At ZME Science, science journalist Tibi Puiu looks at the way Neanderthals tended to “collect” stuff — objects with no apparent use. This clashes with the traditional assumption that they were “brutish and incapable of higher thought,” as Puiu puts it.

The shells discovered in the Neanderthals’ cave, Prado Vargas Cave in northern Spain, date back to between 39,800 and 54,600 years ago:

These weren’t tools or ornaments — they appear to have been collected just for the heck of it, simply because Neanderthals found them interesting.

The fossils, largely mollusks and echinoderms, were found at a site with no known proximity to the sea. Researchers suggest they may have been collected by Neanderthal children, drawn to their striking shapes and patterns.

“These fossils can be understood as evidence of an artistic interest or an attraction or curiosity for the forms of nature,” the study authors explain. This behavior echoes the modern tendency of children to collect stickers, shells, or bottle caps. “Neanderthal children may have enjoyed collecting trinkets,” November 21, 2024.

The presence of a baby tooth may have set the researchers thinking…

They point out that this type of behavior argues against the familiar Neanderthal brute tag:

This would indicate that Neanderthals had psychological and behavioral characteristics similar to those of our species, for which collecting is a common and complex practice motivated by numerous tangible and intangible causes, including competition, cooperation, symbolism, selfishness, selflessness, a sense of continuity, marketing, or addiction, among others. The Neanderthals’ motivation for bringing this set of fossils to the Prado Vargas cave might have been complex, and we have no valid hypothesis that can explain it. However, we should not forget the presence of children in the cave, for the collecting instinct characteristic of children could have had a relevant role in the set’s existence. In any case, the Upper Cretaceous fossil collection of the Prado Vargas cave site suggests that collecting, and the abstract thought that it entails, characterized Neanderthals before the arrival of Homo sapiens.

Navazo Ruiz, M., Benito-Calvo, A., Lozano-Francisco, M. C., Alonso Alcalde, R., Alonso García, P., de la Fuente Juez, H., Santamaría Diez, M., & Cristóbal Cubillo, P. (2024). Were Neanderthals the First Collectors? First Evidence Recovered in Level 4 of the Prado Vargas Cave, Cornejo, Burgos and Spain. Quaternary, 7(4), 49. https://doi.org/10.3390/quat7040049. The paper is open access.

There is other evidence as well. As Puiu reminds us,

The old stereotype of Neanderthals as brutish and incapable of higher thought has crumbled under the weight of discoveries like the stalagmite circles at Bruniquel Cave in France or the possible proto-sculptures at La Roche-Cotard. The fossils of Prado Vargas add another dimension, suggesting a capacity for abstract thought previously attributed only to Homo sapiens. “Enjoyed collecting trinkets,”

The stalagmite circles he mentions provoke a thought: Adult Neanderthals could put together considerable stoneworks if they wanted to undertake a communal project for some apparently abstract purpose:

It’s at least reasonable then to think that collecting amusing shells was an activity primarily enjoyed by children in those days.

Neanderthal tools were better, researchers say

This video, released by the BBC yesterday, also talks about the growing awareness that Neanderthals were not stupider than modern humans when it came to the technology of the day:

The researchers interviewed in the short film compared Neanderthal technology with modern human technology by creating and testing known tool types against each other:

We created thousands of tools. We [2:55 min] found that the technology of the Neanderthals actually produced more cutting edge. Overall, it wasted less raw material and you could produce more tools than the blade cores of modern Homo sapiens

It’s useful to keep in mind that the brute tag was attached to Neanderthals a long time ago because evolution theory needed someone to be the lesser human. And in terms of common stereotypes, they looked the part. Now that researchers tend to set prior assumptions aside and just look for evidence, a very different picture is emerging.

This, of course, deepens the mystery of why the Neanderthals disappeared as a separate group about 40,000 years ago. But if there were no mysteries, there would be no research, right?

You may also wish to read: The human mind has no history. There is no good reason to assume that human intelligence evolved from mud to mind via a long slow history. When we look at the human past, we see lights flashing on suddenly. Technology evolves but not the mind as such.