Hostname: page-component-74656f9884-rdgjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-08T17:23:33.371Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Dating the First Australians

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2016

Richard Gillespie
Richard Gillespie*
Affiliation:
Dizzy Heights, Ripps Road, Stokers Siding NSW 2484, Australia. Email: dizzy@better.net.au.
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the 'Save PDF' action button.

The dating of selected archaeological and megafaunal sites from the Australian region is reviewed, with emphasis on recent work at some of the oldest sites. Improved chemical procedures with decreased analytical background for 14C analysis, combined with new luminescence dating methods, has confirmed many of the results processed decades ago and significantly increased the maximum age for some others. The oldest occupation horizons in four different regions reliably dated by defendable multi-method results are in the range 42–48,000 calendar years ago, overlapping with the age range for similarly well-dated undisturbed sites containing the youngest extinct megafauna. There is less secure evidence suggesting some archaeology may be earlier and some megafauna may have survived later than this period.

Information

Type
Special Section
Information
Radiocarbon , Volume 44 , Issue 2 , 2002 , pp. 455 - 472
Copyright
Copyright © 2002 The Arizona Board of Regents on behalf of the University of Arizona 

References

Adcock, GJ, Dennis, ES, Easteal, S, Huttley, GA, Jermilin, LS, Peacock, WJ and Thorne, A. 2001. Mitochondrial DNA sequences in ancient Australians: implications for modern human origins. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 98:537–42.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Allen, J. 1989. When did humans first colonize Australia? Search 20:149–54.Google Scholar
Allen, J. 1994. Radiocarbon determinations, luminescence dating and Australian archaeology. Antiquity 68:339–43.Google Scholar
Allen, J, Holdaway, S. 1995. The contamination of Pleistocene radiocarbon determinations in Australia. Antiquity 69:101–12.Google Scholar
Allen, J, Gosden, C, Jones, R, White, JP. 1988. Pleistocene dates for the human occupation of New Ireland, northern Melanesia. Nature 331:707–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Arnold, JR, Libby, WF. 1949. Age determinations by radiocarbon content: checks with samples of known age. Science 110:678–80.Google Scholar
Barbetti, M, Polach, HA. 1973. ANU radiocarbon datelist V. Radiocarbon 15(2):241–51.Google Scholar
Balme, J. 2000. Excavations revealing 40,000 years of occupation at Mimbi Caves in south central Kimberley of Western Australia. Australian Archaeology 51:1–5.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baynes, A. 1999. The question “Why did the Australian Pleistocene megafauna become extinct” currently is unanswerable because there are no reliable dates for any of the species. In: Baynes, A, Long, JA, editors. Papers in vertebrate palaeontology. Perth: Records of the Western Australian Museum. Supplement 57. p 391.Google Scholar
Bell, WT. 1991. Thermoluminescence dates for the Lake Mungo Aboriginal fireplaces and the implications for radiocarbon dating. Archaeometry 33:43–50.Google Scholar
Bird, MI, Grocke, DR. 1997. Determination of the abundance and carbon isotope composition of burnt carbon in sediments. Geochimica Cosmochimica Acta 61: 3413–23.Google Scholar
Bird, MI, Ayliffe, LK, Fifield, LK, Cresswell, R, Turney, CSM, Barrows, TT and David, B. 1999. Radiocarbon dating of ‘old’ charcoal using a wet oxidation-stepped combustion procedure. Radiocarbon 41(1):127–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bocquet-Appel, J-P and Demars, P-Y. 2000. Population Kinetics in the Upper Palaeolithic in Western Europe. Journal of Archaeological Science 27:551–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bowdler, S. 1990. 50,000 year old site in Australia – is it really that old? Australian Archaeology 31:93.Google Scholar
Bowler, JM. 1998. Willandra Lakes revisited: environmental framework for human occupation. Archaeology in Oceania 33:120–55.Google Scholar
