Willandra Lakes Research Articles

Assemblage variability in the Willandra Lakes

AbstractAn examination of existing typological descriptions of the stone artefact assemblages from the Willandra Lakes facilitates the development of basic models about assemblage variability in the region. After defining some of the limitations of the data set we illustrate well‐defined spatial patterns in assemblage composition and hypothesise that they reflect a strategy of provisioning the lunette landscape with stone artefacts that were robust and with a comparatively high potential for further use/reduction. These conclusions undermine the notion of the ‘Core tool and scraper tradition’ as an appropriate depiction of assemblage composition and variability in the Willandra Lakes region.

Willandra Lakes revisited: environmental framework for human occupation

AbstractThe story of the Willandra Lakes is also the story of those ancient people who lived there. The landforms, sediments and soils provide the environmental framework within which the patterns of human occupation must be interpreted. The original stratigraphic system involved just two units, the Mungo and Zanci. Two additional units are now defined; one incorporating complexities between Mungo and Zanci, the Arumpo Unit, and a second to acknowledge the reality of a lake full phase near 18ka cal., postdating Zanci aridity of the last glacial maximum. This new unit is defined from Lake Mulurulu as the Mulurulu Unit.Improved facies analysis from data involving lake sediments, freshwater quartz beach sands (QBSs) and lake‐dry pelletal clay dunes (PCDs) helps refine the sequence of environmental changes. Revision of radiocarbon chronologies with conversion to calendar years, and additional dates (radiocarbon, luminescence, amino acid racemisation) permit new age definitions of major environmental changes and human‐land interactions.Following a lake‐full phase (Lower Mungo time) from before about 55ka cal., a phase of PCD accumulation is dated to near 40ka cal. defining an early stage of hydrologic stress. Progressive water level oscillations continued (Arumpo time) culminating in major drying with deflation and extension of regional dune building over large areas of the Murray Basin near 20ka cal. (Zanci time). Freshwater returned temporarily to the Willandra lakes about 18–19ka cal.Throughout the period 25–19ka cal. spanning the glacial maximum, the apparent absence of fish and unionid mussels may reflect major temperature depression corresponding also to the period of maximum aridity. The ecological stress experienced at this time had an immense impact on the landscape, plants and especially larger animals, requiring new adaptive responses from human occupants. Early grinding techniques, pre‐dating evidence of seed grinding, are suggested.Reconstruction of the sedimentary sequence at the main archaeological site at Joulni reveals a pre‐Mungo unit deep in the sequence of a system developed by barrier construction isolating the Joulni Plain from the main lake. Analogous conditions at Lake Victoria today mirror development of the Joulni archaeological site. Oldest artefacts occurring within this un‐named unit are dated beyond 45ka cal.Human occupation on the lakeshore barrier system at Lake Mungo involved aquatic harvesting (fish and shellfish) associated with human burials before the onset of PCD deposition, pre‐40ka‐cal. The association here of the complex burial ritual (Mungo III) involving anointing with ochre at this time presents one of the dramatic mysteries of ancient human cultural development. In death, the story of that person illuminates our understanding of those ancient occupants and the Ice Age environments that supported them.

Willandra Lakes Archaeological Investigations 1968–98

AbstractThe broadly generalised and widely cited late Pleistocene prehistory of the Willandra Lakes Region that has emerged over the last 30 years is based on analyses of a limited sample of the region's archaeology. This paper points to the expansive nature of Pleistocene sediments and archaeological exposures that exist in the region and identifies issues and problems faced by researchers who have investigated its archaeological record.Poorly understood areas of investigation hold considerable potential for expanding our understanding of late Pleistocene occupation, notably the nature of peoples' occupation in the area during the glacial maximum, the antiquity of Aboriginal occupation in south‐eastern Australia, interaction with megafauna, the nature of Pleistocene material culture, exchange of raw materials and associated indicators of trade and extended alliance networks. A review of the research that underpins this prehistory reveals considerable opportunity for further investigation.

