What A Day In The Life of A Neanderthal Was Like
The date is... well, actually, you don't really know.
You wake up on a mat made of reeds, roughly woven together with natural plant fibers.
The animal hide blanket you use for warmth barely keeps out the morning chill of the
European steppes- but you're not very affected by the icy cold.
That's because your chest is large, and your form squat and short, which helps conserve
body heat.
Thick, dark body hair also helps keep the cold at bay.
You're not sure what the date is, because your neanderthal brain has difficulty processing
lengths of time greater than the years you've been alive.
You're not stupid though, or even particularly unintelligent, your large brain simply has
trouble dealing with more abstract concepts.
You're more than capable of making a plethora of hunting tools, and other implements for
daily life such as bone needles and cooking tools- but your tools are largely hand-me-downs,
and you, nor any of your forefathers, have really innovated on them for thousands of
years.
They remain the same in form and function as when they were first thought up countless
generations ago.
You are however, capable of some abstract thinking.
And as you rise off your reed mat you turn your eyes to the cave wall beside you.
The morning sunshine streams in through the large opening and you can make out the rough
shapes you've scratched into the walls using sharpened bits of stone.
You've managed to make some very basic animal shapes, and have stenciled your hand onto
the walls of the cave in several places.
You almost exclusively draw things you have already seen though, such as animals, rather
than create designs from your imagination- which isn't very good anyways.
Still, the fact that you've created even this rudimentary artwork means that you're far
more intelligent than the beasts that you hunt.
Speaking of hunting, you have preparations to make for the day.
The only food available for breakfast is a small assembly of various fungi, lichens,
berries, and nuts.
There's not much left though, and your large stomach rumbles hungrily- if you want to eat
today you'll have to hunt.
You share your cave with a small family group.
At twenty years old you are the senior member of this family group, your father and mother
have long ago died.
With an average lifespan of just thirty years, they still managed to live into their forties,
which is an incredible feat for any neanderthal.
You took care of them as they grew older, fed and provided for them even long after
they stopped being useful to the family.
One day your family unit will do the same for you.
For now though, it's time to hunt.
Your younger brother often accompanies you on the hunt, while your mate and your sister
typically forage nearby for nuts, berries, and other edible items.
Your diet varies depending on your luck in the hunt- some family groups eat meat almost
exclusively, while family groups deep in the woods eat an all-vegetarian diet.
From your home here on the edge of the steppes, you have the best of both worlds, and are
able to hunt when the herds are around, but also forage and gather when hunting is difficult.
For this hunt you take with you a spear and a small sharp rock.
The spear is made of a sharpened rock point held to the wooden shaft with a natural glue
that you and your family have concocted for generations, though you also use pitch occasionally
when necessary.
Though you are strong, you're only strong in short bursts, and despite lacking any natural
weapons, your keen intellect and ability to ambush coupled with the long-range striking
power of a spear makes you a feared predator.
Still, hunting is dangerous and difficult work, and for this you'll need help.
Trekking through the forest for a few miles, you hear a familiar call and spot another
small band of hunters.
You exchange greetings in a halting, terse form of proto-language.
You have learned to symbolize certain emotions and items with different sounds, even sounding
out barks and grunts which might resemble spoken words- though you lack the mental capacity
to expand on this breakthrough and string together various sounds to represent more
abstract ideas and concepts.
This proto language however, combined with body language, is more than enough to communicate
some surprisingly advanced hunting strategies and enable cooperation with your neighbors.
Typically you hunt the large megafauna of the European steppes and plains, seeking prey
such as woolly mammoth and woolly rhinoceros.
Lacking the speed of animals such as the sabre-toothed tiger, a feared predator, you rely on overwhelming
slower moving large animals.
Sometimes though you hunt smaller game such as ibex, boars, and deer- but these are much
trickier to catch.
They are fleet of foot, and your spear is not very well designed for throwing.
To hunt these animals you must rely on stealth, hiding in thick foliage and waiting for an
unsuspecting animal to come close before striking out with your spear.
Today though you and your small hunting party will hunt mammoth.
A herd was observed approaching a few days ago, and word quickly spread through the small
neanderthal communities in your area.
You'll have to hurry if you want a successful hunt, as other groups will be looking to bag
their own mammoth, and over hunting of the herd will inevitably drive it away.
When times are tough and food is scarce, you and your family group might follow the herds,
sometimes for hundreds of miles.
But for now your temporary home seems to be providing for all your needs.
An untold amount of time in the future, another species will think back on your hunting strategies
and wonder how you felled giant woolly mammoths.
They'll hypothesize that you drove the animals off cliffs, killing any survivors and feasting.
In some rare cases, this does occur, but you hunt these beasts the same way your ancestors
did- with sheer tenacity.
You and your group slowly sneak your way through the tall grasses, approaching ever closer
to the wandering herd.
It would be foolish to try to take one of the big males, the animal is simply too strong
and powerful to be felled by your small band.
You grunt, grabbing the attention of your small band, and signal to a young female towards
the back of the herd.
She's likely an adolescent, though still weighs over two tons, and old enough to no longer
be watched over by her mother.
Now she's strayed just far enough from the herd to give you an opportunity.
You continue slinking through the grass, your animal hides helping you to blend in with
the muddy ground.
Just a few dozen feet away though, the massive animal spots you and lets loose an alarmed
trumpeting call.
You yell excitedly and charge at the animal, your hunting party joining in.
