>So, it is an exciting find. My more general question to
>Christians is, I think, pertinent. How far can we use this (and
>related evidence) to assist interpret the incomplete
>archaeological data? And can we conclude that Neanderthals were
>genuinely human and thus descendants of Adam?
This has been my contention even before the finding of the flute. I think
there is no choice but to include Neanderthal as human, and I think a
similar but admittedly less persuasive case can be made about Homo
erectus.
Neanderthal engaged in a number of human-like activities.
more art
"From Neanderthal sites have come pendants made a reindeer phalanx and a
fox canine; a bovid shoulder blade coverd with fine parallel lines; and a
carved mammoth molar, dated by radiocarbon at around 50,000 B. C. The
latter piece, which is quite beautiful shows skilled workmanship. "~Victor
Barnouw, An Introduction to Anthropology: Physical Antrhopology and
Archaeology, Vol. 1, (Homewood, Illinois: The Dorsey Press, 1982) p. 156
religion; some have argued against this interpretation but it is
consistent with a people who would make flutes.
"There are other implications of religious beliefs held by
Neanderthals in the collections of bear skulls found in their caves. The
mere preservation of skulls need not suggest anything religious, but in
some cases special attention was given to their placement. In one cave,
five bear skulls were found in niches in the cave wall. The skulls of
several cave bears in a group have been found surrrounded by built-up
stone walls, with some skulls having little stones planced around them,
while others were set out on slabs."~Victor Barnouw, An Introduction to
Anthropology:Physical Antrhopology and Archaeology, Vol. 1, (Homewood,
Illinois: The Dorsey Press, 1982) p. 156-157
right handed ness
"Additional evidence of the importance of the front teeth in
Neanderthals and their predecessors has come from other microscopic
studies of the front surfaces of these teeth. In an early sample
(Atapuerca) and several later Neanderthals from Europe, Iraq and Israel
unidirectional scratches have been observed, which suggest that something
held in the teeth was being cut with stone tools. When these tools
penetrated the material in question, they left a tell-tale scratch mark on
the teeth which reveals the direction of cut, indicating that the tool was
usually held in the right hand. Along with data on the brain shape of
Neanderthals and the stronger development of their right arms, this
implies that --like modern humans--most Neanderthals were right-handed.
Furthermore, there is evidence that this behaviour started early, in
both senses, since the characteristic scratches are present on a child's
milk canine from the middle Pleistocene site of Atapuerca. It is possible
to see the importance of the front teeth as a general feature of early
human behaviour which was accentuated in the Neanderthals."~Chris Stringer
and Clive Gamble, In Search of the Neanderthals, (New York: Thames and
Hudson, 1993), p. 77
Neanderthals are the first people to bury their dead, doing so after the
appearance of anatomically modern humans but before anatomically moderns
engaged in burial.
The real problem is that if you grant Neanderthal the status of humanity,
then you have pushed humanity back to the appearance of the first
Neanderthals at 230,000 years ago. This is so far back that almost all
current views of how to fit fossil man into a biblical perspective is
falsified. What I have been suggesting in my book is the only view which
can accomidate such a discovery as the flute made by a non-homo sapiens
sapiens.
glenn
Foundation,Fall and Flood
http://members.gnn.com/GRMorton/dmd.htm