Archeological evidence of birch tar production does not mark the presence of technological, cognitive, or cultural complexity in Neanderthals or other hominins, a study suggests. Neanderthals produced birch tar as a sticky substance for attaching stone bits to the ends of wooden handles to create tools. Birch tar production has been assumed to involve a cognitively demanding process of heating birch bark in anaerobic conditions, such as underground or in a clay castle, ash mount, or ceramic container. In contrast to this prevailing view, Patrick Schmidt and colleagues report a simple, easily discoverable method for making birch tar in an oxygenated environment using widely available materials. The authors collected freshly cut or dead birch bark from a forest and burned pieces of bark next to vertical or near-vertical, flat-surfaced river cobbles. Within 3 hours, the authors produced a useable amount of a sticky black material that could be scraped from the surface of the cobbles. Moreover, the authors used the tar to attach a stone bit to a wooden cylinder, which was subsequently used to scrape wood and deflesh a long calf femur fragment. However, the findings do not refute the presence of modern human-like technological or cognitive abilities or cultural behavior in Neanderthals, according to the authors.
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Article #19-11137: "Birch tar production does not prove Neanderthal behavioral complexity," by Patrick Schmidt et al.
MEDIA CONTACT: Patrick Schmidt, Eberhard Karls University of Tu?bingen, GERMANY; e-mail: patrick.schmidt@uni-tuebingen.de
Journal
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences