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Nature 413, 791-792 (25 October 2001) | doi:10.1038/35101688

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Archaeology: Those elusive Neanderthals

Chris Stringer1 & William Davies2

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The 'how, where and when' of possible Neanderthal coexistence with Cro-Magnons, and their extinction, continue to exercise a varied community of researchers. The latest interpretations of the fossil and archaeological records were aired at two meetings.

Will we ever really know what happened to the Neanderthals — the distinctive humans who occupied Europe immediately before the modern-looking Cro-Magnons appeared1? At two meetings* held in late summer in Gibraltar and Liège, Belgium, there was plenty of new evidence from the fossil and archaeological records to discuss.

  1. Chris Stringer is in the Human Origins Programme, Department of Palaeontology, Natural History Museum, Cromwell Road, London SW7 5BD, UK.
    e-mail: Email: cbs@nhm.ac.uk
  2. William Davies is in the Centre for the Archaeology of Human Origins, Department of Archaeology, University of Southampton, Avenue Campus, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK.
    e-mail: Email: swgd@soton.ac.uk