Stone Pages - Archaeo News (Italy)

Archaeologists excavate ancient Populonia

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 10:09:15 +0100

A team of archaeologists, students and volunteers will return again during the summer of 2012 to investigate the remains of a major Etruscan port city that straddles the Mediterranean coast of Tuscany, Italy. Located near the town of Piombino, it features one of the most important necropolises in the country, as well as an acropolis, a history that goes back to Etruscan settlers around 900 BCE, and a Bronze Age culture that dates to about 1200 BCE. The ancient site is known today as Populonia, a city that was for centuries a prominent Mediterranean centre for iron smelting and trade.
Co-led by Andrea Camilli (Superintendence for Archaeological Heritage of Tuscany), Giandomenico De Tommaso (University of Florence), and Carolina Megale (Archeodig Project), they intend to focus their investigation on a section of the lower city that is still intact, where they have identified evidence of a late Roman building and, beneath that, a part of the Etruscan necropolis.
Populonia is composed of a 'lower city', which includes the necropolis, port remains and evidence of its important metallurgical activities; and an 'upper city', or the Acropolis, which features the remains of houses, temples and other structures, located on the summit of the promontory on which the ancient port city was constructed. The lower city is well-known for its impressive monumental tombs.
The name of the Etruscan city was Fufluna, after a god, Fufluns. Based on evidence uncovered from the necropolis area, the site was also inhabited earlier by the ancient Villanovans, a people with origins connected to the Urnfield culture of Eastern Europe. The Villanovans are thought to have introduced iron-working to the Italian peninsula. The later Etruscans and Romans mined and worked the polymetallic ores of Campiglia Marittima, which contain iron, zinc, copper, lead, tin and silver. Mining continues in the area today, and the modern mine is said to be descended from the ancient mine.

Edited from Popular Archaeology (29 January 2012)

Scientists discover Oetzi's last meal

Sun, 18 Dec 2011 10:26:54 +0100

Oetzi's body was discovered in 1991 inside a glacier near the mountainous border between Italy and Austria, where it had been naturally mummified about 5300 years ago.
Previous analysis concluded Oetzi's stomach was almost empty of food, but Albert Zink (of the Institute for Mummies and the Iceman, in Bolzano, Italy) and his colleagues realised that the empty 'stomach' was in fact a section of Oetzi's colon, and that the real stomach, which had been forced upwards under the iceman's ribs, actually contains plenty of partially digested ibex meat - suggesting that Oetzi enjoyed a hearty meal very shortly before he was shot from behind with an arrow.
Oetzi had three gallstones, suggesting a diet rich in animal fat. Previous work showed his arteries were full of fatty deposits. His knees show evidence of wear associated with hiking in mountainous terrain.

Edited from NewScientist (11 December 2011)

Monte 'e Prama ancient statues on display - at last!

