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This article considers some of the uncertainties about the position of oral traditions in relation to historical studies with written texts and in the narrative studies derived from archaeological evidence that may be called archaeohistories. There are issues about the ways in which we learn about Indigenous peoples, sometimes using non-Indigenous people as intermediaries and sometimes, though rarely, in the direct voices of Indigenous peoples. This article discusses the relationships among oral history, oral tradition, history from written texts, and archaeohistory, including the role of sanctification in the survival of knowledge. This discussion includes some consideration of the accuracies of these sources given the different time and personal scales over which they operate. Illustrating the argument with examples of Indigenous oral knowledge from communities in different parts of eastern Australia, it then discusses the possibility that other Indigenous accounts include narratives about different sea levels around Australia. The article concludes with a discussion of the complex interplay of memory and forgetting, verifiable secular knowledge and ritual beliefs, and different classes of historical knowledge. Application of different cultural knowledge to these sources by different agents produces different accounts of the past.

The invasion of the Australian continent by Europeans caused massive disruptions to Indigenous cultures and ways of life. The adoption of new raw materials, often for the production of “traditional” artifact forms, is one archaeological indicator of the changes wrought by “colonization.” Two camp sites associated with the Queensland Native Mounted Police (NMP), a punitive paramilitary government force that operated through the latter half of the nineteenth century in the northeastern part of the continent, contain abundant flaked glass artifacts. These were undoubtedly manufactured by the Aboriginal men who were employed as troopers in the NMP, and/or their wives and children. Produced using traditional stone working techniques applied to a novel raw material, these artifacts are a tangible demonstration of the messy entanglements experienced by people living and working in this particular — and in some ways unique — cross-cultural context. For the Aboriginal troopers stationed in alien landscapes, the easy accessibility of glass afforded a means by which they could maintain cultural practices and exert independence from their employers, unencumbered by traditional normative behaviors.

Grinding stones and ground stone implements are important technological innovations in later human evolution, allowing the exploitation and use of new plant foods, novel tools (e.g., bone points and edge ground axes) and ground pigments. Excavations at the site of Madjedbebe recovered Australia’s (if not one of the world’s) largest and longest records of Pleistocene grinding stones, which span the past 65 thousand years (ka). Microscopic and chemical analyses show that the Madjedbebe grinding stone assemblage displays the earliest known evidence for seed grinding and intensive plant use, the earliest known production and use of edge-ground stone hatchets (aka axes), and the earliest intensive use of ground ochre pigments in Sahul (the Pleistocene landmass of Australia and New Guinea). The Madjedbebe grinding stone assemblage reveals economic, technological and symbolic innovations exemplary of the phenotypic plasticity of Homo sapiens dispersing out of Africa and into Sahul. Madjedbebe. Results - Grinding stone class/morphology. - Usewear. - Residues -- Microscopically visible residues. -- Starch grain analysis. -- Biochemical testing. -- Absorbance spectroscopy. -- Gas chromatography mass spectrometry Discussion Conclusion - Methods -- Usewear -- Residue extraction and staining -- Starch analysis. -- Absorbance spectroscopy. -- Biochemical testing. -- Gas‑chromatography Mass‑spectrometry.

The frontier of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Australia was a place in which colonists routinely lived in fear of retaliation by the Aboriginal peoples whose traditional lands they had forcibly dispossessed. It has been suggested this concern manifested itself in domestic architecture, in both active and passive defensive strategies designed to afford protection against various forms of potential attack. Yet there remains a lack of substantive research to support such assertions. In this article, we present an analysis of accounts drawn from a range of sources of 97 domestic structures across Queensland with claims for defensive features. Although suggesting that fortified domestic structures were more common than previously envisaged, our review indicates that defensive features were usually minimal – holes in walls and barrable doors, windows or other ports of entry – reflecting the often expedient nature of the structures themselves. First-hand accounts of these buildings are rare, although not entirely absent, with most written accounts being reminiscences told in hindsight by later descendants, resulting in both distortions and myth-building. Accounts of fortified domestic structures peak in the decades following Federation and through both World Wars as the newly minted Australian nation explicitly engaged in nation-building and constructing the ‘glorious pioneer’ narrative.

The colonial history of nineteenth-century Queensland was arguably dominated by the actions of the Native Mounted Police, Australia’s most punitive native policing force. The centrality of the Native Mounted Police to the sustained economic success of Queensland for over half a century, and their widespread, devastating effects on Aboriginal societies across the colony, have left a complex legacy. For non-Indigenous Queenslanders, a process of obscuring the Native Mounted Police began perhaps as soon as a detachment was removed from an area, reflected today in the minimisation of the Native Mounted Police in official histories and their omission from non-Indigenous heritage lists. In contrast, the Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Database preserves several elements of frontier conflict and Native Mounted Police presence, giving rise to parallel state-level narratives, neither of which map directly onto local and regional memory. This highlights potential issues for formal processes of truth-telling relating to frontier conflict that have recently been initiated by the Queensland and Federal Governments. Of particular concern is the form that such a process might adopt. Drawing on a 4-year project to document the workings of the Queensland Native Mounted Police through archival, archaeological and oral historical sources, we suggest that this conflicted and conflictual heritage can best be bridged through empathetic truth-telling, using Rothberg’s notion of the implicated subject to consider contemporary contexts of responsibility and connect present-day Queenslanders with this difficult, divisive and disruptive past.

