Page 21 - Barrow Island News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

A key inquiry in Pleistocene human coastal adaptations asks whether coastlines were productive littoral patches that were consistently utilized over time or did fluctuating sea levels make them marginally productive patches that only supplemented terrestrially oriented foraging. Investigating this issue is challenging because rising glacio-eustatic sea levels submerged most evidence of Pleistocene coastal occupation. We address the question directly by integrating this analysis of open-air lithic assemblages with previously reported cave excavations on Barrow and adjacent islands in Western Australia. Well-dated, stratified cave deposits bracket occupation of Barrow Island from c. 50 ka to 7 ka, when rising sea levels severed pedestrian access to the mainland. Consequently, the open-air sites are a solely Pleistocene to Early Holocene record of land-use when the extensive North West Shelf was as a vast coastal plain. These assemblages offer evidence of human interaction with Pleistocen

Barrow islandWestern australiaAnne hayesJane hylandRobyn davisonGlenys hayesBuurabalayji thalanyji aboriginal corporationEarly holoceneNorth west shelfNorth westBarrow island archaeologyThalanyji knowledge holders