In the 20th century it was accepted that Australian Aboriginals had first arrived more than 50,000 years ago. Then science brought this forward to perhaps 40,000 years from the present. New research puts the date to at least 43,000 years in the desert.
A rock shelter in the Australian Western Desert had human habitation until the end of the most recent Ice Age. Researchers now agree that occupation of Australia goes back over 60,000 years. A hafted multifunctional tool found at the desert site shows the tech was used 15,000 years earlier than believed.
Aboriginal culture did advance technologically as they spread right across the continent probably within 10,000 years of their arrival. Rock art was developed in recent times, but it was a culmination of evolving adaptation.
◆ ANTHROPOLOGY ◆
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