Papers by Jillian Huntley
Scientific Reports, 2021
The equatorial tropics house some of the earliest rock art yet known, and it is weathering at an ... more The equatorial tropics house some of the earliest rock art yet known, and it is weathering at an alarming rate. Here we present evidence for haloclasty (salt crystallisation) from Pleistocene aged rock art panels at 11 sites in the Maros-Pangkep limestone karsts of southern Sulawesi.
We show how quickly rock art panels have degraded in recent decades, contending that climate catalysed salt efflorescence is responsible for increasing exfoliation of the limestone cave surfaces that house the ~ 45 to 20-thousand-year-old paintings. These artworks are located in the world’s most atmospherically dynamic region, the Australasian monsoon domain. The rising frequency and severity of El Niño-induced droughts from anthropogenic climate change (that is, higher ambient temperatures and more consecutive dry days), combined with seasonal moisture injected via monsoonal rains retained as standing water in the rice fields and aquaculture ponds of the region, increasingly provide ideal conditions for evaporation and haloclasty, accelerating rock art deterioration.
Quaternary International, 2020
For nearly 70 years scientific techniques have been routinely applied in archaeological research.... more For nearly 70 years scientific techniques have been routinely applied in archaeological research. Yet some artefacts hold such cultural significance that sampling is inappropriate, restricting the methods that can be brought to bear in their analysis. Such restrictions often apply to rock art, especially where research is directed by the indigenous peoples who have stewardship over not only the site fabric, but its inseparable cultural context. Here we report a multi-technique program of in-field and laboratory-based analyses to describe the materiality of a painted rock art site in Nyiyaparli country, in the Central Pilbara region of Western Australia. The relationship between the rock art, nearby potential pigment sources and evidence for ochre processing at the site was investigated using in situ portable X-Ray Fluorescence and optical microscopy, with interpretations aided by field and laboratory-based residue analysis of grinding related stone artefacts and X-Ray Powder Diffraction of potential ochre sources. Our findings provide an example of the nuanced interpretations that scientific analyses can add to rock art investigations. Our work suggests that local materials were used in the production of painted art and that ochre processing was ubiquitous at the site and other nearby rockshelters. Combined with the placement of rock art in a hidden context within the site, we suggest the panels at BBH15-01 were part of in-group events and that art and ochre processing in the Baby Hope study area were part of everyday activities.
Rock Art Research, 2019
In the Hunter Valley of New South Wales, Australia, a deeply worrying trend has emerged where the... more In the Hunter Valley of New South Wales, Australia, a deeply worrying trend has emerged where the approval of major mining projects is predicated on the rescinding of areas previously set aside to conserve environmental, including heritage, values. Here, I want to explore the juxtaposition of a landmark dual listing for the well-known and highly culturally significant rock art site of Baiame Cave, against the devastating impacts on community well-being posed by the extension of the Mt Thorley Walkworth Mine. The long-awaited judicial recognition of place attachment and the acknowledgment of negative consequences for community well-being via landscape-scale transformations from mining at the village of Bul-ga appear at odds with the almost simultaneous dual listing of the nearby Baiame Cave as an Aboriginal Place and a place of State Significance (inscribed on the NSW Heritage List). This case study adds to a burgeoning global literature on the complex impacts mining and other large-scale industrial activities have on indigenous heritage. The frightening example given here should serve to raise scrutiny for legislative processes and decision-making frameworks governing heritage protection everywhere.
Synchrotron Radiation News, 2018
In the Australian Synchrotron’s short history, we have made some
important advances in instrument... more In the Australian Synchrotron’s short history, we have made some
important advances in instruments and capabilities that can be employed to study art and archaeology. In this article, we describe the capabilities at the Australian Synchrotron that are well-suited to investigating art, archaeology, and cultural heritage. We also present some case studies that demonstrate the breadth and impact of science that has been performed by researchers using these capabilities.
