Documentary recreates the face of a Neanderthal who lived 75,000 years ago

A documentary recreates the face of a Neanderthal who lived 75,000 years ago from a skull restored by a team of researchers from the University of Cambridge and the LiverpoolJohn Moores.

After gathering thousands of bone fragments, archaeologists and restorers reconstructed the skull of this woman, found in 2018 in a cave in Iraqi Kurdistan, where this species went to bury its dead.

Now, as reported by the university institution this Thursday, the documentary ‘Secrets of the Neanderthals’, Produced by the BBC Studios Science Unit and published on Netflix, it allows us to learn about the features of this species, which disappeared 40,000 years ago.

Although there are notable differences between the skulls of Neanderthals and those of ‘sapiens’, As the paleoanthropologist at the University of Cambridge, Emma Pomeroy, highlighted, the same does not happen in the case of faces, with greater similarities.

“Perhaps it is easier to see how interbreeding between our species occurred, to the point that almost all people today continue to have DNA Neanderthal”said.

According to a recent analysis, these remains, which are named Shanidar Z, correspond to a woman of about 40 years old, an advanced age for the time.

“As an older woman, Shanidar Z would be a source of knowledge for her group and here we are now 75,000 years later still learning from her”considered Pomeroy.

The skull of this Neanderthal, whose upper half was found, appeared completely deformed, having been crushed shortly after death and compacted by the weight of sediments over the years.

Among the researchers is Dr. Lucía López-Polín, from the Catalan Institute of Human Paleoecology and Social Evolution, who hand-assembled more than 200 pieces of the skull, including the upper and lower part of the jaw.

As Pomeroy explained, for restoration it is cleaned “delicately” each fragment and then a type of glue is used to stabilize the bone, the consistency of which can be compared to that of “a cookie dipped in tea.”“It’s like a high-stakes puzzle in three dimensions,” he influenced.

Regarding this discovery, the researcher also indicated that they found microscopic remains of charred food around Shanidar Z, which, according to Pomeroy, suggests that for Neanderthals “There does not seem to be a clear separation between life and death.”

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