Another hard blow to the reputation from hypercarnivores of our “cousins”: in the Neanderthal diet there was often meat in putrefaction and … inhabited.
The “Paleo” Diet Neanderthal version included one protein who would make his nose turn up to his modern admirers: i Cagnotti or Bigattinithe larvae of flies that feed on putrefaction meat. It is the advanced hypothesis in a recently presented study at the annual meeting of the American Association of Biological Anthropologist and summarized in a popular article on Sciencewhich makes you think – again – that the Neprivantic Name of the Neanderthals has long been too inflated.
More carnivores than carnivores? Useful information to reconstruct the diet of the ancients are deduced from the analysis of the relationship between different isotopes (variants of a chemical element that has the same number of protons in the nucleus, but a different number of neutrons) preserved in bones and teeth. In the fossil bones of the Neanderthals, high levels of nitrogen 15 have been found compared to nitrogen 14, in general the “signature” chemistry of a past diet rich in meat. For a long time, it has therefore been imagined that the Neanderthals ate more animal meats even of the hypercarnivore creatures par excellence, such as Hyenas and Leoni (who hunted).
Too much meat, poisoned. However, this theory is badly coupled with the reference, in several archaeological and anthropological studies, to the so -called “Rabbit Starvation”, an acute form of malnutrition linked to excessive consumption of lean meat and the scarce contribution of other nutrients such as fat and carbohydrates. The body of the primates, and with them of man, has evolved to feed mainly of vegetable foods.
When we feed on proteins, we break them down in amino acids that contain nitrogen, in turn converted into ammonia which is eliminated through the urine. Excess proteins cause an excessive increase in ammonia in the liver, which can be toxic. So how did the Neanderthals eat so much meat, without getting sick?
Cacciatori di … Carogne. Years ago, John Speth, archaeologist of the University of Michigan, had hypothesized that the putrefaction meat could have a greater nitrogen content than the fresh one, and that its consumption was the basis of the high concentrations of nitrogen in the neanderthal bones. Perhaps our “cousins” hominins did not consume as much meat as previously hypothesized, but but they took advantage of that left by other groups or animals To consume a food full of nutrients, not also disdained by modern populations of hunter-gathers.
Nourishing snacks. Melanie Beasley, anthropologist of Purdue University (Indiana, United States), however, he realized that no one had yet tested the nitrogen levels of the Cagnetti and launched himself In an experiment for strong stomachs.
He tested the nitrogen values of 389 larvae (with the appearance of worms) of three different species of flies that flock to putrefaction meat and found that, the longer the insects stopped on the fabrics, the more their nitrogen levels increased.
Those of the larva delle flies black soldier (Hermetia Iluucens) contained eight times more nitrogen of that present in the putrefied meat alone (not “inhabited”). And even more than that present in other animals that man is normally nourished, like fish.
Easy to procure. At the time of the Neanderthals, the presence of worms in the meat left outdoors had to be practically inevitable, and it is likely that the hominins would find many in the ground under the dead animals. These protein morsels had to constitute an important part of their diets, also procured by females Neanderthal. The work is added to the other recent studies that have redesigned our conception on the neanderthal’s diet, more varied and complete than long imagined.
