On November 28, 1998 a chance discovery turned up the 24,500-year-old skeleton of a child at Abrigo do Lagar Velho, Portugal. The skeleton was that of a 4-year-old child.  He had been buried with a pierced shell and sprinkled with ochre.  The ochre was only found immediately next to the body, implying that he had been wrapped in some material with the ochre inside of it. ( Duarte et al, 1999, p.  7604). The discoverers, after examining the skeleton, called Erik Trinkaus in to examine the remains because they suspected that the child was of mixed Neanderthal-modern human parentage. Trinkaus confirmed the mixture of traits in this child. This is the first demonstrable hybrid and as such it has important implications for anthropology and Christian apologetics.

    Lets start with  anthropology. The Out of Africa scenario postulates that anatomically modern human invaders from Africa entered Europe around 35-40,000 years ago. These invaders were tropical Africans who brought with them, their genes, and their hyper-tropical body shapes. What is meant by hyper-tropical body shapes is that in hot countries there is a selective pressure in favor of body shapes that allow heat to be removed. The classic heat tolerant body form is that of the Watusi, a tall skinny people. Such body forms have a high surface area/body mass ratio. Genetics controls the development of this body form. It is not an environmentally acquired form. This is why short squat Europeans living in Nigeria give birth to short squat children and why Watusi living in New York city give birth to tall skinny offspring. Apparently it takes millennia upon millennia for a group with one body form to begin to convert to another. Lapp-landers are hyper-arctic in their body form  There are other ways for humans to adapt to the cold conditions other than becoming hyper arctic. (more on this later.)
The Out of Africa hypothesis holds that there was very little contribution of Neandertal genes to modern European populations.  Essentially the Neandertals were totally replaced leaving no offspring. There are two versions of this. One version would contend that Neandertals are a separate species which did not interbreed with modern humans and the other would allow some interbreeding but no effective gene transfer to the modern human race. (Groves, 1999).  Obviously if the child is a hybrid, the stronger of these Out of Africa schools of thought is falsified.
Contrary to the anatomically modern peoples, Neanderthals were short and squat with extremely hyper-arctic body forms, even more arctic than the Lapps. This is widely believed to have been due to the millennia of living in cold, glaciated Europe. Neanderthals were also hyper robust . This means that their bones were exceptionally thick compared with anatomically modern peoples. I want to use Stringer's words to illustrate what I think is a bit of a double standard in anthropology. Stringer is withholding his judgment on the nature of the Lagar Velho child, but as a strong proponent of the Out of Africa position (albeit allowing some interbreeding) a hybrid can’t be good news for his position. However, using Stringer’s own data we will show that there is a reasonable likelihood that this child is a hybrid. Chris Stringer and Clive Gamble (1993, p. 93) wrote:

    "In their relatively heavy bodies the Neanderthals seem to conform to Bergmann's rule, and in the shorter ends of their limbs to Allen's rule. That the Neanderthal physique was partly determined by climate is further supported by the slight differences in limb proportions between the Neanderthals who lived in glaciated Europe and those who lived in the less extreme climates of the Middle East."

Bergman's rule is that body weights of an animals will tend to be greater in colder climates. And Allen's rule is that their limb proportions will be shorter. These rules have a wide application across many species. Thus Stringer accepts the climate-induced selection pressure that created the Neanderthal physique. How do we measure body form?

    Neandertals apparently followed Allen’s rule by shortening their legs and arms, but they did it by altering the body form. The body form is measured by numerous indices such as the crural and brachial indices which are measurements of the limb lengths. The crural and brachial index quantizes Allen's rule. The crural index is defined as "the length of the tibia/ the length of the femur". One can multiply by 100 if he wants but it doesn't matter. Bergman's rule is measured by the robusticity of the bones. This is because a being with greater body mass needs more robust bones to support the extra weight. So, when looking for differences between modern and Neanderthal we need to look at these types of measures.

