Editing Stone Age (section)

====Middle Paleolithic====
{{main|Middle Paleolithic}}
This period is best known as the era during which the [[Neanderthal]]s lived in Europe and the Near East (c. 300,000–28,000 years ago). Their technology is mainly the [[Mousterian]], but Neanderthal physical characteristics have been found also in ambiguous association with the more recent [[Châtelperronian]] archeological culture in Western Europe and several local industries like the [[Szeletian]] in Eastern Europe/Eurasia. There is no evidence for Neanderthals in Africa, Australia or the Americas.

Neanderthals nursed their elderly and practised [[ritual]] burial indicating an organised society. The earliest evidence ([[Mungo Man]]) of settlement in Australia dates to around [[Prehistory of Australia|40,000 years ago]] when modern humans likely crossed from Asia by island-hopping. Evidence for symbolic behavior such as body ornamentation and burial is ambiguous for the Middle Paleolithic and still subject to debate. The [[Bhimbetka rock shelters]] exhibit the earliest traces of human life in India, some of which are approximately 30,000 years old.