11 In the early 20th century, “Thal,” the German word for “valley” was changed to “Tal.” As a consequence, “Neandertal” is a common alternative to “Neanderthal.” Since the scientific name for the species (or subspecies) remained neanderthalensis, most scientists do not use the new spelling. Soon after the name was coined, researchers determined that two other collections of strange bones found decades earlier in Belgium and Gibraltar (and unnamed by those who discovered them), were also the remains of Neanderthals.
12 Today, even among scientists and academics, calling someone a Neanderthal rarely implies that we’re referring to a skilled hunter who uses his oversized brain to fashion and employ an array of sophisticated tools.
13 Similarly, cave collapses also appear to have caused the demise of a number of Neanderthals whose fossilized bones were initially thought to exhibit percussion pits.
9: Columbus, Caribs, and Cannibalism
The captain . . . took two parrots, very large and very different from those seen before. He found much cotton, spun and ready for spinning; and articles of food; and he brought away a little of everything; especially he brought away four or five bones of the arms and legs of men. When we saw this, we suspected that the islands were those islands of the Caribe, which are inhabited by people who eat human flesh.
—Dr. Diego álvarez Chanca
The quote above came from Dr. Diego álvarez Chanca, a physician from Seville who accompanied Christoffa Corombo (a.k.a. Christopher Columbus) during his second voyage to the New World in 1493. Columbus had come ashore on the island he would name Santa María de Guadalupe. As the landing party entered a small village, the local inhabitants fled in terror, leaving behind everything they owned. It was a response that had taken them a little over a year to develop.
During his first voyage in 1492, Columbus referred to all of the native people as índios, but by a year later a distinction had been made between the peaceful Arawaks (also called Taínos) and another group known to the locals as the Caribes (or more commonly, Caribs). What Columbus would never know was that the indigenous inhabitants were actually a diverse assemblage that had been living on the islands for hundreds of years. Their ancestors had set out from coastal Venezuela, where the out-flowing currents of the Orinoco River carried the migrants into the open sea and far beyond. At each island stop, these settlers developed their own cultures and customs, so that by the time the Spaniards arrived, the entire Caribbean island chain had already been colonized, with settlements extending as far north as the Bahamas.
Columbus, though, cared little about local customs or history. Instead he noted that the Arawaks were gentle and friendly, and he wasted little time in passing this information on to his royal backers in Spain. “[The Arawaks] are fitted to be ruled and to be set to work, to cultivate the land and do all else that may be necessary.”
This somewhat-less-than-friendly response led the locals to initiate some self-preservation-related finger pointing, designed perhaps to send their new pals off on a quest to enlighten somebody else. Although no one is quite sure who was doing the translating, soon after his initial arrival, the Arawaks reportedly told Columbus that the Caribs inhabited certain of the southern islands, including those that would eventually be called St. Vincent, Dominica, Guadeloupe, and Trinidad. Columbus was informed that the Caribs were not only infamous for brutal raids against their peaceful neighbors, but also for the annoying habit of eating their captives. But pillaging and people-eating weren’t the Caribs’ only vices. Every year they took a break from their mayhem-related jobs in order to meet up with a tribe of warrior women. These fighting females were reportedly “fierce to the last degree, strong as tigers, courageous in fight, brutal and merciless.”