If Homo floresiensis wasn’t a fire-using hunter, its origins could be different than we thought. Komodo dragons use their venomous […]
Tag: paleoanthropology
Every Homo naledi we know of is female, and the implications are fascinating
“There is no natural explanation,” says paleoanthropologist John Hawks. Neo, the type specimen for Homo naledi, was originally thought to […]
If I had a hammer… it might actually be a rhino tooth
One way archaeologists learn how ancient people, including Neanderthals, did things is to attempt to do those things themselves, a […]
Neanderthals drilled cavities to treat a toothache 59,000 years ago
Two of the teeth were museum specimens, whose age and context curators didn’t know, making them less useful for other […]
Neanderthal brains measure up to ours—literally
(When we talk about “intelligence,” we’re describing something complex and, frankly, sort of nebulous; it’s impossible to really quantify, but […]
Never mind Band-Aids, Neanderthals had antiseptic birch tar
Our view of Neanderthal life keeps getting more complex and vibrant. This replica shows how Neanderthals might have used birch […]
“Million-year-old” fossil skulls from China are far older—and not Denisovans
careful with that, it’s an antique The revised age may help make sense of 2-million-year-old stone tools elsewhere in China. […]
We have a fossil closer to our split with Neanderthals and Denisovans
The Casablanca fossils are about the same age as hominin fossils from Spain, which belong to a species called Homo […]
Lead poisoning has been a feature of our evolution
Lead poisoning has been a feature of our evolution A recent study found lead in teeth from 2 million-year-old hominin […]
Stone tools may hint at ancestors of Homo floresiensis
Some stone tools found near a river on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi suggest that the first hominins had reached […]