    Here is how these rules apply to the Lagar Velho child. When we examine various populations, fossil and modern, we find a range of values for the brachial, crural and robusticity indices. Unfortunately the Lagar Velho child's radius is incomplete so the brachial index can't be studied. Here is the data presented by Stringer and Gamble (once again I want to use Stringer's data so that an Out of Africa proponent’s data is in play). This data is taken from a chart on page 92 of Stringer and Gamble (Stringer and Gamble, 1993, p. 92).

crural index = Tibia/Femur length
modern peoples      79% in Lapps
                    86% in Black African groups
Group             crural Mean annual temp C
                  index

average Neanderthal 79%         ?

Modern  peoples
Lapps               79%        .25
modern Inuit        81.5%     4
Belgium             82.5%    10
S.African white     83.2%     8.5
Yugoslav            83.75%    8.4
American white      82.6%     9.8
Kalahari Bushman    83.4%    18
New MexicoIndian    84.6%    14
S.African black     86.4%    17
Arizona Indian      85.5%    18
Melanesian          84.8%    23
Pygmy               85.1%    24.2
Egyptian            84.9%    26.1
American Black      85.25%   26

One sees at once that the subtropical peoples have a higher crural index than those living in cold climates. This amazingly even applies to the pygmies. Shortness is not at issue here. Body form is.

Lagar Velho has a crural index of .782 which as can be seen is lower than all anatomically modern peoples including the Lapps. This value, as we shall see is lower than ALL values for ALL anatomically modern, African invaders.

What of the Lapps. I am going to claim that is is perilously close to circular reasoning to use the Lapps as an analogue to compare with the Neanderthals for one reason. Lapps occupy a region very close to the former Neanderthal territories. If there has been any hybridization, the low crural index of the Lapps might be indicative of that hybridization. In other words one cannot tell if their squatness was due to genetic heritage or the accumulation of the trait since the invasion of anatomically modern peoples. The only way one can use the Lapps as evidence that a low crural index means that the Lagar Velho child is nothing special is if they ASSUME THAT THERE WAS NO HYBRIDIZATION. That is assuming the conclusion! I would say that the Inuit make a better case for the acquisition of a low crural index by the African invaders. This is because the Inuit were nowhere near the Neanderthal homelands.

On the other hand, if one insists on using the Lapps as evidence that the Lagar Velho child is within the range of variation of modern humans, then it clearly argues in favor of Neanderthals being within modern human variation in this regard. Neanderthal's averaged close to the Lapp average. And if Neanderthals were within modern human variation, then there is little reason to claim, as Tattersall and Schwartz claim, that Neanderthal is a separate species. Thus they are hoisted on their own petard. Tattersall and Schwartz seem to want to have it both ways.

About 100,000 years ago, anatomically near modern peoples appeared in the Middle East at Skhul and Qafzeh Caves. So, we should look to these peoples for the archetypes of the modern humans who invaded Europe. But we do need to be careful in our analysis. Neanderthals lived in the Middle East along with anatomically modern men and if there could be hybridization in Spain, then it could have happened in the Mid East also. What do we find? We find that, with one exception, all the Skhul/Qafzeh skeletons clearly have subtropical body forms. Frayer shows the crural index on the Skhul/Qafzeh peoples. There are three individuals with enough skeletal matter to make this measurement on. One has a crural index of 89, one has an index of 86 and Skhul V has an 80.(Frayer, p. 33, 68, Fig 9)

Obviously, one can argue that Skhul V shows that the range of the crural index is so great as to make meaningless the measure on the Lagar Velho child. But in anthropology things are rarely that simple. Two things argue against this position. The Lagar Velho child has a crural index of .782 which is much smaller than the .80 of Skhul V. But then Skhul V has been suggested to be an hybrid also. Johanson and Blake (1997, p. 242) write of Skhul V:

Skhul V
"Others have subsequently interpreted Skhul V's anatomy as showing signs of hybridization between modern and Neandertal populations. Hybridization is difficult to demonstrate in fossils, and even if it did happen rarely, it would not mean that Neandertals and modern humans were a single species. The Tabun individuals clearly differed from those at Skhul, who were undoubtedly on the cusp of becoming modern humans."

It is interesting that the same trait is used to support hybridization with Skhul V as with the Lagar Velho child.

