Archaeology in Oceania

Abstract

A general model is outlined showing how the prehistoric development of clothing for thermal reasons may be relevant to the emergence of modern human behaviour. A distinction is drawn between simple and complex clothing, with the latter leading to repercussions that can ultimately became decoupled from thermal contingencies. Archaeological correlates of complex clothing can be linked to attributes of modern human behaviour, some but not all of which made a transient...

All but one of the papers on this topic published in this and the next issue of Archaeology in Oceania were first presented in the Indo-Pacific Prehistory Association conference in Manila in March 2006. The session was organized by Julie Field and I and titled 'Climate Change in the Indo Pacific: Human Responses from the Late Pleistocene to the Little Ice Age'. Six of the original eleven presenters, plus one additional presenter from another IPPA session, are represented here....

Abstract

A number of archaeologists have suggested that significant climatic change with environmental and social consequences occurred between 1000 and 400 years ago in the Indo-Pacific region. We investigate this premise by examining the archaeological record of changes in hunter-gatherer economies in three geographically distinct coastal regions of tropical northern Australia. These case studies support the argument that Aboriginal mollusc exploitation reflects the altered...