Wed, 30 Nov 2011 14:38:16 +0100

37 years after their discovery, the stone giants of Monte 'e Prama are being shown to the public for the first time in the gallery of Li Punti in Sassari (Sardinia, Italy), for the exhibition 'La pietra e gli eroi' (Stone and the heroes). On display 25 impressive statues about two metres tall and 13 models of nuraghi, the ancient Sardinian towers. Ten tons and 5,178 fragments of white limestone have been reassembled in 16 statues of boxers (some with a curved and rectangular shield above their heads), 5 of archers and 4 of warriors (with a round shield), characterized by magnetic eyes represented by two concentric circles.
The extraordinary collection of prehistoric sculptures, unearthed in 1974, will soon be separated: one part will be housed in the Museum of Cabras, near Oristano, the other in the Archaeological Museum of Cagliari. The Superintendency of Cagliari, in agreement with the Sardinia regional Council, has decided to take the route that most of the scientific world and public opinion had not recommended. "My idea is that all the finds should stay together, but it is true that an important museum such as Cagliari should have at least one find of such a great discovery," said professor Carlo Tronchetti, the archaeologist who in 1976 led the first excavation that brought to light the sculptures
Everything started in the spring of 1974, when the plow of Sisinnio Poddi, in Monte 'e Prama, near Cabras, came up against something very hard. After removing the earth, the farmer was amazed by a two wide-eyed stare framed by a stone face. The report to the authorities was immediate and between 1974 and 1975, the Archaeological and the University of Cagliari set up the first excavation. The campaign got to the heart a few years later, in 1979, under the guidance of professor Tronchetti and along with his team he brought to light an entire necropolis.
Speaking of dating, scholars currently are supporting two timeframes: the first one places the statues around the seventh century BCE, the other one goes to the end of the first millennium BCE. After the discovery, the debate went on for a while, but it was followed by a long period of silence. The entire complex was closed and the findings stored in boxes in the basement of the Archaeological Museum of Cagliari. From that moment on, the curtain fell over the ancient sculptures. A silence kept for more than thirty years, broken only in 2005, when the Italian Ministry for Cultural Heritage and the Sardinia regional Council allocated 1.2 million euros for the restoration of which the recent exhibition in Sassari marks the conclusion.
Archaeologists will soon return to Monte 'e Prama, perhaps as early as next spring. The Italian Ministry for Cultural Heritage has in fact already allocated an additional 250,000 euros to launch a new excavation campaign, along with restoration and consolidation works. However, the ancient giants are now threatened to fly to Korea: they could become guests at Seoul Expo even though it is still unclear whether the Sardinian authorities will send the original statues or only a few copies. "The final decision still rests withthe Superintendency of Cagliari," Regional Councilor for Culture Sergio Milia said.
The exhibition in Sassari will be open until December 30, 2011 from Thursday to Sunday, booking is available calling the toll-free number 800 148 776.

Edited from La Nuova Sardegna, L'Unione Sarda (23 November 2011)

Oetzi may have smashed eye in fall

Wed, 23 Nov 2011 13:38:47 +0100

A sharp incision in his right eye may have contributed to the rapid demise of Oetzi the Iceman, the famous mummy who died in the Italian Alps more than 5,000 years ago. New analyses have revealed that a deep cut likely led to heavy bleeding in the man's eye.
The official opinion remains that an arrow in his left shoulder was the cause of death for Oetzi. But the new study raises the possibility that he fell over after being shot by an arrow. "Maybe he fell down or maybe he had a fight up there, nobody knows," said Wolfgang Recheis, a physicist in the radiology department at the University of Innsbruck in Austria. "With this cut alone, at 3,250 meters, it would have been a deadly wound up there."
In one of the latest studies, Recheis used the most advanced CT-scanning technology available to take a closer look at Oetzi's right eye. Earlier examinations had shown a crack in the skull in that spot. The new work revealed a deep incision in the same place. Scans also revealed iron crystals around the right eye and forehead, which produce a bluish hue. And since the region's rocks are naturally low in iron, Recheis and colleagues suspect the iron is a sign of a hematoma, or massive bleeding outside of the blood vessels. A biopsy is needed for confirmation.
Albert Zink, head of the EURAC Institute for Mummies and the Iceman in Bolzano, Italy, was surprised and perplexed to hear of these new claims. At a conference this fall, he said, a whole table-full of experts discussed the evidence and unanimously agreed that the arrow killed the Iceman. The shoulder wound, he said, was clearly fresh and bleeding heavily when Oetzi died. The eye injury could have happened from a fall after Oetzi was shot or from a blow to the head by his attacker. But whatever the cause, Zink is sure that it was secondary to the arrow strike. "It's true that there might be new evidence that there was a little crack in the skin, so maybe he was bleeding from skull trauma," he added. "But it doesn't change anything in the end."
According to some news reports, the new findings could support a theory that Oetzi was the victim of a mountaineering accident. Both Recheis and Zink agreed that this was unlikely. Based on his muscle strength and patterns of joint degeneration, the Iceman was a fit and experienced climber. And he was near an easy path when he died.

