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Neanderthals, who were not brainless brutes of our imagination, apparently used advanced hunting techniques to hunt down and kill their prey, suggests a new study.
About 120,000 years ago, prehistoric deer bones show how animals were killed and what weapons were used. The cut marks – or "hunting lesions" – on the bones of the deer provide the first "gun evidence" that such weapons have been used, reported Agence France-Presse.
The samples represent "the first unequivocal examples" of bones damaged by hunting, according to archaeologist Annemieke Milks, who wrote an article that accompanied the study in Nature Ecology and Evolution.
The authors of the study claim that the deer were killed by being pushed at close range with sharp wooden spears, possibly as part of a cooperative ambush tactic.
"This suggests that the Neanderthals approached the animals very closely and pushed, not launched, their spears at the animals, most likely at a devious angle," said Sabine Gaudzinski-Windheuser, researcher at the Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz. AFP.
"Such a way of driving off confrontation required careful planning and concealment, as well as close cooperation between individual hunters," she said.
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Milks, a professor at University College London, said the study "demonstrates that Neanderthals are hunting their prey and are highlighting their hunting strategies, such as the types of prey they exploit." , that they be thrown or thrown away, and in what types of habitats hunted. "
Such hunting methods require close cooperation among participants, according to the study.
The deer bones were found on the shore of Lake Neumark North near the current Halle in eastern Germany. Although unearthed 20 years ago, the new technology has allowed a more detailed analysis of the bones.
Neanderthals are ancient human species that appeared about 300,000 years ago and disappeared about 40,000 years ago. Neanderthals and modern humans are closely related, sharing 99.7% of their DNA.
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