Alternative timescales: a critical review of Willandra Lakes dating

AbstractThe Late Pleistocene radiocarbon record from the Willandra Lakes region is analysed to select the most reliable age estimates. Chemical pretreatment experiments addressing problems of contradictory ages on black organic samples from archaeological hearths and shell middens show that macroscopic charcoal is not present at some sites, although multiple sub‐samples of well preserved charcoal have been dated at other sites. Radiocarbon measurements on properly decontaminated charcoal are as reliable as other robust single component samples such as shell, fish otoliths and emu eggshell. After calibration, 14C ages are in close agreement with luminescence based ages on suitably analysed quartz from the same sites. Regional patterns of 14C and luminescence dates are correlated across the Murray‐Darling basin, implying rapid and sensitive responses to changing climate. Chemical arguments, and the likelihood of widespread sediment erosion prior to Last Glacial Maximum, suggest that probable ages for some human burials are younger than usually quoted. There is no unequivocal evidence for archaeological remains in the Willandra older than 43 ka.

Reinterpreting the 1969–1972 Willandra Lakes archaeological surveys

AbstractThe surveys of the Willandra Lakes sites between 1969 and 1972 were the first to attempt the study of open sites on an archaeological landscape rather rockshelters. Gaps in the evidence were filled using ethnographic data based on observations of 19th century Bagundji life. The conclusions drawn regarding the continuity of Aboriginal subsistence and the development of intensive wild cereal gathering were robust and have played a part in archaeological debates since. This article seeks to reexamine the data from the 1969–72 surveys, to test the original conclusions drawn from them and, finally, to determine the role the Willandra Lakes sites might continue to play in Pleistocene studies. The information from the Willandra Lakes sites is limited to the Pleistocene. When the original conclusions are discarded, the data support more recent conclusions derived from a wider sample of sites in the Darling River region by Hope and Balme.

Burnt and Unburnt Carbon: Dating Charcoal and Burnt Bone from the Willandra Lakes, Australia

A new analysis of previous results on conflicts between shell and charcoal dates and on burnt human bones, with new data presented here, suggests that alternative interpretations are possible for the archaeology and environmental history of the Willandra Lakes region. Black sediment samples from archaeological sites at Lake Outer Arumpo exhibit wide variation in burnt and unburnt carbon content; high humic acid concentrations in midden layers and in one group of hearth/ovens are absent in another, older, group of hearth/ovens. There are no acceptable results on charcoal from hearth/ovens older than ca. 31 ka bp, and no evidence that these samples are associated with numerous midden shell dates at 34–37 ka bp. Similar logic applied to humic-free residue dates on burnt human bones places five gracile skeletons (including Mungo 1) as post–Last Glacial Maximum.

Late quaternary lacustrine, groundwater, aeolian and pedogenic gypsum in the Prungle Lakes, southeastern Australia

Detailed petrographic studies of recent or sub-recent evaporites where many critical environmental parameters are defined can help in the analysis of ancient deposits and in the establishment of chemical and environmental models for evaporite formation. The Prungle Lakes are part of the now dry Willandra Lakes system in semi-arid southwestern New South Wales. The Willandra Lakes have been a site of cyclic Quaternary sedimentation in response to the well documented global climatic fluctuations associated with the glacial-interglacial cycle. At times of hydrologic stress, low lake levels are associated with high salt volumes, inherited from evaporative concentration in large shallow lakes upstream and the inflow of saline groundwaters. Thus, at Prungle, a complex array of concentric shorelines, lake floor terraces and lunettes has developed as basin-within-basin landforms which formed in response to filling and drying cycles. Sediments associated with these geomorphic units include: 1. (1) Freshwater littoral, nearshore and deep-water deposited laminated sands and muds, with biogenic carbonates chiefly of ostracodal and algal origin; 2. (2) Evaporites comprising interbedded clay and laminated gypsum-clay couplets, which consist of discrete thin laminae of sugary white euhedral prismatic gypsum separated by detrital clay layers with a high degree of optical orientation. Primary accessory celestite (SrSO 4) occurs as discrete patches within the gypsum laminae; 3. (3) Groundwater pyramidal, discoidal or lenticular gypsum crystals, grown from supersaturation produced by evaporation at the capillary fringe of the water table. These have formed displacively within the sediments and caused considerable disruption of the sediment matrix; 4. (4) Aeolian deposition in irregular transverse ridges of sand-sized reworked groundwater gypsum and disrupted lacustrine clays. The gypsum crystals are predominantly discoidal pyramidal forms which are conspicuously oriented parallel to bedding, well sorted and extensively corroded. The clay pellets are well sorted and moderately well rounded. Higher in the profile, bedding is indistinct due to pedogenic processes, which include modification of detrital grains and secondary crystallization of gypsum and carbonate. A thin gypcrete horizon occurs at the surface. The last cycle of sedimentation in the Prungle Lakes is believed, from correlation with lakes higher in the Willandra System, to have occurred during the period 50,000–16,000 yr B.P. Since then groundwaters have dropped below the zone of interaction with the lake floor and surface water no longer reaches the lakes. Sedimentation has ceased and soil formation with secondary carbonate and gypsum has continued to the present. A range of sedimentary environments is identified which depend on strong seasonal oscillations. These environments are virtually absent from the Australian continent today, and their occurrence during the Pleistocene supports the contention of enhanced climatic seasonality at that time. The array of sediment types and mineralogies is almost identical to that characteristic of coastal sabkha sequences highlighting the difficulty of relying on unusual evaporative mineralogy to differentiate marine and non-marine environments. Detailed petrographic analyses of the Prungle sequence have been made in association with a review of theoretical, experimental and observational studies of the environmental controls of calcium sulfate mineralogy and crystal habit. This has enabled the correlation at Prungle of depositional environment with gypsum petrofacies and associated compositional, fabric or structural features. These observations are more generally applicable to other evaporite deposits. Many gypsum evaporites reported in the literature have been compared with this scheme developed at Prungle.