This paper reports on an Aboriginal site complex, incorporating hut structures, ceremonial stone arrangements, an extensive surface artefact assemblage of lithics and mussel shell, and a silcrete quarry, located along Hilary Creek, a tributary of the Georgina River in western Queensland, Australia. At least two phases of occupation are indicated. The most recent huts have their collapsed organic superstructure still present, while those of a presumably earlier phase are distinguished as bare, circular patches of earth which are conspicuous amongst the ubiquitous gibber, with or without stone bases, and lacking any collapsed superstructure. Immediately adjacent to the huts and also a few hundred metres away are clusters of small stone arrangements, and about 2 km to the southwest, along the same creekline, is another series of larger, more substantial stone arrangements; these features speak to the importance of the general Hilary Creek area for ceremonial purposes. Radiocarbon dating reveals use of the Hilary Creek complex dates to at least 300 years ago; the absence of any European materials suggests it was likely not used, or only used very sporadically, after the 1870s when pastoralists arrived in the area, and when traditional lifeways were devastated by colonial violence.

In recent years the publication of online maps documenting frontier conflict between Indigenous peoples and interlopers in Australia has generated great public interest. These new resources are vit...

For nearly 70 years scientific techniques have been routinely applied in archaeological research. Yet some artefacts hold such cultural significance that sampling is inappropriate, restricting the methods that can be brought to bear in their analysis. Such restrictions often apply to rock art, especially where research is directed by the indigenous peoples who have stewardship over not only the site fabric, but its inseparable cultural context. Here we report a multi-technique program of in-field and laboratory-based analyses to describe the materiality of a painted rock art site in Nyiyaparli country, in the Central Pilbara region of Western Australia. The relationship between the rock art, nearby potential pigment sources and evidence for ochre processing at the site was investigated using in situ portable X-Ray Fluorescence and optical microscopy, with interpretations aided by field and laboratory-based residue analysis of grinding related stone artefacts and X-Ray Powder Diffraction of potential ochre sources. Our findings provide an example of the nuanced interpretations that scientific analyses can add to rock art investigations. Our work suggests that local materials were used in the production of painted art and that ochre processing was ubiquitous at the site and other nearby rockshelters. Combined with the placement of rock art in a hidden context within the site, we suggest the panels at BBH15-01 were part of in-group events and that art and ochre processing in the Baby Hope study area were part of everyday activities.

The opening keynote session at the 2019 Australian Archaeological Association (AAA) annual conference on the Gold Coast was designed to allow reflection on how archaeology has developed in the 50 y...

Although the historical record relating to nineteenth century frontier conflict between Aboriginal groups and Europeans in Queensland has been clearly documented, there have been limited associated archaeological studies. As part of the Archaeology of the Queensland Native Mounted Police (NMP) project, this paper canvasses the physical imprint of frontier conflict across Queensland between 1849 and the early 1900s, focusing specifically on the activities and camp sites of the NMP, the paramilitary government-sanctioned force tasked with policing Aboriginal people to protect settler livelihoods. At least 148 NMP camps of varying duration once existed, and historical and archaeological investigations of these demonstrate some consistent patterning amongst them, as well as idiosyncrasies depending on individual locations and circumstances. All camps were positioned with primary regard to the availability of water and forage. Owing to their intended temporary nature and the frugality of the government, the surviving structural footprints of camps are generally limited. Buildings were typically timber slab and bark constructions with few permanent foundations and surviving architectural features are therefore rare, limited to elements such as ant bed flooring, remnant house or yard posts, stone lines demarcating pathways, and stone fireplaces. Architectural forms of spatial confinement, such as lockups or palisades, were absent from the camps themselves. The most distinctive features of NMP camps, and what allows them to be distinguished from the myriad pastoral sites of similar ages, are their artefact assemblages, especially the combined presence of gilt uniform buttons with the Victoria Regina insignia, knapped bottle glass, and certain ammunition-related objects.

Nardoo (scientific name Marsilea spp.) is a small freshwater fern, common across semi-arid and arid Australia. While reported as an important starchy food, albeit requiring complex processing in some regions, it is not well known as a food source in the Pilbara of Western Australia. Here we describe plant residues including megaspores, starch grains, cellulose, and fibres on a portable grinding stone from the surface of a rockshelter in the West Angelas region of the Central Pilbara. These residues display physical characteristics that strongly suggest they derive from nardoo. Given these findings, we encourage researchers to consider nardoo processing and consumption in future ethnobotanical and archaeological studies in the Pilbara.

Much has been written about the history of the Queensland Native Mounted Police, mostly focussing on its development, its white officers, how much the Colonial Government genuinely knew about the actions of the Force, and how many people were killed during the frontier wars. Far less attention has been given to the Aboriginal men of the force, the nature of their recruitment, and the long-term traumatic impacts on Aboriginal peoples’ and communities’ psyches rather than broadscale changes to Aboriginal culture per se. This article examines the historical and ongoing psychological impacts of dispossession and frontier violence on Aboriginal people. Specifically, we argue that massacres, frontier violence, displacement, and the ultimate dispossession of land and destruction of traditional cultural practices resulted in both individual and collective inter-generational trauma for Aboriginal peoples. We posit that, despite the Australian frontier wars taking place over a century ago, their impacts continue to reverberate today in a range of different ways, many of which are as yet only partially understood.

This paper focuses on a collection of objects deliberately concealed beneath the verandah of a ward for middle-class, female, paying patients at Australia’s longest continuously operating mental health institution, the Royal Derwent Hospital in Tasmania. Cached in small discrete mounds across an area of some 50 square metres, the collection was probably concealed in the mid-20th century and contains over 1000 items of clothing, ephemera and other objects dating from 1880 to the mid-1940s. In achieving a possessional territory of such magnitude, this patient achieved a level of personal self-expression that is rarely encountered archaeologically, particularly within an institutional context. Analysis of this collection as an ‘underlife’ illuminates both functional aspects of the hospital and the hopes and desires of this particular, though still anonymous, patient and her vibrant world of things.