I would suggest Johanson and Edgar are wrong in that if interbreeding did occur biologically we are the same species. They would be the same species according to the biological definition of species.

What of the theological viewpoint?  Many Christian apologists latch on to the concept that Neandertal was a separate species.  What they don’t understand is the definition of such a species.  There is the biological definition of species in which interbreeding and the production of fertile offspring defines who is and who isn’t a species.  The alternative definition is that two populations are separate species IF in the normal course of affairs they don’t interbreed (for whatever reason).  They might be capable of interbreeding but they don’t do it. This is the definition which Johanson and Edgar, as well as Tattersall are using.
The difficulty this definition presents for the theologian is that one could claim that until the modern era, Black Africans were a separate species. Indeed, many Christians of the last century (and a few in this one) held exactly that view. That view was used to justify racism. For Christian apologetics, it seems to me that the best definition is that which reduces the opportunity for racism. If modern humans could produce offspring (fertile or not) with Neanderthals, we can not exclude Neandertals from humanity.

Stringer and Gamble ignore Skhul V in their book. They write in contradiction of the facts:

"The skeletons of the Skhul and Qafzeh samples are even more modern than their skulls. And in contrast to the Neanderthals, their body proportions are tropical rather than cold-adapted, with long forearms and tibiae [high crural and brachial indices--grm] and an a average stature of about 1.83 m..." (Stringer and Gamble, 1993, p. 102)

And Tattersall also ignores the outlier skeleton at Skhul. He writes (Tattersall, 1995, p. 116):

"ESR dates on mammal teeth associated with the Hominid remains from Skhul (virtually modern human) and Tabun (lightly built Neanderthal) have come out around 100,000 years and 120,000 years, respectively."

Obviously there is one skeleton that doesn't fit what they say {selective use of data? Note here that I am using data like the Lapps and Skhul V which don't initially fit within the position I am advocating and that is what a person should do].  Now, if Stringer and Gamble are correct in ignoring Skhul V and dismissing him as a possible hybrid, then the measurement of a Neanderthal-like crural index becomes even more problematic for their position. They have to explain how, among ALL upper Paleolithic anatomically modern humans, this one child, this single individual achieved a Neanderthal-like body form during the more moderate climatical times of 24,000 years ago when no other anatomically modern person in Europe was able to achieve this body form! How do I know this? Frayer (again in Figure 9 p. 68) shows the crural indices for European hominids from 90,000 years ago to the present. The Skhul/Qafzeh peoples have the ranges I mentioned above. Neanderthals from 70,000 years ago have crural indices ranging from 76-81. Since the earliest anatomically modern fossil dates from 34,000 years ago and is fragmentary, the earliest anatomically modern crural index is from about 28,000 years ago and has a value of 88. At 25,000 years ago there are 7 specimens with a crural index range of 84-88. At 24,000 years the range is 82-83. At 20,000 years ago the range is from 79-87 Between 15,000 and 10,000 the range is from 81 to 90.5. I might point out that the 79 at 20,000 years ago is only one individual. The next lowest above him at that time is 82. As Frayer notes, the average crural index of anatomically modern humans has remained around 84 throughout the past 30 millennia. Only as one gets into the height of the last glacial age and on do we find anatomically modern peoples with low crural indices. The finding of an individual like Lagar Velho is clearly out of step with the rest of the data for European men. In table form this data is

28 kyr          88
25 kyr          84-88
LV child        78
24 kyr          82-83
20 kyr          79-87 height of the glacial age
15-10kyr        81-90.5

The data for the ranges of the crural index shows that it takes up to 20 millennia before one sees the acclimatization to climate and this only after the Wurm glaciation cooled Europe increasing the selective pressures on modern humans. What I might suggest is that the single specimen at 20,000 years, might very well have had a Neandertal gene.  Why? Because anatomically modern Europeans have adapted to the cold of Europe differently than the Neandertals did.  They did follow Allen’s rule and their limbs are shorter, but they retained their African crural indices! Holliday reports (1999, p. 549)

“Additionally, brachial and crural indices do not appear to be a good measure of overall limb length, and thus, while the Late Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic humans have significantly higher (i.e., tropically-adapted) brachial and crural indices than do recent Europeans, they also have shorter (i.e., cold-adapted) limbs. The somewhat paradoxical retention of "tropical" indices in the context of more "cold-adapted" limb length is best explained as evidence for Replacement in the European Late Pleistocene, followed by gradual cold adaptation in glacial Europe.”

