Even the clouded leopard who has long upper canines has fully lips-covered dentition. The canines of the Gorgonopsians were also nowhere as elongated as those of saber-toothed cats.
I mean Glover's rule was a valid theory that suggested that cold climates lead to evolve pale-skins in humans and was applied to Neanderthals. But today we have dark-skinned populations living in cold climates and genetic evidence showed that Neanderthals varied in skin colors rather than being uniformly of one color. So I want them to be portrayed with diverse skin colors that veries from population to population rather uniformly of one color. I'd also argue dark skin is the ancestral base of genus Homo.
It literally looked like an oversized spectacled bear, which while understandable is inflated. Andean bears and short faced bears do of course belong to the same subfamily but they're two species who diverged from each other 5-4 million of years ago, they are species of two different lineages. Even their skulls show that short faced bears had taller fronts, wider noses and broader faces than Andean bears. Reconstructing short faced bears as oversized spectacled bears is like reconstructing black bears as undersized grizzlies.
This argument often shows up in online forums saying they must've been thick-furred because of being adapted to cold climates but I'd push back.
Neanderthals already had massive skulls and stocky bodies with short physiques and limbs that could've helped them minimize heat loss. This adaptation is evident in modern Inuit who suffer cold very little because of that anatomy.
>> Most Eskimos have heavily built, barrel-shaped torso and short arms and legs to minimize heat loss.
https://sk.sagepub.com/ency/edvol/anthropology/chpt/eskimos
They also wore and made clothes, which is evidenced by evidence of lice evolution, hide-processing tools with marks consistent with clothing-preparation, front teeth consistent with hide-softening and skeletons of thick-furred animals with signs of systematic hide removals.
>> A stone scraper from the site of Neumark-Nord in Germany had a small amount of residue on it, which likely got stuck during hide processing 200,000 years ago. The residue contained acid from oak bark, which can be used to tan, or preserve, animal skins. Whether this residue was from making clothing or fur bed covers, however, is unclear. Stone and bone awls (pointed tools) from a late Neanderthal site in central France also suggest these ancient people crafted tools specifically to attach hides together for clothing or shelter.
>> The genetics of head and body lice shows that Neanderthals and Homo sapiens diverged somewhere between 170,000 and 72,000 years ago and that one kind of body lice was reintroduced to H. sapiens from another ancient human population — possibly Neanderthals — 100,000 years ago. Because body lice live on clothing, this suggests our ancestors began wearing clothing sometime before that.
>> The front teeth of essentially all Neanderthals are worn down far more than their back teeth, which means they used their mouths to hold and manipulate objects, not just to eat. This dental wear in Neanderthals is similar to that of contemporary Inuit people, who use their teeth to soften animal hides to make clothing.
https://www.livescience.com/archaeology/did-neanderthals-wear-clothes
>> We compared animal bones from Neanderthal and modern human archaeological strata. We targeted mammalian families used for cold weather clothing in the recent past. Cold weather clothing species occur in both Neanderthal and early modern human strata. Leporids, canids, and mustelids are more frequent in early modern human strata. This supports the hypothesis that Neanderthals employed cape-like clothing while early modern humans used specialized cold weather clothing.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0278416516300757
Clothing is very maladaptive for a dense-furred animal as that traps moisture.
>> Health risks associated with dressing pets include skin problems and overheating, especially in short-faced (brachycephalic) breeds.
https://news.vin.com/default.aspx?pid=210&catId=-1&id=11476874
They also made fire and built shelters to keep themselves warm, this reduces need for a thick or dense fur.
>> Archaeological evidence makes a compelling case for Neanderthal-created fires 400,000 years ago in Suffolk, UK — plus, how chatbots can sway the opinions of voters.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-025-04059-4
>> The research, focused on the 220,000 year old cave site of La Cotte de St. Brelade on the Channel Island of Jersey, has begun to bring a period of important change in way early human organised their lives under examination. Detailed studies of key parts of the site have revealed how Neanderthals used the site as a home base, part of more complex lifeways emerging on the edge of the human world.
And genetic evidence suggest that humans lost fur before diverging from Neanderthals, to which re-evolving it would require complex evolutionary changes.
>> Evidence for this theory also comes from studies that have found switches for some genes responsible for determining whether certain cells develop into sweat glands or hair follicles. "So all of these things have a related developmental pathway," says Lasisi. "If we look at that in combination with some of the things we're able to infer about genes that increased human skin pigmentation, then we're able to basically confidently guesstimate that 2-1.5 million years ago… humans probably would have lost their body hair."
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20230310-why-dont-humans-have-fur
>> According to the coevolutionary tale of humans and their lice, our immediate ancestors lost most of their body fur 3 to 4 million years ago and did not don clothing until 83,000 to 170,000 years ago.
>> That means that for over 2.5 million years, early humans and their ancestors were simply naked.
We also inherited Neanderthal genes that regulate our skin and keratin function, which suggests Neanderthals had a similar skin/hair architecture to humans. We also have inherited Neanderthal genes associated to less back hairs.
