A recent date for the dog (Canis familiaris) from Mapala Rockshelter and implications for associated mammal community changes in subalpine Highland West New Guinea

Abstract

The arrival of the dog (Canis familiaris) in Australasia is believed to have had major impacts on the region’s ecosystems as well as human society and organisation. Very little is known about the antiquity of the dog in New Guinea due to a paucity of fossil specimens of secure antiquity, particularly in the Highlands. Here, we report the direct dating of a partial dog cranium from Mapala Rockshelter, a subalpine site at ∼4000 m asl in the Sudirman Range. Recovered in 1972 from a bone-rich layer in the cave floor above a basal charcoal date of about 5500 BP, this individual has been considered a possible early example of dog in Australasia. An Accelerator Mass Spectrometry date from maxillary bone shows that the Mapala dog is far more recent (491 ± 19 BP, or 536–501 cal BP). Our finding is of relevance to understanding the antiquity of dog in the Highlands of New Guinea, and also for the wild dog populations which exist across this large area. The date is also the first for the site’s mammal-rich fossiliferous sedimentary unit, providing a chronological context for Late Holocene turnover in the composition of the local fauna. The most notable of these changes include the regional extinction of two Thylogale spp. and the invasion of Pseudochirops cupreus into subalpine western New Guinea environments.