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Neanderthals are among the snug extinct congener of modern humanity , but they inhume their idle differently than earlyHomo sapiensdid , new evidence suggests .
Among the hominins — the group that includes humans and the extinct specie more closely related to human beings than to any other animal — NeanderthalsandH. sapiensare currently the only one sleep with to lay to rest their deadened .
A reconstruction of a burial of a Neanderthal man at La Chapelle-aux-Saints, France.
" We know there are other hominins that had some mortuary practices , that did something with their dead , but no others put their dead in holes and covered them up like we do and the Neanderthals did , " written report lead authorElla Been , a paleoanthropologist at Tel Aviv University in Israel , say Live Science .
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To learn more about the law of similarity and differences between the funerary practices of Neanderthal andH. sapiens , Been andOmry Barzilai , an archeologist at the University of Haifa in Israel , analyzed 17 swinish and 15H. sapiensburials . The burials range from 35,000 to 120,000 yr former and add up from Western Asia , a region that Neanderthals andH. sapiensoccupied at the same time .
The research worker found numerous similarities between Neanderthal andH. sapiensburials . " They both inhume male person and female , and babies , children and older people , " Been sound out . Both also buried items with the great unwashed . For instance , previous digs see wild goat horns , carmine deer jaws , tortoiseshells and Lucy Stone artifacts in Neanderthal burials , and cervid antlers , boar jaws , seashells and the cherry mineral ochre withH. sapiensburials .
However , " there are also some gravid difference , " Been say . First , " Neanderthals buried their dead inside caves . EarlyH. sapienseither buried their dead outside of cave , or under the cave entrances , not under the roofs of cave . "
secondly , " earlyH. sapiensalmost always sink their dead in the fetal stance , with their heads flexed down toward their chests , " Been sound out . " Neanderthals buried their dead in a variety of positions . "
" The datum are limited , but this is an impressive survey,“John Hawks , a paleoanthropologist at the University of Wisconsin – Madison who did not take part in this research , told Live Science . Notably , he said there appear to have been consistent burial practices that distinguish Neanderthal and earlyH. sapiensburials . This is surprising because all of these little , scattered population would n’t be wait to share cultural practices over tenacious stretches of space and fourth dimension .
The new sketch also suggests that Neanderthals and earlyH. sapiensmight have started to bury their dead at about the same fourth dimension , about 90,000 to 120,000 days ago , and in the same geographical country , the Levant — the eastern Mediterranean region that today includes Israel , the Palestinian territories , Jordan , Lebanon and Syria . Scientists have long call back the Levant was a cardinal gateway for hominins migrating out of Africa .
" This was our most surprising discovery to me , " Been said . " Only after we finished comparing their wont surrounding the interment of their dead did we find that all other inhumation site of theirs , in Africa and in Europe , came after the Levant . “Previous work suggested that Neanderthals and earlyH. sapiensexchanged cognition in the Levant , Been said . If you were to look at sites where they coexisted in clip in the Levant — from about 250,000 to 50,000 years ago — and had only artefact and no bones , " you would n’t have intercourse if they were Neanderthal or earlyH. sapiens , " she suppose .
However , in addition to whatever exchange of knowledge occurred between Neanderthals and earlyH. sapiensin the Levant , the investigator suggested both human pedigree may have buried their dead for another reason .
" We know when there are a slew of groups exist in the same district , and there is resulting pressure over , say , resources , they set out using entombment to tick off their association to specific cave , " Been said .
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However , Hawks thinks the number of site examined in the new study is too small to support a single descent for human entombment practices in the Levant , with dispersal around the existence from there .
" The head is whether there is transmittal of melodic theme or concepts from one single source , and the data really are not unspoiled enough to certify that flow of information , " Hawks said .
Been match that the number of burials was modest . " We should do more excavations , " she take down . " Maybe in three yr , or 30 , or 300 , we ’ll find more burials , and the import will change . "
The scientists detailedtheir findingsearlier this year in the daybook L’Anthropologie .
