Science finally shows that they hunted the largest beasts of their time

The classic image of neanderthal as a brute hominid with no intelligence and that barely survived by scavenging what other predators left behind, it is increasingly being left behind as we make new discoveries. Precisely, we now know that 125,000 years ago, our evolutionary cousins They were Europe’s apex predators, capable of organizing to take down the most formidable land creature of their time: the straight-tusked elephant. A beast that doubled the size of today’s African elephants and reached 13 tons in weight.

The mystery of the spear. To reach this conclusion we have not traveled back in time, but rather we have gone to Leringen in Germany. Here in 1948 archaeologists found a skeleton of the straight-tusked elephant, with a 2.4 meter yew spear stuck between the ribs. A priori it seemed like the definitive proof or, as some anthropologists have called it, the smoking gun of Neanderthal hunting.

However, scientific skepticism prevailed: was it a coordinated attack or did a group of opportunistic Neanderthals find an elephant trapped in the mud and finish it off? This is where a great debate has been generated that has now been closed in 2026 with the publication of a new scientific article.

What have they done? Here the researchers have basically focused on the skeletal remains of the animal that was found, and the objective was to find the details of the hunting process. What they saw was that the cut marks and damage to the bones did not correspond to a simple opportunistic shot, but to a frontal and tactical attack. In this way, experts point out that the Lehringen spear is no longer an anomaly or a happy coincidence, but rather irrefutable proof of systematic hunting behavior.

The context. In addition to what has now been known, in the past researchers demonstrated that the hunt for these titans was not an isolated event, but rather a systematic and recurring practice. The problem that was seen is that shooting down a 13-ton elephant raises the obvious question: what do you do with so much meat before it rots?

This is where the classic perception of the Neanderthal falls apart. An elephant of that size provided enough calories to feed 100 people for a month, and processing that amount of meat and fat required three basic points:

• Groups of people larger than previously believed, which break with the idea of ​​small nomadic bands of 20 individuals.
• Settle in a specific area when you have plenty of food.
• Master fire and techniques, such as drying meat so that it can last for a long time.

A new image. With all this research, the truth is that the textbooks have to be rewritten, since you can see how Neanderthals had the cognitive ability to plan, the communication necessary to coordinate mass ambushes, and the social structure to process and store tons of food.

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