Ground-penetrating radar (GPR) surveys offer several advantages for non-invasively assessing stratigraphy in archaeological rockshelters, including providing information about subsurface stratigraphy and the location of features such as roof fall and bedrock. Challenges to understanding the record of human impact and site formation processes in Australian rockshelter deposits include where to position archaeological excavations, how best to determine the onset of human occupation within sequences beyond the presence of stone artefacts (which can be limited at depth owing to sampling issues) and how to resolve issues relating to stratigraphic associations. This paper demonstrates how GPR can be used to gain a better understanding of buried deposits in a Pleistocene-aged rockshelter. When compared with results from sediment magnetic susceptibility studies, GPR verified the major stratigraphic units identified at the site, the depth of bedrock and the presence of roof fall, but it also provided information on the sediment volume within the stratigraphic units. This is a unique outcome for exploring rockshelter deposits and geophysical signatures overall, aiding in the interpretation of complex site sediments and offering a useful tool for future site investigations.

The archaeological record of Lower Laura (aka Boralga) Native Mounted Police camp, a longstanding base for Queensland’s frontier war in Cape York Peninsula, includes a diverse assemblage of culturally modified Erythophleum chlorastychys (Cooktown ironwood) trees. Analysis of cultural scar attributes and tool marks – which were found to be variously associated with Aboriginal stone tools, tomahawks of different types, and long handled axes – reveals a scenario of nineteenth century land use and technology that transcends the pre-conflict era of Aboriginal clan estates. As well as reflecting traditional patterns of Aboriginal tenure of prime waterfront land, the assemblage reveals innovations that occurred in Aboriginal technology in the lead-up to war. However, an unusual style of cultural scar cut using long handled axes appears to signal transformations in demography and land use following Native Mounted Police occupation. By integrating historical, oral history, spatial, typological, and botanical data this study provides evidence of demographic and environmental changes set in train by the gold-rush invasion. It also highlights the complexities of documenting Cooktown ironwood trees of advanced age and their fragile, deteriorating cultural modifications.

The “Frontier Wars” in Australia were a series of conflicts carried out at different times and places by various military and civilian actors between 1788 and c1938. One of the principal agents in ...

Over the past two decades, archaeologists have explored aspects of Indigenous agency to better encompass experiences of cross-cultural contact in colonial Australia. Yet the area of frontier conflict has largely remained the purview of historians, in part because of challenges in identifying such events archaeologically. One alternative means through which to consider frontier conflict is to investigate the material remains of colonial policing forces. This article focuses on the camps of the Native Mounted Police, a paramilitary government force that operated in Queensland from 1849 (before the state was officially established) until the early decades of the twentieth century. During this period, this force variously occupied 174 camp sites across Queensland, spread unevenly across pastoral and biogeographic districts. By mapping known events of frontier conflict (whether they be attacks on Aboriginal or non-Aboriginal people, stock, and/or property) across the state, we demonstrate that the extent and nature of frontier conflict was highly variable spatially and temporally, and was tied into a largely negative feedback loop with the deployment of the Native Mounted Police. Although Native Mounted Police camps did not form a defensive cordon of structures akin to a ‘frontier line’ across Queensland, they demarcated a frontier ‘zone’ that was contested, precarious, and violent. The fact that so many camps were required for such a long period provides clear evidence of the persistent and determined resistance of Aboriginal peoples to the theft of their land and the bloodshed that resulted.

The plant macrofossil assemblage from Madjedbebe, Mirarr Country, northern Australia, provides insight into human-plant relationships for the ~ 65,000 years of Aboriginal occupation at the site. Here we show that a diverse diet of fruits, nuts, seeds, palm and underground storage organs was consumed from the earliest occupation, with intensive plant food processing in evidence. The diet varied through time as foraging strategies were altered in response to changes in environment and demography. This included a broadening of the diet during drier glacial stages, as well as changes in the seasonal round and incorporation of new foods with the formation of freshwater wetlands following sea level rise in the late Holocene. The foundations of the economy evidenced at Madjedbebe include seasonal mobility, a broad diet and requisite plant processing and grinding technologies, all of which are maintained throughout the entire timespan of occupation. This points to a resilient economic system in the face of pronounced environmental, and likely demographic, change.

Little is known about the Pleistocene climatic context of northern Australia at the time of early human settlement. Here we generate a palaeoprecipitation proxy using stable carbon isotope analysis of modern and archaeological pandanus nutshell from Madjedbebe, Australia’s oldest known archaeological site. We document fluctuations in precipitation over the last 65,000 years and identify periods of lower precipitation during the penultimate and last glacial stages, Marine Isotope Stages 4 and 2. However, the lowest effective annual precipitation is recorded at the present time. Periods of lower precipitation, including the earliest phase of occupation, correspond with peaks in exotic stone raw materials and artefact discard at the site. This pattern is interpreted as suggesting increased group mobility and intensified use of the region during drier periods., Stable carbon isotope analysis of modern and archaeological pandanus nutshell from Australia’s oldest known archaeological site of Madjedbebe reveals precipitation fluctuations over the last 65,000 years.

There is little evidence for the role of plant foods in the dispersal of early modern humans into new habitats globally. Researchers have hypothesised that early movements of human populations through Island Southeast Asia and into Sahul were driven by the lure of high-calorie, low-handling-cost foods, and that the use of plant foods requiring processing was not common in Sahul until the Holocene. Here we present the analysis of charred plant food remains from Madjedbebe rockshelter in northern Australia, dated to between 65 kya and 53 kya. We demonstrate that Australia’s earliest known human population exploited a range of plant foods, including those requiring processing. Our finds predate existing evidence for such subsistence practices in Sahul by at least 23ky. These results suggest that dietary breadth underpinned the success of early modern human populations in this region, with the expenditure of labour on the processing of plants guaranteeing reliable access to nutrients in new environments., Little is known about the diets of early modern humans as they dispersed into Australia. Here, Florin et al. study charred plant remains from Madjedbebe rockshelter, which show that 65–53 thousand years ago, early modern humans in northern Australia already had a broad diet of plants.

