it is believed that these nefelheim[again my spelling is phonetic which is probably completely screwed up] were neanderthal. there are a few skeletal remains that some say are neanderthal and others say modern human and yet others say are both. again historical info talks about children of the fallen meaning interbreeding between neanderthal and modern man. ofcourse they were dated to the proper time.

i think that the evidence of this is plausible and personally i believe it to be true.

i saw part of a tv show as i was surfing the channels a while back that was discussing the word nefelheim. i didn’t watch it but surfed past. i think it was a discovery channel show the naked archaeologist. you can do some research and check out this theory if you wish.

on june 20 the naked archaeologist is doing a show on the giants of genesis. this is said to be a new show but it touches on what i have posted here. maybe the web site is old as i could swear this 30 minute show was a while back. anyways following is a description of the june 20 naked archaeologist show which will touch on the giants in the old testament how there were really no giants and how the word giants the greek used was not the term used in the original hebrew.;

JUNE 20 The Giants of Genesis
Genesis 6:4 says: “There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.” Who were these giants? In this episode, the Naked Archaeologist quests after Goliath of Gath, the mighty King Og and other towering figures from the Old Testament.

thanks! i feel genuinely pleased that i not only spell it arguably correctly but say it correctly as well!

now, if i can just remember to hit those CAPitaLIzatIOn keys more often! (:O

but, to be quite consistent, kindly note: i’m a ‘lower case’ guy because of my email volume and creeping (if not creepy!) desensitization effect it’s had on me as a typist! and almost always post lower case even when i type loren, etc. i only use caps when i’m EMPHASIZING, cretin that i am!
so no disrespect to you, mr. coleman, or our extinct sub-species/cousins/parallel homo sapiens/whatever; i just can’t seem to slow down long enough to reach for that #(~!! Caps key! (probably the Neanderthal in me — oh no, i just offended… oh well…).

i do note, however, i subconsciously capped Google in the above; again, it shows you my priorities!

that said, i’ll cap Neanderthal from now on to keep it proper like a good stuffy brit! (oops, i just offended the brits now too — and they’re not even close to being extinct! mea culpa, me lads, mea culpa!)

thatericn wrote:

Actually, the tallish, lanky builds of many Old World equatorial populations is very un-Neanderthal.

well, true enough, IF you presume that the dominant body style of the Neanderthal (thanks again, Loren!) was a dominant gene and not the lankier body style of homo sapiens as being dominant as the case probably is by genetic predisposition and population.

but if that were the case? then why wouldn’t the Neandethals be writing this thesis about us? who is to say that only some recessive genes of the Neanderthal genetic strain manifests itself? there’s no reason to believe this isn’t possible, anymore than brown eye versus blue, hair color, skin pigmentation, etc.

seriously, consider the Basque population and their history. this is science writer marc kaufman of the washington post talking about them:

I know that with the Basques, there has been considerable speculation about their possible connection to Neanderthals. Under Basque myth, their origins come from the ‘basajaun’, who were stocky people who lived in the forests of the Iberian Pyrenees. They are believed to have come into being around the time that the modern humans began moving into Europe. Could they be an admixure of Neanderthals?

i’m posting the link for the above quote at the risk of offering too much unrelated information, and yet — it IS completely about this subject. it contains a recap of much of what is being discussed herein plus the ideas i presented in the asperberger/Neanderthal link.
washington post interview with kaufman:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/discussion/2007/04/27/DI2007042701501.html

Actually, the tallish, lanky builds of many Old World equatorial populations is very un-Neanderthal. Neanderthal were quite stocky and built to survive very cold conditions.

If any Neanderthal genes made it into any human populations, it most likely would have happened in the areas they lived, Western Europe, the Mediterranean area and the Near East. Someone could easily make a counter-case that the the stockier body types, lighter hair color and heavier body hair of those populations indicated possible interbreeding.

I’ll leave it to the geneticists, archaeologists and paleontologists to make the final determination.

i have researched this neanderthal (forgive my spelling, but i’m old schooled and — lest we forget — that ‘h’ is silent!) vs homo s. debate for many years.

Besides “Neanderthal” being capitalized, CryptoHaus_Press is technically incorrect about the “silent ‘h’.” “Ne·an·der·thal” is traditionally pronounced with a hard “th” sound, to wit: “nee-an-der-thawl.”