Edited from Discovery News (21 November 2011)

Oetzi's state of health and death are no more a mystery

Thu, 03 Nov 2011 21:21:05 +0100

There is now broad agreement on the circumstances of Oetzi's death. Around 100 experts on mummies from nearly every single continent gathered recently for the '2nd Bolzano Mummy Congress' held at the European Academy of Bolzano, with the aim of discussing any diseases he might have been suffering from and the events surrounding his death.
From the moment of his discovery 20 years ago, Oetzi - the 5,000-year-old glacier mummy - has been puzzling the scientific research community, though little by little he is also revealing many of his secrets.
Albert Zink, Head of the Institute for Mummy Research at EURAC, reports the circumstances of the Iceman's death: "He felt safe enough to take a break, and settled down to a copious meal. While thus resting, he was attacked, shot with an arrow and left for dead." There was no evidence pointing to a possible burial as some scientists have suggested in the past. "The position of the mummified body with his arm pointing obliquely upwards, the lack of any piles of stones or other features which often accompany burial sites, runs counter to the burial theory," he continues.
But there is still the problem of what was Oetzi doing up there, at a height of 3,200 metres? At the Bolzano Congress, the Innsbruck based scientists Andreas Putzer, Daniela Festi and Klaus Oeggl refuted the theory according to which Oetzi was a shepherd who had taken his herd to pastures high up in the mountains to graze during the summer months. According to the latest archaeological and botanical findings, there was no seasonal migration of cattle during the Chalcolithic period, the Copper Stone Age. The so called transhumance did not start until around 1500 BCE. Oetzi was not on the run. On the contrary, between 30 and 120 minutes before his death he had settled down to a hearty meal, as evidenced by stomach samples.
Innsbruck Botanist Klaus Oeggl was able to detect pollen from the Hop-hornbeam in Oetzi's stomach. Oeggl had, some time ago, discovered a high concentration of such pollen in Oetzi's bowels and had concluded that Oetzi had actually died in the spring.
Nanotechnology used on a brain sample at the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich was able to confirm a further assumption: Oetzi did in fact suffer trauma to his skull and brain. This alone would have been sufficient to cause death, but was no doubt at least a contributory factor along with his arrow wound. What is still unclear is whether he incurred the trauma through a fall or a blow to the head.

Edited from ScienceDaily (25 October 2011)

Found Amsicora: the oldest Sardinian

Sun, 09 Oct 2011 23:19:43 +0100

Ancient human remains have been discovered at Pistoccu, in Marina di Arbus, a few meters from the shoreline of the Costa Verde, in south-western Sardinia (Italy). Professor Rita Melis, geoarchaeologist of the Department of Earth Sciences, University of Cagliari, said that it may be the "oldest human found in Sardinia dated back to the transition period between the Mesolithic and Neolithic," that is between 10,000 and 8,200 years ago.
It has been nicknamed 'Amsicora', like an historical character still alive in the Sardinian culture and known because of his strong opposition to the Roman power. The discovery was made after a short excavation campaign, thanks to the tenacity of Rita Melis and her colleague Margherita Mussi of the Department of Classical Studies, University La Sapienza of Rome, who studied the oldest population of Sardinia for more than 15 years.
The site was already known to archaeologists because in 1985 a first series of human remains was found in a sandstone wall collapsed after a storm. At the time, it was the Neapolis Archaeological Group of Guspini who recovered the ancient skeleton of a man, about 40 year old, who was nicknamed Beniamino, since then kept in Guspini. Beniamino was covered with red ocher, and was found along with a large Trion shell, and bone fragments of Prolagus sardus, a small rodent now extinct. Problems due to the 'unscientific' recovery and subsequent storage caused irreparable damage to the Beniamino remains: "It was not possible to date it with C14 because of the lack of collagen," says Rita Melis.
During the 2007 excavation campaign, the archaeologists discovered other human remains at the site; samples sent to the NSF Laboratory of the University of Tucson (Arizona, USA) allowed scientists to date the human bones back to 8400 years ago. This spring, Melis and Mussi began a new excavation, followed by another dig this week. "Immediately, after retrieving the shells of a burial offering we realized there was something important," Melis says, "And we have directed our attention to a particular spot. So we discovered the part of a human skeleton," she added. "We need to examine whether it is a traditional burial or a deposition of one individual left in a cave with a series of burial offerings," Margherita Mussi said.
The two scientists are carrying out a research on paleoenvironmental and climatic changes of Sardinia and the population growth of the Mediterranean islands during the Holocene. "This discovery provides insight into the first people of Sardinia, an island far from the continent that, unlike Sicily, is not easily accessible," Melis concluded.

