Neanderthals operated prehistoric “fat factory” on German lakeshore

Summary

Neanderthals in central Germany 125,000 years ago employed an advanced method of food preparation, according to a recent study: systematically stripping fat from the bones of large animals using water and heat. The practice, uncovered at the Neumark-Nord 2 archaeological site, shows that Neanderthals had a much more advanced conception of nutrition, planning, and resource management than previously believed.Artistic impression of activities at the “Fat Factory” site. Credit: Scherjon, LEIZA-MonreposThe research, published in Science Advances, was conducted by international researchers from MONREPOS (Leibniz Centre for Archaeology), Leiden University in the Netherlands, and the State Office for Heritage Management and Archaeology of Saxony-Anhalt. The study indicates that Neanderthals, in addition to smashing bones to access the marrow—a behavior shared by their earliest African ancestors—also crushed them into fragments and boiled them to obtain bone grease, a nutrient-rich resource.“This was intensive, organized, and strategic,” said Dr. Lutz Kindler, the study’s lead author. “Neanderthals were clearly managing resources with caution—planning hunts, transporting carcasses, and rendering fat in a task-specific area. They understood both the nutritional value of fat and how to access it efficiently.”Excavations at the Neumark-Nord 2 site. Credit: Wil Roebroeks, Leiden UniversityAt least 172 large mammals, such as deer, horses, and aurochs, were butchered here. The production of bone grease, which required huge quantities of bone to be worthwhile, was previously considered to be something limited to Upper Paleolithic modern humans. This find pushes back the timeline by thousands of years and represents a fundamental shift in our knowledge of Neanderthal diet and adaptation.From complete bones to tiny fragments. Credit: Kindler, LEIZA-MonreposThe Neumark-Nord complex, discovered in the 1980s by archaeologist Dietrich Mania, is a full interglacial ecosystem. Excavations...