There are several misconceptions that many believe about Neanderthals. One is that they were dumb and uncivilized, which is actually untrue. This misconception has lingered on for so long that we use “Neanderthal” as a word for an uncivilized and unintelligent person. Neanderthals were even almost named Homo stupidus (“the stupid man”).

Today, we know Neanderthals were as smart as humans. But that isn’t the only surprising fact we have about the Neanderthals. Read on to find out about the interesting things we’ve dug up.

10 They Walked Upright

Neanderthals have often been depicted as slouched creatures with hunched backs, almost as if they were some other species of great ape. This depiction is wrong. Neanderthals walked upright and could have been better-postured than us. The myth of the hunched Neanderthal was started by Marcellin Boule, who believed Neanderthals were the missing link between humans and other great apes.

Researchers concluded that Neanderthals walked upright after creating a computer model of a Neanderthal skeleton. They noted that the neck and lower spine were curved. Both indicate an upright posture. Neanderthals would have walked with a hunch if their necks and spines were straight, as originally thought.

Researchers also saw that the wear marks on the skeletion’s hips indicated an upright posture. The sacrum (the bone in between the hip bones) was positioned just as it is with Homo sapiens. This could have only been possible if they had an upright posture.^[1]

9 Non-Africans Have Neanderthal Genes

Early Homo sapiens migrated out of Africa 70,000 years ago. At the time, Homo sapiens shared the Earth with two other species of humans: the Neanderthals and Denisovans. The Homo sapiens went toward Eurasia, where they met and interbred with Neanderthals.

Today, the descendants of these Homo sapiens (Asians and Europeans) have some Neanderthal genes in them. Scientists have discovered that the DNA of the average Asian and European is about two-percent Neanderthal. Sub-Saharan Africans have little to no Neanderthal DNA because their ancestors never left Africa and did not interbreed with Neanderthals.

Homo sapiens interbred with Neanderthals and Denisovans because they were all closely related. All three groups descended from Homo heidelbergensis.

A group of Homo heidelbergensis left Africa between 500,000 and 600,000 years ago. They split on the way. One group traveled to Western Asia and Europe and became the Neanderthals. The other group went toward Eastern Asia and became the Denisovans. The Homo heidelbergensis that remained in Africa eventually became Homo sapiens.^[2]

8 Homo Sapiens Could Have Hunted And Eaten Neanderthals

Early Homo sapiens seem to have had a thing for Neanderthal meat, at least if the hypothesis by Spanish anthropologists Policarp Hortola and Bienvenido Martinez-Navarro is true. The anthropologists speculate that humans feasted on Neanderthals as they migrated from Africa into Europe.^[3]

Researcher Fernando Rozzi of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris makes the same claims. He reached the conclusion after analyzing a Neanderthal jawbone. He and his team discovered that cut marks on the bone were made by humans.

If that wasn’t enough, early humans also probably used Neanderthal teeth to make necklaces. Other researchers, however, dispute the claims that Homo sapiens hunted and ate Neanderthals. They say early humans could have taken the jawbone from an already dead Neanderthal.

If true, the claims would support the hypothesis that humans hunted the Neanderthals into extinction. Some researchers believe this because Neanderthals went extinct around the same time early humans reached Europe.

7 They Painted

Neanderthals were artists. In fact, they made the oldest cave painting in the world. Around 65,000 years ago, some Neanderthal used a red pigment to etch something that resembles a ladder onto the walls of a Spanish cave.

Researchers have found two more paintings made by Neanderthals in two other Spanish caves. All three artworks were clearly the handiwork of a Neanderthal because Homo sapiens had not reached Europe at the time. The artworks indicate that Neanderthals had a similar cognitive abilities to humans.^[4]

6 They Were Almost Called Homo Stupidus

The first Neanderthal fossil (that was recognized to be an early human) was discovered in the Neander Thal (“Neander Valley”) in Germany in 1856. Neander Thal was named after Joachim Neumann, a 17th-century German minister who often roamed the valley. Neumann also wrote hymns, which he published under the pseudonym “Neander,” the Greek translation of Neumann (as in “new man”).

