Contact Us FAQ Français
Home / NOVA: Decoding Neanderthals

NOVA: Decoding Neanderthals

Maple Leaf This item is only available for Canadian orders.

Catalogue Number:  041620
Producer:  PBS Video
Subject:  Archaeology, History, Science
Language:  English
Grade Level:  9 - 12, Post Secondary, Adult
Country Of Origin:  United States
Copyright Year:  2013
Running Time:  60


Request Preview Access

Over 60,000 years ago, the first modern humans - people physically identical to us today, left their African homeland and entered Europe, then a bleak and inhospitable continent in the grip of the Ice Age. But when they arrived, they were not alone: the stocky, powerfully built Neanderthals had already been living there for hundreds of thousands of years. So what happened when the first modern humans encountered the Neanderthals? Did they make love or war? That question has tantalized generations of scholars and seized the popular imagination. Then, in 2010, a team led by geneticist Svante Paabo announced stunning news. Not only had they reconstructed much of the Neanderthal genome — an extraordinary technical feat that would have seemed impossible only a decade ago — but their analysis showed that “we” modern humans had interbred with Neanderthals, leaving a small but consistent signature of Neanderthal genes behind in everyone outside Africa today. In “Decoding Neanderthals,” NOVA explores the implications of this exciting discovery. In the traditional view, Neanderthals differed from “us” in behavior and capabilities as well as anatomy. But were they really mentally inferior, as inexpressive and clumsy as the cartoon caveman they inspired? NOVA explores a range of intriguing new evidence for Neanderthal self-expression and language, all pointing to the fact that we may have seriously underestimated our mysterious, long-vanished human cousins.


Related Titles

Becoming Human Unearthing Our Earliest Ancestors: NOVA

PBS Video 041167

Nothing is more fascinating to us than, well, us. NOVA's groundbreaking investigation explores how...

NOVA scienceNOW: What Makes Us Human?

PBS Video 041586

Scientists have struggled for centuries to pinpoint the qualities that distinguish humans from the...

First Peoples

PBS Video 041795

200,000 years ago we took our first steps in Africa. Today there are 7 billion of us living across...

NOVA: Iceman Reborn

PBS Video 041840

Murdered more than 5,000 years ago, Otzi the Iceman is the oldest human mummy on Earth...


Browse Our Collection By Subject

View All Subjects