ArticleNature ecology & evolution2021
A 51,000-year-old engraved bone reveals Neanderthals' capacity for symbolic behaviour.
Article in Nature ecology & evolution, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. An erratum has been issued. Cited by 22 papers.
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22 citing papers in PubMed, 68 citations in OpenAlex.
- Humans 40,000 y ago developed a system of conventional signs.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
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- Dating the key structures of the Guge ancient city through integrated 14C and literary research.PloS one · 2026Article
- East Siberian ice wedges recording dust transport variability during the Late Pleistocene.Nature communications · 2025Article
- Hominin Population Structure, Mating Systems, and Intrasexual Competition : Implications for Craniofacial Robusticity and the Self-Domestication Hypothesis.Human nature (Hawthorne, N.Y.) · 2025Article
- From stones to sketches: investigating tracing behaviours in Japanese macaques.Primates; journal of primatology · 2025Article
- Art beyond cognition: reframing Neanderthal art through social connectivity and cultural transmission.Evolutionary human sciences · 2025Article
- Early human collective practices and symbolism in the Early Upper Paleolithic of Southwest Asia.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2024Article
- Ochre-based compound adhesives at the Mousterian type-site document complex cognition and high investment.Science advances · 2024Article
- Bone tools, carnivore chewing and heavy percussion: assessing conflicting interpretations of Lower and Upper Palaeolithic bone assemblages.Royal Society open science · 2024Article
- First direct evidence of lion hunting and the early use of a lion pelt by Neanderthals.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- Measuring ancient technological complexity and its cognitive implications using Petri nets.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- A 36,200-year-old carving from Grotte des Gorges, Amange, Jura, France.Scientific reports · 2023Article
- From fossils to mind.Communications biology · 2023Review
- Quantum Leaps in Human Biocultural Evolution and the Relationship to Cranial Capacity.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- Toward reframing brain-social dynamics: current assumptions and future challenges.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2023Review
- The earliest unambiguous Neanderthal engravings on cave walls: La Roche-Cotard, Loire Valley, France.PloS one · 2023Article
- Immunohistochemical Characterization of Immune System Cells in Lymphoid Organs from Roe and Fallow Deer.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2022Article
- Neural correlates of perceiving and interpreting engraved prehistoric patterns as human production: Effect of archaeological expertise.PloS one · 2022Article
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Authors and funding
13 authors at 7 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
While there is substantial evidence for art and symbolic behaviour in early Homo sapiens across Africa and Eurasia, similar evidence connected to Neanderthals is sparse and often contested in scientific debates. Each new discovery is thus crucial for our understanding of Neanderthals' cognitive capacity. Here we report on the discovery of an at least 51,000-year-old engraved giant deer phalanx found at the former cave entrance of Einhornhöhle, northern Germany. The find comes from an apparent Middle Palaeolithic context that is linked to Neanderthals. The engraved bone demonstrates that conceptual imagination, as a prerequisite to compose individual lines into a coherent design, was present in Neanderthals. Therefore, Neanderthal's awareness of symbolic meaning is very likely. Our findings show that Neanderthals were capable of creating symbolic expressions before H. sapiens arrived in Central Europe.
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