Edited from Adnkronos (9 October 2011)

6,000-year-old Romeo and Juliet

Fri, 16 Sep 2011 09:11:03 +0100

In 2007 a team of archaeologists, led by Elena Maria Menotti, were excavating in a village called Valdaro, near Mantua in northern Italy, when they discovered the skeletons of two intertwined bodies. The burial dates from the Neolithic period, between 5,000 and 4,000 BCE. Double burials are rare in Neolithic times but the positioning of this couple was unique, as they were facing each other with arms and legs intertwined.
The excavation of a skeleton would normally involve the documentation and removal of the bones, one at a time. But in this case that would have destroyed the unique positioning. So the team decided to lift the block of soil surrounding trhe bones out of the ground intact. Analysis of the remains revealed that they belong to a male and a female, aged between 18 and 20 years and they rapidly became known as the 'Lovers of Valdaro'. Whilst the theory that the 'Lovers' had been killed became popular (Mantua - along with Verona - is the city associated with Shakespeare's ill fated couple Romeo & Juliet), no evidence was found to support a violent death.
DNA testing, 3-D laser scanning and X-Ray scanning are ongoing at the Musei Civici in Como and it is hoped to have more information soon. The remains were put on public view for the first time a few days ago and, because of the association with Romeo & Juliet and Verdi's opera Rigoletto (also set locally and telling the story of lovers & death) the 'Lovers of Valdaro' have become very popular and an association called 'Lovers in Mantua' is looking to raise enough funds to house them permanently. Professor Silvia Bagnoli, the president of the association, has said that half a million Euros would be needed to provide a permanent exhibition and multimedia space for the lovers.

Edited from La Stampa, Yahoo! News (13 September 2011)

Huge number of statue menhirs found on a Sardinian wall

Sun, 31 Jul 2011 18:19:08 +0100

The astonishing discovery in the Sardinian countryside (Italy) of a small drystone wall entirely made of broken standing stones - many carved with stylised human figures - could make the site at Cuccuru e Lai, near Samugheo, one of the most important prehistoric sanctuaries of the island.
Mauro Perra, archaeologist manager of the Villanovaforru Museum, said that the finding could be as important as the Mount Prama statues - a unique discovery with huge historical and scientific values.
The broken standing stones date back to the Copper Age, or about 5000 years ago, and fit perfectly on the drystone wall, as they were probably broken up about 70 years ago, when the wall was built.
Archaeologists started studying the area in the 1990s, when they made a dig near a giants tomb at Paule Lutturi; then in August 2008 they found a series of statue-menhirs (standing stones carved with human traits). Finally, this month a new dig led to the discovery of about 300 pieces of broken standing stones.
"Around the 3rd millennium BCE, anthropomorphic statues spread throughout Europe. In Sardinia they can be found on Mandrolisai, Barigadu, at Laconi and Isili - in each area they have their own symbolic traits. Some of the stones discovered at Samugheo have carved faces, an inverted U and a central frieze, either with a grid or a herringbone design," Mauro Perra said.
On a few of the recently discovered statues there is also a carved dagger. "This is typical of the carved stones found in the Alps," said Mr Perra. "It's also the same design found on the Lunigiana statue menhirs. That means that prehistoric Sardinia wasn't a small isolated island, but a place that was part of a larger cultural movement," he added.
Some of the symbols carved on the stones found at Cuccuru e Lai are completely different from those of the Laconi stones. "The real meaning of the symbols is still unknown, but these standing stones may be well territorial markers," Perra said. The tallest stones discovered are about 1.20m tall, but the vast majority are badly broken. Now the aim of both local authorities and the Archaeological Superintendence is to organize a lab to allow experts to restore the broken stones.