The Irish settlement of Baker’s Flat, located in the rural heart of South Australia near the town of Kapunda, was occupied from the mid-nineteenth century for about 90 years. Although little archaeological work has been carried out in Australia specifically on Irish communities, Baker’s Flat is of particular interest because it potentially operated as a traditional Irish clachan, an informal clustering of farm dwellings and outbuildings, and home in this instance to the Irish immigrants who worked in the nearby copper mine. The site was cleared for farming purposes in the 1950s, and little recordation of the dwellings and settlement exist today, aside from a single 1890s map. Owing to the demolition and landscape modification, it was unclear whether any intact subsurface deposits still existed. Therefore, this site was ideal for deploying two geophysical methods, ground-penetrating radar (GPR) and magnetic gradiometry, to assess the presence of subsurface remains and explore the spatial layout of the site. Our results, when compared with those obtained from surface surveys and targeted archaeological excavation, revealed numerous subsurface features and helped to confirm that Baker’s Flat was built in the style of a traditional Irish clachan. This study also demonstrated that magnetic gradiometer was the better geophysical method for mapping this settlement as the nature of the geology (shallow bedrock) and construction of the houses (built within the bedrock) limited the utility of GPR.

A bolide that impacted NW Australia during the Late Quaternary left a circular depression more than 100 m deep and nearly a kilometer in diameter, with a crater rim ∼30 m above the regional terrain. The resultant crater is a window into the regional water table. The surface of the contemporary central pan is 25 m below the adjacent terrain, coincident with the late Holocene regional water table modified by local evaporative processes. Shielded from aeolian deflation by the crater rim, the central depression has slowly filled with dust, sand, and chemical precipitates, estimated to be 20–100 m thick based on geophysical surveys, one of the few continuous depocenters in the Australian Arid Zone. The nature of the crater's sediment fill is controlled by interactions between the water table, primarily in response to changes in summer monsoon rain, changes in the delivery of sand and dust to the crater by the prevailing easterly winds, and the level of the sedimentary fill surface. Optically Stimulated Luminescence (OSL) and 14C dates constrain an age model indicating the upper 10 m of sediment fill recovered from the central pan span the past ∼60 ka. The lowest 3 m consist of clayey sand deposited in perennial water during Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 3. The water table subsequently dropped rapidly ∼35 ka and remained more than 7 m below the late Holocene level through most of MIS 2, during which 2 m of sandy clay was deposited on a dry crater floor, confirming a dry and dusty Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) climate. By 14 ka a rising water table intersected the crater surface, modifying the upper 50 cm of LGM sediment, and syndepositionally modifying another 60 cm of subsequent sandy clay deposition. Aeolian sediment delivery effectively ceased ∼13 ka, and the upper 4.8 m is a gypsum-dominated precipitate, which initially accumulated rapidly, before equilibrating with the late Holocene water table shortly after 6 ka. Lacustrine carbonate encrustations on rocks at the base of the crater wall and ∼4 m above the central pan with 14C ages >40 ka document a time when regional groundwater maintained a water body in the crater 3.5–4.5 m above the modern groundwater level. The crater wall deflected the prevailing easterly winds, creating a horseshoe-dune extending westerly on both sides of the crater, with an extension rate of 35 m ka−1. An augered hole through the northern dune revealed 10 m of sediment overlying ferricrete. The lowest meter is a mixture of broken ferricrete and sand that we interpret to be debris from the bolide impact. Three OSL dates through the dune project an age for the debris-dune contact of 120 ± 10 ka. Changes in physical properties and bulk sediment δ13C through the 9 m of aeolian sediment indicate the lowest 1.8 m was deposited during MIS 5 (120–85 ka), under a uniformly wetter climate than present. The overlying 4.3 m of sediment was deposited between 85 and 14 ka (MIS 4, 3, 2) and exhibits transitional characteristics between the lower unit and the upper 3.8 of sand, which was deposited primarily during the Holocene. Large changes in the regional water table occurred over the past 60 ka, including an LGM water table persistently ≥7 m lower than late Holocene levels, and 3.5–4.5 m higher prior to 40 ka, plausibly in MIS 5, indicative of a stronger Australian Summer Monsoon than at any time subsequently. Age models and sediment properties from the two sedimentary records indicate the crater was formed >60 ka and most likely ∼120 ka, more recently than previous estimates.

Ant bed (also known as termite mound) floors were a common feature of historical buildings in colonial Australia, yet they are rarely identified in archaeological contexts. In this paper we present a case study of these features in buildings associated with a late nineteenth century Native Mounted Police camp in Cape York Peninsula, Queensland. Aboriginal colleagues reported the former existence of these floors in buildings at the site, though none could be seen at the contemporary ground surface. The question thus existed as to whether they were extant in subsurface contexts. Ground-penetrating radar revealed rectangular, high amplitude reflections in many parts of the site. Excavation demonstrated these features comprised stratigraphically discrete units that were highly compact, often with a substantial gravel component. Sediment analysis of the coarse-grained component has distinguished these floors from surrounding off-site samples. The level of compaction seen in the floors has significant implications for the retrieval of artefacts in such contexts since it prevents any objects from being integrated into the deposit. While the distribution of the practice of using ant beds for floors is unknown, it appears their use was common throughout Australia in the late 18th through the 19th and 20th centuries. Examination of the physical elements that make up these floors has provided a clearer idea of each floor's recorded history and use. We have also identified a methodology for examining ant bed floors in Australia and elsewhere that can be used anywhere that ant mounds occur and may have been a source of flooring material.

