‘Cavemen’ Diet Was Far from Primitive: Paleo Diet Myths

Countless schoolchildren have been told that they evolved from cavemen who wore no clothes, communicated in grunts, and were primitive hunters. But many of their teachers can't answer the question "how do you know that?" Tiny remnants of ground-up grains were recently found at Neandertal dwelling sites, and like so many other recent finds, they contradict a common evolution-based myth about human origins. Ancient humans are popularly viewed as hunting game with a primitive club. But "a new study shows they cooked and ate veggies." An examination of fossilized Neandertal remains from Belgium and Iraq revealed that their teeth contained starch granules from grain. Amanda Henry, lead author of the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, told CNN, "Neanderthals are often portrayed as very backwards or primitive….Now we are beginning to understand that they had some quite advanced technologies and behaviors."