Pleistocene Extinction of
            <i>Genyornis newtoni</i>
            : Human Impact on Australian Megafauna

Miller, Gifford H.; Magee, John; Johnson, Beverly J.; Fogel, Marilyn L.; Spooner, Nigel A.; McCulloch, Malcolm T.; Ayliffe, Linda K.

doi:10.1126/science.283.5399.205

Cited by 342 publications

(222 citation statements)

References 18 publications

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“…Under the Allen and coworkers interpretation, this would imply that modern humans arrived in Australia at the same time as both modern humans and extinct Neanderthal arrived in Europe, possibly about 50 ka. Similarly, the distributions in Figure 4B would imply that modern Australians, who were certainly eating the extant fish, shellfish, and emu, could also have been eating the extinct Genyornis (n=22, Miller et al 1999) over this time range.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 94%

Dating the First Australians

Gillespie¹

2002

Radiocarbon

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ABSTRACT. The dating of selected archaeological and megafaunal sites from the Australian region is reviewed, with emphasis on recent work at some of the oldest sites. Improved chemical procedures with decreased analytical background for 14 C analysis, combined with new luminescence dating methods, has confirmed many of the results processed decades ago and significantly increased the maximum age for some others. The oldest occupation horizons in four different regions reliably dated by defendable multi-method results are in the range 42-48,000 calendar years ago, overlapping with the age range for similarly well-dated undisturbed sites containing the youngest extinct megafauna. There is less secure evidence suggesting some archaeology may be earlier and some megafauna may have survived later than this period. INTRODUCTIONEstimates of the time since humans first occupied the extended Late Pleistocene continent Sahul (sometimes called Greater Australia or Meganesia) have steadily increased since systematic archaeological excavation and radiocarbon dating became established in the 1960s. Jones (1968) considered 30,000 BP a reasonable estimate for the earliest arrivals, based on the available evidence showing 3 or 4 sites with 14 C dates of more than 20,000 BP. In the second edition of The Prehistory of Australia (Mulvaney 1975) an appended date list documented four sites in Australia and one in New Guinea with 14 C results older than 25,000 BP. The current edition (Mulvaney and Kamminga 1999) provides an overview of the hundreds of dates now accumulated for Late Pleistocene archaeological sites in Sahul. Some of the robust debate about claims for earliest occupation of the region is presented in Murray (1998).Traditional 14 C dating using radiometric counting has become less important in Sahul, as elsewhere, since accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) laboratories began to take on large workloads from the mid 1980s. In many situations this new measurement technology also allowed better pretreatment chemistry to be applied in the isolation and decontamination of specific sample components. At about the same time newer thermoluminescence (TL), optically stimulated luminescence (OSL), electron spin resonance (ESR), amino acid racemization (AAR), and uranium-thorium series (U/Th) dating methods began to make significant contributions to archaeology and the earth sciences. These and other techniques operate under different rules and on different materials to 14 C. An "archaeological event" such as a fire may sensibly be 14 C dated using charcoal, whereas luminescence methods on quartz sand are likely to be dating an "environmental event" such as exposure to sunlight, not necessarily directly associated with the target archaeological event. However, since everyone should eventually get the same answer to questions like "when did humans first colonize Australia" or "when did the megafauna become extinct" there are some instructive examples of cross-dating with different numerical methods.Projects such as dating the first Au...

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 94%

Dating the First Australians

Gillespie¹

2002

Radiocarbon

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“…As discussed above, the AAR technique has the limitation that less racemisation occurs within glacial periods, causing ratios to overlap from successive interglacials (e.g. Miller et al, 1999;McCarroll, 2002;Penkman et al, 2008b, in press). Whilst this overlap is less pronounced when analysing calcitic opercula, it is still necessary to also take into account palaeoenvironmental and biostratigraphic evidence.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The mechanism of the protein breakdown reactions means that increased degradation occurs during warm stages and there is a slowing in the rates of degradation in cold stages (e.g. see Figure 2 in Miller et al, 1999). As little decomposition occurs in cold stages, and there is a degree of natural variability in biological samples, it can be difficult to discriminate the end of one warm stage from the beginning of the next (Penkman et al, 2008b) and the separation between the end of MIS 11 and the beginning of MIS 9 is particularly difficult using the amino acids presented here (Ashton et al, 2008;Roe et al, 2009).…”

Section: Aar Valuesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Integrated chronological control on an archaeologically significant Pleistocene river terrace sequence: the Thames-Medway, eastern Essex, England

Briant

Kilfeather

Parfitt

et al. 2012

Proceedings of the Geologists' Association

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“…In addition, at some point during the Quaternary megafauna including Diprotodon, Genyomis and other giant marsupials became extinct. Miller et al (7) suggested that this extinction might be related to the arrival of hominins. Alternatively extinction might have resulted from environmental changes.…”

Section: Marsupial Teethmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Ages can, therefore, be cross-calibrated both with 14 C and with ^Ar/^Ar results. Most archaeological applications have used enamel from teeth of large placental mammals such as bovids and equids, in part because teeth, being the hardest tissues in the body, are often preserved (7). There are many environments and time periods where placental mammals are rare or non-existent.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%