The earliest evidence of high-elevation ice age occupation in Australia

Abstract

Australia’s Eastern Highlands have traditionally been viewed as a cold-climate barrier to Late Pleistocene (~35,000–11,700 years ago) mobility, with older evidence restricted to elevations below the periglacial zone. However, this model has not been adequately tested with regionally specific, high-resolution archaeological data. Here we report excavation results from a high-altitude (1,073 m) cave, Dargan Shelter, in the upper Blue Mountains, which indicate that occupation first occurred ~20,000 years ago, during the Last Glacial Maximum, making this the highest elevation Pleistocene site identified in Australia so far. Findings include multiple in situ hearths and 693 stone artefacts, several of which were sourced from sites along the mountain range, providing evidence for previously undetected interactions to the north and south and the repeated use of this cold-climate landscape during the Late Pleistocene. Our results align the Australian continent with global sequences, which indicate that cold climates were not necessarily natural barriers to human mobility and occupation.