Neanderthals, Cannibalism, Interbreeding

I have blogged previously about recent archaeological discoveries which support William Golding's contention in The Inheritors that Homo Sapiens killed and ate Neanderthal man. At the end of the novel, the only surviving Neanderthal is a baby, who is adopted by the Homo Sapiens tribe. There is at least the implication that the Neanderthal will become assimilated, perhaps will even grow up to breed with its distant cousins. Having been confronted with the shock of recognising the murderers as our own ancestors, we are given a second shock: we are descended from both perpetrators and victims, having witnessed one tribe of our ancestors committing genocide against another.

Evidence from DNA analysis claims to identify the extent of this interbreeding. According to newly published research, between 1% and 4% of the DNA of Europeans and Asians has been inherited from Neanderthals. The scientists go on to explain that 'interbreeding between humans [sic] and Neanderthals may nonetheless have been rare. Just two Neanderthal females in a group of around a hundred humans would have been enough to leave such a trace in our genome, provided that was the group that gave rise to all modern humans outside Africa.'

Neanderthals on the menu

William Golding's The Inheritors (1955) describes the destruction of a Neanderthal community at the hands of Homo sapiens. In one particularly horrific scene, two adult Neanderthals try to rescue a child who has been captured by this strange and brutal race. Lok, the male, is puzzled that he can smell the child everywhere among the Homo sapiens' dwellings, and yet she is nowhere to be found. The reader understands the horror which is beyond Lok's comprehension: the Neanderthal child has been eaten.

A recent story in The Guardian supports Golding's recreation: the discovery of a Neanderthal bone covered in cut marks similar to those left when meat is stripped has led one scientist to conclude that 'Neanderthals met a violent end at our hands and in some cases we ate them'.