The Neanderthal People of the English Channel: Adaptations and Extinctions

The Neanderthal People of the English Channel: Adaptations and Extinctions with Dr Matt Pope on Wednesday 13th November at the Wagner Hall, West Street, Brighton**.** Doors and bar open 7:15pm, talk starts at 8:00pm.

La Manche is the name we give to the Ice Age landscapes of the English Channel, southern Britain and northern France. It has a record of early human behaviour which varies from isolated and difficult-to-interpret single artefacts through to rare sites preserving deep and rich accumulations of many thousands of finds. By interpreting these traces, which include rare human remains, we are able to tell a story of Neanderthal people from their earliest origins through to their apparent extinction. In this lecture we explore this record looking at Neanderthal culture through the lens of their adaptive success and consider in what ways their interactions with Homo sapiens may have led to their disappearance.

Matt Pope is an archaeologist based at the UCL Institute of Archaeology. Leading on excavations in Britain and the Channel Islands, he studies the Ice Age prehistory of northern Europe. His research tries to understand how early human cultures pushed at the limits of their range and how these adaptations underpinned our species success and the current challenges it faces.