a chimpanzee. Darwin published Origin of Species in 1859, &
Neanderthal was immediately drawn into the evolution/anti-evolution debate because it was the
only known fossil human. It soon became the only fossil hominin with nearly universal name
recognition by the public. This was bad news for Neanderthal, because evolution was instantly
controversial.
Slide 5: Neanderthal and Modern human skulls, front view. Compared to Anatomically Modern
Homo sapiens (AMHs), the most important Neanderthal cranial traits are: a large face placed in
front of the braincase, large brow ridges and a very wide nasal aperture. The brain is larger than
Anatomically Modern Homo sapiens (Nean. = 1,500 cc, AMHs = 1,400 cc).
Slide 6: Neanderthal Post-Cranial Characteristics: MUSCULAR, powerful bodies. Bone density
2 times modern levels. Short, stocky stature. Large joint surfaces, which indicates heavy body
weight and vigorous physical activity. Huge chest cavity enclosing large heart and lungs.
Slide 7: Neanderthal depiction in 1910 French magazine. Early characterizations of Neanderthals
stressed their bestial, animalistic nature.
Slide 8: Neanderthal as criminal psychopath, Museum of Criminal Anthropology, Turin, Italy,
1880’s.
Slide 9: Physical anthropologist Marcellin Boule & the La Chapelle-aux-Saints skull. The first
scientific description by Marcellin Boule (1911), used a single, elderly arthritic male skeleton
from La Chapelle-aux-Saints (France) as the “typical” (Type Fossil) Neanderthal, creating a false
impression of a stoop-shouldered, stupid, and uncoordinated species. This ignored the fact it had
a larger brain (1,620 cc) than the modern human average.
Slide 10: Beginning the Neanderthal rehabilitation – Evidence for religious ritual at La Ferrassie,
France. The rise of cultural relativism beginning around 1910 combined with the discovery of
what appeared to be deliberate burials at La Chapelle, Le Moustier & La Ferrassie was
interpreted as proof of Neanderthal ritual behavior and abstract thoughts. This began the slow
process of rehabilitating the Neanderthals.
Slide 11: Neanderthal in modern clothes. By the 1930’s some physical anthropologists were
arguing that Neanderthals were directly ancestral to modern humans, and were not really very
different from us. (Drawing by physical anthropologist Carlton Coon.)
The Neanderthal Problem —> due to
fluctuation in how people view them
Influenced by Catastrophism (belief) of the
time
A lot of debates on evolution became associated to Neanderthals (and all the misconceptions)
Bone density relates
to muscle (increase
in one leads to an
increase in the
other). Also had
shorter limbs overall.
Large nasal
aperture means
larger air intake, so
must’ve processed
more oxygen, which
makes sense for the
larger muscles.
Attributed lack of moral instincts to animals (including carnivorous).
Features on skull believed to determine whether you were “good” or “criminal” & apparently neanderthals had all these characteristics.
Standard species
was to describe type
fossil (first, most
complete fossil) as if
it was normal to all of
those species (they
ignored variation)
Put the neanderthal as side branches because they couldn’t believe it related so closely
to humans. Considered them extremely stupid, even though it had the largest skull to
date.
Found fetus bones??
Text
2
Slide 12: Ales Herdlicka. Many anthropologists also wanted to fight the growing racist
ideology of German fascism, and sought to present all humans past and present as intellectual
equals. One of the leaders of this movement was Ales Hrdlicka, first curator of Physical
Anthropology at the Smithsonian Natural History Museum. Hrdlicka championed the view that
Neanderthals were direct ancestors of modern humans, and this became a precursor of the
“Multiregional” hypothesis of human evolution.
Slide 13: Shanidar “flower burial”. Claimed evidence of Neanderthal sophistication found in the
1930’s and 40’s included Ralph Solecki finding pollen concentrations near a Neanderthal
skeleton at Shanidar cave, Iraq. He thought that the man was buried with an offering of
wildflowers.
