14 DAY TRIAL // A growing body of pieces of evidence seems to suggest that our ancestors, the Neanderthal people, might have wore body paint, or other forms of “make-up,” more than 50,000 years ago. In the latest issue of the respected journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), experts report that the shells containing pigment they discovered as belonging to the times the Neanderthals lived in Europe appear to have been make-up containers. This is the first persuasive evidence to substantiate the claims, which have been made many years ago, the BBC News reports.
According to the science team behind the new investigation, the idea that Neanderthals were “half-wits” should be buried for good. If the fact that they wore body paint is indeed confirmed, then experts may find themselves forced to accept the fact that the early hominins were able to abstract thinking. This is something that anthropologists have believed for a long time to be a trait that was developed in the Homo species, of which we are a part of. The containers were found in the Murcia province of southern Spain, at two separate archaeological sites.
The leader of the new study was British archaeologist Joao Zilhao, a professor at the Bristol University. He and his team were the ones who examined the shells that were discovered at the two locations. The experts say that the primitive containers were most likely used to store and mix various types of pigments, before they were applied to one's body and/or face. This is not the first find of this kind, Zilhao reveals. In Africa, other sites have yielded manganese sticks. Manganese is a natural pigment, and the specialists believe that they might have been in use as components of paint even then.
However, “This is the first secure evidence for their use of cosmetics. The use of these complex recipes is new. It's more than body painting,” the professor told the British news agency. Inside the containers, the investigators uncovered traces of a yellow pigment, which also seems to have been mixed with flacks, bits and pieces, of a reflective, black mineral. “The association of these findings with Neanderthals is rock-solid and people have to draw the associations and bury this view of Neanderthals as half-wits” he concluded.