Edited from L'Unione Sarda, Sardegna 24 (15 July 2011)

Bronze Age 'holy site' found in Central Italy

Thu, 28 Jul 2011 10:05:15 +0100

Italian archaeologists have discovered a sacred mountain where ancient Etruscans worshipped gods and burned sacred objects in their honour during the Bronze Age 3000 years ago. Experts from the Archeological Superintendency for southern Etruria and La Sapienza University in Rome found the site at Mount Cimino near Viterbo, 80 km north of Rome (Italy). The discovery is considered one of the most important in the early history of the region, with archaeological remnants dating back to 1000 BC.
Archaeologists led by Professor Andrea Cardarelli of La Sapienza University in Rome have carried out excavations on the 3,200-foot summit for the past three years. Cardarelli said they found a number of materials which were linked to cult fires and 'clear evidence of votive offerings'. "Religious activities 1000 years BC were carried out through fire," he said. "Offerings were burnt for the gods - sacred objects, food or animals". Remnants of an ancient wall encircling the mountain were also found by the archeological team.
"These excavations have raised so many questions," said Laura D'Erme from the Archeological Superintendency. "What relations did the inhabitants of Mount Cimino have with the nearby community of Soriano? Was the mountain inhabited by the ruling class? Was this the point of religious reference for Etruria"?

Edited from ANSA, UPI (26 July 2011)

5,000-year-old skeleton unearthed in Northern Italy

Sun, 17 Jul 2011 08:22:28 +0100

The 5,000-year-old skeleton of a woman was recently found in Aosta Valley (Northern Italy). "The Lady of Introd", as it has been nicknamed, was in perfect conditions, but the archaeologists found no sign of any burial items apart from the bones themselves.
The tomb was discovered in the small Alpine village of Introd, today home to about 600 people and located not far from the main town Aosta. An archaeological survey made before a planned extension of the local kindergarten allowed scientists to discover the ancient burial. The human remains have been found on a hill near the village; in the same area there is also a castle, the parish church and a shack. The skeleton found at Introd is contemporary to Oetzi, the famous iceman found 20 years ago in Trentino-Alto Adige, the mountainous region on the border between Austria and Italy.
"This discovery is of great importance, and we are looking forward to organizing special meetings in order to allow local community to fully understand the value and the related historical information of such a find. We'd like to give access to our heritage to as many people as possible," regional Cultural assessor Laurent Vierin said.
The remains are now in a lab, and they will be carefully studied to assess the cause of death. In any case, the children of the local kindergarten have been granted the right to choose the official name of their ancestor.