>> So why is a dermatologist concerned with this? Because of that small 1-3 percentage, around 70% is expressed in your skin. As one researcher put it, "Neanderthal DNA in your skin punches above its weight class." Human skin is rich in Neanderthal DNA and it primarily codes for a thing called keratin. Keratin is the fibrous protein that makes up our skin, hair, and nails. It is the basic building block of these structures and quite strong (a rhinoceros horn is made out of keratin also).
https://vitadermatology.com/neanderthal-genes-and-skin/
>> While our Neanderthal heritage may be limited, it does have a handful of associations with our traits. For instance, Neanderthal genetic variants are associated with having straighter hair and with being less likely to sneeze after eating dark chocolate. And counter to the popular perception, Neanderthal variants are actually associated with having less back hair! Perhaps most intriguingly, some scientists believe that interbreeding with Neanderthals even provided modern humans with evolutionarily advantageous traits as they migrated into Europe.
https://blog.23andme.com/articles/why-23andme-love-neanderthals-and-you-should-too
With this a hairless Neanderthal with thick hair scalps and clothing-use is more likely than a dense-furred (and cartoony) Neanderthal.
It's well supported theory that they lacked dense fur and had hair scalps like us (due to cooling hypothesis, genetic evidence, clothing-use evidence, etc.) but how are we sure they had the same sexual dimorphism as us? Tigers and leopards express their sexual dimorphism differently from lions (tigers have males with thicker mane cheeks while leopards males with dewlaps but neither have maned males like lions) and even cave lions seem to not have the same mane males dimorphism as modern lions, yet all these four cats are in the same genus. Although we have Western and Eastern gorillas who have similar sexual dimorphism and are different species of the same genus, I haven't found a simple explaination for why Neanderthals would've get the same sexual dimorphism from humans. Any explaination?
Suface-dwelling fully-marine verterbrates (sharks, cetaceans, tuna fishes and moon fishes) generally have dorsal fins to cut surfaces, so I'm guessing mosasaurs had it too given it was a suface-dwelling fully-marine verterbatre as well. Sea cows (dugongs and manatees) lack dorsal fins because they live in shallow coastal waters while marine snakes just have undulating and flexible bodies without limbs (they don't need dorsal fins), which is unlike Mosaurus who had a heavy body with limbs and moved in surfacing habitats. Even ichtyosaurs who are anatomically similar to Mosasaurus had dorsal fins as evidenced by fossil prints. I just wanna hear why you disagree.
They seem to have round orbital bones like East Asians, who have epicanthic folds, rather than rectangular shaped like Europeans. I think I made a good anatomical comparison. Thoughts?
A wolflike-eared Amphicyon is cool but no longer senseful imo. I mean it was a solitary apex predator specialized in hunting large prey. Small prey specialists (small canids and small wild cats) have pointed ears to hunt small prey and protect themselves from predatory attacks of larger predators as compared to large prey specialists like large cats, which have rounder ears.
> It has mainly to do with their living environment. Big cats, in most parts of their distribution have few natural enemies, however small cats distribution overlaps with big cats and other large predators. Therefore big cats don’t need to concern themselves too much with being attacked from behind but small cats do and this is where the ability to pick up sound from behind becomes an advantage.
> Another reason is the difference in prey. Large cats often hunt medium to large herbivores such as deer or even wild boar such as in the the case of the leopard. They are relatively easy to spot and requires these predators to rely on their eyes rather than their ears. Small cats however such as the jungle cat in the image and rusty-spotted cat hunt small prey such as rodents. Such prey is difficult to see in the tall grass, so small cats have to rely largely on their auditory system to ensure a hunt is successful.
https://scar.lk/the-mystery-behind-cat-ears/
So I think that a round-eared Amphicyon makes far more sense.
As for wolves, they have actually triangular-shaped ears with round tips, not pointed ears like small wild cats and small canids. And this are used for social dynamics as far I searched.
> Ears play an important role in wolf body language and communication. Wolves cock their ears to indicate alertness, aggression, playfulness or submission. And, along with eyes, ears, mouth, hackles, tail and posture, ears convey mood, status, sexual interest and intent.
https://www.paulawild.ca/a-wolfs-ear/
Now Amphicyon was likely a solitary predator, therefore triangular-shaped ears like wolves would've been pointless. In short, I will favor a round-eared Amphicyon any time.
I mean looking at this comparison I made. Australopithecus seem to have less nasal projections than modern humans but still more nasal projections than modern apes. So I'm guessing it's nose could be something between human-like and ape-like. I even made a drawing with an Australopithecus with a semi-projecting nose. Thoughts?
I mean Neanderthals evolved in Ice Age Europe which had a climate closer to Siberia than modern Europe. People from extremely cold climates like Inuit, Siberian natives, Sherpa and Tibetans have epicanthic folds as adaptation to cold climates, so I'm guessing Neanderthals may had epicanthic folds too. Thoughts?
I mean Australopithecus had a nasal cavity closer to that of humans: they had taller nasal cavities, more nasal bone projections and more prominent nasal spines than modern apes, so I'm guessing a semi-projecting nose. It also appears that black people have nasal bone projections anatomically close to Australopithecus, so I see Australopithecus nasal anatomy as closer to humans than apes.
If even modern lions have produced fertile offsprings with tigers, why a cave lion couldn't?
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This study suggests that archaic hominins like Neanderthals had protruding browridges for sexual displays.
https://www.zmescience.com/science/news-science/eyebrow-human-evolution-09042018/
So following that theory, Neanderthal women might have viewed our men with retracted browridges as non-optimal mates due to being possibly wired to seek males with heavy browridges.
Comparing these images it seems like that species like Neanderthals, Denisovans and Homo heidelbergensis had short snouts but not an elongated external snout like apes that may be because they started relying on tools. Neanderthal prognathism was also mid-facial but didn't form the same elongated external snout of apes. And we also all know that prehistoric hominins had projecting external noses and enlarged braincases like us.