Patrick Faulkner

The archaeology, chronology and stratigraphy of Madjedbebe (Malakunanja II): A site in northern Australia with early occupation.

Published ages of >50 ka for occupation at Madjedbebe (Malakunanja II) in Australias 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.

New direction in human colonisation of the Pacific: Lapita settlement of south coast New Guinea

Abstract Expansion of Austronesianspeaking peoples from the Bismarck Archipelago out into the Pacific commencing c.3300 cal BP represents the last great chapter of human global colonisation. Bismarck Indonesia Archipelago Papua New Guinea Torres Strait Caution Bay The earliest migrants were bearers of finelymade dentate-stamped Lapita pottery, hitherto found only across Island Melanesia and western Polynesia. We document the first known occurrence of Lapita peoples on the New Guinea mainland. The new Lapita sites date from 2900 to 2500 cal BP and represent a newly-discovered migratory arm of Lapita expansions that moved westwards along the southern New Guinea coast towards Australia. These marine specialists ate shellfish, fish and marine turtles along the Papua New Guinea mainland coast, reflecting subsistence continuities with local pre-Lapita peoples dating back to 4200 cal BP. Lapita artefacts include characteristic ceramics, shell armbands, stone adzes and obsidian tools. Our Lapita discoveries support hypotheses for the migration of pottery-bearing Melanesian marine specialists into Torres Strait of northeast Australia c.2500 cal BP.

Dating the Dreaming? Creation of Myths and Rituals for Mounds along the Northern Australian Coastline

Shell mounds ceased to be built in many parts of coastal northern Australia about 800-600 years ago. They are the subject of stories told by Aboriginal people and some have been incorporated in ritual and political activities during the last 150 ears. These understandings emerged only after termination of the economic and environmental system that created them, 800-600 years ago, in a number of widely separated coastal regions, Modern stories and treatments of these mounds by Aboriginal people concern modern or near-modern practices. Modern views of the mounds, their mythological and ritual associations, may be explained by reference to the socioeconomic transitions seen in the archaeological record; but the recent cultural, social and symbolic statements about these places cannot inform us of the process or ideology concerned with the formation of the mounds. Many Aboriginal communities over the last half a millennium actively,formed understandings of new landscapes and systems of land use. Attempts to impose historic ideologies and cosmologies on earlier times fail to acknowledge the magnitude and rate of economic and ideological change on the tropical coastline of Australia.

Coastal Subsistence, Maritime Trade, and the Colonization of Small Offshore Islands in Eastern African Prehistory

ABSTRACT Recent archaeological research has firmly established eastern Africas offshore islands as important localities for understanding the regions pre-Swahili maritime adaptations and early Indian Ocean trade connections. While the importance of the sea and small offshore islands to the development of urbanized and mercantile Swahili societies has long been recognized, the formative stages of island colonization—and in particular the processes by which migrating Iron Age groups essentially became “maritime”—are still relatively poorly understood. Here we present the results of recent archaeological fieldwork in the Mafia Archipelago, which aims to understand these early adaptations and situate them within a longer-term trajectory of island settlement and pre-Swahili cultural developments. We focus on the results of zooarchaeological, archaeobotanical, and material culture studies relating to early subsistence and trade on this island to explore the changing significance of marine resources to the local economy. We also discuss the implications of these maritime adaptations for the development of local and long-distance Indian Ocean trade networks.

Late-Holocene occupation and coastal economy in Blue Mud Bay, northeast Arnhem Land: Preliminary archaeological findings

Abstract Twelve months of archaeological excavation and survey were conducted on the Blane Peninsula in Blue Mud Bay over three field seasons between 2000 and 2002. During this time, 141 sites were recorded, and 16 sites were excavated. Though archaeological work in the region prior to this study has not been extensive, some general patterns have been identified that are similar to those reported by other researchers across the tropical North of Australia. These patterns include the type of sites present, the use of similar resources; the distribution of sites across similar landscapes, and the timing and extent of occupation through the late-Holocene. The preliminary analysis of the archaeological evidence demonstrates Aboriginal occupation and marine resource exploitation on the Blane Peninsula from 3000 years ago to the present day. This evidence includes relative continuity in the range of shellfish species gathered, in the site locations used during this time, and in the patterns of shellfish discarded in midden deposits.

Late Holocene climate change and human behavioural variability in the coastal wet-dry tropics of northern Australia: Evidence from a pilot study of oxygen isotopes in marine bivalve shells from archaeological sites

Abstract Previously it has been argued that midden analysis from three geographically distinct coastal regions of tropical northern Australia (Hope Inlet, Blyth River, Blue Mud Bay) demonstrates that changes through time in Aboriginal mollusc exploitation reflect broader coastal environmental transformations associated with late Holocene climatic variability (Bourke et al. 2007). It was suggested that, while a direct link between environmental change and significant cultural change in the archaeological record has yet to be demonstrated unambiguously, midden analysis has the potential to provide the as-yet missing link between changes in climate, environment and human responses over past millennia. We test this hypothesis with a preliminary sclerochronological analysis (i.e. of sequential stable isotopes of oxygen) of archaeological shell samples from all three regions. Our findings suggest the existence of variations in temperature and rainfall indicative of an increasing trend to aridity from 2000 to 500 cal. BP, consistent with previous palaeoenvironmental work across northern Australia.

