Tooth enamel provides clues to hunter-gatherer lifestyle of Neanderthals

A Neanderthal premolar tooth from the Almonda cave system, Portugal. Credit: João Zilhão. A study by an international team of researchers, led by the University of Southampton, has given an intriguing glimpse of the hunting habits and diets of Neanderthals and other humans living in western Europe. The scientists examined chemical properties locked inside tooth enamel to piece together how pre-historic people lived off the land around the Almonda Cave system, near Torres Novas in central Portugal almost 100 thousand years ago. Their findings, published in the journal PNAS , show Neanderthals in the region were hunting fairly large animals across wide tracts of land, whereas humans living in the same location tens of thousands of years later survived on smaller creatures in an area half the size. Strontium isotopes in rocks gradually change over millions of years because of radioactive processes. This means they vary from place to place depending on the age of the underlying geology.