Bowler, JM, Magee, JW. 2000. Redating Australia's oldest skeleton: a sceptic's view. Journal of Human Evolution 38:719–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bowler, JM, Price, DM. 1998. Luminescence dates and stratigraphic analyses at Lake Mungo: review and new perspectives. Archaeology in Oceania 33:156–68.Google Scholar
Bowler, JM, Thorne, AG. 1976. Human remains from Lake Mungo: discovery and excavation of Mungo 3. In: Kirk, RL, Thorne, AG, editors. The origin of the Australians. Canberra: Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies. p 127–38.Google Scholar
Bowler, JM, Thorne, AG, Polach, HA. 1972. Pleistocene man in Australia: age and significance of the Mungo skeleton. Nature 240:48–50.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bowler, JM, Jones, R, Allen, H, Thorne, AG. 1970. Pleistocene human remains from Australia: a living site and human cremation from Lake Mungo, western New South Wales. World Archaeology 2: 39–60.Google Scholar
Chappell, J. 1991. Late Quaternary environmental changes in eastern and central Australia, and their climatic interpretation. Quaternary Science Reviews 10: 377–90.Google Scholar
Chappell, J, Head, J, Magee, J. 1996a. Beyond the radiocarbon limit in Australian archaeology and Quaternary research. Antiquity 70:543–52.Google Scholar
Chappell, J, Omura, A, Esat, T, McCulloch, M, Pandolfi, J, Ota, Y, Pillans, B. 1996b. Reconciliation of late Quaternary sea levels derived from coral terraces at Huon Peninsula with deep sea oxygen isotope records. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 141:227–36.Google Scholar
Chen, T-M, Yuan, S. 1988. Uranium-series dating of bones and teeth from Chinese Palaeolithic sites. Archaeometry 30:59–76.Google Scholar
Clarke, SJ. 1999. The application of the AAR geochronological technique to Late Pleistocene fossil teeth from the Australian megafaunal locality Cuddie Springs. Unpublished BSc (Hons) thesis. Department of Geosciences, University of Wollongong.Google Scholar
Cooper, A, Rambaut, A, Macaulay, V, Willerslev, E, Hansen, AJ, Stringer, C. 2001. Science 292:1655.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cosgrove, R. 1989. Thirty thousand years of human colonization in Tasmania: new Pleistocene dates. Science 243:1706–8.Google Scholar
David, B. 2002. Landscapes, rock-art and the dreaming: an archaeology of preunderstanding. London: Continuum Press. Chapter 8.Google Scholar
David, B, Roberts, R, Tuniz, C, Jones, R, Head, J. 1997. New optical and radiocarbon dates from Ngarrabullgan Cave, a Pleistocene archaeological site in Australia: implications for the comparability of time clocks and for the human colonization of Australia. Antiquity 71: 183–8.Google Scholar
Dodson, J, Fullagar, R, Furby, J, Prosser, I. 1993. Humans and megafauna in a Late Pleistocene environment at Cuddie Springs, northwestern New South Wales. Archaeology in Oceania 28:93–9.Google Scholar
Dortch, CE. 1979. 33,000 year old stone and bone artifacts from Devil's Lair, Western Australia. Records of the Western Australian Museum 7:329–67.Google Scholar
Dortch, CE, Dortch, J. 1996. Review of Devil's Lair artefact classification and radiocarbon chronology. Australian Archaeology 43:28–32.Google Scholar
Dortch, CE, Merrilees, D. 1973. Human occupation of Devil's Lair, Western Australia during the Pleistocene. Archaeology and Physical Anthropology in Oceania 8:89–115.Google Scholar
Field, J, Boles, WE. 1998. Genyornis newtoni and Dro-maius novaehollandiae at 30,000 BP in central northern New South Wales. Alcheringa 22:177–88.Google Scholar
Field, J, Dodson, J. 1999. Late Pleistocene megafauna and archaeology from Cuddie Springs, southeastern Australia. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 65:275–301.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fifield, K, Allen, GL, Ophel, TR, Head, J. 1992. Accelerator mass spectrometry of 14C at the Australian National University. Radiocarbon 34(3):452–7.Google Scholar
Fifield, LK, Bird, MI, Turney, CSM, Hausladen, PA, Santos, GM and di Tada, ML. 2001. Radiocarbon dating of the human occupation of Australia prior to 40 ka BP –successes and pitfalls. Radiocarbon 43(2B):1139–45.Google Scholar