Late Holocene mollusc exploitation and changing near-shore environments: a case study from the coastal margin of Blue Mud Bay, northern Australia

Abstract Occupation on the coastal margins of northern Australia over the mid to late Holocene characteristically reflects chronological and spatial variability in settlement and subsistence. In many geographically diverse regions across the tropical coast, the archaeological record indicates patterns of molluscan resource exploitation that reflects the altered local ecological habitats that accompanied broader coastal environmental change over the last few thousand years. This paper investigates these issues via analyses of molluscan species richness, diversity, and habitat exploitation through time and space on the Point Blane Peninsula, Blue Mud Bay, north-east Arnhem Land. As well as variability in the intensity of exploitation, this research confirms the interpretation of previous investigation of coastal occupation as being flexible and dynamic, with changes linked to alterations in species availability and abundance relative to changes in near-shore environments.

Reinvestigation of Kuumbi Cave, Zanzibar, reveals Later Stone Age coastal habitation, early Holocene abandonment and Iron Age reoccupation

ABSTRACT The late Pleistocene and Holocene history of eastern Africa is complex and major gaps remain in our understanding of human occupation during this period. Questions concerning the identities, geographical distributions and chronologies of foraging, herding and agricultural populations — often problematically equated with the chronological labels ‘Later Stone Age (LSA)’, ‘Neolithic’ and ‘Iron Age’ — are still unresolved. Previous studies at the site of Kuumbi Cave in the Zanzibar Archipelago of Tanzania reported late Pleistocene Middle Stone Age (MSA) and LSA, mid-Holocene Neolithic and late Holocene Iron Age occupations (Sinclair et al. 2006; Chami 2009). Kuumbi Cave considerably extends the chronology of human occupation on the eastern African coast and findings from the site have been the basis for the somewhat contentious identification of both a coastal Neolithic culture and early chicken, a domesticate that was introduced to Africa from Asia. The site therefore warrants further investigation. Here we report on a new excavation of the Kuumbi Cave sequence that has produced a suite of 20 radiocarbon and optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) dates. Our results suggest that the cave’s stratigraphy is complex, reflecting taphonomic processes that present interpretive and dating challenges. Our assessment of the stratigraphic sequence demonstrates three phases of habitation, two of which reflect terminal Pleistocene occupation and are characterised by quartz microliths, bone points and the exploitation of terrestrial and marine species, and one of which reflects later reoccupation by AD 600. In this latter phase, Kuumbi Cave was inhabited by a population with a locally distinct material culture that included idiosyncratic Tana or Triangular Incised Ware ceramics and medium-sized limestone stone tools, but with a subsistence economy similar to that of the late Pleistocene, albeit with more emphasis on marine foods and smaller terrestrial mammals. Our results suggest that Kuumbi Cave may have been unoccupied for much of the Holocene, after Zanzibar became an island. Our findings also place into question earlier identifications of domesticates, Asian fauna and a mid-Holocene Neolithic culture at the site.

78,000-year-old record of Middle and Later stone age innovation in an East African tropical forest

The Middle to Later Stone Age transition in Africa has been debated as a significant shift in human technological, cultural, and cognitive evolution. However, the majority of research on this transition is currently focused on southern Africa due to a lack of long-term, stratified sites across much of the African continent. Here, we report a 78,000-year-long archeological record from Panga ya Saidi, a cave in the humid coastal forest of Kenya. Following a shift in toolkits ~67,000 years ago, novel symbolic and technological behaviors assemble in a non-unilinear manner. Against a backdrop of a persistent tropical forest-grassland ecotone, localized innovations better characterize the Late Pleistocene of this part of East Africa than alternative emphases on dramatic revolutions or migrations.Most of the archaeological record of the Middle to Later Stone Age transition comes from southern Africa. Here, Shipton et al. describe the new site Panga ya Saidi on the coast of Kenya that covers the last 78,000 years and shows gradual cultural and technological change in the Late Pleistocene.

New radiocarbon dates for Kulpi Mara rockshelter, central Australia

Abstract Kulpi Mara is one of three known late Pleistocene sites in Central Australia. Four recent radiocarbon determinations combined with 7 earlier results clarify the sedimentation history and occupation phases at the rockshelter. The sequence shows a number of pulses of occupation, the earliest dating between c.34,178 and 29,102 cal BP, with little use of the shelter during intermediate periods. This contrasts with the more or less continuous sequence reported for Puritjarra rockshelter 165km to the west. These differences suggest that we can expect intraregional variability in both the geomorphic setting and occupational histories of Pleistocene and Holocene sites in Central Australia and the Western Desert.