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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
 Posted - 07/26/2006 : 14:51:03
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This LiveScience article includes fascinating photos of Pleistocene era footprints left in a dry lake bed by the likely ancestors of modern Australian aboriginal peoples:
  
quote:
Ancient Human Footprints Uncovered in Australia
By Ker Than
LiveScience Staff Writer
posted: 26 July 2006
04:16 pm ET
About 20,000 years ago, humans trekked along the margins of a shallow lake in Australia, leaving behind records of their passage in the soft, wet sand.
In 2003, an aboriginal woman who is likely a descendant of those early Australians stumbled across dozens of timeworn footprints in the same area. Excavations of the site have since uncovered hundreds more.
The discovery, detailed in a recent issue of the Journal of Human Evolution, represents the largest collection of Pleistocene human footprints in the world, and the only footprints from that era ever found in Australia. In total, 457 footprints have now been uncovered.
"The preservation is just remarkable," said study team member Matthew Cupper of the University of Melbourne in Australia. "You can see quite clearly how mud oozes between the toes."
The Pleistocene stretched from about 2 million to 12,000 years ago.
. . .
Myself, I'm curious to know if any dog footprints were found in association with the human prints. I see no mention of that, so I'm left wondering if the dingo was introduced to Australia by later migrants, or by traders.
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
Edited by - HalfMooner on 07/26/2006 14:51:42
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