PLOS ONE, 2020
The Kimberley region of Western Australia is one of the largest and most diverse rock art provena... more The Kimberley region of Western Australia is one of the largest and most diverse rock art provenances in the world, with a complex stylistic sequence spanning at least 16 ka, culminating in the modern art-making of the Wunumbal people. The Gunu Site Complex, in the remote Mitchell River region of the northwest Kimberley, is one of many local expressions of the Kimberley rock art sequence. Here we report excavations at two sites in this complex: Gunu Rock, a sand sheet adjacent to rock art panels; and Gunu Cave, a floor deposit within
an extensive rockshelter. Excavations at Gunu Rock provide evidence for two phases of occupation, the first from 7–8 to 2.7 ka, and the second from 1064 cal BP. Excavations at Gunu Rock provide evidence for occupation from the end of the second phase to the recent past. Stone for tools in the early phase were procured from a variety of sources, but quartz crystal reduction dominated the second occupation phase. Small quartz crystals were reduced by freehand percussion to provide small flake tools and blanks for manufacturing small points called nguni by the Wunambal people today. Quartz crystals were prominent in historic ritual practices associated with the Wanjina belief system. Complex methods of making bifacially-thinned and pressure flaked quartzite projectile points emerged after 2.7 ka. Ochre pigments were common in both occupation phases, but evidence for occupation contemporaneous with the putative age of the oldest rock art styles was not discovered in the excavations. Our results show that developing a complete understanding of rock art production and local occupation patterns requires paired excavations inside and outside of the rockshelters that dominate the Kimberley.
Australian Archaeology, 2020
Little is known about cultural change on the inlets of the northern subcoastal plains of the Alli... more Little is known about cultural change on the inlets of the northern subcoastal plains of the Alligator Rivers region during the transition period between sea-level highstand c.8,000 BP and the establishment of freshwater wetlands (c.2,000 BP to present). The research presented
here begins to fill this gap by illustrating differences in Indigenous land-use at two sites only a few kilometres apart and both dating to c.1,000 years ago. Located on the lower reaches of the South Alligator River within what is now Kakadu National Park, the earth mound Myaranji 1 and the shell midden Djindibi 1 provide a snapshot of settlement and subsistence strategies practiced on the floodplains in the late Holocene. This paper presents the analyses of the cultural materials recovered from these two open sites, including those of invertebrate and vertebrate faunal remains, shell and stone artefacts, and pigment on artefacts. Interpretation of the data suggests that occupation was relatively short-lived. Differential representation of food resources indicates that each site was occupied in different seasons. Both local manufacture and regional connectivity are suggested by ochre use and stone artefact working. Evidence from other regional sites implies a subsequent focus for settlement to the south and east.
Australian Archaeology, 2019
The ‘direct’ dating of rock art has proliferated since the development of accelerator mass spectr... more The ‘direct’ dating of rock art has proliferated since the development of accelerator mass spectrometry radiocarbon, uranium-series and optically stimulated luminescence dating, yet still, most rock art is not directly datable due to the mineral nature of the constituent pigments. Here we present another method: the recovery and dating by stratigraphic association of small buried fragments of ochre and dried paint drops deposited onto soft sediment surfaces as by-products of paint production and use. These finds also give added contextual occupational information for archaeology of painting events. The case is made through the example of Borologa 1, a richly decorated Wanjina rockshelter in the Kimberley region of northwestern Australia that contains buried hearths, grindstones, earth pigments and small fallen spalls of rock containing traces of pigment and paint drops. Results from excavation indicate the beginning of Wanjina motifs and associated painting conventions on Art Panel B1 sometime between 2,080–1,160 cal BP and their proliferation in the past millennium.
Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 2018
The materials used to create rock art preserve information regarding how and, in some instances, ... more The materials used to create rock art preserve information regarding how and, in some instances, when it was made. Here we outline the field based, geochemical study of three white hand stencils on the Sunshine Coast of Queensland, Australia. Portable X-ray fluorescence analysis determined that all hand stencils were made using a titanium based pigment, almost certainly commercially produced white paint. Significantly this helped us assign a chronology, inferring that the rock art must have been produced in the colonial period. The amount of titanium in the paint likely reflects a mid-twentieth century recipe, specifically> 1960, rather than a modern, twenty first century paint. The manner in which the stencils were made and their arrangement upon the sandstone boulder is consistent with Aboriginal rock art across the continent, and chemical indicators of post-depositional weathering suggest the stencils have been in place for many decades. Rather than ‘second-hand copies’ of Aboriginal art made by European descendants, we suggest that these stencils provide rare insight into the continuing cultural traditions of the Indigenous peoples of southeast Queensland during the mid-1900s, a time of significant socio-political change for Aboriginal Australians.
