Rock art and socio‐demography in northeastern Australian prehistory

Abstract

The late Holocene witnessed widespread cultural change in northeastern Australia. These changes incorporated: 1) novel food processing technologies allowing new levels of food production; 2) the commencement of new lithic types; 3) major increases in intensities of site occupation; 4) increases in intensities of regional land use; and 5) a regionalization of rock art styles. Regional demographic models need to account for both the quantitative and qualitative aspects of these changes. In particular, we argue that demography needs to be considered as a social, as well as a ‘biological’ or ecological phenomenon. Demography in this sense includes population sizes and densities and their socio‐organizational principles. We conclude by arguing that a regionalization of artistic behaviour in Cape York during the late Holocene points to an increased compartmentalization of people‐land relations, culminating in the establishment of new territorial structures after ‐2000 BP, approximating those observed ethnohistorically.