Study into Jersey Neanderthal mammoth hunters

Archaeologists are investigating the truth behind the story that Ice Age Neanderthals in Jersey would push mammoths off cliffs in St Brelade for food.

About 30 years ago, evidence suggested early residents of what is today the island of Jersey chased the giant mammals off the cliffs at La Cotte above Ouaisne.

Dr Geoff Smith, an analyst for Jersey Archive, said: "It was in the 70s and 80s that the hypothesis was put forward that Neanderthals were grouping together to drive herds of woolly mammoth and woolly rhinos off the cliffs and butchering them."

He is now using new technology to look at whether that theory is correct or not.

Dr Smith said: "No-one has ever really questioned it so we are going back, re-assessing and re-analysing and see if we can come up with new information to come up with more support or even refute it slightly.

"We don't know, we are never going to completely understand, but we just want to see if we can get more data and understand Neanderthals even better."

In a cave at La Cotte in Ouaisne Bay archaeologists have, over the years, found tools and the fossilised bones and teeth of woolly mammoth, woolly rhinoceros, cave bear and reindeer.

These remains date from a time when the view from Ouaisne was not sea, but a huge treeless land stretching all the way to what is now St Malo...

BBC News

Link 2: Arqueólogos de la isla de Jersey (Inglaterra) investigan si los neandertales cazaban mamuts precipitándolos en los acantilados.