Wallacea, the zone of oceanic islands separating the continental regions of Southeast Asia and Au... more Wallacea, the zone of oceanic islands separating the continental regions of Southeast Asia and Australia, has yielded sparse evidence for the symbolic culture of early modern humans. Here we report evidence for symbolic activity 30,000–22,000 y ago at Leang Bulu Bettue, a cave and rock-shelter site on the Wallacean island of Sulawesi. We describe hitherto undocumented practices of personal ornamentation and portable art, alongside evidence for pigment processing and use in deposits that are the same age as dated rock art in the surrounding karst region. Previously, assemblages of multiple and diverse types of Pleistocene " symbolic " artifacts were entirely unknown from this region. The Leang Bulu Bettue assemblage provides insight into the complexity and diversification of modern human culture during a key period in the global dispersal of our species. It also shows that early inhabitants of Sulawesi fashioned ornaments from body parts of endemic animals, suggesting modern humans integrated exotic faunas and other novel resources into their symbolic world as they colonized the biogeographically unique regions southeast of continental Eurasia.
The significance of ochre in Indigenous Australia is well documented. Several large, well-known q... more The significance of ochre in Indigenous Australia is well documented. Several large, well-known quarries containing ochre that is highly sought after have been
described in the archaeological literature, however less attention has been paid to smaller, regionally and locally significant quarries. In this paper a small yellow ochre quarry (VSTA_20140611_1) from the Central Pilbara, where evidence of paint preparation is preserved in the form of residues in two in situ grinding hollows, is described in order to address this oversight. Portable XRF (pXRF) analysis of the pigment in the quarry itself and the paint in the hollows was undertaken to understand the chemistry of the pigmentaceous minerals, to explore the taphonomy of the ochre seam, and to gauge variation within the source. Chemistry indicates that the VSTA_20140611_1 quarry is composed of an iron mineral (likely a hydroxide such as goethite), with Fe abundances consistently between 10.7 and 30%. Typical of the regional geology, the yellow
pigment is consistently siliceous, with an Si abundance of between 5.8 and 20.4%. As there are no painted motifs in the rockshelter containing the VSTA_20140611_1 quarry, nor on the suitable BIF surfaces nearby, it is considered highly likely that the surviving paint produced on-site was used for
either body decoration or the adornment of artefacts, rather than for rock art production. Nevertheless, the similarity in chemical composition between the
VSTA_20140611_1 pigments and that of motifs painted in sites a few kilometres away suggests that, in addition to immediate processing and use at the site, ochre
from this quarry may have been transported to rockshelters in the vicinity and used for rock art production.
The non-destructive nature of X-ray fluorescence (XRF) spectrometers is a principal reason for an... more The non-destructive nature of X-ray fluorescence (XRF) spectrometers is a principal reason for an increase in their use in archaeological science over the last 15 years, especially for analysing museum-curated artefacts and in situ site fabrics. Here, we show that low power XRF spectrometry can be detrimental for luminescence dating (surface applications such as mud-wasp nest dating in particular). We investigated the effects of irradiation by X-rays emitted from handheld and benchtop spectrometers on optically stimulated luminescence (OSL) signals. Measurements were taken using a portable OSL (pOSL) unit on the following unprepared archaeological materials: sedimentary quartz grains, pottery, a mud-wasp nest, stone tools and a rock flake with anthropogenically applied pigment and natural pigmentation (iron oxides). We observed an increase in luminescence compared to initial background counts for all materials tested, which could lead to overestimation of age determinations in some situations. Our experiment provides a reminder of the potential effects of X-ray radiation, and the need for thorough documentation of all recording and analytical techniques applied to archaeological materials.
Messages in Paint: An archaeometric analysis of pigment use in Aboriginal Australia focusing on t... more Messages in Paint: An archaeometric analysis of pigment use in Aboriginal Australia focusing on the production of rock art
One of the most fundamental problems facing rock art researchers is understanding the age of thei... more One of the most fundamental problems facing rock art researchers is understanding the age of their subject. In the absence of numeric age determinations, rock art chronologies have often been inferred by extrapolating the ages associated with subsurface ochres. Here I have used portable x-ray fluorescence spectrometry (pXRF) to assess if the association between rock art and buried ochres proposed by researchers at two sites in the Sydney Basin — Dingo and Horned Anthropomorph and Yengo 1 — can be demonstrated. I found that pXRF can determine if there is no relationship between archaeological pigments. Where geochemical similarities are found, pXRF does not have the analytic precision to unequivocally link archaeological ochres, but it does provide a robust and readily accessible step in the right direction. The method outlined here therefore provides an inexpensive means of generating complementary chronological (and behavioural) information within rock art studies
Australian Archaeology, Jun 2014
We report the identification of minerals in stratified paint layers from a Wandjina motif in the ... more We report the identification of minerals in stratified paint layers from a Wandjina motif in the central Kimberley region, Western Australia, via synchrotron powder diffraction. Interpreting our findings with reference to previous pigment characterisations of Wandjina motifs, we outline the potential of this method for rock art investigations. We particularly highlight the implications of successful major and minor phase identification in very small (~3 μg) pigment samples. The results of this pilot study show that crystallographic data is critical in helping to separate environmental/cultural signatures from post-depositional processes within anthropogenically applied pigments. In Wandjina rock art, crystallography facilitates the examination of the cultural context of rock art production within an assemblage ethnographically known to have undergone regular, ritual repainting.