Although historians have provided substantial insights into the structure, development and activities of the Queensland Native Mounted Police, they have rarely focused on the complex and sensitive issue of Aboriginal recruitment. A careful reading of historical records, however, identifies several methods, including coercion, intimidation, kidnapping and inducement, as well as “voluntary” enlistment. It is difficult to identify Aboriginal agency in recruitment processes as the records are entirely one-sided— the voices of the troopers themselves are absent from the archival sources. In this article, we examine the cultural and historical contexts of Aboriginal recruitment—for example, the dire social situations of Aboriginal survivors of the frontier war and the absence of future survival options for the potential recruits. We explore, through the framework of historical trauma, the impacts on vulnerable victims of violence and other devastating effects of colonisation. We conclude that the recruitment of Aboriginal troopers was far from a homogeneous or transparent process and that the concept of agency with regard to those who can be considered war victims themselves is extremely complex. Unravelling the diverse, conflicting and often controversial meanings of this particular colonial activity remains a challenge to the historical process.

Houses are quintessential statements of identity, encoding elements of personal and social attitudes, aspirations and realities. As functional containers for human life, they reflect the exigencies of their construction and occupation, as well as the alterations that ensued as contexts, occupants and uses changed. As older houses endure into subsequent social contexts, they become drawn into later symbolic landscapes, connoting both past and present social relationships simultaneously and connecting the two via the many ways they are understood and represented in the present. As historical archaeologist Anne Yentsch has argued: ‘Many cultural values, including ideas about power relationships and social inequality, are expressed within the context of the stories surrounding houses’. This paper is one attempt to investigate the stories surrounding a ruined pastoral homestead in central northern Queensland in light of relationships between non-Aboriginal and Aboriginal people on the frontier.

The time of arrival of people in Australia is an unresolved question. It is relevant to debates about when modern humans first dispersed out of Africa and when their descendants incorporated genetic material from Neanderthals, Denisovans and possibly other hominins. Humans have also been implicated in the extinction of Australia’s megafauna. Here we report the results of new excavations conducted at Madjedbebe, a rock shelter in northern Australia. Artefacts in primary depositional context are concentrated in three dense bands, with the stratigraphic integrity of the deposit demonstrated by artefact refits and by optical dating and other analyses of the sediments. Human occupation began around 65,000 years ago, with a distinctive stone tool assemblage including grinding stones, ground ochres, reflective additives and ground-edge hatchet heads. This evidence sets a new minimum age for the arrival of humans in Australia, the dispersal of modern humans out of Africa, and the subsequent interactions of modern humans with Neanderthals and Denisovans. Optical dating of sediments containing stone artefacts newly excavated at Madjedbebe, Australia, indicate that human occupation began around 65,000 years ago, thereby setting a new minimum age for the arrival of people in Australia. When did humans first colonize Australia? The date of the initial landing on the continent that is now associated with cold lager and 'Waltzing Matilda' has been highly controversial. Dates from a site called Madjedbebe in northern Australia had put the presence of modern humans in Australia at between 60,000 and 50,000 years ago, but these results have since been hotly contested. Here, the results from a comprehensive program of dating of new excavations at the site confirm that people first arrived there around 65,000 years ago. The results show that humans reached Australia well before the extinction of the Australian megafauna and the disappearance of Homo floresiensis in neighbouring Indonesia.

The functional study of ground stone artefacts and the analysis of charred plant remains together demonstrate that plant foods played a significant role in the diets of Aboriginal Australians through all occupation phases at the Pleistocene-aged archaeological site of Madjedbebe. Here we report studies of three sandstone grinding stones from the Holocene levels of the site, one associated with a radiocarbon age of 690 cal. BP, and the others with an age of 8320 cal. BP. The functional analyses involved technological studies combined with brightfield microscopy, starch grain analysis, biochemical testing and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC–MS). All three tools had usewear consistent with plant processing, with two having abrasive smoothing and polish characteristics typical of seed-grinding. Significant quantities of starch were recovered from each artefact and demonstrate the early Holocene processing of waterlily (Nymphaea violacea) and possibly kapok bush root (Cochlospermum fraseri), cheeky yam (Amorphopallus galbra) and long yam (Dioscorea transversa). In addition to starchy plant foods, one of the tools was used for processing animal tissue, as indicated by biochemical testing and GC–MS analysis, inferring a multi-functional use.

This study investigates the palynological remains (both fossil pollen and charcoal) recovered from the Thundiy shell midden deposit, Bentinck Island, Gulf of Carpentaria, northern Australia, to provide a vegetation and fire record for this site, which sheds light on human occupation of the southern Wellesley Archipelago over the late Holocene. Results show that the development of a high-density shell deposit by human activities was directly responsible for pollen preservation, possibly through the creation of a moist, anaerobic environment that reduces oxidation of pollen grains. The presence of recoverable pollen from a shell midden deposit from Bentinck Island provides a valuable new proxy to provide greater context for archaeological records, particularly in terms of local vegetation information and potential insight into human land management practices.

Rockshelters contain some of the most important archives of human activity in Australia but most research has focused on artifacts and cultural context. This study explores geomorphological and geoarchaeological approaches for understanding a sandstone rockshelter in interior northern Australia: Gledswood Shelter 1. At this site, magnetic susceptibility and micromorphology techniques were integrated with bulk sedimentology, soil chemistry and geochronology to better understand the record of human impact and site formation processes. The micromorphology studies indicate that primary depositional fabrics, such as graded bedding or laminations, are absent, and sediment structural development is low throughout the entire sequence, with most samples exhibiting a high degree of post-depositional mixing. The sediment magnetic susceptibility analysis reveals magnetic changes coinciding with human occupation, a result of anthropogenic burning. Specifically we highlight that combustion features are prevalent in this sandstone shelter and provide critical insights into the human usage of the shelter.

