Paleo diet is one of those fad diets that has gained some popularity lately, supposedly because it mimics the eating habits of our hunter-gatherer ancestors, and there are a number of claims about various health benefits. For example, the Paleo diet’s emphasis on whole foods, including fruits, vegetables, and lean protein, can help stabilize blood sugar levels and improve the body’s response to insulin. But does the paleo diet as it is sold today really mimic our ancestors’ diet?
Of course no one really knows with 100% certainty and accuracy what was included in paleo diet. However, based solely on nitrogen ion ratios found in bones, the Neanderthals’ diet appears to be comparable to carnivores on a mostly meat diet, but this is contradicted by some other, plant based evidence about their diet.
But now, some researchers figured out a way to explain the secret ingredient in the Neanderthal diet that could explain the skewed δ¹⁵N ratio: maggots from rotting meat!! 😲
By analyzing stable nitrogen isotope ratios, we can reconstruct the diets of Neanderthals and early Homo sapiens during the late Pleistocene, which ran from 11,700 to 129,000 years ago. Fossils from various sites tell the same story—these hominins have high δ¹⁵N values. High δ¹⁵N values would typically place them at the top of the food web, together with hypercarnivores such as cave lions and hyenas, whose diet is more than 70% meat.
We suspected that maggots could have been a different potential source of enriched nitrogen-15 in the Neanderthal diet. Maggots, which are fly larvae, can be a fat-rich source of food. They are unavoidable after you kill another animal, easily collectible in large numbers and nutritionally beneficial.
Warning: linked articles may be hard to stomach!!
Article: https://phys.org/news/2025-07-neanderthals-ate-fermented-meat-side.html
Study: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adt7466
I wonder if contemporary paleo diets will include this fat-rich, nutrient-dense, and fully authentic, throwback food item.