Hn dental calculus included starches & phytoliths

Henry and Piperno
Plants in Neanderthal Diet:
Plant Microfossil Evidence From the Dental Calculus of Shanidar III

Relatively little is known about the diet of Neanderthals and contemporary
modern humans, and what is known is drawn largely from indirect measures of
diet such as faunal remains and isotope signatures. Despite these piecemeal
data, many theories on the diets of Neanderthal and modern human groups have
been formulated, including ideas that Neanderthals focused solely on meat
from large game while modern humans had a more varied diet. Plant
microfossil analysis, a technique relatively underused in paleoanthropology,
has the potential to answer many questions about the plant portion of diets
of these ancient populations. Plant microfossils such as starches and
phytoliths can be recovered from from a variety of archaeological contexts,
and are identifiable to plant family, genus and even species. A few previous
studies of plant microfossils from Neanderthal sites in the Near East have
suggested that they may have used plants extensively, and may have even
consumed grains (Albert, et al.1999, 2000; Henry et al.1996, Madella et
al.2002). However, these studies examined only microfossils trapped in
soils, which may be subject to contamination, or may not represent dietary
use of the plants. Using methods described at last yearʹs Paleoanthropology
Society Meetings (Henry, Piperno & Brooks 2007), we have examined plant
microfossils trapped in the dental calculus of Shanidar III, a Neanderthal
fossil dating to around 35kya from Shanidar Cave, Iraq. Abundant plant
material was found on these teeth, including both starches and phytoliths.
Preliminary identification of the starches suggest this individual was
consuming grass seeds. This is the first direct evidence of dietary use of
plants by Neanderthals, and the discovery of starch grains from grasses
indicates these staples of modern human diet were consumed well before the
origins of agriculture.

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