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[[File: Homo_sapiens_and_Neanderthal.jpg|300px|thumbnail|left|Modern Recreation and Comparison of an Early Modern Man (RL) and a Neanderthal Man (LR)]]
The study of human history, often termed “historiography,” is technically the study of the past through primary documents and sources. Although those primary sources can include art and architecture, they are most often written documents, including religious texts, annals and other historiographical records, and administrative records just to name a few. According to scholars, anything before the dawn of human civilization and writing, which roughly coincides with 3,100 BC, is considered “pre-history.” But obviously history was being made before 3,100 BC, so it too is studied, but with different methodologies, tools, and by a different set of scholars.
===The First Europeans===
<i>Homo neanderthalensis</i>, usually just known by the abbreviated term “Neanderthal,” inhabited the Earth, primarily in Europe, but also parts of Asia and north Africa, from about 400,000 to 30,000 years ago. They were once thought to have been the final step in the evolutionary ladder, but today anthropologists believe that although closely related to modern humans, with the average some modern European Europeans and Asian Asians having 1% to 4% Neanderthal DNA, they were not direct ancestors. Research now indicates that the Neanderthals emerged from a common ancestor not long before modern humans and can be specifically tied to a cave in Spain about 400,000 years ago. After emerging as a distinct species, the Neanderthals demonstrated superior intelligence, which was seen in their advanced tool making culture, allowing them to be the dominant species in Europe and parts of Asia for more than 200,000 years.
===<i>Homo erectus</i> and <i>Homo heidelbergensis</i>===
[[File: homo_tree.jpg|300px|thumbnail|left|Anthropologist Chris Stringer’s Proposed Family Tree of the <i>Homo</i> Genus]]
Before the Neanderthals roamed across Europe and parts of Asia, <i>Homo erectus</i> was the dominant hominin species on Earth. It first appeared in Africa about two million years ago and lived until at least 108,000 years ago. Scholars was once thought that Neanderthals and modern humans directly evolved from <i>Homo erectus</i>, although that hypothesis has been challenged in recent years. Neanderthals and modern humans may be directly descended from <i>Homo erectus</i>, but it may also be that they are just closely related and from collateral branches of the same family tree. <ref> Fergusson, Kennan. “What Was Politics to the Denisovan?” <i>Political Theory</i> 42 (2014) p. 170</ref> The common ancestor of the Neanderthals and modern humans is now believed to have been a sub-species of <i>Homo erectus</i> that many anthropologists now argue was a completely unique species of homo.
As <i>Homo erectus</i> emerged from Africa and spread across Asia and Europe, a subspecies emerged about 600,000 years ago, now known as <i>Homo heidelbergensis</i>, which lived until about 250,000 years ago. <i>Homo heidelbergensis</i> is so named because it was first discovered in a sand quarry near Heidelberg, Germany in 1907. <ref> Klein, Richard G. <i>The Human Career: Human Biological and Cultural Origins.</i> Third Edition. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009), p. 311</ref>
[[Category: ArchaeologyArcheology]] [[Category: European History]] [[Category: Anthropology]] [[Category: Paleolithic Period]] [[Category: Deep Impact History]]