In regions that lack built structures or stratified open archaeological sites, such as precolonial Australia, rockshelters are a major source of detailed information for understanding the nature and timing of human occupation. A key concern is that the proposed ages for the earliest archaeological sites are based on luminescence dating of sediments, rather than directly of cultural materials, leaving the association between the sediments and evidence of human activity questionable. Here, we present evidence of magnetic enhancement associated with cultural horizons within the deposits of a Pleistocene rockshelter in interior northern Queensland. Soil magnetic studies combined with experimental burning show that magnetically enhanced sediments in Gledswood Shelter 1 are the result of anthropogenic burning of hearth fires, which burn hotter and for a longer time than natural wild fires. These techniques appear to work in this setting because of the nature of the local geology and the geological antiquity of the landscape. Susceptibility and frequency dependence of susceptibility signatures provide a critical tool to resolve that human occupation starts at 2.2 m depth within a stratigraphic section. In conjunction with luminescence dating, soil magnetic studies provide an opportunity for archaeologists to resolve the timing of human settlement in Australia and other intracratonic plate settings.

For several years now the Australian Archaeological Association (AAA) has been expanding its online presence through the Association’s website, Facebook page and Twitter account. In order to ascertain whether these activities are worth the investment of time and energy required to pursue and maintain them, an audience survey was undertaken. Coupled with interrogation of Facebook and Twitter user data, the survey results were assessed to understand better AAA’s online audience, the value of particular kinds of content, and the online platforms and their use, in order to tailor the Association’s efforts. Results show surprising uptake and use by all age groups, despite the common perception that social media users are predominantly ‘young’. Our overall assessment is that a strong understanding of one’s audience leads to more sophisticated use of online media, which is proving essential to achieving the objects and purposes of the Association in terms of public education and the dissemination of arch...

A 2400 year record of environmental change is reported from a wetland on Bentinck Island in the southern Gulf of Carpentaria, northern Australia. Three phases of wetland development are identified, with a protected coastal setting from ca. 2400 to 500 years ago, transitioning into an estuarine mangrove forest from ca. 500 years ago to the 1940s, and finally to a freshwater swamp over the past +60 years. This sequence reflects the influence of falling sea-levels, development of a coastal dune barrier system, prograding shorelines, and an extreme storm (cyclone) event. In addition, there is clear evidence of the impacts that human abandonment and resettlement have on the island's fire regimes and vegetation. A dramatic increase in burning and vegetation thickening was observed after the cessation of traditional Indigenous Kaiadilt fire management practices in the 1940s, and was then reversed when people returned to the island in the 1980s. In terms of the longer context for human occupation of the South Wellesley Archipelago, it is apparent that the mangrove phase provided a stable and productive environment that was conducive for human settlement of this region over the past 1000 years.

Published ages of >50 ka for occupation at Madjedbebe (Malakunanja II) in Australia's north have kept the site prominent in discussions about the colonisation of Sahul. The site also contains one of the largest stone artefact assemblages in Sahul for this early period. However, the stone artefacts and other important archaeological components of the site have never been described in detail, leading to persistent doubts about its stratigraphic integrity. We report on our analysis of the stone artefacts and faunal and other materials recovered during the 1989 excavations, as well as the stratigraphy and depositional history recorded by the original excavators. We demonstrate that the technology and raw materials of the early assemblage are distinctive from those in the overlying layers. Silcrete and quartzite artefacts are common in the early assemblage, which also includes edge-ground axe fragments and ground haematite. The lower flaked stone assemblage is distinctive, comprising a mix of long convergent flakes, some radial flakes with faceted platforms, and many small thin silcrete flakes that we interpret as thinning flakes. Residue and use-wear analysis indicate occasional grinding of haematite and woodworking, as well as frequent abrading of platform edges on thinning flakes. We conclude that previous claims of extensive displacement of artefacts and post-depositional disturbance may have been overstated. The stone artefacts and stratigraphic details support previous claims for human occupation 50-60 ka and show that human occupation during this time differed from later periods. We discuss the implications of these new data for understanding the first human colonisation of Sahul.

A GPR survey was carried out in advance of archaeological excavations at Madjedbebe (formerly known as Malakunanja II), a sandstone rock shelter in western Arnhem Land (Australia) containing numerous Aboriginal burials. GPR revealed subsurface patterning of rocks in the shelter deposits and archaeological excavation demonstrated that these were related to burials. Post-excavation, GIS and statistical analysis further elucidated the relationship between the rocks and human burials. This integration of detailed mapping, GPR and excavation afforded the opportunity to test a way to identify unmarked burials using GPR in sandstone rock shelters and to document a marker for burial identification in this region. Application of the methodology developed through this case study provides a useful management tool for Indigenous communities and other heritage practitioners.

In coastal areas of the globe, open shell matrix sites are commonly used to establish regional chronologies of human occupation and identify patterns of cultural change, particularly for the Holocene, post-sea-level stabilisation period. Despite this, many basic sedimentary analyses that are routinely applied to rockshelter deposits (e.g. geophysical characterisation, particle size etc) are rarely applied to these sites. Magnetic susceptibility, occasionally used in rockshelters, has never been used to investigate shell matrix sites in Australia, despite several international studies identifying its efficacy for other types of open sites. This paper reports a pilot project applying a range of conventional sedimentary and archaeological analyses, as well as magnetic susceptibility at three anthropogenic shell mounds on Mornington Island, Gulf of Carpentaria, Australia. Results are compared to, firstly, assess site integrity and, secondly, to ascertain whether magnetic signatures are related to cultural or natural site formation processes. The results establish that the mounds were repeatedly visited, despite the archaeological evidence, including radiocarbon ages, suggesting effectively 'instantaneous' deposition. This has important implications for studies of other shell mounds where the limitations of radiocarbon dating precision may also mask multiple deposition events.