“Neander” and “thal” were soon slurred together to create the name “Neanderthal.” In 1904, the “h” was removed from “thal” because German does not have a “th” sound. However, some languages stuck with the “th,” creating a variant spelling of the name.

In 1864, William King suggested that the new human species be named Homo neanderthalensis, after the Neander Valley in which the fossil was found. Two years later, Ernst Haeckel suggested that we call the new human species Homo stupidus (“the stupid man”). Fortunately for the Neanderthals, King’s name was chosen because he proposed it first.

It is no surprise that Ernst suggested the name Homo stupidus for Neanderthals. We had poor knowledge of Neanderthals at the time—and probably still do now. Most people thought they were dumb creatures that couldn’t draw or use tools.^[5]

However, we now know Neanderthals could draw and use tools. They were also effective hunters, cared for their sick and elderly, and probably spoke some language. Neanderthals were just like Homo sapiens in many ways.

5 Neanderthals Inbred A Lot

Inbreeding was common among Neanderthals. In 2014, researchers discovered a 120,000-year-old Neanderthal toe bone in the Altai Mountains of Siberia. Analysis of its genome revealed that the Neanderthal had closely related parents. They could have been siblings, first cousins, or even an uncle and his niece.

The inbreeding hypothesis was further supported by a 50,000-year-old Neanderthal fossil unearthed in Vindija, Croatia, and 13 found in Sidron, Spain. All bones showed that the subjects descended from closely related parents.

As with modern humans, inbreeding among Neanderthals came with its own problems. Inbred Neanderthals had malformed body parts and bones. Many of their fossils had misshapen kneecaps and vertebrae. At least one Neanderthal retained a baby tooth into adulthood. Inbreeding made Neanderthals weaker and also less likely to reproduce than early Homo sapiens.

Unfortunately for us, Neanderthals transferred some of these unfavorable genes to early humans as they interbred. The genes are still present in some humans today, even though they have been largely suppressed. Some researchers speculate that inbreeding could have been one of the reasons the Neanderthals went extinct.^[6]

4 They Were Cannibals

While we are unsure whether early Homo sapiens ate Neanderthals, we know Neanderthals ate Neanderthals. Yes, Neanderthals were cannibals. The conclusion was reached after scientists analyzed the bones of five 40,000-year-old Neanderthals. The bones were broken the same way Neanderthals broke bones of the animals they hunted.

The reason Neanderthals feasted on other Neanderthals remains unclear. For a start, Neanderthals, early Homo sapiens, and even modern Homo sapiens are not nutritious. Neanderthals would clearly have preferred hunting bigger and more nutritious animals like horses, bison, reindeer, and mammoth that roamed nearby.

Researchers have speculated that Neanderthals cannibalized other Neanderthals for their marrow. This could be true, considering that the bones showed signs of being deliberately broken to reach the nutritious marrow inside. Researchers also suspect that Neanderthals could have turned to cannibalism for cultural reasons, or they just liked munching down on neighboring Neanderthals that strayed into their territory.^[7]

3 They Were Hunted By Other Animals

Neanderthals probably spent a huge chunk of their lives trying to avoid getting eaten. Besides their fellow Neanderthals and possibly humans, they were also hunted by wild animals of the day.

Researchers reached this conclusion after analyzing some Neanderthal fossils. They discovered the fossils had bite marks consistent with large carnivores. A fossil bone belonging to a young Neanderthal child clearly proved he was eaten by a large cat.

The analysis of the bone of another Neanderthal child from Ciemna Cave in Poland revealed that he was eaten by a large bird. The 115,000-year-old bone had holes indicating that it had passed the digestive system of a bird. However, researchers could not confirm whether the bird killed the child or fed on its corpse.

