(10-22-2024, 12:22 AM)Byrd Wrote: I would think it was more likely to be based on "feral children"... basically the nonverbal autistic. The stories of the "last Neanderthal" were not something that would have been known by the world, but rather by a small band of people (30? 50? Fewer?) who met them. That's a tiny story and not one that would survive in the noise that came from those who survived.
Sasquatch mythos seems to be largely European in origin: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bigfoot
I think that we have always had recluses and hermits of a sort. Wild men too that live outside society.
Also perhaps not just feral children but feral families.
A bogeyman of sorts might have been useful too.