Dramatic changes in shellfishing behaviors occur across northern Australia during the late Holocene, marked most conspicuously by the cessation of large shell mound construction in some areas, and the reorganization of shellfishing behaviors towards more intensive production in the last 1,000 years. Excavations reveal rapid and widespread changes within coastal sites, an increasing diversification in overall subsistence resources, and patterns of increase in site establishment and use. Some of these changes have been argued to be associated with increasing climate variability and a trend towards increasing aridity during the late Holocene, thought to have transformed coastal ecosystems and mollusc availability. However, when these hypotheses are tested at the local level, more nuanced patterns of human-environment interaction emerge, which call into question interpretations based on broad-scale climate records. We suggest that disjunctions in the timing of the cessation of shell mound construction...

This paper focuses on Australian Indigenous rock art tourism, a field that has received limited research attention. Our aim is to identify aspects which are invisible in tourism promotions. We note trends in rock art tourism and related research, survey the Australian situation, and employ a case study approach to outline the development of Indigenous rock art tourism in Kakadu National Park (KNP) and parts of the Quinkan (Laura Cooktown) region. In both regions, Aboriginal communities inherited legacies of top down decision-making and bureaucratic methods. Although the Laura people transitioned to a community-based system and a successful ranger program, they face challenges in achieving their aspirations for sustainable rock art tourism. KNP communities, subsumed into an unwieldy joint management arrangement for the World Heritage listed National Park, are faced with competing values and perspectives of the dominant government system. A centerpiece of the Balnggarrawarra tourism initiative is the ranger/tour guide system of the type which operated for some years at Laura and was introduced briefly at KNP. The model incorporates key elements of sustainable Indigenous tourism&ndash, traditional owner control and jobs, land care, conservation, cultural preservation, partnerships, and public education. Notwithstanding contemporary challenges and realities, a unifying theme is caring for rock art.

This paper presents 29 radiocarbon dates from eight surface concentrations of shell and 10 test-pits across four shell middens at Long Point in the Coorong, South Australia. Results indicate that occupation of these sites was confined to the late Holocene period, post-2500 cal. BP. With the exception of one midden, which appears not to have been used after 500-300 cal. BP, all other sites suggest continued use until the recent past. This pattern fits with a proposed period of population expansion and intensification of resource use in the Coorong, along with more general changes known to have occurred in parts of coastal Australia during the mid- to late Holocene.

In recent years there has been greater examination and discussion of teaching and learning in archaeology, and exploration of how best to reconcile the sometimes competing requirements of students, industry, teachers and university administrators. A key response by the academy in Australia has been the emergence of graduate level programmes. Drawing on the experiences of staff, students and industry partners of the Flinders University Archaeology and Cultural Heritage Management graduate programmes, we reflect on the opportunities such programmes afford to effect positive change in the training of graduates, the challenges they pose and the contrast they offer to the standard and long accepted Honours degree. We demonstrate that carefully crafted graduate level teaching programmes, with strong involvement of industry stakeholders, offer practical solutions to the issue of providing students with a well-rounded degree, whilst also meeting the particular needs of the cultural heritage sector to produce work-ready graduates.

