New Discovery: Neanderthals and Humans Have Similar Speaking and Hearing Capacities.

Whether or not Neanderthals could speak has been studied for more than five decades—and the question is still being researched because no definitive answer has been given. It is clear that our human relatives were capable of enormously complex cultural achievements. So how was all of that possible without the powerful communication capabilities afforded by speech?

Some studies cast doubt on whether Neanderthals’ anatomy was suitable for producing the sounds of speech: their larynx was shaped differently than that of modern humans. Still, it was considered likely that our cousin species could produce a wide variety of sounds.

Recently scientists made 3-D scans using computerized tomography to construct digital models of the structures of the inner ears of five Neanderthals. They then compared the sound transmissions within the simulated organs with those of the ears of modern humans, older hominins and chimpanzees. This analysis enabled the Spanish researchers to deduce which pitches each ear was best attuned to. The wider the frequency band that can be detected, the more acoustic signals can be contained within it, enabling the transmission of a distinguishable signal in a short interval. The results from this work is clear: the frequency bandwidth of modern human and Neanderthal ears do not differ significantly.

Neanderthals could therefore hear language just as well as we do—with an acoustic sensorium that is optimally tuned to the frequencies that are particularly relevant for understanding human speech. In contrast to ears of H. heidelbergensis individuals from Spain’s Sima de los Huesos cave, which were analyzed for comparison, Neanderthals could hear better at frequencies of four to five kilohertz, an acoustic capacity comparable to that of modern humans. The band of frequencies Neanderthals could perceive was also as wide as that of humans.

The recent study provides only a hint of whether Neanderthals were able to speak. But if they could do so, then they could hear and distinguish between a similarly wide range of sounds as humans.

Information sourced from: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-021-01391-6