Archeological analysis of faunal remains and of lithic and bone tools has suggested that hunting of medium to large mammals was a major element of Neanderthal subsistence. Plant foods are almost invisible in the archeological record, and it is impossible to estimate accurately their dietary importance. However, stable isotope (δ 13 C and δ 15 N) analysis of mammal bone collagen provides a direct measure of diet and has been applied to two Neanderthals and various faunal species from Vindija Cave, Croatia. The isotope evidence overwhelmingly points to the Neanderthals behaving as top-level carnivores, obtaining almost all of their dietary protein from animal sources. Earlier Neanderthals in France and Belgium have yielded similar results, and a pattern of European Neanderthal adaptation as carnivores is emerging. These data reinforce current taphonomic assessments of associated faunal elements and make it unlikely that the Neanderthals were acquiring animal protein principally through scavenging. Instead, these findings portray them as effective predators.

Human remains excavated from Vindija cave include a large although fragmentary sample of late Mousterian‐associated specimens and a few additional individuals from the overlying early Upper Paleolithic levels. The Mousterian‐associated sample is similar to European Neandertals from other regions. Compared with earlier Neandertals from south central Europe, this sample evinces evolutionary trends in the direction of Upper Paleolithic Europeans. Compared with the western European Neandertals, the same trends can be demonstrated, although the magnitude of difference is less, and there is a potential for confusing temporal with regional sources of variation. The early Upper Paleolithic‐associated sample cannot be distinguished from the Mousterian‐associated hominids. We believe that this site provides support for Hrdlička's “Neandertal phase” of human evolution, as it was originally applied in Europe.

Despite intensive study and a number of remarkable discoveries in the last two decades of the 20th century, our understanding of the cultural and biological processes that resulted in the emergence of the Upper Paleolithic and the establishment of modern humans in Interpleniglacial Europe remains far from complete. There is active debate concerning the timing and location of the origins of the Aurignacian, the nature of the origins of Initial Upper Paleolithic industries (whether by autochthonous development or through acculturation by Aurignacian peoples), the timing of the appearance of early modern humans and the disappearance of the Neandertals, and the relationship of archeologically defined cultures to these different types of hominids. Frustrating our attempts to address these latter two questions is a general paucity of taxonomically diagnostic human fossil material from early Upper Paleolithic contexts. We undertake here a review of the human fossil record of Interpleniglacial Europe, and its archeological and chronological context, to clarify to the extent possible the nature of the relationship between hominid groups and the earliest Upper Paleolithic artifact industries, particularly the early Aurignacian. Although substantial difficulties involved in interpreting the fossil, archeological, and geochronological records of this time period prohibit making any definitive statements, a number of observations are suggested by the current data: 1) the Middle Paleolithic of Europe appears to have been made exclusively by Neandertals; 2) Initial Upper Paleolithic industries (with the exception of the Bachokirian) appear to have their roots in the late Middle Paleolithic industries of their respective regions; 3) all of the human fossils yet recovered from Initial Upper Paleolithic (except the Bachokirian) contexts for which any diagnostic morphology is present have their greatest morphological affinities with Neandertals and not early modern humans; 4) modern humans were almost certainly established in Europe by ca. 32 ky BP, with a strong possibility that they were there by ca. 36 ky BP. Claims for an appearance before 36 ky BP cannot be substantiated with currently available evidence; 5) the hypothesis that modern humans are uniquely associated with the Aurignacian cannot yet be refuted. Aurignacian-associated human fossils (including those from the Bachokirian) for which any diagnostic morphology is present have their greatest affinities with early modern Europeans and not Neandertals; and 6) Neandertals and modern humans coexisted in Europe for at least 2,000-4,000 years, and perhaps for 8,000-10,000 years or longer. The overall picture is one of an extended period of cultural contact, involving some degree of genetic exchange, between Neandertals and early modern Europeans.

South-Central European fossil hominids dated to the Upper Pleistocene exhibit a distinct morphological and metric continuum in supraorbital form from early Neandertal (Krapina), through late Neandertals (Vindija), to early Upper Paleolithic hominids. The supraorbital morphologies pertinent to this continuum are documented, and the alterations in size and morphology are discussed relative to the function of supraorbital superstructures and their relationship to overall craniofacial form. It is concluded that this continuum most likely reflects localized transition between Neandertals and modern man in this region of Europe.