It should not be very surprising that Neanderthals sometimes ended up in the stomachs of other animals. Neanderthals and these animals were practically neighbors. Clashes would have been common, since they competed for the same sources of food and sought shelter in the same caves.^[8]

2 They Buried Their Dead

In 1908, two archaeologists unearthed the 50,000-year-old remains of a Neanderthal in a cave in La Chapelle-aux-Saints, France. The anthropologists insisted that the Neanderthal had been deliberately buried there, even though nobody believed them at the time.

Archaeologists returned to the site in 1999. In 2012, a team led by William Rendu of New York University confirmed that the Neanderthal was truly buried there. Since then, we have found over 20 other sites scattered across Europe containing the remains of buried Neanderthals. The burials were often hasty, to prevent the body from being eaten by scavengers.

The discovery of burials among Neanderthals adds credibility to claims that Neanderthals took care of their sick and elderly. The Neanderthal found in the French cave had bone deformations and had lost lots of teeth. It is unlikely that Neanderthals would have bothered to bury somebody they refused to care for.^[9]

1 We Don’t Know Why They Went Extinct

We do not know why Neanderthals went extinct. We have already mentioned inbreeding and hunting by Homo sapiens as possible reasons, but those are only hypotheses. Other researchers speculate that Neanderthals went extinct after early humans infected them with deadly diseases after they migrated into Europe.

Other researchers think it was actually because Neanderthals couldn’t match the higher reproduction rate of humans. A more recent theory involves two ice ages.

Some 44,000 years ago, an ice age began and lasted for 1,000 years. This was followed by another ice age that began 40,800 years ago and ended 600 years later. Temperatures in Europe reached below zero during both ice ages.

Plants died off, starving the large game that the Neanderthals hunted. The large animals died off, and the Neanderthals soon followed since they depended on large game for food. Early Homo sapiens survived the ice ages because they were already adapted to eating plants and all kinds of meat and fish.

Some researchers believe a small number of Neanderthals survived the first ice age, and any remaining Neanderthals moved in with humans when the second ice age began. They interbred and soon became a part of the human gene pool.^[10]

Roughly 200,000 years ago, Neanderthals came into existence across Eurasia. They were named after the Neander Valley in Germany, where the first fossils of one of the earliest groups of archaic humans were found. Commonly referred to as ‘cavemen’, it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that our perception of Neanderthals isn’t all that accurate to the facts.

Despite what you might think, Neanderthals weren’t dumb, hairy brutes who struggled to survive. Neanderthals are our closest extinct relatives, and over the years, we’ve begun correcting our past falsehoods and learned far more about our distant cousins. What we’ve gathered is how comparable they were to modern day humans.  

Not only were Neanderthals similar to us in appearance, albeit stockier, shorter, and with more prominent facial features, but their way of life had some striking similarities to that of our own. Neanderthals, the earliest foundations of homo sapiens and misunderstood throughout history, are now being revealed as lovers of art, brilliant thinkers, and fearless hunters. However, that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

10. Unique Voices

When we think of Neanderthals, or what we more commonly refer to as ‘cavemen’, we usually jump straight to thinking they communicated in grunts. While it’s true they weren’t equipped with the most advanced or sophisticated vocabularies, their communication style wasn’t as primitive as grunting.

Neanderthals’ body structure meant that complex speech patterns were possible. Similarly to modern humans, they had a hyoid bone in the neck supporting their tongue. Neanderthals and humans both have this bone, which helps to make vocalization possible.

While we are (and, in their case, were) both able to speak thanks to this pivotal bone, that doesn’t mean we sounded the same. Neanderthals’ throats, nasal cavities, and chests were shaped differently than modern humans. The combination of their unique composition and posture affected the phonetic qualities of Neanderthals’ speech patterns. The overall consensus is their voices were much louder than ours are, and much higher in pitch.

9. Sharing Molecular Structure with the Wooly Mammoth

Neanderthals and wooly mammoths roamed the world around the same time. Considering the Neanderthals’ superior hunting skills, and wooly mammoth’s 12,000-pound bodies meant they were often the targets. In what is a unique example of convergent evolution, Neanderthals and wooly mammoths have recently been found to share molecular signs.

Wooly mammoths’ origins are in Africa, where their ancestors, Mammuthus rumanus, lived until migrating to Eurasia. Through this migration, they adapted to the different conditions of Eurasia, which presented colder weather than that of Africa. Their physiology depicted in later studies was one that could handle these conditions when these genomes were mapped and isolated.

Neanderthals have also been linked to African roots, having migrated to Eurasia, meaning they too had to adapt to these vastly different conditions. Through the studying of both genomes, evidence has shown that they likely adapted to these conditions around the same time, sharing ecological habitats, and Neanderthals ate wooly mammoths. This has led to the plausible conclusion that Neanderthals and wooly mammoths both share similarities in their molecular structure through migration and adaptation to their new environment.  

8. Early Artists

In 2018, a study was released that detailed the findings of what is believed to be the earliest instances of art. Found in three caves across Spain were paintings of animals, geometric signs, dots, handprints, engravings, and hand stencils, using a black and red substance that mimics modern paint, all more than 65,000 years old.

This important discovery gave us critical insight into art’s origins within homo sapiens societies. It also provided information into some of the earliest instances of culture within archaic humans. There was also evidence to suggest that Neanderthals used early examples of jewelry with body ornamentation found that dated back 40,000 to 45,000 years.

The evidence found in these caves also proved that while the cave paintings were over 65,000 years old, other findings in the cave such as perforated seashell beads dated back over 115,000 years, meaning Neanderthals and art weren’t segmented to a specific time period, but existed throughout their place in the Earth’s timeline. While they were no Da Vinci or Van Gogh, they were true pioneers of art and culture, long before structured societies existed.

7. Skilled Hunters

The need to survive usually makes anyone learn a few tricks to help get them their next meal. Neanderthals were no exception to this logic. During their time roaming Eurasia, evidence has proven them to be extremely capable hunters. Thanks to a healthy combination of wit and skill, they easily could capture and kill game and had impressive cognitive capabilities, which helped them coordinate attacks.

Neanderthals worked together to hunt down food across Eurasia. Evidence has suggested that Neanderthals had extraordinary hand dexterity and therefore could yield advanced hunting gear for their time, including stone-tipped spears to hunt down their prey. Beyond their weapon of choice and power in numbers approach, Neanderthals were not short on strength. Bones of our distant anthropological cousins showed many fractures that are like those found in professional rodeo performers.

This combination of strength, teamwork, and their intelligent approach to hunting in learning migration patterns and the timing of their stays in certain parts of Eurasia meant they did not just survive, but they thrived as hunters.

6. Masters of Fire

A study by the University of Colorado-Boulder examined prior uses of fire within Neanderthal societies, and what they found was contradictory to what we believed was a primitive discovery and use of fire.

Our earliest belief of Neanderthals and fire was that while it was used, it wasn’t used continuously. Upon further examination of various Neanderthal sites across Europe, the theory shifted and researchers were surprised that they might have been wrong, and based on evidence, Neanderthals could masterfully control and use fire.

Nobody really knows when the discovery of fire took place. There are theories but no solid conclusions, so the theory around Neanderthals and fire was primitive in its assessment. With evidence such as fireplaces, remnants of charcoal, burned bones, heated stone artifacts, and burned sediment, it’s become difficult to deny that we had been incorrect in believing Neanderthals weren’t competent in using fire; it was instead present in almost every aspect of their way of life.

5. Respect for their Elders

One aspect of our understanding of Neanderthals that has evolved through the findings of bones across various caves is that they likely not only had great respect for the elderly in their tribes, but also cared for them until their deaths.

When bones were found in southwest France, they discovered the bones of a man who’d lost his teeth before being buried. They also realized based on the structure of his leg bones that he likely could barely walk in the later years of his life. This meant that before he died, he could barely survive on his own.

The lead author of the study, William Rendu, said that the evidence found in his bones suggests he was not only buried with respect, but that he was also taken care of until the very end of his life by the community. While Neanderthals could have been callous and allowed this man to die long before natural causes, they instead took care of him until the end. This meant that Neanderthals showed a great deal of intelligence, empathy, and conscience for others.