Because modern Europeans adapted to the cold differently than Neandertal’s, the existence of Neandertal-like limb proportions in the Lagar Velho child is further evidence for hybridization.

Thus the lack of low crural index modern humans prior to 20,000 years ago, which was the height of the last glaciation argues against the view that Lagar Velho is merely an extreme form of modern human. 24,000 years ago, the time of the child, modern humans had been in Europe for about 10,000 years and they maintained their typically subtropical extremum (the lowest value in the population of fossils ) crural index for another 4,000 years. During the glacial ages around 20,000 years ago any Neandertal genes for short limbs in the population would be strongly selected for.  While there might not be much gene flow from Neandertals into the modern human population, there clearly was some—a gene for Neandertal legs in particular.

What of robusticity? Duarte et al (1999, Table 2) The z scores of Tibia circumference divided by the length is 2.582 in Lagar Velho, 2.405 in the La Ferrassie 6 Neanderthal and .037 in Skhul I, the African Invader. The same measure for the femur is 2.815 for Lagar Velho I, 2.501 for the La Ferrassie 6 Neanderthal, 2.032 for the Roc de Marsal Neanderthal and 2.643 for the Teshik-Tash Neanderthal. For the Invaders from Africa the femur measurement is 1.646 for Qafzeh 10 and 1.148 for Skhul I.

Clearly these robusticity measures place the Lagar Velho well within the Neanderthal robusticity and separate from the African Invaders.

Similar analyses on the Tibia/femur length support the crural analysis above. Lagar velho has a score of 2.044, La Ferrassie 6 2.415 and Skhul I, 0.493.

What Tattersall and Schwartz say? If I might be a bit pedantic in my interpretation of their initial paragraph it says (Tattersall and Schwartz, 1999, p.7117):

"Thus, although many students of human evolution have lately begun to look favorably on the view that these distinctive hominids merit species recognition in their own right as Homo neanderthalensis, at least as many still regard them as no more than a strange variant of our own species, Homo sapiens." Tattersall and Schwartz, "Hominids and Hybrids: The Place of Neanderthals in Human Evolution,"

If 'at least as many" anthropologists regard Neanderthals as a strange variant of humans, then pedantically speaking, this is a majority of anthropologists. By their own admission, their position looks to be a minority position among their peers.

One of the weakest reasons for placing Neanderthal in a separate species that I have ever seen comes from Tattersall and Schwartz' commentary. They state(1999, p. 7117):

"In contrast, if we see them [Neanderthals] as mere subspecific variants of ourselves, we are almost obliged to dismiss the Neanderthals as little more than an evolutionary epiphenomenon, a minor and ephemeral appendage to the history of Homo sapiens."

This almost sounds like a religious reason, a doctrinal reason rather than a scientific reason for making Neanderthals a separate species. Who cares how we view them? What is important is the correctness of how we view them.

They do admit that if this is a hybrid, then we are the same species, no more than a racial variant. (Tattersall and Schwartz, 1999, p. 7117)

Tattersall and Schwartz critisize the hypothesis because there is no dental or cranial evidence of Neanderthal morphology. But they are criticizing what Duarte et al freely state in their paper. Duarte say that the child is a mosaic, not a morphing of form which is what Tattersall and Schwartz seem to expect. And as a mosaic, some parts will be Neanderthal like and some modern.