Fullagar, R, Field, J. 1997. Pleistocene seed-grinding implements from the Australian arid zone. Antiquity 71:300–7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fullagar, RLK, Price, DM, Head, LM. 1996. Early human occupation of northern Australia: archaeology and thermoluminescence dating of Jinmium rock shelter, Northern Territory. Antiquity 70:751–73.Google Scholar
Furby, JH, Fullagar, R, Dodson, JR, Prosser, I. 1993. The Cuddie Springs bone bed revisited. In: Smith, MA, Spriggs, M, Fankhauser, B, editors. Sahul in review: Pleistocene archaeology in Australia, New Guinea and Island Melanesia. Canberra: Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University. p 204–10.Google Scholar
Gillespie, R. 1990. On the use of oxidation for AMS sample pretreatment. Nuclear Instruments and Methods B52:345–7.Google Scholar
Gillespie, R. 1997. Burnt and unburnt carbon: dating charcoal and burnt bone from the Willandra Lakes, Australia. Radiocarbon 39(3):225–36.Google Scholar
Gillespie, R. 1998. Alternative timescales: a critical review of Willandra Lakes dating. Archaeology in Oceania 33:169–82.Google Scholar
Gillespie, R, Temple, RB. 1973. Sydney University natural radiocarbon measurements II. Radiocarbon 15(3): 566–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gillespie, R, Horton, DR, Ladd, P, Macumber, PM, Rich, TH, Thorne, AR, Wright, RVS. 1978. Lancefield Swamp and the extinction of the Australian megafauna. Science 200:1044–8.Google Scholar
Gillespie, R, Hedges, REM, Humm, MJ. 1986. Routine AMS dating of bone and shell proteins. Radiocarbon 28(2A):451–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gillespie, R, Roberts, RG. 2000. On the reliability of age estimates for human remains from Lake Mungo. Journal of Human Evolution 38:727–32.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Groube, L, Chappell, J, Muke, J, Price, D. 1986. A 40,000 year old human occupation site at Huon Peninsula, Papua new Guinea. Nature 324:453–5.Google Scholar
Groves, CP 1996. Hovering on the brink: nearly but not quite getting to Australia. Perspectives in Human Biology 2:83–7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grün, R, Spooner, NA, Thorne, A, Mortimer, G, Simpson, JJ, McCulloch, MT, Taylor, L, Curnoe, D. 2000. Age of the Lake Mungo 3 skeleton, reply to Bowler and Magee and to Gillespie and Roberts. Journal of Human Evolution 38:733–41.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Haynes, CV. 1969. The earliest Americans. Science 166: 709–15.Google Scholar
Hedges, REM, Millard, AR. 1995. Bones and groundwater: towards the modelling of diagenetic processes. Journal of Archaeological Science 22:155–64.Google Scholar
Hiscock, P. 1990. How old are the artefacts in Malakunanja II? Archaeology in Oceania 25:122–4.Google Scholar
Huxtable, J, Aitken, MJ. 1977. Thermoluminescent dating of Lake Mungo geomagnetic polarity excursion. Nature 265:40–1.Google Scholar
Jones, R. 1968. The geographical background to the arrival of man in Australia and Tasmania. Archaeology and Physical Anthropology in Oceania 3:186–215.Google Scholar
Kamminga, J, Allen, HR. 1973. Report on the archaeological survey. The Alligator Rivers fact-finding study. Darwin: Government Printer.Google Scholar
Kiernan, K, Jones, R, Ranson, D. 1983. New evidence from Fraser Cave for glacial age man in southwest Tasmania. Nature 301:28–32.Google Scholar
McConnell, K, O'Connor, S. 1997. 40,000 year record of food plants in the southern Kimberley, Western Australia. Australian Archaeology 45:20–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Martin, HA. 1973. Palynology and historical ecology of some cave excavations in the Australian Nullabor. Australian Journal of Botany 21:283–305.Google Scholar
Martin, PS. 1984. Prehistoric overkill: the global model. In: Martin, PS, Klein, RG, editors. Quaternary extinctions: a prehistoric revolution. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. p 354–403.Google Scholar
Martin, PS. 1986. Refuting Late Pleistocene extinction models. In: Eliott, DK, editor. Dynamics of extinction. New York: John Wiley & Sons. p 107–30.Google Scholar
