The view from Shukbah Cave (Credit: Amos Frumkin)
(CN) Neanderthals used stone-shaping technology once thought to be used exclusively by homo sapiens, in a discovery revealed this week that has scientists rethinking how ancient humans developed.
Researchers discovered stone tools in cave sites in the Levant, a historical region in the present-day Middle East, belonging to Neanderthal communities, distant cousins of modern humans.
In a study published Monday in the journal Scientific Reports, scientists from the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Germany detailed their findings of the use of Nubian Levallois technology that helped ancient humans craft stone tools by chipping away at stone to make weapons such as spearheads.