Mapping and monitoring land cover in the Willandra Lakes World Heritage Region

Abstract Landsat digital data is used to map land cover in the Willandra Lakes World Heritage Region in the semi-arid region of New South Wales. An unsupervised classification using a migrating means clustering algorithm followed by a maximum-likelihood classification procedure was found to be the most discriminating method of classifying land cover. The results of applying three change-detection routines to multitemporal data sets of selected sites within the region are presented and discussed.

Cranial thickening in an Australian hominid as a possible palaeoepidemiological indicator

This paper describes the cranial thickening of a late Pleistocene hominid (Willandra Lakes Hominid 50) from Australia. The unusual development of the vault structures in this individual has few, if any, equals among other hominids or more recent populations from around the world. The vault morphology is, therefore, described in terms of a pathologically related condition associated with the modern haemolytic blood dyscrasias, typical of sickle cell anamia and thalassemia. A possible palaeoepidemiology for these genetic adaptations among early Australasian populations is proposed together with a discussion of similar changes observed in the vault of the Singa calvarium from the Sudan. It is tentatively suggested that the cranial thickening of the Australian hominid has its origins in some form of genetic blood disease and that if this diagnosis is correct, this individual provides a rare glimpse of human biological adaptation in the late Upper Pleistocene.

Changes in Activities with the Shift to Agriculture in the Southeastern United States

Changes in Activities with the Shift to Agriculture in the Southeastern United States

A survey of the mammal fauna of the Willandra Lakes World Heritage region, New South Wales

A survey of the mammal fauna of the Willandra Lakes World Heritage region, New South Wales

A Regional Environmental Plan for the Willandra Lakes World Heritage Region

The Willandra Lakes region was registered on the UNESCO World Heritage List in October 1981, on the basis of both the cultural heritage value of the archaeological finds there, and the natural heritage value of the environment, specifically the Pleistocene landforms which document climatic and environmental change. As a World Heritage property, the Willandra Lakes Region falls under the provisions of the International Convention for the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage 1972 (The World Heritage Convention) which was ratified by Australia in August 1974. It also falls under the provisions of the Federal Government's World Heritage Properties Conservation Act 1983, which was particularly designed to prevent the damming of the Franklin River in western Tasmania.

Pleistocene mammal extinctions: the problem of Mungo and Menindee, New South Wales

The lunettes at Mungo and other dry lakes along Willandra Creek in western New South Wales have provided the best dated late Pleistocene geomorphological sequence for Australia. They also contain the oldest archaeological material, including human burials and cremations, in Australia, but the remains of extinct Pleistocene mammal species are extremely rare. At Menindee and other lakes along the Darling River, 150 km to the west, lunettes of apparently similar age contain both archaeological material and abundant fossils of extinct species. The rarity of such fossils along the Willandra Lakes has been cited as evidence that the extinction of the Pleistocene species occurred before 30,000 BP. However, a comparison of the Darling and Willandra sites in terms of taphonomy and palaeoecology leads to the conclusion that these sites do not yet provide any definitive evidence for the time or causes of the Pleistocene extinctions.