Tattersall and Schwartz say that this child can’t be due to long interbreeding, as Duarte et al claim because the child is  more like a first generation hybrid, ignores the possibility that this very well might be an F1 hybrid. The latest Neanderthal dates somewhere around 28,000 years ago, merely 4,000 years before the Lagar Velho child. Are we really to believe that the 28,000 year old burial was the burial of the ABSOLUTELY LAST NEANDERTHAL ON EARTH? Of course not. Neanderthals lived for some time after that but we don't know how long. So, one can't entirely rule out that Neanderthals lived until the 24,000 mark. After all, human remains are rather scarce even during that time. Even Stringer mentions  that possibility. (Stringer, 1999)

Tattersall and Schwartz spend a lot of time discussing the jaw, but very little time (one paragraph) discussing the postcranial remains which is where the major data supporting the hybridization hypothesis lies. Thus, they spend most of their time on the parts that support their view and little on the data that goes against their view. Yet their opinion is claimed to have done away with the hypothesis. This is good sleight of hand (don't look at the man behind the curtain), but very poor scientific procedure. It is precisely the data supporting the Neanderthal hybridization hypothesis upon which they should have spent most of the time.

They also left totally unchallenged the neck-shaft angle data in Duarte et al which shows that the Lagar Velho femur is more similar to Neanderthal.

They claim. "And the tibia, like the femur, is hard to evaluate in the absence of the epiphyses; it does not appear significantly different from what one might expect to find in a robust modern human of this age." Tattersall and Schwartz. (Tattersall and Schwartz, 1999, p. 7119)

And they say, " The probability must thus remain that this is simply a chunky Gravettian child, a descendant of the modern invaders who had evicted the Neanderthals from Iberia several millennia earlier." (Tattersall and Schwartz, 1999, p. 7119)

This simply does not conform to the facts. Anatomically modern humans are demonstrably less robust than the archaic variants of Homo sapiens. The data I showed above and the data presented in Duarte et al clearly shows that the Lagar Velho child is much more robust than African invaders. The Lagar Velho child's legs are much more Neanderthal-like than ANY pre 22,000 year old African Invader. If this is no hybrid, where are all the other anatomically modern fossils with similar crural indices and robusticities from which this child could have received his genes? Or did the child self-create his own genetic heritage?

One other item that strongly indicates Neandertal affinities for this child.  Neandertals had some muscle attachments that were slightly different from those of modern humans.  One of these is the  pectoralis major insertion which is different on Neandertals and is different in their young.  This child has that diagnostic trait. (Trinkaus, Personal communication, 1999).  Duarte et al write of this (1999, p. 7607):

“The left humerus has clear diaphyseal torsion and a prominent ridge along the pectoralis major insertion leading up to the anterior greater tubercle. There is rugosity for the pectoralis major attachment, and the ridge creates a marked intertubercular sulcus and an anterolateral to posteromedial elongation of the diaphyseal cross section. This proximal humeral diaphyseal morphology implies hypertrophy of the thoracohumeral musculature, a pattern seen in Neandertals but usually little developed among early modern humans (39, 46).”

After the publication of the Duarte et al report along with the Tattersall and Schwartz commentary, Trinkaus and Zilhao (1999) have charged Tattersall and Schwartz with observational error, making observations from slides, anatomical errors, misquoting people 180 degrees from what was actually said as well as statistical errors. Of Trinkaus and Zilhao’s rebuttal of the Trinkaus and Schwartz commentary, Colin Groves, who in general agrees that there has been no Neanderthal contribution to the human gene pool said that the commentary was ‘roundly and justifiably castigated.’ (Groves, 1999).
 Since the Tattersall and Schwartz commentary has been cited by Christians opposed to the interbreeding between Neandertal and modern humans, a check on the credibility of Tattersall and Schwartz is in order.  As it turns out, this is not the only time that such charges have been leveled against these two commentators. In 1996, Schwartz and Tattersall made the claim that unique nasal attributes clearly separated Neandertal from modern humans and forced them to conclude that they were a separate species (Schwartz and Tattersall, 1996). Apologists like Hugh Ross picked up on this article and endorsed it heartily (Ross, 1997). Ross (1998, p. 113) further took the absurd position that these nasal bones mean that Neandertals can’t be related to any primate or mammalian species—a position so absurd that one won’t believe it unless I quote him.