4. Thoughtful Burial Practices

It was long thought that modern humans were the first to conceive the idea of digging graves to bury the dead. But over time, evidence has suggested that Neanderthals may have intentionally buried their dead, too.

This was first discovered in 1908 in the south of France when a Neanderthal tomb was found. Inside, they found bones that were well-preserved. The finders of these bones believed this proved Neanderthals intentionally buried their dead, while skeptics argued otherwise.

Between 1999 and 2012, seven caves were excavated across the La Chapelle-aux-Saints, where the 1908 discovery was made. They found several remains in the caves, including two children, an adult, and reindeer. While no tools or weapons were discovered to support the idea that these graves were intentional, the depth of the pits were found to not be a natural feature of the cave itself.

Further findings from 1908 suggested that Neanderthals were deliberate and quick in their burying practices to preserve bones. This was supported by how intact the bones were, with little to no cracks or smoothing that would have resulted from natural erosion.

It’s believed that beyond the act of burying their dead, they were ceremonial in the process, akin to modern human funerals. This theory was born from findings of fire pits, and tools found at Des-Cubierta Cave in Madrid, where it’s believed the cave was a place to bury and mourn the dead.

3. Humans and Neanderthals Bred Quickly

Modern humans began migrating from Africa over 100,000 years ago. They’d eventually cross paths with Neanderthals in Eurasia. In 2010, researchers sequenced Neanderthals’ full genome for the first time.

They discovered that small bits of Neanderthal DNA lived on in modern humans, supporting the idea that these two subsets of the human species did, in fact, mate.

The discovery has been studied even further since 2010, and what they found was that the inherited DNA exists in present-day Europeans and Asians, but not Africans. A particular study of DNA from a 45,000-year-old modern human in Romania helped to pinpoint a more accurate timing of when this encounter first occurred, placing it between 50,000 and 65,000 years ago.

Studies have proven that mating occurred, but pinpointing how it happened remains up for debate. Evidence has only proven that the primary provider of interbreeding was between Neanderthal men and modern women. While that’s not to say the reverse isn’t possible, it was less likely as the neanderthal genome would have been stronger in children conceived with neanderthal women.

2. Climate Change Linked Disappearance

In what might be a cautionary tale, Neanderthals’ disappearance has been linked to the effects of climate change. There are conflicting theories regarding what happened to Neanderthals and why they disappeared, but one theory suggests that climate change is the primary cause.

Around the time of their existence, the climate was going through a process of changes nowhere near on the scale we’re seeing today, but still severe enough that they could thin a species out substantially. Eurasia was experiencing extreme examples of dry climate and cold climate at opposing times. It’s theorized that this event not only caused devastation on the Neanderthal population, but also affected migration patterns and animal populations, which resulted in an inconsistent hunt for Neanderthals.

The opposing theory suggests that modern humans and Neanderthals mating caused the population to decrease over several generations until it no longer existed. This was aided by the increasing number of modern humans migrating to Eurasia.

1. Modern Diseases Have Roots in the Distant Past

A 2014 Harvard Study discovered a surprising link between Neanderthals and a variety of illnesses and variants that affect modern humans. The research led by Harvard Medical School concluded that modern humans inherited genetic material from Neanderthals through cohabitation and crossbreeding.

While yes, Neanderthals are no longer around today, their genetic code does still exist within non-African people who often show an average of 2% Neanderthal genomes are present in modern day human genomes.

Some of the variants homo sapiens inherited affect our risk of acquiring diseases such as type-2 diabetes, lupus, Crohn’s disease, biliary cirrhosis, and even impacts our smoking behavior. Beyond disease, it also can be the reason for infertility, or characteristics of our skin and hair.

This is not to say that every gene given to modern humans by Neanderthals is necessarily bad. We still don’t even know the full extent of the findings, as studies still continue to this day. Regardless, it’s clear that through interbreeding and the process of adaptive introgression, humans took a piece of this vastly misunderstood past human species with them into the future.