Archaeometry 57-1:77-99, Jan 2015
Distinctive mulberry paintings found in northern Australia, particularly those of Kimberley regio... more Distinctive mulberry paintings found in northern Australia, particularly those of Kimberley region, have been argued to represent some of the oldest surviving rock art on the continent. Significant research efforts continue to focus on resolving the age of these motifs, but comparatively little attention has been given to understanding their physical composition and potential source(s). In a pilot investigation we conclude that (at least) two mineralogically distinct mulberry pigments occur in Gwion motifs and demonstrate that their major components can be indicatively chemically differentiated, non-invasively. Characterisation of a ‘quarried’ mulberry ochre source demonstrates that these pigments occur locally as natural minerals.
Journal of the Australian Association of Consulting Archaeologists, Volume 1: 1-14
As part of the environmental impact assessment (EIA) process, the Hunter Valley has been subject ... more As part of the environmental impact assessment (EIA) process, the Hunter Valley has been subject to decades of archaeological investigations involving many Aboriginal stakeholder groups. This paper critically discusses the EIA process, specifically the Aboriginal cultural heritage assessment (ACHA) process and the Aboriginal consultation requirements (ACHRs) for New South Wales (NSW) drawing on our collective experience of cultural heritage management (CHM) in the Hunter Valley. We examine the definition of ‘values’ and the identification of heritage within the history of relevant legislation in NSW to critique the ACHA process in the Hunter Valley. We introduce the relevance of the concept ‘solastalgia’, relating concerns for heritage to effects of ‘environmental distress’ from the cumulative impacts of mining and its relevance to the ACHA process. CHM legislation and practice is currently under review by the NSW State government, we hope to stimulate constructive dialogue on these issues based on our collective experience.
Australian Archaeology, Dec 2012
Portable spectrographic techniques have desirable attributes for archaeological investigations be... more Portable spectrographic techniques have desirable attributes for archaeological investigations because they can be applied in the field non-invasively and non-destructively. With the increasing ubiquity of portable spectrographic techniques in Australia it is timely that the complexities of field-based analyses are discussed. A review of portable x-ray fluorescence (PXRF), including the limitations of the technique, and discussion of the complex physical interactions encapsulated by the resulting elemental data, provide a firm basis for interpreting the analysis of a rock art panel on the Woronora Plateau, New South Wales. PXRF data supports the results of previous (laboratory-based) pigment characterisations, that a locally sourced, composite clay based paint was used to produce rock art. Results highlight the requirement for specific knowledge and expertise, not only in relation to the technique, but also the rock art under investigation and, critically, its taphonomic context. Ultimately this case study demonstrates that portable spectrometry should be considered an addition to the existing repertoire of archaeometric techniques applicable to the study of rock art, rather than as a replacement for laboratory analyses.
Abstract. This paper presents the results and interpretations of a pilot study of pigment charac... more Abstract. This paper presents the results and interpretations of a pilot study of pigment characterisations conducted between 2002 and 2006 on the rock art assemblage of the south Woronora Plateau located immediately west of Wollongong, New South Wales. Eighteen samples from ten sites are described. Analyses of the geochemistry, mineralogy and micro-morphology of samples was undertaken using a combination of scanning electron microscopy including energy dispersive x-ray analysis, x-ray diffraction, particle induced x-ray emission and particle induced gamma-ray emission techniques. With one exception the analyses show that composite clay-based paints were used to produce both iconic and non-iconic rock art on the Woronora Plateau and adjacent Mittagong Tablelands. We discuss differences in the processing of paints used for iconographic and stencil art, and consider the possible chronological and behavioural implications of paint chemistry and morphology. The results of the study, while indicative, provide an exciting example of the type of archaeometric work which can be undertaken successfully in the taphonomically complex Hawkesbury Sandstone rockshelters of the Sydney Basin.
