Tristan Hughes

What types of images did Neanderthals draw?

What did it mean?

And how might Neanderthal art have influenced that of our ancestors, of the first groups of Homo sapiens that interacted with them?

I'm Tristan Hughes, your host, and this is the fascinating, developing story of Neanderthal art with our guest, Dr Genevieve von Petzinger.

Genevieve, it is such a pleasure to have you on the show.

Oh, absolutely.

Go wild on this topic as well.

So, I mean, Neanderthal art, first of all, this belief that it has been there for so long that it's only modern humans who can make art, it seems that more evidence is coming to the fore now that that is not the case.

I mean, that was brilliant, Genevieve.

And I must admit, a topic for another day, but I remember talking to Chris Stringer about this, is imagining those first contacts between a Neanderthal and Homo sapien group and imagining how that language, the language barrier would have been

how they would have got past it.

Kind of these ideas of the translators of the prehistoric age of these early humans and modern humans, like how they communicated.

That's another fascinating thing to explore for another day.

And art is just one part of that larger story.

No, I know.

Come on, let's do the big basics.

Shall we explain what exactly are Neanderthals?

Talk us through this or who exactly are Neanderthals?

We might cover that quickly.

And just so we know the date range as well, Genevieve, so a large area, quite robust in their body features, but as you say, that diversity, that variety as well.