A riveting scientific journey exploring the enigma of the Neanderthal and the species' unique form of intelligence.

What do we really know about our cousins, the Neanderthals?

For over a century we saw Neanderthals as inferior to Homo Sapiens. More recently, the pendulum swung the other way and they are generally seen as our relatives: not quite human, but similar enough, and still not equal. Now, thanks to an ongoing revolution in paleoanthropology in which he has played a key part, Ludovic Slimak shows us that they are something altogether different -- and they should be understood on their own terms rather than by comparing them to ourselves. As he reveals in this stunning book, the Neanderthals had their own history, their own rituals, their own customs. Their own intelligence, very different from ours.

Slimak has travelled around the world for the past thirty years to uncover who the Neanderthals really were. A modern-day Indiana Jones, he takes us on a fascinating archaeological investigation: from the Arctic Circle to the deep Mediterranean forests, he traces the steps of these enigmatic creatures, working to decipher their real stories through every single detail they left behind.

A thought-provoking adventure story, written with wit and verve, The Naked Neanderthal shifts our understanding of deep history -- and in the process reveals just how much we have yet to learn.

Author: Ludovic Slimak
Binding Type: Hardcover
Publisher: Pegasus Books
Published: 02/06/2024
Pages: 208
Weight: 0.74lbs
Size: 9.10h x 6.20w x 1.00d
ISBN: 9781639366163


Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 10/15/2023
Publishers Weekly 11/27/2023
Shelf Awareness 02/23/2024

About the Author
Ludovic Slimak is a paleoanthropologist at the University of Toulouse in France and director of the Grotte Mandrin research project. His work focuses on the last Neanderthal societies and he is the author of several hundred scientific studies on these populations. His research has been featured in Nature, Science, the New York Times and more.