The Cognition of Homo neanderthalensis and H. sapiens: Does the Use of Pigment Necessarily Imply Symbolic Thought?

Abstract

Zilhão and his colleagues have argued that the discovery of pigment use in Middle Palaeolithic contexts in Cuevas de los Aviones and Antón, Spain, provides ``secure evidence that, approximately 50 ka cal B.P., 10 millennia before modern humans are first recorded in Europe, the behaviour of Neanderthals was symbolically organised and continues to be so until the very end of their evolutionary trajectory''. This derived from some outstanding archaeological research but is it a valid interpretation? To address this question I will initially review the evidence for similarities and differences in the cognition of H. neanderthalensis and H. sapiens, and then consider the impact on existing theories of the recently discovered and/or published evidence for Neanderthal pigment use. My conclusion is that while such evidence supports proposals for a socially complex, emotionally driven Neanderthal lifestyle, it does not provide prima facie evidence for symbolic thought and behaviour. Neither does the evidence for pigment use by H. sapiens when found without any additional evidence for symbolic thought, such as that from Pinnacle Point at c. 164 kya in the Middle Stone Age of South Africa.