Iceman died after a hasty meal

Wed, 06 Jul 2011 14:48:56 +0100

Over 20 years ago the mummified body of an iceman, nicknamed Oetzi, was discovered in the ice fields in the Italian Alps. The mummified remains were dated at approximately 3,300 BCE and were of a 40 year old male. Whilst preliminary investigations were carried out at the time, scientists and anthropologists have had to wait until now to discover the full story.
When first discovered, only analysis of the lower intestine was carried out as the stomach was not detectable. This showed what had been eaten up to 30 hours before death and revealed a diet of grains and cooked meat. But it was not until a CAT scan was carried out, 2 years ago, that the stomach was found, having shifted upwards, after death, to the general location of the lungs.
Analysis of the contents showed, again, grains, but also partially digested meat (identified by DNA as Ibex), which had been eaten within two hours of death occuring. It was probably a rather hasty meal as bits of flies and strands of animal hair were also found, suggesting a lack of preparation.
Probably the most interesting development was with his teeth. Once again, although the mummy had been examined extensively over the last 20 years, no evidence of tooth decay had been found and, although 40 years old, Oetzi had not lost any teeth. However, new CT scan technologies have revealed a whole range of dental diseases and problems, mainly caused by his high-carb diet, which was an indication of the changes in the Neolithic diet that were occuring at that time. Further dental analysis is being carried out by the University of Zurich (Switzerland)

Edited from Discovery News (15 June 2011), National Geographic News (23 June 2011)

Heidelberg Man links humans and Neanderthals

Fri, 06 May 2011 09:48:56 +0100

The last common ancestor of humans and Neanderthals was a well-traveled species called Heidelberg Man, according to a new study.
The evolutionary split between Neanderthals and modern humans may have occurred around 400,000 years ago. The determination is based on the remains of a single Heidelberg Man (Homo heidelbergensis) known as 'Ceprano,' named after the town near Rome, Italy, where his fossil - a partial cranium - was found. Previously, this 400,000-year-old fossil was thought to represent a new species of human, Homo cepranensis. The latest study, however, identifies Ceprano as being an archaic member of Homo heidelbergensis.
The finding may shed light on what the species that gave rise to both Neanderthals and Homo sapiens looked like. Anthropologists believe Heidelberg Man was tall and had a strong jaw holding small teeth.
Researchers believe that Homo heidelbergensis was widespread, dispersing throughout Eurasia and Africa beginning around 780,000 years ago. Good weather may have permitted Heidelberg Man's worldly lifestyle, favouring expansion and contacts between populations.
While many eyes are on Heidelberg Man as being the likely common ancestor to Neanderthals and our species, the jury is still out as to where that pivotal evolution took place.

Edited from Discovery News (4 May 2011)

Did the Neanderthals disappear by chance?

Sat, 09 Apr 2011 18:31:18 +0100

The popular theory has it that humans soon displaced Neanderthals thanks to their superior skills and adaptations. But mathematicians Armando Neves at the Federal University of Minas Gerais in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, and Maurizio Serva at the University of Aquila, Italy, now say that the extinction of Neanderthals may have been down to a genetic lottery.
We know that humans and Neanderthals got pretty cosy during their time together in the Middle East, 45,000 years ago. Between 1 and 4 per cent of the DNA of modern non-Africans is of Neanderthal origin, implying their ancestors must have interbred before humans moved into Europe. When two populations interbreed, one of them can go extinct simply due to the random mixing of their genes through sexual reproduction.
To find out if this could have wiped out Neanderthals, Neves and Serva modelled the populations that met in the Middle East. Using very few assumptions, they estimated the rate of interbreeding that would lead to the observed share of Neanderthal DNA. Their results suggest that the 1 to 4 per cent genetic mix could have come about with one interbreeding every 10 to 80 generations. The time taken to reach this mix would depend on the size of the populations. But regardless of populations, Neves and Serva's model shows that low rates of interbreeding could theoretically have led to the extinction of Neanderthals through a genetic lottery. "The observed low fraction of Neanderthal DNA could easily have arisen quite naturally even if Neanderthals weren't inferior," says Neves.
A strong point of the analysis, says anthropologist Luke Premo of the University of Washington in Pullman, is that it makes few assumptions about unknown factors, including the relative sizes of the African and Neanderthal populations at the time. Nevertheless, says Premo, the evidence for some kind of superiority of the African group is still strong. "Humans were expanding while Neanderthals were fairly restricted to a portion of Eurasia," he says. "Given their larger population and expansion, it appears that humans were bound to win out."

Edited from NewScientist (7 April 2011)

Neanderthals: copycats or innovators?