N A FIELD OFTEN ACCUSED of being unable to settle controversies or resolve competing I hypotheses, the recent proposal based on interpretations of mitochondria1 DNA (mtDNA) allows for the unambiguous testing of two models about the origin of modern Homo sapiens. These are the total replacement ("Eve") and the continuity (multiregional evolution) models, both of which have clearly definable, completely different predictions about the pattern ofpast evolution, as well as different expectations about the distribution of certain grade (modernizing) and clade (regional, such as African, North Asian, etc.) features in the human fossil record. Since proponents of both views recognize that the fossil record is real, and the two competing interpretations of prehistory have non-overlapping predictions about the modern human origins, specific aspects of each model can be weighed against the fossil record for potential refutation. Here, fossils are not used to develop interpretations of the human evolutionary pattern, a thankless task whose success is very sensitive to the completeness of the fossil record. Instead, limited conflicting predictions of these two models can be addressed from a circumscribed data set, which the fossil record clearly provides. Unlike an earlier controversy between the genetic and fossil reconstruction of the past concerning the timing of the split between humans and chimpanzees, the current debate about the origin of modern Homo sapiens is represented by a much more extensive fossil record, spanning a reasonably well dated time period and supplemented by extensive archeological data.Using the prehistoric skeletal data of Australasia (Southeast Asia and Australia), North Asia, Europe, Africa, and the Levant, we test the conflicting predictions of these two models by evaluating evidence for the existence of transitional samples and the persistence of morphological and metric features over time and space. While many previous and some current models about the later aspects of human evolution are riddled with untestable or non-excluding hypotheses, the differences between the "Eve" and the multiregional evolution models are so profound it is impossible for both to be correct. These differences in theoretical expectations relate to the requirements of the Eve theory that a single source of all contemporary mtDNA variation exists and that this source is derived exclusively from a relatively recent African female (Eve). In this article we review the predictions of the Eve and the multiregional evolution models and test these against the human fossil record from the Old World. In addition, we will show that, while an extreme replacement interpretation is unsupportable, the rntDNA data can be reconciled with the fossil record within the context of multiregional evolution.American Anthropologist 95( 1): 14-50.

The 1856 discovery of the Neandertal type specimen (Neandertal 1) in western Germany marked the beginning of human paleontology and initiated the longest-standing debate in the discipline: the role of Neandertals in human evolutionary history. We report excavations of cave sediments that were removed from the Feldhofer caves in 1856. These deposits have yielded over 60 human skeletal fragments, along with a large series of Paleolithic artifacts and faunal material. Our analysis of this material represents the first interdisciplinary analysis of Neandertal remains incorporating genetic, direct dating, and morphological dimensions simultaneously. Three of these skeletal fragments fit directly on Neandertal 1, whereas several others have distinctively Neandertal features. At least three individuals are represented in the skeletal sample. Radiocarbon dates for Neandertal 1, from which a mtDNA sequence was determined in 1997, and a second individual indicate an age of Ϸ40,000 yr for both. mtDNA analysis on the same second individual yields a sequence that clusters with other published Neandertal sequences.

New accelerator mass spectrometry radiocarbon dates taken directly on human remains from the Late Pleistocene sites of Vindija and Velika Pećina in the Hrvatsko Zagorje of Croatia are presented. Hominid specimens from both sites have played critical roles in the development of current perspectives on modern human evolutionary emergence in Europe. Dates of Ϸ28 thousand years (ka) before the present (B.P.) and Ϸ29 ka B.P. for two specimens from Vindija G1 establish them as the most recent dated Neandertals in the Eurasian range of these archaic humans. The human frontal bone from Velika Pećina, generally considered one of the earliest representatives of modern humans in Europe, dated to Ϸ5 ka B.P., rendering it no longer pertinent to discussions of modern human origins. Apart from invalidating the only radiometrically based example of temporal overlap between late Neandertal and early modern human fossil remains from within any region of Europe, these dates raise the question of when early modern humans first dispersed into Europe and have implications for the nature and geographic patterning of biological and cultural interactions between these populations and the Neandertals.Neandertals ͉ early modern humans ͉ Croatia ͉ Europe

During the past decade or so, considerable new data pertinent to the origin of modern humans have come to light. Based on these new data and reinterpretation of older information, three models have been offered to explain the development of modern people. These models-Brauer's Afro-European sapiens hypothesis, Stringer and Andrew's recent African evolution model, and Wolpoff, Wu, and Thorne's multiregional evolution model-have their roots in earlier models but differ from most by virtue of their worldwide perspective and integration of genetic and paleoanthropological data pertinent to modern human origins. This review presents a detailed discussion of these data in light of the three models. While convincing arguments can be offered for each of these models, it is concluded that none are unequivocally supported by the available data.