Cavemen weren’t thick in spite of everything and will have been simply as brainy as us
Eggheads say the extinct humans, who roamed Europe and Asia for hundreds of thousands of years, were long painted as dim cavemen who couldn’t compete
The teen was though to be a budding hunter(Image: Getty Images/iStockphoto)
Neanderthals weren’t thick after all and may have been just as brainy as us, boffs say. Eggheads say the extinct humans, who roamed Europe and Asia for hundreds of thousands of years, were long painted as dim cavemen who couldn’t compete.
Despite their larger skull, it was thought they had poor speaking skills and smaller memory capacity. But a new study has blown that theory apart.
It found their thinking skills matched the Homo sapiens they lived alongside before vanishing around 40,000 years ago.
Researchers at Indiana University analysed brain data and found differences between Neanderthals and early humans were no bigger than those seen between people today.
Modern folk even show bigger differences between each other in nine out of 13 brain areas than those seen between Neanderthals and early humans.
Experts believed Neanderthals died out because they couldn’t match today’s people when it came to grey matter.
But the boffs said: “Putting estimated Neanderthal differences into the context of modern human variation does not support this view.”
They added: “Neanderthal differences in brain and cognition would fit comfortably within the range of differences seen among modern human populations,” casting doubt on the idea that they died out because they were less smart.
Instead, experts reckon Neanderthals were slowly absorbed.
As populations spread out of Africa, they outnumbered smaller Neanderthal groups and interbred with them.
The process – known as “genetic swamping” – means around 1 to 2% of DNA in modern Europeans can still be traced back to them today.
