Neanderthal Man did not die out because of catastrophic climate change, according to research which suggests that human beings could have been responsible for the demise of our nearest cousins.

A study of the climate around the time that the Neanderthals disappeared from Europe about 30,000 years ago has found no record of any sudden disasters that might have contributed to their extinction, suggesting that other factors such as competition with Homo sapiens were important.

After thriving in Europe for about 300,000 years, Homo neanderthalensis disappeared abruptly at some point between 32,000 and 24,000 years ago. The cause has long been disputed, with some scientists favouring a cooling climate while others point to the arrival on the continent of modern man.

Temperatures were gradually cooling over the period, but the Neanderthals had survived many glacial periods before. The arrival of the Cro-Magnon people in Europe about 10,000 years before the Neanderthals disappeared has raised suspicions of a prehistoric clash of civilisations, in which the more intelligent and resourceful newcomers drove their cousins to extinction, deliberately or otherwise.

Both species would have been in competition for food and shelter, which could have proved fatal to Neanderthal man.

The likelihood that humans played a key role in the downfall of the Neanderthals has been increased by the new research from a team led by Poly-chronis Tzedakis of the University of Leeds, which has ruled out dramatic climate change as a possible cause.

Sediment samples taken from a deep-sea core drilled in the Cariaco Basin off the coast of Venezuela, which provide a climate record for the entire Atlantic region, have uncovered no extreme climate events for any of the likely dates on which the Neanderthals died out.

Most palaeoanthropologists accept a final date for the Neanderthals of either 32,000 to 30,000 years ago, or about 28,000 years ago, and the records suggest a stable climate over both periods.

A third possible extinction date, of about 24,000 years ago, is more controversial among scientists, and is the only one in which climate change could have played a significant part. The sediments, however, suggest that this date marked the beginning of a 1,000-year-long transition to an ice age in northern Europe, but in which conditions in the Neanderthals’ last redoubts around Gibraltar remained relatively unaltered. There was no sudden cold snap that could have pushed the Neanderthals suddenly to extinction.

The study is published in the journal Nature, and one of the authors, Katerina Harvati, of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, presented it by video link to the British Association Festival of Science in York yesterday.

Dr Harvati said: “This suggests that catastrophic, abrupt climate change was not responsible for the Neanderthals’ demise. If climate change played a part, it was indirect.”

Although the findings do not necessarily mean competition from modern humans for food and shelter were solely responsible, they narrow down the possible options, making a role for Homo sapiens more likely.

Dr Harvati said: “There are many different proposals, including disease, climate, demography, and direct and indirect competition from humans, and this study does not support one over the other. It could have been competition from modern humans, or a combination of climate and competition with modern humans.”

Chris Stringer, of the Natural History Museum in London, whose recent book Homo Britannicus describes the history of human occupation in Britain, said it was likely that human competition at least played a role, perhaps in combination with climate change.

“Perhaps Neanderthal extinction in Western Europe was caused by an unlucky combination of events for them: an unstable climate – which they had survived before – and the arrival of competing modern human populations,” Professor Stringer said.

“Only the most resourceful and adaptable populations would have survived at a time when environmental change was so challenging, and competition for resources would have intensified. The Cro-Magnons surely suffered badly too, but with the aid of better technology, shelters, clothing, infant care and wide-reaching social networks, they somehow got through the bad times in Europe, while the unlucky Neanderthals did not.”

How they compare

Occipital bun, a protuberance of the occipital bone that looks like a hair knot

Projecting mid-face Low, flat, elongated skull A flat basic cranium A prominent, spongy browridge Skull about 10 per cent bigger than the modern human

Lack of a protruding chin No groove on canine teeth Distinctive shape of the bony labyrinth in the ear

Bony projections on the sides of the nasal opening

A broad, projecting nose

Considerably more robust

Large round finger tips

Barrel-shaped rib cage

Large kneecaps Long collar bones

Short, bowed shoulder blades

Thick, bowed shaft of the thigh bones

Short shinbones and calf bones Long, gracile pelvic pubis

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