of defence wounds on his arms, so it seems he was attacked suddenly from
behind by his murderer.^6
Stone Age murders
Most cases of prehistoric murder involved only the skeletal remains. One of
the earliest examples that has been suggested comes from northern Iraq, in the
Zagros Mountains. Between 1953 and 1960, nine skeletons were found in a
cave, called Shanidar. These people were not modern humans, but
Neanderthals, the latest surviving hominid other than our own species, and
have been dated to between 50,000 and 75,000 years old. The Neanderthal
species existed for over 200,000 years, but seems to have died out just
20,000–30,000 years ago, so that they would have coexisted with modern
humans for some time in parts of Europe and Western Asia. The species was
first discovered in the Neander Valley near Düsseldorf in Germany. They
probably diverged as a separate species fromHomo sapiensnearly 400,000
years ago, perhaps even longer, and fossil bones have been found over a large
stretch of Europe and Western Asia, where small bands roamed just south of
the ice sheets that covered most of the north. Their tools and equipment have
been found in southern England, in remains of hunting camps that demonstrate
that they followed the game animals up into what was then tundra.
Neanderthals were stocky, strong people, whose anatomy seems to have
been particularly welladapted for life in colder regions. They made tools and
weapons, and used fire. They created art, and probably music too. It is not
known why they died out–it might have been that they could not compete
with our own species, or they might have not been able to adapt to climate
fluctuations, periods when the climate turned much warmer at a rapid pace.
Recent studies of one individual from the Iraq cave, known as Shanidar 3,
who was a male in his later middle years, found evidence of a lethal wound
which had sliced into one of his ribs. Many Neanderthal specimens show
signs of wounds and accidental damage to the bones; theirs must have been a
hard and dangerous life, hunting large game for food and seeking for shelter in
caves and rock overhangs. Weapons damage has been noticed from time to
time on Neanderthal bones, such as a scalp injury on a specimen from France.
Researchers from Duke University in North Carolina undertook some
experiments to try to replicate the bone trauma found on Shanidar 3. They
made some stonetipped spears and fired them at pig carcasses. Pigs have very
similar skin thickness and muscle mass to humans, so they make useful
experimental subjects for comparison. The spears were of two types–light
throwing spears, and heavier thrusting weapons. It was the lighter throwing
THE OLDEST CRIMES