Slide 14: Deliberate conservation of cave bear skulls, Drachenloch, Germany. The “Cave Bear
Cult” was also cited, but other evidence of complex cognition such as art, language and ethnicity
was lacking, in part due to primitive archaeological field and analytical methods.
Slide 15: Gabriel de Mortillet. In the late 19th century, French archaeologist Gabriel de Mortillet
considered all Neanderthal tools to be very simple and generally similar between sites. He
thought they represented a single slowly evolving technological tradition (culture) he called the
Mousterian. Like most 19th Cent. scholars he had a very low view of Neanderthal intelligence.
Slide 16: Francois Bordes, Bordes argued that de Mortillets functional classification was
speculative and proposed a comprehensive classification of tools based solely on their formal
characteristics. Bordes identified 62 different Mousterian tool types. Through simple statistical
analysis he thought he could identify distinct styles of tool manufacture that, instead of being a
result of gradual change (evolution) over time, co-occurred in space and time. He interpreted
this as evidence of different “tribes” of Neanderthals. In other words, he thought he had found
evidence of ethnicity and languages among Neanderthals.
Slide 17: Transverse scraper and side scraper. In other words, Bordes argued that some
Neanderthals made most of their scrapers on the sides of flakes, while others made more of their
scrapers across the ends of flakes (“transverse”) because of different learned behavior patterns, in
other words because of different cultural preferences.
Slide 18: Lewis Binford and Sally Schanfield. Bordes’ “cultural” explanation of assemblage
variability was opposed by Lewis Binford, who, beginning in the 1960’s, argued that assemblage
variability was best explained by the activities taking place in sites rather than ethnicity. This is
the “Functional Variability” perspective, and it assumes that individual tool types (shapes) have
specific functions.
Slide 19: Binfords’ functional interpretation of tool shapes can be problematic. Form and
function seem to be linked for things like points, but things are more complicated for scrapers,
which are the most common kinds of Mousterian tools. There is also no clear correlation
between the ecological circumstances of sites and the types of tools found there. Eventually,
Binford concluded that Neanderthals were not behaviorally complex, and that they existed in
sex-segregated societies organized more like social carnivores than human hunter/foragers. Even
as carnivores, Binford considered Neanderthals to be failures in that he thought they were mostly
scavengers rather than hunters. The rise of Binfords’ ideas began the second decline in our
estimation of Neanderthal intelligence.
Slide 20: Monte Circeo and La Ferrassie – Ritual burial by Neanderthals debunked. The
development of better archaeological field methods and analytical techniques in the mid 20th
Anthropologists had taken on a belief of cultural relativism (that all cultures were equal)
Meant religious ritual and reverence for the dead.
People began to
look for indications
of Neanderthal
intelligence in stone
tools.
4 functions in tools:
1) Scraping
2) Pointed knives
3) Concave shaping
tools
4) Pointed spears
But tools clustered differently. Tribes implies ethnicities and different languages
amongst Neanderthals.
Different shapes in tools simply mean different functions, so tools will be specialized to the type of site and not the necessarily the cultures.
Scrapers are multi-functional,
so more complex to analyze
E.g. lions (females
have territory &
travel together,
males just fight for
periphery of
groups)
Document Summary
The rise and fall (and rise again) of neanderthal intelligence. A lot of debates on evolution became associated to neanderthals (and all the misconceptions) The first neanderthal was discovered at gibraltar in 1848, but went unrecognized because of the dominance of french paleontologist georges. Germany, was found by quarry workers in 1854. Slide 4: caricature of darwin as a chimpanzee. Darwin published origin of species in 1859, & Neanderthal was immediately drawn into the evolution/anti-evolution debate because it was the only known fossil human. It soon became the only fossil hominin with nearly universal name recognition by the public. This was bad news for neanderthal, because evolution was instantly controversial. Slide 5: neanderthal and modern human skulls, front view. Homo sapiens (amhs), the most important neanderthal cranial traits are: a large face placed in front of the braincase, large brow ridges and a very wide nasal aperture. Slide 6: neanderthal post-cranial characteristics: muscular, powerful bodies.
