Harvey Johnston

Bio: Harvey Johnston is an academic researcher from Parks and Wildlife Service. The author has contributed to research in topics: Archaeological record & Glacial period. The author has an hindex of 5, co-authored 5 publications receiving 734 citations.

New ages for human occupation and climatic change at Lake Mungo, Australia

Abstract: Australia's oldest human remains, found at Lake Mungo, include the world's oldest ritual ochre burial (Mungo III) and the first recorded cremation (Mungo I). Until now, the importance of these finds has been constrained by limited chronologies and palaeoenvironmental information. Mungo III, the source of the world's oldest human mitochondrial DNA, has been variously estimated at 30 thousand years (kyr) old, 42-45 kyr old and 62 +/- 6 kyr old, while radiocarbon estimates placed the Mungo I cremation near 20-26 kyr ago. Here we report a new series of 25 optical ages showing that both burials occurred at 40 +/- 2 kyr ago and that humans were present at Lake Mungo by 50-46 kyr ago, synchronously with, or soon after, initial occupation of northern and western Australia. Stratigraphic evidence indicates fluctuations between lake-full and drier conditions from 50 to 40 kyr ago, simultaneously with increased dust deposition, human arrival and continent-wide extinction of the megafauna. This was followed by sustained aridity between 40 and 30 kyr ago. This new chronology corrects previous estimates for human burials at this important site and provides a new picture of Homo sapiens adapting to deteriorating climate in the world's driest inhabited continent.

Human predation contributed to the extinction of the Australian megafaunal bird Genyornis newtoni ~47 ka

Abstract: Although the temporal overlap between human dispersal across Australia and the disappearance of its largest animals is well established, the lack of unambiguous evidence for human-megafauna interactions has led some to question a human role in megafaunal extinction. Here we show that diagnostic burn patterns on eggshell fragments of the megafaunal bird Genyornis newtoni, found at >200 sites across Australia, were created by humans discarding eggshell in and around transient fires, presumably made to cook the eggs. Dating by three methods restricts their occurrence to between 53.9 and 43.4 ka, and likely before 47 ka. Dromaius (emu) eggshell occur frequently in deposits from >100 ka to present; burnt Dromaius eggshell first appear in deposits the same age as those with burnt Genyornis eggshell, and then continually to modern time. Harvesting of their eggs by humans would have decreased Genyornis reproductive success, contributing to the bird's extinction by ∼47 ka.

Willandra Lakes Archaeological Investigations 1968–98

Abstract: The 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.

The impact of visitors on Aboriginal sites in Mungo National Park

Abstract: Visitor impact is an inherent and dynamic component of cultural heritage management whenever cultural sites are accessed by people. Mungo National Park has become the focus of some 35,000 visitors per year. The impacts these visitors have on the archaeological record are investigated in this study. A series of fourteen mock sites, composed of stone artefact and bone scatters, were created in the park and the impacts that visitors had on these sites were monitored over a five month period. The results indicate that high visitation areas are subject to a variety of impacts, and site components are frequently moved, turned over, clustered and pilfered. Recognition of these impacts can lead to improvements in the management and conservation of archaeological sites.

The human Y chromosome: an evolutionary marker comes of age

Abstract: Until recently, the Y chromosome seemed to fulfil the role of juvenile delinquent among human chromosomes — rich in junk, poor in useful attributes, reluctant to socialize with its neighbours and with an inescapable tendency to degenerate. The availability of the near-complete chromosome sequence, plus many new polymorphisms, a highly resolved phylogeny and insights into its mutation processes, now provide new avenues for investigating human evolution. Y-chromosome research is growing up.