The mammoth is large, and though she can still move at a healthy rate, she's not nearly fast
enough to outrun you.
You and your party reach the animal and stab your spears into her side.
You work to cut her off from the herd, encouraging her to run away from the safety of the larger
mammoths by continuously stabbing her on the side facing towards them.
The panicked, wounded animal thus turns away from her herd, and unknowingly to her eventual
death.
Panting, your chest burning, you continue running after the animal.
You and your pack mates take turns sprinting up to her and stabbing into her flesh, before
falling back so you can fall into a slower jog and catch your breath.
Your hunting tactics resemble those of a pack of wolves, with members taking breaks while
others rush forward to harass their quarry.
Eventually the mammoth is overwhelmed by dozens of stab wounds, and exhausted, she stands
her ground, unable to run anymore.
It is soon over for the large animal.
You send back your younger brother to gather the family group, it will take all hands to
butcher and haul back the meat- but you will eat very well for several days.
Unfortunately, you will have to hunt again soon as you and your people haven't developed
the techniques of drying meat in order to preserve it.
You must eat it before rot sets in and spoils it, and thus most of the meat from the giant
animal will be left behind for the scavengers.
This practice however has unexpected benefits, and a pack of large wolves has smelled your
kill.
Yet the animals don't attack you- they have learned over many generations that all they
have to do is simply wait for you to have your fill, and then they will get the larger
share of the spoils.
Instead, the wolves simply sit and wait, and as an added benefit they even chase away prowling
sabre-toothed tigers trying to muscle in on your kill.
You don't realize it, but this learned behavior is setting the roots down for a bond between
two species- modern man and wild dogs- which may one day drive you extinct.
The meat is sliced with sharpened rocks, and once your family arrives it is quickly wrapped
up in furs for transporting.
The hide is incredibly valuable though and while meat will be left behind, very little
of the hide will go to waste.
From the hide you can craft clothing and blankets, some groups have even created crude sails
for small boats.
It will be evenly split between you and the other family group which joined you in the
hunt, in the past there was often violence for the spoils, but you have learned to work
together for the betterment of both groups.
Back at your cave, you allow your mate to prepare the meat as you in turn attempt to
prepare your fire.
Unable to reproduce fire yourself, you instead keep small burning embers lasting as long
as possible after discovering fires started by lightning strikes and other natural phenomenon.
Adding pine needles to a few embers, you soon have a roaring flame.
You have no idea, but the act of cooking your food is creating a bright new future for your
descendants.
That's because cooking food makes it easier to digest, which in turn frees up energy which
the brain gets to consume instead of the gut.
In every other animal, most of the body's energy is used up in digestion, but in your
neanderthal biology, cooked food allows the brain to use more and more energy.
Eventually this will have dramatic consequences for your species, and the species to follow
yours.
Along with the mammoth meat you eat a helping of lichens and mosses.
You've learned to eat a certain fungus that grows on decomposing things, which you would
normally avoid.
Over many generations your people have discovered that this specific fungus helps keep you healthy,
and when you're sick helps fight illness.
Unknowingly you've developed one of the first antibacterial treatments in the world, and
you make sure to consume small quantities of the unpleasant fungus with your meals.
Your belly is full, and outside the sun is starting to dip below the horizon.
Normally you and your family would huddle in the cave for warmth and safety, fearful
of what predators lurk in the dark.
But with a roaring fire you don't fear the animals outside your cave, for you know that
they fear fire enough to stay away.
Today was a very good day, your family has survived another day on the European steppes,
and you have enough food to last for the immediate future.
The mammoths will likely remain for a few weeks, and you will have plenty of prey to
hunt.
Alongside you on your reed mattress, your mate pushes herself closer to you for warmth
and comfort.
You can't communicate the idea, but she means more to you than other females, in a way that's
strangely different.
She is not like your mother, whom you cared for until she passed away and respected as
an elder, nor is she like your sister whom you are bonded to by blood as a sibling.
Your mate is simply... different.
She inspires emotions and feelings within you that you struggle to understand, but are
different from any other female.
You find yourself frustrated at your inability to understand or communicate these feelings,
even as you are surprised to discover that it is important to you that she herself understands
her significance.
You rise from your mat, and mixing some of the mammoth fat with dirt and blood, you smear
it on your hand.
Then, you grunt and gently coo at your mate, sounds that will one day form the basis for
spoken words.
You signal at the mammoth fat mixture, and motioning to your hand, recognition dawns
on her face as she follows your example.
Then, grabbing her hand, you push both of your hands together against the cave wall,
leaving side by side impressions on the stone.
You don't know why, but you find this deeply satisfying.
In the years to come for as long as you occupy this cave you'll often look upon the hand
impressions fondly, and when bad hunting forces you to migrate and find a new cave, you'll
repeat the act there as well.
Your children will learn this from you and recreate the side-by-side hand impressions
with their mates, passing the tradition on to their own children.
For now, this simple act is the only way you can express to your mate her significance,
and to the world as well, but one day your people will mate with smaller, more intelligent
people from far to the south, passing the tradition on.
Eventually the idea you struggled to understand in your own brain- love- will be shared in
hundreds of languages, and descendants you can't even imagine will live one day who will
at last understand that you were not a dumb brute, but a rational, intelligent, and loving
creature.
Think you could have survived as a neanderthal?
Tell us your prehistoric lifehacks in the comments!
Then go watch “Lion vs T Rex - Who Would Win?”
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