“The nasal bones and sinus cavities of Neandertals are so large and so distinct that Schwartz and Tattersall go on to conclude that Neandertals cannot be biologically related to any known primate species or any known mammalian species.  Just as modern humans appear to have been specially created, so too do Neandertals.  The naturalistic explanation for Neandertals currently rests on a set of ‘unknown’ intermediate species.”

Robert G. Franciscus evaluated the Schwartz and Tattersall article on the nasal anatomy of Neandertals.  His conclusions were revealing. He wrote (1999):
“Critically reviewing the anatomical basis for Schwartz and Tattersall’s contentions reveals several serious problems with their analysis, including (i) reliance on specimens with damaged, incomplete, or, in some cases, entirely absent relevant anatomy; (ii) failure to consider primary vs. secondary spatial consequences in nasal trait conceptualizations; and (iii) failure to consider actual ranges of variation in these traits in both fossil and recent humans. Accordingly, the unique phylogenetic and adaptive ‘specialiazations’ attributed to Neandertal internal nasal structures are unwarranted.”

Schwartz and Tattersall claim that the nasal features are unique to Neandertals.  They aren’t. Franciscus wrote:
 “Far from being unique to Neandertals, as Schwartz and Tattersall maintained, the crista tubinalis is present in the internal aspect of the apertura piriformis in high frequncies in most recent humans and fossil Homo, especially  those from Africa.  Moreover, the precise configuration of all three cristae, when present, found in 65% of Neandertals (Gower’s Stage 5: fused cristae lateralis and spinalis with partial fusion of cristae spinalis and turbinalis) can be found in more than 10% of recent samples from western Europe, the Near East, and sub-Saharan Africa, as well as a north African Mesolithic (Taforalt and Afalou) and Nubian Mesolithic (Jebel Sahaba) sample. It is important to point out that 35% of the Neandertal sample does not have an internal margin or a crista turbinalis, possessing instead a single, sharp crest that is continuous between the anterior nasal spine and the lateral walls fo the aperture piriformis. These include Amud 1, Amud 7 (subadult), Arcy-Sur-Cure 9, St. Cesaire 1, Spy 1 and possibly Teshik Tash (the last was observed from a cast.”

 “With respect to Schwartz and Tattersall’s contention that the conchal crest is oriented vertically rather than horizontally in Neandertals, the two specimens used in their araticle as photo illustrations of this feature are problematic.  Spy 1 is missing the area of the lateral wall of the maxilla where  the conchal crest (and thus the purported projection) would be located.  The feature labeled in their photograph of this specimen (their figure 2a) as the medial projection is, in reality, the confluence of the cristae lateralis and spinalis on what remains of the inferolateral corner of the apertura piriformis.  The degree of horizontality vs. verticality of the conchal crest as well as the degree of medial projection cannot be determined for this specimen.  This observation highlights another troublesome aspect of their analysis, namely, the inclusion of specimens that simply are missing relevant anatomy.  Skhul V was included in their comparative sample (included in their table 1 as ‘Homo sapiens(?)’). However, there is not a single aspect of external or internal nasal anatomy present on this specimen; the entire midface is restored in plaster.  It is also unclear which features the Neandertal Gibraltar 2 (Devil’s Tower) specimen evinces, because it is also missing the areas necessary to evaluate the purported inner margin, medial projection, or lacrimal groove. (see below).
 “The Gibraltar 1 (Forbes’ Quarry) Neandertal specimen was emphasized heavily by Schwartz and Tattersall,  but is also prblematic.  Before cleaning with a pneumatic drill, the internal nasal fossa of this specimen was filled in completely with a hard breccia.  It is not at all clear whether the present form of the medial projections in this specimen (the most pronounced among all of the Neandertals) is the result of ‘pneumatic sculpting’ or actual anatomy.  My own measurements on this and other aspects of the specimen (see below) are placed in parentheses to reflect this uncertainty.  In specimens such as La  Chapelle-aux-Saints, where the root of the conchal crest has not been damaged heavily, its orientation is clearly horizontal/oblique rather than vertical.” ).” Robert G. Franciscus, ”Neandertal Nasal Structures and Upper Respiratory Tract ‘Specialization”, Proc. Natl. Academy of Sci., USA, 96(4):1805-1809.
**
“The final purported Neandertal autapomorphy that Schwartz and Tattersall have identified is the lack of an ossified roof over the lacrimal groove, in contrast to modern humans in which the lacrimal groove is roofed-over in adults and partially so in newborns.  As with the other two features, however, no modern comparative sample is specified other than Skhul V (which completely lacks any preserved nasal anatomy, as noted above)  and Cro-Magnon 1.  However, Murphy systematically examined the frequency of these two trait configurations in a geographically diverse sample of recent human skulls (n-206) and found both the open and roofed-over condition present.  The nonroofed (open) condition was argued to be unique to Neandertals by Schwartz and Tattersall.  However, Murphy found that the open condition was present in all of the subsamples.  It was found in an especially high frequency among skulls from the archaeological site of Tepe Hissar, Iran.”
And so that people won’t think that Franciscus is against Schwartz and Tattersall’s placement of Neandertal in a separate species, he concludes (1999):
“Therefore, although Neandertals may well constitute a species separate from H. sapiens based on other morphological criteria, the purported internal nasal features proffered by Schwartz and Tattersall do not support this contention. Moreover, adaptive and maladaptive speculations for Neandertal upper respiratory anatomy will have to be argued on other anatomical bases.”
In short, one should take the doubts of Tattersall and Schwartz with some caution, as their previous work has not been up to standards, and this commentary is not being received well even by their natural allies.
What are the theological implications of the Neandertal hybrid?  First, it means that they are human in the sense of being spiritual. It means that human morphological form has not remained constant and those anti-evolutionists who claim otherwise are contradicted by the data. It means that spiritual humanity has been on earth much longer than most Christian apologists are willing to accept.  The earliest Neandertals date from 225,000 years ago at Pontnewydd cave in Wales and at Ehringsdorf, Germany about the same time. (Stringer and Gamble, 1993, p. 66) Whatever Christian apologists do with this data, they can not ignore it.  I fear that they will.

