Customer Reviews

The Last Neanderthal: The Rise, Success, and Mysterious Extinction of Our Closest Human Relatives

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This profusely illustrated and well written book deals with the Neanderthals and the world they lived in, as well as their lifestyles and "technology". Starting in Chapter 1, the author gradually introduces the reader in the Neanderthal world, also explaining other interesting areas related to their study, such as how evolution works, how was the world during Neanderthal periods, and techniques used in dating the antiquity of fossils. The book contains a lot of photographs on Neanderthal skulls and skeletons, as well as some of the tools they used. Requiring almost no background in anthropology or paleoanthropology, this book contains a lot of information and it is very thought provoking, and I think is a must for anyone interested in learning about our closest relatives.

I'm not a reader who usually pays too much attention to photos and illustrations, but I could recommend "The Last Neanderthal" on that basis alone. There are nearly 150 of them in this 200-page book, some covering an entire page in my oversized edition. Almost all of them are superb. The illustrations are mostly of various fossilized bones and reconstructions. They are not haphazardly thrown throughout the book or tightly grouped in the middle, but introduced when appropriate for the text.

Ian Tattersall's set-up of what is known about Neanderthals is masterful. Most of the first third of the book is about evolution, how fossilization works, and a brief description about what is known of the precursors to both Homo neanderthalensis and Homo sapiens. Tattersall is clearly at home with this material and confident in his presentation of it. He takes his time in this area - even though it has little to directly do with the topic of his book - because one cannot understand Neanderthals unless one has some understanding of other pre-modern humans and the scientific techniques used to understand them.

The set-up is not wasted on a flat ending. When Tattersall finally gets to the Neanderthals, he maintains a high level of interest for the reader by first showing how the scholarly views on Neanderthals have changed so much over the last hundred-fifty years (much more fascinating than it sounds) and then by moving into areas about its evolution and what is known about its lifestyle. He appears to be a fair partisan, pointing out evidence both for and against different sides of the numerous controversial topics on Neanderthals.

I am a high school student with an interest in human origins and I found "The Last Neanderthal" fascinating. The author does justice to Neanderthals without making the book too academic. He answers, as much as current theory and evidence allow, many of the questions I had about Neanderthals: How much like us in intellect and abstract thought were the Neanderthals? Were they our ancestors? What was their geographic range? How many were there? When did they disappear? Did modern humans eliminate them? And so on. Tattersall discusses cranial shapes and skeletal remains, other human ancestors, genetics, stone tools, cave bears, and what have you. There are plenty of photographs of skeletons, skulls, tools, maps, and plenty of sidebar topics. This is a great book for intelligent laypeople of all ages and I greatly recommend it.

Dr. Tattersall's writing is straightforward, unbiased and presents a clear view of this compelling area of paleoanthropology. Written as an introduction to the field, the volume does as charged, with copious full page photos, illustrations and a summation of currently held theories without the complexities of a technical journal.

The Last Neanderthal is a lavishly photographed and illustrated book. Ian Tattersall covers the Neanderthal finds with great detail, and a lot of the book is devoted to the history of discovering and analyzing the Neanderthal finds. Mr. Tattersall is a pure evolutionist - as one would expect - but he is very careful to identify his opinions verses the actual findings at Neanderthal sites. This is a refreshing change from the usual "scientific" approach by other authors on such subjects who present their opinions as fact. This careful technique adds a great deal to the book and speaks well of Mr. Tattersall's mind set. A lot of authors cannot distinguish their opinions from fact.

The book is very interesting, well written and a lot of fun to study. There are some unanswered questions, because the cannot be answered, that should have at least been mentioned. For example, what role did disease play in the eradication of the Neanderthals? Perhaps the "invading" humans brought diseases that managed to end the species without any overt aggressive acts. In any event many such questions go unaddressed, but that is a minor complaint in an overall impressive effort

The Last Neanderthal is a wonderfully illustrated book perfect for anyone interested in human evolution. While providing an excellent overview of human evolution and the history of the discovery and study of Neanderthals, this book's true merit lies in its photographs of all the major finds of both Neanderthals and other human ancestors. Great as a reference for someone wishing to begin a more in-depth study of Neanderthals for class or just for fun.

This book was my entry into current theory on neanderthal man and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Very well written, it covered most if not all of my basic questions. The author's biases are clear yet he is seemingly forthwright about opposing views. The language he uses betrays the complexities of conjecture and theory behind many finds, rather than simply laying things out as 'fact'. Many excellent photographs, paintings, etc...

Ian Tattersall has a superb sense of what a layman wants to know about neanderthals and our origins of Homo Sapiens. The book is beautifully illustrated with photos and diagrams of bones, skulls, and charts. He tells us the latest theories of where the neanderthal originated and how they relate to Homo Sapiens. He is forced to use many pages to describe all of our possible ancestors to show where the Neanderthal fits in the grand picture.

Tattersall's book is a must have. It covers all the basics in a compelling style and with particular focus on site locations. The photos and illustrations are as good as those of any "coffee table" book. It is too light on some particular aspects concerning extinction, e.g. hybridization, pelvic ring size, birth/death ratios, and exotic disease resistance, but is superior in descriptions of Neanderthal morphology and environment.

No, this is not an unauthorized biography of my mother-in-law, or a memoir of my own tattersalled career. It's a coffee table book, really - large format with full page polychromatic photos of fractured crania, gap-toothed jaw bones, and Chatelperronian stone scrapers. It would be a perfect solstice present for your Uncle Gottlieb, who believes that the world was created 6,000 years ago, or your Cousin Euphemisia, who maintains that evolution took place, but under guidance.

Enough smart-alecking! The photographs of most of the known Neanderthal fossil skulls and of other skeletal fossils of Homo neanderthalis are fascinating, and well worth the price of the book. Included also are pictures of tools and other evidence of Neaderthal technology, plus graphs of climate change and maps of fossil sites in Europe and the Near East. The text by Ian Tattersall, one of the foremost expounders of human evolution to the general public, is intended to be comprehensible and entertaining for anyone who can read at all. A list of chapter titles will give you a pretty good idea of the book's contents:

1 - Who were the Neanderthals?
2 - How Evolution works
3 - Fossils, Dates, and Tools
4 - Before the Neanderthals
5 - Discovery and Interpretation of the Neanderthals
6 - The Neanderthals' World
7 - Evolution of the Neanderthals
8 - Neanderthal Lifestyles
9 - The Origin of Modern Humans
10- The Last Neanderthal

Chapter 2 - How Evolution Works - presents some ideas about evolutionary divergence and speciation which may be new to readers who learned their science decades ago, especially the important concept of allopatric evolution. Tattersall does a fine job of keeping such challenging vocabulary to a minimum and of making concepts both clear and convincing. Readers who want more sophisticated marshalling of evidence and more elaborate ramification of current neo-Darwinian evolutionary theories should look to one of Tattersall's other books. I would urge you also to examine Sean Carroll's excellent books outlining the concept of evo-devo (evolutionary development), which unites the evidence of fossils with genetic discoveries.

Caveat lector: In this field of knowledge of ancient processes, the more recent the book the better!