Cavemen vs. The Bears (ca. 18,000 BC)

By: The Scribe on January, 2008

Researchers used to think these ancient cave bears were herbivores… unfortunately for ancient humans, it now looks like the bears were thriving meat eaters…

For decades, scientists believed that ancient cave bears which lived around the same time as prehistoric humans were nothing to worry about – they were supposedly the ‘gentle giants’ of the time, vegetarian animals that thrived on berries and roots…

Unfortunately for these human ancestors, that no longer appears to have been the case. Along with saber-toothed lions, man-eating birds of prey, and dire wolves, ancient cave bears can now be added to the list of terrifying predators that prehistoric humans struggled to avoid in their fight to survive.

New bones found in the Carpathian mountains indicate that the ancient cave bears – named ‘Ursus spelaeus’ or ‘cave bears’ since their bones have been commonly found in caves – have caused scientists to throw away the idea that all these bears were largely herbivores.

For 30 years, studies of their skulls, teeth and jaws revealed the same long-term wear as other herbivores, and the bones of the bears had very low levels of nitrogen-15. Nitrogen-15 is something accumulated by all animals, but carnivorous animals build up far more nitrogen-15 in their bones than herbivores. Oddly enough, these new bones from the Carpathians had quite the opposite results from previous cave bear bones, with extremely high levels of nitrogen-15.

This cave bear is young, but when they were fully grown, cave bears were slightly larger than the grizzly bears of today.

The bones were quite difficult to retrieve, located within a cave where the entrance had collapsed thousands of years before. In order to reach the back rooms, archaeologists had to wade through a spring and then swim underwater across an underground river, using scuba gear. To get up into the cave, climbing equipment was needed.

So far, the cave bear bones from this location are the only bones that show signs of carnivorous activity. The question that arises is whether certain regions of Europe were home to carnivorous Ursus spelaeus while other regions were strictly occupied by herbivores, or whether these bears practiced a degree of bear-bear cannibalism. There are examples of bear cannibalism from a cave in Western Turkey, where a young bear’s skull holds tooth marks from a larger bear.

This discovery might also shed some light on the rituals that were practiced by ancient humans, who often deposited large amounts of cave bear bones inside of caves that they had taken over and occupied themselves. One theory is that if humans and bears were competing for food resources and living space – assuming that there were more meat-eating bears than just the group found at this one Carpathian cave – humans might have found the bears compelling, and felt the need to venerate or honor them in some way.

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