万物简史 第644期:永不安分的类人猿(8)

（单词翻译）

Quite who they were and what they were like remain matters of disagreement and uncertainty¹. Right up until the middle of the twentieth century the accepted anthropological² view of the Neandertal was that he was dim, stooped, shuffling³, and simian⁴—the quintessential caveman. It was only a painful accident that prodded⁵ scientists to reconsider this view. In 1947, while doing fieldwork in the Sahara, a Franco-Algerian paleontologist named Camille Arambourg took refuge from the midday sun under the wing of his light airplane. As he sat there, a tire burst from the heat, and the plane tipped suddenly, striking him a painful blow on the upper body. Later in Paris he went for an X-ray of his neck, and noticed that his own vertebrae were aligned⁶ exactly like those of the stooped and hulking Neandertal. Either he was physiologically⁷ primitive⁸ or Neandertal's posture⁹ had been misdescribed. In fact, it was the latter. Neandertal vertebrae were not simian at all. It changed utterly¹⁰ how we viewed Neandertals—but only some of the time, it appears.

他们究竟是谁，长得像什么样，至今依然莫衷一是，谜团一片。直到20世纪中叶，人类学界普遍流行的观点是，尼安德特人举止笨拙，身体弯曲，拖拽着脚行走，与猿人没有多大区别——他们是穴居人中的佼佼者。只是一件令入痛苦的偶然事件，才使得科学家对这一观点遗行了重新审视。 1947年，一位名为卡尔·阿拉姆卡尔的法裔阿尔及利亚古生物学家在撒哈拉地区野外考察时，中午烈日炎炎，他躲在他的轻型飞机的机翼下休息。他坐在那里的时候，一只轮胎由于天气太热而爆裂，飞机突然倾斜，他的上身被重重地击了—下。后来他取巴黎对他颈部做了一次X光检查，结果发现脊椎的排列与身体微屈，举止笨拙的尼安德特人完全一样。要么从生理学角度讲他类同于原始人，要么就是我们对尼安德特人样子的认识存在着偏差。答案自然是后者。尼安德特人的脊椎完全不同于类人猿。这完全改变了我们对尼安德特人的看法——但是这种认识似乎只是昙花一现。

It is still commonly held that Neandertals lacked the intelligence or fiber¹¹ to compete on equal terms with the continent's slender and more cerebrally¹² nimble newcomers, Homo sapiens. Here is a typical comment from a recent book: "Modern humans neutralized¹³ this advantage [the Neandertal's considerably¹⁴ heartier¹⁵ physique] with better clothing, better fires and better shelter; meanwhile the Neandertals were stuck with an oversize body that required more food to sustain." In other words, the very factors that had allowed them to survive successfully for a hundred thousand years suddenly became an insuperable handicap.

时至今日，仍有不少人认为尼安德特人缺少智能，与更灵巧、脑量更大的后来者智人不可同日而语。下面就是最近出版的一本书中一个典型的论点：“现代人以更舒适的穿着，更先进的取火方式，更好的住所，战胜了这种优势（尼安德特人的强壮体格），而尼安德特人处境尴尬，庞大的身躯需要更多的食物维持生存。”换句话说，使得他们成功生存了10万多年的优势突然之间成了难以克服的不利条件。