Southwest Asian Neanderthals were Neanderthals who lived in Turkey, Lebanon, Syria, Israel, Palestine, Iraq, and Iran - the southernmost expanse of the known Neanderthal range. Although their arrival in Asia is not well-dated, early Neanderthals occupied the region apparently until about 100,000 years ago. At this time, Homo sapiens migration seem to have replaced them in one of the first anatomically-modern expansions out of Africa. In their turn, starting around 80,000 years ago, Neanderthals seem to have returned and replaced Homo sapiens in Southwest Asia. They inhabited the region until about 55,000 years ago.[1]
In Southwest Asia Neanderthals have left well-preserved skeletal remains in present-day Palestine, Syria, and Iraq. Remains in Turkey, Lebanon, and Iran are fragmentary. No Neanderthal skeletal remains have ever been found to the south of Jerusalem, and although there are Middle Palaeolithic Levallois points in Jordan and in the Arabian peninsula, it is unclear whether these were made by Neanderthals or by anatomically modern humans.[1] Neanderthals living further to the east, such as those found in present-day Uzbekistan[2][3] and Asian Russia[4][5] are known as Central and North Asian Neanderthals.
As of 2013[update], although many more Neanderthal remains have been discovered in Southwest Asia than in North Asia, where genetic studies have succeeded,[6] no attempt at extracting DNA from Southwest Asian Neanderthals has ever been successful.[7]
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