Neanderthals 'enjoyed broad menu'

"It seems Neanderthals enjoyed a wide range of foods - a much broader menu than had previously been supposed.

Excavations in caves in Gibraltar once occupied by the ancient humans show they ate seal and dolphin when they could get hold of the animals.

There are even indications that mussels were warmed to open their shells.

The findings, reported in the journal PNAS, give the lie to the popular view that Neanderthals ate a diet utterly dominated by meat from land animals.
It is one more example of the greater sophistication now being ascribed to Homo neanderthalensis; and further complicates the story of how modern humans (Homo sapiens) out-competed and out-lived their evolutionary cousins.

"Moderns still had a more efficient way of extracting the maximum out of the environment compared with the Neanderthals," said lead author Chris Stringer from London's Natural History Museum.

"So there still is an element of superiority, but it is a much more finely balanced one now. This is yet another difference that had been proposed between Neanderthals and moderns which now disappears," he told BBC News. (...)"

Full text: BBC News