Regarding the old debate that CryptoHaus_Press brings up about that spelling, here’s what I wrote earlier on the topic, in the following “footnote.” CryptoHaus_Press is more than old school about it, he’s old, snobby, British school about it. Considering the “Haus” in his moniker, I’m in total shock.
Footnote: I follow the stylistic and spelling movement occurring within anthropology, begun in Germany, the USA and elsewhere, but not in the UK, to replace “Neanderthal” with “Neandertal.” The word “Neanderthal” is an old German word for “Neander” (a specific river’s name) + “thal” (valley), used to acknowledge where the first fossils of these hominids were found and described. The Germans did a revision of their spellings in 1904, so today “Neandertal” is preferred. Nevertheless, because of the historical scientific naming of these fossil hominids before the change to modern spelling, the Latin name Homo neanderthalensis retains the “h.” But as anthropologist John Hawks says in his “Neandertal vs Neanderthal” blog: “Never forget: all the cool kids write it with a ‘T’”.

++++

Also, it turns out I was on target about the full species status, for at the conclusion of the footnote, I wrote: I am in the ’species school’ regarding Neandertals as Homo neanderthalensis versus the ’subspecies camp’ that still views these fossils as Homo sapiens neanderthalensis.

Distant cousins, but I’m sure they would have lot to share with us about the way they viewed the world.

while i am not definitive in my opinion — for what else could there be since no theory (including this latest) — is conclusive, i favor the species interbreeding theory over this new one, which is from my point of view, merely a ‘trick’ or stunt of technology and not based as much in hard evidence but morphonics (which, as measuring the skull sizes of criminals and whatnot to draw conclusions is, as we know by historical misuse of such conceits, potentially highly misleading if not downright immoral if misused; i am NOT saying these theorists did this, mind you).

i read a research paper last year in which some humans with asperger’s syndrome andother socially reclusive autistic spectrum disorders had striking parallels to neanderthal traits and genetic heritage.

in broad essence, the theory argued with very profound albeit inconclusive evidence that austistic spectrum disorders are not ‘malfunctions’ but fully adapted if integrated genetic latencies from a human/neandethal mixture.

or, point more simply: many folks who bear such traits as red hair, depression or mania, and other mental disorders are not truly mentally ‘deranged’ or whatnot, but actually just wired more akin to their regressive albeit dominant neanderthal brain make-up.

the theory states, in over-simplification, that these individuals are normal to their genetic history, but because the neanderthal traits are still making themselves known or ‘expressed,’ in genetic terms, these individuals are at odds with modern day homo sapiens thought patterns, modes of social constructs, etc.

of course, since the homo sapiens are dominant in extremely large numbers, this puts the neanderthal expressed survivors/inheritors at a competitive disadvantage, the same way — so the theory logically concludes — it did when the species interbred.

think about it: humans favor conformity, strength in numbers, and a high degree of social interaction. whereas, through anthropological evidence, neanderthals were reclusive, favored smaller tribes, and — based on their ability to stealth hunt not by stalking their hunted prey like homo sapiens but remaining motionless and refusing eye contact with their intended prey (a key trait of autism is eye contact avoidance) until the animal literally walked right up beside them (at which point they used their massive upper body strength to pounce and strangle/kill) — different climates which also ‘coincidentally’ have higher incidences of autistic and bi-polar spectrum disorders in modern-day homo sapien populations!

i know it sounds and reads strange, but the depth of scientific treatment on this theory is far from ‘out there.’ in fact, it’s arguably very close to a theory worthy of serious albeit skeptical consideration.

judge for yourself by reading it and then see what you think. i’ll post the URL at the end of this posting, but am not sure it won’t be edited out. if it is removed by the Wordpress software, enter ‘asperspergers neanderthal’ in Google and click the first link or so and you’ll be taken to the paper, which was published several years ago.

the theory is controversial, as several geneticists are critical of some of the data, etc. but what theory isn’t that’s worthy? still, as theories go, it’s a very new one relatively, and anyone at all fascinated as i am by this apparent and probable connection between our species would do well to seriously study this well-researched paper.

me? i wonder how a species so biologically similar to ours could just ‘vanish’ less than 28,000 years ago. that may seem like a long time ago, but consider how that’s not even a blink of an eye in geological time considerations. in fact, it’s not even a twitch!

Link to extract: http://www.rdos.net/eng/asperger.htm

Greatqualitygoods, your comments may have not been meant to be racist or down right rude but when I read them they sounded that way to me. If they did to me then odds are someone else feels the same way. Just my opinion

And no, I don’t see the resemblance.