The Clan of the Cave Bear is a historical fiction novel by Jean M. Auel.

This book investigates the possibility of the Neanderthals and homo sapiens (modern man) living at the same time. The protagonist is a young girl named Ayla, presumably of the species h.sapiens. She is orphaned in a natural disaster and subsequently adopted into a band of (presumably) Neanderthals, which in turn hold some allegiance to a less propinquitous tribal league calling itself the titular Clan of the Cave Bear (or simply the Clan). The novel attempts to create the affect of kairosis from Ayla's attempts at assimilation into the alien culture and species. Ayla embodies the Stranger in a Strange Land, acting as our (the modern human readership's) emissary to terra incognita. Here she meets the Mog-ur, a spiritual leader and savant who, although physically handicapped and unable to hunt (as all "normal" males in the Clan must), represents the acme of Clan, if not of Neanderthal, evolution: he is vastly more gifted than other mog-urs within the greater Clan in his ability to connect with ancestral spirits and knowledge (cf Frank Herbert's Bene Gesserit concept). The Clan is the Darwinian apex of a communal society, with gender and class roles cemented not only by custom, but by physical, mental and spiritual adaptation. Concepts explored in the novel, albeit briefly, include the innately greater ability of h.sapiens to understand abstract concepts such as language and counting, their relative deficiency in instinct, and their tendency toward innovation. Ayla makes inroads into animal and even plant domestication as well as (from our perspective) the rational codification of knowledge, or epistemology; this is contrasted with the Clan's reliance on inherited memories. Ayla's obvious physical and less obvious mental differences from Clan people lead to most of the conflicts, as, for example, when she is thought by Clan members to be a very slow learner; where the process of 'learning' for a member of the Clan is akin to being reminded of something they already knew but had forgotten, for Ayla the same information has to be assimilated anew and therefore slowly. Ultimately, the novel opts for catharsis with Ayla finding herself exiled from the Clan to begin a new life on her own; the sequels pick up her story (see Jean M. Auel).

In 1986, the movie, The Clan of the Cave Bear, which was based on the book was released. It starred Daryl Hannah.