Tue, 08 Mar 2011 19:45:53 +0100

The question of whether Neanderthals had the ability to innovate new kinds of tools, and not just imitate, is coming up in scientific circles. For the past few decades, most archeologists assumed that Neanderthal stone tools were simple and roughly shaped. But that assumption may be undermined by the discovery at some Neanderthal sites of thinner, more blade-like stones similar to tools favored by humans during the same time period, leading some experts to assume that Neanderthals were heavily influenced by human culture.
Now, some archaeologists are viewing Neanderthals in a more favorable light, casting them as an intellectual match for humans and calling into question the widely-held idea that changes in Neanderthal culture were introduced by Homo sapiens.
The first of the recent studies was set in southern Italy, where researchers examined a group of artifacts known as the Uluzzian culture from about 30,000 years ago. At the time, Neanderthals were making their last stand in Europe, and the climate was seesawing between cold snaps and warmer periods. In such harsh and varying climates, the tools that Neanderthals traditionally used may not have been as useful, forcing them to improvise.
A central question forsaid Julien Riel-Salvatore, lead author of the study, was whether or not the Uluzzian style could have developed independently of modern humans, who were creating similar technologies to the north. The Uluzzian area, was highly isolated, so the toolkit could have developed independently of human influence. The findings indicate that even though Neanderthals eventually died off, it's possible that they attempted to adapt to their changing ecosystem.
The other new Neanderthal study was conducted by the archaeologist Thomas Higham of Oxford University. His research was focused at the Grotte du Renne, a site in France that archeologists have excavated since the 1930s. Researchers there have been exploring a similar tool grouping, from around the same time period as the Uluzzian, known as the Chatelperronian culture. The set of tools was ascribed to Neanderthals, because Neanderthal remains were found there. The combination of bones and tools proved to be a convincing argument, until Higham's paper showed definitively that the site at Grotte du Renne was disturbed long after its initial use. Because of this disturbance, it calls into question whether Neanderthals were even around when the inhabitants at the Grotte du Renne were making Chatelperronian tools.
Higham's paper casted doubt on the idea that Neanderthals created the Uluzzian culture. Riel-Salvatore agreed with Higham that it was still too early to rule out Neanderthal toolmakers at either Chatelperronian or Uluzzian sites, and that more research into the subject was needed.
Further muddying the issue is the fact that no one is certain whether the new, sharper tools were really more effective in coping with the cooling climate than Neanderthal tools. The blunt tools favored by Neanderthals were more clumsy-looking than the bladed stone tools their human contemporaries used, but were produced more efficiently and lasted longer. If Neanderthals did not develop new tools, it may not have been because they were insufficiently intelligent, but because they were already smart enough to know they didn't need the cool new tools that the humans used.

Edited from ScienceLine (7 March 2011)

Did Neanderthals use feathers for fashion?

Fri, 25 Feb 2011 13:05:22 +0100

A team of Italian archaeologists has found evidence that Neanderthals were using feathers as ornaments 44,000 years ago. The claim adds fuel to the debate over whether our distant cousins were cultured as Homo sapiens.
Marco Peresani at the University of Ferrara in Italy found 660 bird bones mixed in with Neanderthal bones in Fumane cave in northern Italy. Many of the wing bones were cut and scraped where the flight feathers were once attached, suggesting the feathers had been systematically removed. Just like the shells which Neanderthals may have worn as jewellery, Peresani thinks the feathers were used as ornaments. He dismisses other explanations on the grounds that many of the species are poor food sources and fletched arrows had not been invented at the time.
The debate is ongoing, with Joao Zilhao at the University of Barcelona in Spain saying Peresani's finding are more evidence that Neanderthals were as cultured as H. sapiens, while Thomas Higham at the University of Oxford says Peresani has pushed his data too far.

Edited from PNAS (February 2011), NewScientist (21 February 2011), Official Wire (22 February 2011), SBS.com (24 February 2011)