Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis) represent an extinct lineage of Hominins that diverged from a common ancestor shared with anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens) about 500,000 years ago. While the lineage that gave rise to Homo sapiens evolved in Africa – adapting to tropical landscapes and a predominantly warm climate, the lineage that gave rise to Homo neanderthalensis evolved mainly in Europe and Western Asia, adapting to the cold climates and mountainous terrains of the region known as Eurasia. Consequently, Neanderthals developed a distinct anatomy: they were shorter and more robust, with a more elongated skull than modern humans.
Neanderthals also mastered the use of fire, produced stone tools, and displayed artistic expression. Despite these capabilities, they disappeared from the fossil record around 40,000 years ago. Scientists believe their extinction resulted from a combination of factors, including competition with Homo sapiens, who emerged in Africa around 300,000 years ago and began to occupy Eurasia between 70,000 and 50,000 years ago. During the period in which the two species coexisted, they also interbred; research indicates that between 1% and 4% of the genome of all present-day humans of non-African ancestry was inherited from Neanderthals. Many questions, however, remain about how these interactions took place and to what extent they influenced the evolution of Homo sapiens. This is one of the questions Brazilian researchers are seeking to address, in collaboration with their Romanian colleagues.
Over millions of years of human evolutionary history, several Hominin species emerged—but only Homo sapiens survived, giving rise to all modern humans. Archaeological research on Neanderthals cannot be conducted in Brazilian territory, since the only human lineage to reach the Americas was that of Homo sapiens itself, between 14,000 and 30,000 years ago.
