A Shark-tooth Ornament From Pleistocene Sahul Antiquity
Correlations undertaken with improved palaeoclimatic data and archaeological records indicate that the regional time-series curves are robust, and can be used as a proxy for human behaviour. However, interrogation of the datasets is essential with artificial peaks and taphonomic over-correction being critical considerations. The time-series curves are interpreted as reflecting population growth, stasis and even decline in phase with terminal Pleistocene/early Holocene climatic fluctuations.
We present Ca isotope data from dental enamel of modern Tasmanian bare-nosed wombats to constrain the Ca isotope composition of this species, an opportunistic grazer, and assess whether sex and environmental variables influence such composition. We compare these data to complementary strontium isotope data from the same samples as a proxy for geographical location. Elodont (ever-growing) wombat teeth allow for a sequential sampling strategy and thus provide high resolution intra-individual variability on a seasonal scale, creating the largest intra-individual and intra-species set of Ca isotope data in a single species so far. We show that the Ca isotope composition of Tasmanian bare-nosed wombats falls within the range for herbivores and is independent of geological substrate. The Ca isotope compositions of male and female wombats suggest that Ca isotopes in marsupials could be used to trace nursing and weaning behaviour.
Although the sequence broadly reflects previous models of the lunette’s depositional history and changing hydrological conditions, our results indicate spatially variable deposition of sediments, possibly as a result of changes in prevailing wind regimes. Archaeological traces are exposed in all stratigraphic units deposited after ca. 15 ka, indicating human occupation of the area under a range of palaeoenvironmental conditions.
Some of the key aspects of geotribology are briefly discussed to illustrate the advantages of such an interdisciplinary approach, before exploring the even greater benefits of applying tribological methods to many aspects of archaeology. That discipline comprises a vast array of physical evidence that derives from tribological processes and cannot be credibly explained by traditional archaeology. Many of these processes are briefly described, and the methodology required to define and elucidate them is discussed. The paper concludes that, for the further development of archaeology and the study of rock art, it is essential to establish a sub-discipline of archaeotribology. Before about 1930, European maps showed the highlands as uninhabited forests.
Redating Australia’s oldest human remains: a skeptic’s view
Austronesian-speaking peoples colonized many of the offshore islands to the north and east of New Guinea, such as New Ireland and New Britain, with settlements also on the coastal fringes of the main island in places. Human habitation of New Guinea over tens of thousands of years has led to a great deal of diversity, which was further increased by the later arrival of the Austronesians and the more recent history of European and Asian settlement through events like transmigration. The entire length of the New Guinea Highlands system passes through New Guinea as a vast watershed. The northern rivers flow into the Pacific Ocean, the southern rivers into the Arafura Sea and the Gulf of Papua. On the north side, the largest rivers are the Mamberamo, Sepik and Ramu.Mamberamo was born from the confluence of two large inland rivers. These rivers meander through swamps with huge internal descents and then merge.
Palaeo-ecology and Pleistocene human occupation in south central Tasmania
For Australia, a substantial corpus of foundational literature has competently established the environmental sources of isotopic variation in modern kangaroo and wallaby species. However, despite the pervasive distribution of these kinds of macropods in contemporary and archaeological contexts, isotopic techniques are utilised infrequently. Our review of the history of macropod isotopic analysis identifies and proposes solutions to the complexities that have inhibited its widespread application in Australian archaeology. This includes a description of relevant basic principles including ecology, physiology and isotopic fractionation. To support our claims for the considerable research potential of macropod remains, we present preliminary analyses of tooth enamel carbonates from archaeological deposits at Boodie Cave, Barrow Island, located in Australia’s northwest arid zone.
Island colonisation and adaptive responses of humans to newly colonised environments during the Pleistocene is hotly debated in archaeological discourse globally. Investigating these occurrences enables us to better understand the human condition and is a useful proxy of early human cognition. This paper reviews the evidence for Pleistocene https://www.datingmentor.net/findbbwsex-review maritime knowledge for the island of Cyprus, the palaeoclimatic and palaeonvironmental context for the arrival of early humans on the island, and the existing lithic evidence regarding a potential Pleistocene colonisation. The island of Cyprus in the Eastern Mediterranean is an important nexus for addressing these phenomena.
This process exhumed a large low region of northwest Sahul, forming either a broad arc of islands or a fully emergent continental shelf extending towards the Banda Arc island chain. Between ∼60 and 48 kya rising sea levels once again drowned the northwest shelf, but after ∼48 kya sea levels again fell sufficiently to exhume the shelf until post-LGM sea level rise . Although oceanic area within ISEA was considerably diminished during the last glacial, the voyages undertaken along the proposed migration pathways incorporated numerous long water crossings, some considerably in excess of 65 km.
The great arc of dispersal of modern humans: Africa to Australia
The precise phasing between sea-level and monsoon precipitation is thus key to assess the likelihood of a successful crossing or the behavioural and technological capacities that facilitated crossing. Based on a precisely-dated stalagmite record from Yemen, we reveal a distinct phase-lag of several thousand years between sea-level rise and major monsoon intensification. Pluvial conditions in Southern Arabia during MIS 5e lasted from ∼127.7 to ∼121.1 ka BP and occurred when sea-levels were already higher than at present. Sapiens which all have pertinent implications for our understanding of human technological and behavioural capacities during MIS 5e. The New Guinea Highlands were among the first areas where agricultural societies developed about 9 kya. Even today, the highest human population densities can be found in the tropical highlands, those are the most important shelters for societies in this seriously malaria-affected equatorial area.
In 1526–27, Portuguese explorer Jorge de Meneses saw the western tip of New Guinea and named it ilhas dos Papuas. In 1528, the Spanish navigator Álvaro de Saavedra also recorded its sighting when trying to return from Tidore to New Spain. In 1545, Spaniard Íñigo Ortíz de Retes sailed along the north coast of New Guinea as far as the Mamberamo River, near which he landed on 20 June, naming the island ‘Nueva Guinea’. The first map showing the whole island was published in 1600 and shows it as ‘Nova Guinea’. In 1606, Luís Vaz de Torres explored the southern coast of New Guinea from Milne Bay to the Gulf of Papua including Orangerie Bay, which he named Bahía de San Lorenzo. His expedition also discovered Basilaki Island naming it Tierra de San Buenaventura, which he claimed for Spain in July 1606.
It is named after one of the ships of the English Royal Fleet, which first sailed into the mouth of the river in 1845. Strickland, a tributary of the Fly, reaches the Papuan Plain through wild gorges. The rivers of the island are extremely rich in water due to the annual rainfall of 2,000–10,000 mm. According to a modest calculation, the New Guinea River carries about 1,500 km3/a (48,000 m3/s) of water into the sea.
Watercraft technology would therefore have been indispensable to this undertaking (Balme, 2013, Birdsell et al., 1977, Bulbeck, 2007, O’Connell and Allen, 2012). These factors, in addition to the requirement for a viable initial founding population size (Atkinson et al., 2007), strongly indicate purposeful maritime migration was instrumental in the peopling of Sahul. However, the results of analyses of Aboriginal Australian genetic diversity (mitochondrial DNA, Y-chromosomal DNA and autosomal DNA) are inconclusive as to the location of the initial landfall of Sahul’s first migrants .
