Australian 49,000-year-old human settlement discovered; proves human responsibility for megafauna extinction
The discovery was originally found by Adnyamathanha elder Clifford Coulthard when he was searching for a toilet and accidentally stumbled in the oldest known evidence of Aboriginal settlement. Scientists believed that the site, 550 kilometers north of Adelaide known as Warattyi has been settled by Aboriginal Australian 49,000 years ago.
According to Forbes, the find gives another interesting answer to the theory that humans are responsible for the extinction of megafauna. Archaeologist Giles Hamm from La Trobe University in Melbourne together with his team found bones of humans and tools, also the earliest known use of pigment ochre.
There are also artifacts that include burnt eggshells, sharpened stone and bone tools, red ochre and gypsum pigments, technologies that the team speculated were developed locally.
The shells were believed to have come from emus and an extinct bird from Genyornis genus. Also bones of extinct wombat-like species Diprodoton optatum.
The fact that the said bones were found in the shelter of early Aboriginal Australians prompted them to conclude that early settlers have close encounters with the legendary megafauna. They hunted them and brought their bones in their shelter.
Science Alert reported that Gavin Prideaux from Flinders University in Adelaide said that the good thing about this study is that no doubt that megafauna remains in the form of Diprodoton and a giant bird is well dated to be roaming the area at around 45,000 and 50,000 years ago.
."The only way those bones and shells got there is because people brought them there ... in terms of megafauna that's the really significant finding. "Humans evidently lived alongside these animals and hunted them, so the idea that there wasn't any interaction between people and these animals is put to bed now," Prideaux added.
Scientists have been using radio carbon dating since and could calculate the sequence of occurrence basing on actual findings.
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