The typical view of Neanderthals has been of a large brutish species, physically imposing but with little intellectual, social or cultural development – the archetypal ‘caveman’.
This view has softened in recent years. Simple Neanderthal jewellery has been discovered while the fact that they had the modern human form of the FOXP2 gene (and certain anatomical adaptations) suggests they may have had some capacity for speech. They may even have had a musical form of ‘proto-language’ – music and language may well share an evolutionary origin.
Drawing on various strands of evidence, Frederick Coolidge of the University of Colorado has come up with a picture of how Neanderthals might have lived and communicated. The archaeological record suggests that they only used local raw materials, suggesting that they did not trade. They probably lived in small groups and, unlike humans, they never developed any ‘division of labour’ according to gender or age. As their energy needs were so great, most Neanderthals probably spent the bulk of their time hunting.
It was also a violent society. Neanderthals are rarely found with healed lower limb injuries – suggesting that once they had been injured and immobile, they were doomed.
All this evidence, suggests Dr Coolidge, indicates that Neanderthals (unlike modern humans) never developed complex social groups bound together by effective communication. They probably lacked key mental abilities, such as recursive thinking (‘thinking about thinking’), theory of mind (appreciating what is going on in someone else’s head) and inhibition of impulsive reactions.
Interestingly, brain damage and some developmental abnormalities can interfere with these abilities in humans, and markedly affect people’s social skills. People with autism, for example, are thought to lack theory of mind and struggle in their social interactions.
Dr Coolidge’s conclusion is that the Neanderthal brain may not have been wired to support effective communication and social interactions. To put it bluntly, they lacked diplomatic skills. They may have been less imaginative in their thinking, less able to see others’ points of views, and less able to inhibit their impulsive reactions. As a result, they would have been extremely difficult to get along with, and thus unable to sustain large social groups.
