Neandertal archaeology - Implications for our origins

This article identifies key aspects of the metaphysical paradigms under which European Paleolithic archaeological research is conducted and contrasts the anthropological approaches typical of anglophone New World workers with those of the "history-like" natural science-based traditions of Latin Europe. Because the Middle-Upper Paleolithic transition in Europe is thought by many to correspond to the biological replacement of Neandertals by modern humans over the ten millennia bracketing 40 kyr B.P., generalizations about the archaeological transition invoked in support of biological replacement are examined and are found to lack empirical support. Patterns in lithic technology, typology, raw material variability, reduction strategies, blank frequencies, bone and antler technologies, Paleolithic art, subsistence strategies, and settlement patterns all indicate a temporal-spatial mosaic of changing monitors of human adaptation over the transition interval that cannot be reconciled with any construal of a relatively abrupt and complete biological replacement.