Neanderthal tourism should provide all the weird you need for this day of seasonal Christmas festivities. (Science Daily: Jersey was a must-see tourist destination for Neanderthals for over 100,000 years)
Ed: aren't you jumping the gun?
In no way is this a jumped start when the advent calendars are already counting off the days. Mostly others are too busy doing whatever they do but we have plenty of time for Christmas in the Rockhouse and we're enjoying all of it.
Archaeologists at La Cotte de St Brelade.
Credit: Dr Sarah Duffy
Ed: aren't you jumping the gun?
In no way is this a jumped start when the advent calendars are already counting off the days. Mostly others are too busy doing whatever they do but we have plenty of time for Christmas in the Rockhouse and we're enjoying all of it.
Archaeologists at La Cotte de St Brelade.
New research led by the University of Southampton shows Neanderthals kept coming back to a coastal cave site in Jersey from at least 180,000 years ago until around 40,000 years ago.
As part of a re-examination of La Cotte de St Brelade and its surrounding landscape, archaeologists from Southampton, together with experts from three other universities and the British Museum, have taken a fresh look at artefacts and mammoth bones originally excavated from within the site's granite cliffs in the 1970s. Their findings are published in the journal Antiquity.
As part of a re-examination of La Cotte de St Brelade and its surrounding landscape, archaeologists from Southampton, together with experts from three other universities and the British Museum, have taken a fresh look at artefacts and mammoth bones originally excavated from within the site's granite cliffs in the 1970s. Their findings are published in the journal Antiquity.
- Science Daily
So far, we're seeing the Neanderthal version of Fort Lauderdale but we're puzzled why they didn't go to the south of France where all the cool Neanderthals go.
You will need to read the source article for the detail on how they know the Neanderthals kept returning and it wasn't simply because they liked the weather since it changed substantially during that time.
The team, including academics from the British Museum, University College London (UCL) and the University of Wales found that Neanderthals kept coming back to this particular place, despite globally significant changes in climate and landscape. During glacial phases (Ice Ages), they travelled to the site over cold, open landscapes, now submerged under the sea. They kept visiting as the climate warmed up and Jersey became a striking highpoint in a wide coastal plain connected to France.
- Science Daily
The intriguing part to the scientists is they don't know why the Neanderthals kept returning but we have no doubt they will keep trying to discover that reason.
Dr Beccy Scott of the British Museum added: "We're really interested in how this site became 'persistent' in the minds of early Neanderthals. You can almost see hints of early mapping in the way they are travelling to it again and again, or certainly an understanding of their geography. But specifically what drew them to Jersey so often is harder to tease out. It might have been that the whole Island was highly visible from a long way off -- like a waymarker -- or people might have remembered that shelter could be found there, and passed that knowledge on."
- Science Daily
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