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Neanderthals
6 stories · all stories
The First Humans Who Stole Fire: From Sparks to the Hearth
Before fire was a simple button, it was a fragile miracle. We examine the archaeological evidence of early fire-use and the breakthrough of fire-making.
Why Are We the Last Humans on Earth? The Extinction of Our Ancestors
For most of history, multiple human species coexisted on Earth. We examine why they vanished shortly after Homo sapiens arrived and how their DNA lives in us.
The First Word: The Search for the Origin of Language
Language may be our defining trait, yet it leaves no fossils. Scientists reconstruct its origin from anatomy, the FOXP2 gene, and the first symbolic art.
They Opened Skulls in the Stone Age — And the Patients Lived
Stone Age people practiced real surgery: healed trepanation, a 31,000-year-old amputation in Borneo, and Neanderthal care for the injured—skill and mercy written in bone.
The Denisovans: The Ghost Human Species Hiding in Your DNA
The Denisovans were a human species found from a finger bone and known mostly from DNA, until the Dragon Man skull gave them a face. They still live on in living people's
Did Neanderthals Invent Advanced Weaponry?
Were Neanderthals and early humans primitive brutes — or engineers? The physics of the Schöningen spears, hafted points, birch-tar glue and the atlatl say otherwise.