The traditional preparation of spinifex resin for use as an adhesive by Indigenous Australians involves the application of limited heat as a source of energy for processing though overheating may cause permanent degradation of the material. This paper investigates the physico-thermal properties of spinifex resin and its traditional manufactured composite materials to manipulate morphologies and properties during handling and performance. The pure resin was found to display a low glass transition temperature (T-g), and the T-g was found to increase when it was heat-treated due to the thermally induced reaction of resin functional groups. The glass transition temperature further increased when soil minerals were incorporated within the resin matrix according to the conventional theory of hindrance of molecular motion of the polymer chains. The pure resin (metabolic compounds) contained some inorganic elements (Al, Fe, Mg, Mn, Ca, etc.) because of the micro-nutrients taken up by spinifex plants during their life span. Thermo-gravimetric analysis (TGA) revealed that the pure resin displayed the lowest thermal stability. However, the thermal stability improved for resin samples that had been extracted by solvent and subsequently heat treated. This enhanced thermal stability was most likely due to the thermally induced reaction of resin functional groups to form a crosslinked network structure. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Amongst other issues, the 'History Wars' raise the question as to whether or not sites of conflict on the Australian colonial frontier will be preserved in the archaeological record. We explore this question through a consideration of what the expected nature of any such evidence might be, based on general and specific historical accounts and an understanding of site formation processes. Although limited success has been achieved to date in locating definitive evidence for such sites in Australia, we conclude that there are some specific situations where archaeology could usefully be applied to give rise to a more multi-dimensional understanding of the past. Keywords: frontier conflict, massacre sites, History Wars, colonial Australia, site formation processes ********** In recent years the extent and nature of colonial frontier conflict has been at the fore of Australian public consciousness as a result of the widely publicised 'History Wars'--a fierce academic debate that has garnered extensive media coverage (Attwood 2005; Attwood and Foster 2003; Birch 1997; Blainey 1993; Clark 2002; Connor 2002; Keating 1992; Macintyre and Clark 2004; Manne 2003; Stanner 1968; Windschuttle 2000a, 2000b, 2002, 2009). The crux of the argument is historiographical and also founded in issues associated with the nature and reliability of social memory, and the manner in which stories about the relationships between settlers and Indigenous peoples have been constructed. As various scholars have demonstrated, archaeology has the potential to provide alternative views of the past, and in particular of Indigenous-settler relationships (e.g. Harrison and Williamson 2004; Murray 2004; Paterson et al. 2003; Silliman 2004; Stein 2005). Accordingly, some historians have called for archaeologists to engage in explorations of frontier conflict events through the application of archaeological techniques (e.g. Attwood and Foster 2003: 23). Such an approach affords the opportunity to inform the historiographical debate, through elucidating written and verbal renditions of frontier conflict events and/or satisfying the lacunae evident in some historical and oral accounts. While most archaeologists are aware of the adage that 'an absence of evidence does not necessarily indicate evidence of absence', beyond our discipline this is not always the case. There is concern that some people interpret the surprisingly small number of massacre sites listed in state and national heritage registers as further proof as to the falsity of claims of extreme violence against Indigenous people on the frontier. In this paper we provide an explanation as to why so few massacre sites have been identified archaeologically to date and, through a consideration of their expected archaeological signatures, discuss how researchers might effectively engage in the investigation of such sites. We suggest that such investigations do not necessarily run the risk of satisfying revisionist arguments (cf Barker 2007: 12), if discussions of site formation processes are well incorporated in published accounts thereafter. Despite arguments by Barker (2007) that the nature of Australian frontier conflict was such that there is little probability of massacre events being manifested in the archaeological record, anecdotal accounts from archaeologists and Indigenous people dispute this, and we argue below that evidence from particular types of frontier massacres are more likely to be preserved than others. While these might be comparatively rare, there is little doubt they will be of extreme cultural significance to Indigenous people. They will additionally be of high social, historical and scientific significance to non-Indigenous people and are worthy of identification, investigation and protection. The language of conflict Given the emotive and contentious nature of the topic of frontier conflict, and the perils of becoming enmeshed in semantics, it is important to provide clear definitions for the terminology we utilise in this paper. …

Otoliths are calcium carbonate structures found in the inner ear of teleost fish. While they are routinely studied by marine scientists, analyses of otoliths recovered from archaeological sites in Australia and the Pacific have generally been restricted to identification of species and sometimes the fish age. Otoliths can also provide information on the season of catch, and, through trace element analysis, allow the reconstruction of environmental conditions experienced by fish. In this study, we use otoliths from mid- to late Holocene aged archaeological shell middens at the Coorong (South Australia) to examine species present, season of catch, age of fish and environmental conditions experienced by fish. Results demonstrate that the majority of the fish (identified as Argyrosomus japonicus and Acanthopagrus butcheri) were caught in freshwater environments during the warm season, and had grown to an age and size indicative of their having reached sexual maturity. This study provides data indicating fluctuating levels of salinity in the estuary, which are significantly lower than the hypersaline conditions experienced today. Ultimately, this project highlights the usefulness of conducting more detailed investigations of otoliths, including geochemical analyses, to address a wide range of research questions in archaeology and palaeoenvironmental research.

The rock art of the north Queensland highlands has previously been argued to be the northern limit of the Central Queensland Province, based on a similarity of techniques and motifs. In this paper we test this hypothesis through an archaeological study of the rock art of Middle Park Station in the Gregory Range. Motifs from 88 rock art sites were analysed, revealing a predominance of stencilling of a limited range of motifs, with rare paintings of mostly geometric motifs and similarly rare occurrences of geometric motifs executed in a variety of engraving techniques. We argue these results, coupled with other considerations of distance and biogeography, suggest the north Queensland highlands should be regarded as a distinct rock art province, separate from the Central Queensland Province. Evidence is also presented to suggest that open social networks with limited territoriality were operating in the study area through at least the late Holocene.

Palaeoenvironmental reconstruction based on phytolith analysis of late Holocene-aged soils in and around the Somapura Mahavihara archaeological monastery site in the Paharpur area, Badalgacchi Upazila of Naogaon District in northwestern Bangladesh was undertaken. Results indicate five climate zones marked by alternatively cool and temperate events. The phytolith assemblages of Zones 1, 3 and 5 are clearly characterized by a higher proportion of Pooideae phytoliths. The climate indices for these zones are all greater than 50, indicating cooler climatic conditions. In contrast, the phytolith assemblages of Zones 2 and 4 are typified by a higher proportion of Panicoideae phytoliths; their climate indices are 42 and 44, respectively, indicating the presence of a warmer, more temperate climate. In general, the dominance of grasses over broad- leaved trees throughout the sequences suggests that generally cool to temperate and dry conditions with some cyclical variability persisted around Paharpur and the surrounding region throughout the Pala Dynasty from AD 730 to 1080. The question of whether these shifts in vegetation might be linked with El Nino Southern Oscillation events, and whether these might in turn have cultural responses, is raised.

This paper presents an overview of archaeological investigations in the Sir Edward Pellew Islands in the southwest Gulf of Carpentaria, northern Australia. It is argued that Vanderlin Island, like the majority of Australia's offshore islands, attests to a lacuna in human habitation for several thousand years after the marine transgression and consequent insulation c.6700 years ago. With the imminent threat of inundation, people appear to have retreated to higher land, abandoning the peripheral exposed shelf areas; subsequent (re)colonisation of these relict shelf areas in their form as islands took place steadily from c.4200 BP, with increased intensity of occupation after 1300 BP. Possible links between the timing of island occupation, watercraft technology and the role of climate change are investigated, with more recent changes in the archaeological record of Vanderlin Island also examined in light of cultural contact with Macassans.