Human occupation of northern Australia by 65,000 years ago

Abstract: The time of arrival of people in Australia is an unresolved question. It is relevant to debates about when modern humans first dispersed out of Africa and when their descendants incorporated genetic material from Neanderthals, Denisovans and possibly other hominins. Humans have also been implicated in the extinction of Australia’s megafauna. Here we report the results of new excavations conducted at Madjedbebe, a rock shelter in northern Australia. Artefacts in primary depositional context are concentrated in three dense bands, with the stratigraphic integrity of the deposit demonstrated by artefact refits and by optical dating and other analyses of the sediments. Human occupation began around 65,000 years ago, with a distinctive stone tool assemblage including grinding stones, ground ochres, reflective additives and ground-edge hatchet heads. This evidence sets a new minimum age for the arrival of humans in Australia, the dispersal of modern humans out of Africa, and the subsequent interactions of modern humans with Neanderthals and Denisovans. Optical dating of sediments containing stone artefacts newly excavated at Madjedbebe, Australia, indicate that human occupation began around 65,000 years ago, thereby setting a new minimum age for the arrival of people in Australia. When did humans first colonize Australia? The date of the initial landing on the continent that is now associated with cold lager and 'Waltzing Matilda' has been highly controversial. Dates from a site called Madjedbebe in northern Australia had put the presence of modern humans in Australia at between 60,000 and 50,000 years ago, but these results have since been hotly contested. Here, the results from a comprehensive program of dating of new excavations at the site confirm that people first arrived there around 65,000 years ago. The results show that humans reached Australia well before the extinction of the Australian megafauna and the disappearance of Homo floresiensis in neighbouring Indonesia.

The Archaeology of Aquatic Adaptations: Paradigms for a New Millennium

Abstract: Although aquatic resources are often seen as central to the development of post-Pleistocene cultural complexity, most models of human evolution have all but ignored the role of aquatic or maritime adaptations during the earlier stages of human history. When did aquatic resources, maritime adaptations, and seafaring first play a significant role in human evolution? I explore this fundamental question by (1) reviewing various theories on the subject; (2) discussing a variety of problems that prevent archaeologists from providing a clear answer; and (3) examining the archaeological record for evidence of early aquatic resource use or seafaring. I conclude that aquatic resources, wherever they were both abundant and relatively accessible, have probably always been used opportunistically by our ancestors. Evidence suggests, however, that aquatic and maritime adaptations (including seafaring) played a significantly greater role in the demographic and geographic expansion of anatomically modern humans after about 150,000 years ago. Another significant expansion occurred somewhat later in time, with the development of more sophisticated seafaring, fishing, and marine hunting technologies.

Why did modern human populations disperse from Africa ca. 60,000 years ago? A new model

Abstract: Recent research has provided increasing support for the origins of anatomically and genetically “modern” human populations in Africa between 150,000 and 200,000 years ago, followed by a major dispersal of these populations to both Asia and Europe sometime after ca. 65,000 before present (B.P.). However, the central question of why it took these populations ≈100,000 years to disperse from Africa to other regions of the world has never been clearly resolved. It is suggested here that the answer may lie partly in the results of recent DNA studies of present-day African populations, combined with a spate of new archaeological discoveries in Africa. Studies of both the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) mismatch patterns in modern African populations and related mtDNA lineage-analysis patterns point to a major demographic expansion centered broadly within the time range from 80,000 to 60,000 B.P., probably deriving from a small geographical region of Africa. Recent archaeological discoveries in southern and eastern Africa suggest that, at approximately the same time, there was a major increase in the complexity of the technological, economic, social, and cognitive behavior of certain African groups, which could have led to a major demographic expansion of these groups in competition with other, adjacent groups. It is suggested that this complex of behavioral changes (possibly triggered by the rapid environmental changes around the transition from oxygen isotope stage 5 to stage 4) could have led not only to the expansion of the L2 and L3 mitochondrial lineages over the whole of Africa but also to the ensuing dispersal of these modern populations over most regions of Asia, Australasia, and Europe, and their replacement (with or without interbreeding) of the preceding “archaic” populations in these regions.

Going east: new genetic and archaeological perspectives on the modern human colonization of Eurasia.

Abstract: The pattern of dispersal of biologically and behaviorally modern human populations from their African origins to the rest of the occupied world between ∼60,000 and 40,000 years ago is at present a topic of lively debate, centering principally on the issue of single versus multiple dispersals. Here I argue that the archaeological and genetic evidence points to a single successful dispersal event, which took genetically and culturally modern populations fairly rapidly across southern and southeastern Asia into Australasia, and with only a secondary and later dispersal into Europe.