References

Cidalia Duarte, et al, “The Early Upper Paleolithic Human Skeleton from the Abrigo do Lagar Velho (Portugal) and Modern Human emergence in Iberia,” Proceedings of the National Academy Of Sciences, USA, 96(1999):7604-7609.
Robert G. Franciscus,”Neandertal Nasal Structures and Upper Respiratory Tract ‘Specialization”, Proc. Natl. Academy of Sci., USA, 96(4):1805-1809.
David W. Frayer, "Evolution at the European Edge: Neanderthal and Upper Paleolithic Relationships," Prehistoire Europeenne, 2:9-69.

Groves, Colin, Personal Communication,  July 6, 1999. He believes that the child is a hybrid while still maintaining that Neandertals input to the modern gene pool was effectively zero.

Holliday. TW, 1999, “Brachial and crural indices of european late upper paleolithic and mesolithic humans.” J Hum Evol 1999 May;36(5):549-66

Johanson, Donald and Blake Edgar, From Lucy to Language, (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1997), p. 242

Ross, Hugh, 1997 “Neanderthal does a one-eighty,” http://www.reasons.org/resources/FAF/97q3faf/neandertal.html

Ross, Hugh, The Genesis Question, (Colorado Springs: NavPress, 1998)

Schwartz Jeffrey H., and Ian Tattersall, 1996. "Significance of of Some Previously Unrecognized Apomorphies in the Nasal Region of Homo Neanderthalensis," Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci, USA, 93(1996):10852-10854

Stringer, Chris, 1999, cited by Stephen Jones,  http://www.calvin.edu/archive/evolution/199906/0347.html

Stringer, Chris and Clive Gamble, 1993. In Search of the Neanderthals, (New York: Thames and Hudson.

Tattersall, Ian, The Last Neanderthal, New York: Macmillan, 1995).

Trinkaus, Erik and Joao Zilhao, 1999, “A Correction to the Commentary of Tattersall and Schwartz Concerning the
Interpretation of the Lagar Velho 1 Child”
http://www.ipa.min-cultura.pt/docs/eventos/lapedo/lvfaq_corr.html

Trinkaus, Erik, Personal Communication, July 06, 1999