Deep below the Earth’s surface, the «supervolcano» Campi Flegrei near Naples may be slowly forming life. This monumental volcano has a brutal history, and some experts believe an eruption 40,000 years ago may have played a role in the Neanderthal extinction.
But did it really kill our ancient relatives?
The 7 to 9-mile (12 to 15 km) long volcano, located in southern Italy, not far from Mount Vesuvius (of the famous Pompeii), is a massive underground volcano that hasn’t erupted since 1538. However, it is showing signs of a steady increase in seismic activity since the 1950s – and recent research shows Europe’s deadliest Volcanoes may be crawling towards an eruption.
Campi Flegrei has produced several major eruptions in the past. Most notably, an eruption that occurred about 40,000 years ago may have been Europe’s largest eruption of the past 200,000 years. Volcanologists call it «the Campanian Fire» – an eruption ranked 7 on the Volcanic Explosion Index, according to a study abroad 2020 in the journal Frontiers of Earth Science. Scale points to 8and only supervolcanoes record the highest rated eruptions.
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The explosion caused a major change in Earth’s climate and it happened around the time Neanderthals (homo neanderthalensis) disappear. The timing of both incidents led scientists to speculate that Campi Flegrei’s eruption may have affected the disappearance of the Neanderthals.
Campi Flegrei and the Neanderthals
Black Benjaminassistant professor at Rutgers University, a member of the research team building climate model in 2014 to test the hypothesis that the volcano may have dealt the finishing blow.
«When exactly the Neanderthals disappeared is the subject of much debate, but there is evidence that it may have happened around this time. [as the Campanian Ignimbrite eruption]’, he told Live Science. ‘I think this is really suggestive of a timing coincidence, plus the possibility of climate change, making people wonder if the eruption was related to the extinction. Neanderthal death or not.»
The model predicts temperatures will drop between 3.6 and 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit (2 to 4 degrees Celsius) in Europe the year after the Campanian Ignimbrite eruption, depending on the amount of sulfur released.
This would be colder than the 3.6 F drop known as the «Little Ice Age», a period of cooling from the 14th to the 19th centuries. witnessed widespread famine and social unrest. So it is conceivable that a major climate disaster caused by Campi Flegrei could have wiped out the Neanderthals. But according to Black, the rest of the evidence doesn’t add up.
«Our model predicts that the most severe volcanic cooling is further east, rather than in areas of Europe where entrenched Neanderthal populations appear to be,» Black said. clinging to survival”. He suggests that while Neanderthals were certainly affected by volcanism, they were far from where most of the climate disruption actually occurred.
At the time of the Campanian Ignimbrite eruption, the Neanderthals faced a greater threat. Anatomically modern human (a wise man) had reached Europe and were competing for resources with the Neanderthals, putting them in a difficult position.
Antonio Costa, a senior researcher at Italy’s National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology agreed that volcanoes are not a smoking gun in the Neanderthal death mystery. «Most of the Neanderthal population started to decline rapidly around 40,000 years ago,» Costa told Live Science. «However, the temporal resolution of these events is not sufficient to confirm a causal relationship.»
Costa doesn’t just suggest that the volcano didn’t kill the Neanderthals: He argues that the eruption may have actually helped the struggling Neanderthal populations to last longer than they could have. Costa is an author on a Research Scientific Report 2016 that suggests modern humans and Neanderthals co-existed in Europe before the eruption – but that volcanic fallout may have temporarily halted much of modern humans’ westward expansion in Neanderthal habitat.
«We actually suggest that the eruption might even delay the decline of Neanderthals,» Costa said. While the actual date of extinction is a matter of debate, the Neanderthals were stuck for a long time after the Campanian Ignimbrite eruption, and the last holders have been searching for their existence in Gibraltar recently. best 28,000 years ago.
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