Meltzer, DJ, Mead, JI. 1985. Dating late Pleistocene extinctions: theoretical issues, analytical bias, and substantive results. In: Meltzer, DJ, Mead, JI, editors. Environment and extinction: man in late glacial North America. Orono: University of Maine, Center for the Study of Early Man. p 145–73.Google Scholar
Meltzer, DJ, Grayson, DK, Ardila, G, Barker, AW, Dincauze, D F, Haynes, C V, Mena, F, Nunez, L, Stanford, DJ. 1997. On the Pleistocene antiquity of Monte Verde, southern Chile. American Antiquity 62:659–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Millard, AR, Pike, AWG. 1999. Uranium-series dating of the Tabun neanderthal: a cautionary note. Journal of Human Evolution 36:581–5.Google Scholar
Miller, GH, Magee, JW, Johnson, BJ, Fogel, ML, Spooner, NA, McCulloch, MT, Ayliffe, LK. 1999. Pleistocene extinction of Genyornis newtoni: human impact on Australian megafauna. Science 283:205–8.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mulvaney, DJ. 1974. Summary report of the first Mungo Project season. AIAS Newsletter 1:21–2.Google Scholar
Mulvaney, DJ. 1975. The prehistory of Australia. 2nd edition. Melbourne: Penguin Books Australia.Google Scholar
Mulvaney, DJ, Kamminga, J. 1999. Prehistory of Australia. Sydney: Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Murray, TA, editor. 1998. Archaeology of Aboriginal Australia: a reader. Sydney: Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Murray, AS, Roberts, RG. 1997. Determining the burial time of single grains of quartz using optically stimulated luminescence. Earth and Planetary Science Letters 152:163–80.Google Scholar
O'Connell, JF, Allen, J. 1998. When did humans first arrive in greater Australia and why is it important to know? Evolutionary Anthropology 6:132–46.Google Scholar
O'Connor, S. 1995. Carpenter's Gap Rockshelter 1: 40,000 years of Aboriginal occupation in the Napier Ranges, Kimberley, WA. Australian Archaeology 40: 58–9.Google Scholar
O'Connor, S, Spriggs, M, Veth, P. 2002. Excavation at Lene Hara Cave establishes occupation in East Timor at least 30,000–35,000 years ago. Antiquity 76:45–50.Google Scholar
Oyston, B, 1996. Thermoluminescence age determinations for the Mungo 3 human burial, southeastern Australia. Quaternary Science Reviews (Quaternary Geochronology) 15:739–49.Google Scholar
Polach, HA, Lovering, JF, Bowler, JM. 1970. ANU radiocarbon datelist I V. Radiocarbon 12(1):1–18.Google Scholar
Roberts, RG. 1997. Luminescence dating in archaeology: from origins to optical. Radiation Measurements 27: 819–92.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roberts, RG, Jones, R. 2000. Chronologies of carbon and silica: evidence concerning the dating of the earliest human presence in northern Australia. In: Tobias, PV, Moggie-Cecchi, J, Raas, MA, Doyle, GA, editors. Humanity from African naissence to coming millenia, colloquia in human biology and palaeoanthropology. Firenze: University Press. p 239–48.Google Scholar
Roberts, RG, Jones, R, Smith, MA. 1990a. Thermoluminescence dating of a 50,000-year-old human occupation site in northern Australia. Nature 345:153–6.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roberts, RG, Jones, R, Smith, MA. 1990b. Stratigraphy and statistics at Malakunanja II: reply to Hiscock. Archaeology in Oceania 25:125–9.Google Scholar
Roberts, RG, Jones, R, Spooner, NA, Head, MJ, Murray, AS, Smith, MA. 1994. The human colonization of Australia: optical dates of 53,000 and 60,000 years bracket human arrival at Deaf Adder Gorge, Northern Territory. Quaternary Science Reviews 13:573–84.Google Scholar
Roberts, RG, Spooner, NA, Jones, R, Cane, S, Olley, JM, Murray, AS, Head, MJ. 1996. Preliminary luminescence dates for archaeological sediments on the Nullabor Plain, South Australia. Australian Archaeology 42:7–16.Google Scholar
Roberts, R, Bird, M, Olley, J, Galbraith, R, Lawson, E, Laslett, G, Yoshida, H, Jones, R, Fullagar, R, Jacobsen, G, Hua, Q. 1998a. Optical and radiocarbon dating at Jinmium rock shelter in northern Australia. Nature 393: 358.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Roberts, R, Yoshida, H, Galbraith, R, Laslett, G, Jones, R, Smith, M. 1998b. Single-aliquot and single-grain optical dating confirm thermoluminescence age estimates at Malakunanja II rock shelter in northern Australia. Ancient TL 16:19–24.Google Scholar
