SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
[Ed note: This story was originally posted 2019-08-14 23:09 UTC but was lost when we had the site crash Thursday morning. Prior comments have, unfortunately, been lost. --martyb]
Neanderthals commonly suffered from 'swimmer's ear'
Abnormal bony growths in the ear canal were surprisingly common in Neanderthals, according to a study published August 14, 2019 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Erik Trinkaus of Washington University and colleagues.
External auditory exostoses are dense bony growths that protrude into the ear canal. In modern humans, this condition is commonly called "swimmer's ear" and is known to be correlated with habitual exposure to cold water or chilly air, though there is also a potential genetic predisposition for the condition. Such exostoses have been noted in ancient humans, but little research has examined how the condition might inform our understanding of past human lifestyles.
In this study, Trinkaus and colleagues examined well-preserved ear canals in the remains of 77 ancient humans, including Neanderthals and early modern humans from the Middle to Late Pleistocene Epoch of western Eurasia. While the early modern human samples exhibited similar frequencies of exostoses to modern human samples, the condition was exceptionally common in Neanderthals. Approximately half of the 23 Neanderthal remains examined exhibited mild to severe exostoses, at least twice the frequency seen in almost any other population studied.
Also at CNN and New Scientist.
External auditory exostoses among western Eurasian late Middle and Late Pleistocene humans (open, DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0220464) (DX)
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Friday August 16 2019, @12:50AM (2 children)
Here's a link [wikipedia.org] to Wikipedia's article on the Aquatic ape hypothesis for those who are not familiar.
It's not the madest thing I've read, but the evidence is scant.
I guess the point is that it seems unlikely our ancestors would ignore a great source of food just because they might get wet.
Neanderthals were pretty much people too, so presumably they could swim and liked seafood.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday August 16 2019, @01:06AM (1 child)
TFA quote:
Daim', 'twas such a neat and plausible hypothesis!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Friday August 16 2019, @01:32AM
Oh. I did not see that bit.
Maybe the neanderthals who lived near the beach liked swimming? I will need to interview more neanderthals to get a better sample size.