Roberts, RG, Galbraith, RF, Olley, JM, Yoshida, H, Laslett, GM. 1999. Optical dating of single and multiple grains of quartz from Jinmium rock shelter, northern Australia: Part II, results and implications. Archaeometry 41:365–95.Google Scholar
Roberts, RG, Flannery, TF, Ayliffe, LK, Yoshida, H, Olley, JM, Prideaux, GJ, Laslett, GM, Baynes, A, Smith, MA, Jones, R, Smith, BL. 2001. New ages for the last Australian megafauna: continent-wide extinction about 46,000 years ago. Science 292:1889–92.Google Scholar
Shackleton, NJ. 2000. The 100,000 year ice-age cycle identified and found to lag temperature, carbon dioxide and orbital eccentricity. Science 289:1897–902.Google Scholar
Shawcross, W. 1998. Archaeological excavations at Mungo. Archaeology in Oceania 33:183–200.Google Scholar
Shawcross, FW, Kaye, M. 1980. Australian archaeology: implications of current interdisciplinary research. Interdisciplinary Science Reviews 5:112–28.Google Scholar
Simpson, JJ, Grün, R. 1998. Non-destructive gamma spectrometric U-series dating. Quaternary Science Reviews (Quaternary Geochronology) 17:1009–22.Google Scholar
Smith, MA. 1987. Pleistocene occupation in arid central Australia. Nature 328:710–1.Google Scholar
Smith, MA. 1998. The pattern of continental occupation: late Pleistocene colonization of Australia and New Guinea. In: Murray, TA, editor. Archaeology of Aboriginal Australia: a reader. Sydney: Allen and Unwin. p 41–9.Google Scholar
Smith, MA, Prescott, JR, Head, MJ. 1997. Comparison of 14C and luminescence chronologies at Puritjarra rock shelter, central Australia. Quaternary Science Reviews (Quaternary Geochronology) 16:299–320.Google Scholar
Smith, MA, Bird, MI, Turney, CSM, Fifield, LK, Santos, GM, Hausladen, PA, di Tada, ML. 2001. New ABOXSC AMS 14C ages remove dating anomalies at Puritjarra rock shelter. Australian Archaeology 53:45–7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Spooner, N. 1998. Human occupation at Jinmium, northern Australia: 116,000 years ago or much less? Antiquity 71:173–8.Google Scholar
Spooner, NA, McBryde, I, Magee, JW, Johnston, H, Clark, P, Questiaux, DG, Bird, M, Olley, JM, Lawson, L, Lawson, G, Hill, NG, Taylor, L. Optical dating at the Lake Mungo lunette, Willandra Lakes, Australia. 2001. Optical dating at the Mungo lunette. Quaternary Science Reviews (Quaternary Geochronology). Forthcoming.Google Scholar
Stafford, TW Jr, Hare, PE, Currie, L, Jull, AJT, Donohue, DJ. 1991. Accelerator radiocarbon dating at the molecular level. Journal of Archaeological Science 18: 35–72.Google Scholar
Thorne, A, Grün, R, Mortimer, G, Spooner, NA, Simpson, JJ, McCulloch, M, Taylor, L, Curnoe, D. 1999. Australia's oldest human remains: age of the Lake Mungo 3 skeleton. Journal of Human Evolution 36:591–612.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Turney, CSM, Bird, MI, Fifield, LK, Roberts, RG, Smith, MA, Dortch, CE, Grün, R, Lawson, E, Ayliffe, LK, Miller, GH, Dortch, J, Cresswell, RG. 2001. Early human occupation at Devil' Lair, southwestern Australia 50,000 years ago. Quaternary Research 55:3–13.Google Scholar
van Huet, S, Grün, R, Murray-Wallace, CV, Redvers-Newton, N, White, JP. 1998. Age of the Lancefield megafauna: a reappraisal. Australian Archaeology 46:5–11.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Watchman, AL, Tacon, P, Fullagar, R, Head, L. 2000. Minimum ages for pecked rock markings from Jinmium, northwestern Australia. Archaeology in Oceania 35: 1–10.Google Scholar
Webb, SG. 1989. The Willandra Lakes hominids. Canberra: Department of Prehistory, Australian National University.Google Scholar
Wright, RVS. 1971. The archaeology of Koonalda Cave. In: Mulvaney, DJ, Golson, J, editors. Aboriginal man and environment in Australia. Canberra: ANU Press. p 105–13.Google Scholar
Yokoyama, Y, Esat, T, Lambeck, K, Fifield, LK. 2000. Last ice age millennial scale climate changes recorded in Huon Peninsula corals. Radiocarbon 42(1):383–401.Google Scholar