Book Chapters by Jillian Huntley
The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of Indigenous Australia and New Guinea, 2021
Aboriginal Australians use ochre in varied cultural practices. It is found in the earliest to mos... more Aboriginal Australians use ochre in varied cultural practices. It is found in the earliest to most recent archaeological sites and geographically across the wide-ranging geological and climatic contexts of the continent. Ochre's importance in Aboriginal societies, cou pled with its availability across Australia and its long-term durability, has led to a ubiqui tous archaeological presence with considerable potential to study past cultural land scapes and intergroup interactions, including long-distance trade and exchange. Concen trating on scientific sourcing analyses, this article highlights the benefits of archaeopig ment research, defining key terms (ochre, provenience, and provenance) and the techni calities of sourcing studies before discussing theoretical frameworks used in interpreta tions of ochre distribution patterns. The article argues that as we move away from novel studies on ethnographically well-known source locations into applied research, exception al Australian records are well placed to investigate territoriality, mobility, intergroup and human-landscape interactions, and to explore the catalysts driving cultural diversity.
Defining the Fringe of Contemporary Australian Archaeology: Pyramidiots, Paranoia and the Paranormal , 2018
We all love a conspiracy theory and hopefully at some point have all been so moved by something a... more We all love a conspiracy theory and hopefully at some point have all been so moved by something as to be compelled to act. In this paper I consider the consequences for Aboriginal well-being when feelings of dispossession are triggered by Aboriginal rock art being attributed to another race (including aliens). I will also explore the indirect cultural appropriation created when artworks overtly reference distinctive Aboriginal rock art. As a nation we have made explicit attempts to progress reconciliation through domestic policy agendas, but there remains an unspoken undercurrent of discrimination against Aboriginal people. I will use unconscious bias as the thread of this paper, including exploring my own response to Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal rock art. It would be easy to slight this essay as another preachy exercise in political correctness, however the more difficult and rewarding path of acknowledging that there are valid enduring reasons that Indigenous Australians have sensitivities to cultural disassociation and appropriation is the one I want to tread.
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Papers by Jillian Huntley
We show how quickly rock art panels have degraded in recent decades, contending that climate catalysed salt efflorescence is responsible for increasing exfoliation of the limestone cave surfaces that house the ~ 45 to 20-thousand-year-old paintings. These artworks are located in the world’s most atmospherically dynamic region, the Australasian monsoon domain. The rising frequency and severity of El Niño-induced droughts from anthropogenic climate change (that is, higher ambient temperatures and more consecutive dry days), combined with seasonal moisture injected via monsoonal rains retained as standing water in the rice fields and aquaculture ponds of the region, increasingly provide ideal conditions for evaporation and haloclasty, accelerating rock art deterioration.
important advances in instruments and capabilities that can be employed to study art and archaeology. In this article, we describe the capabilities at the Australian Synchrotron that are well-suited to investigating art, archaeology, and cultural heritage. We also present some case studies that demonstrate the breadth and impact of science that has been performed by researchers using these capabilities.
an extensive rockshelter. Excavations at Gunu Rock provide evidence for two phases of occupation, the first from 7–8 to 2.7 ka, and the second from 1064 cal BP. Excavations at Gunu Rock provide evidence for occupation from the end of the second phase to the recent past. Stone for tools in the early phase were procured from a variety of sources, but quartz crystal reduction dominated the second occupation phase. Small quartz crystals were reduced by freehand percussion to provide small flake tools and blanks for manufacturing small points called nguni by the Wunambal people today. Quartz crystals were prominent in historic ritual practices associated with the Wanjina belief system. Complex methods of making bifacially-thinned and pressure flaked quartzite projectile points emerged after 2.7 ka. Ochre pigments were common in both occupation phases, but evidence for occupation contemporaneous with the putative age of the oldest rock art styles was not discovered in the excavations. Our results show that developing a complete understanding of rock art production and local occupation patterns requires paired excavations inside and outside of the rockshelters that dominate the Kimberley.
here begins to fill this gap by illustrating differences in Indigenous land-use at two sites only a few kilometres apart and both dating to c.1,000 years ago. Located on the lower reaches of the South Alligator River within what is now Kakadu National Park, the earth mound Myaranji 1 and the shell midden Djindibi 1 provide a snapshot of settlement and subsistence strategies practiced on the floodplains in the late Holocene. This paper presents the analyses of the cultural materials recovered from these two open sites, including those of invertebrate and vertebrate faunal remains, shell and stone artefacts, and pigment on artefacts. Interpretation of the data suggests that occupation was relatively short-lived. Differential representation of food resources indicates that each site was occupied in different seasons. Both local manufacture and regional connectivity are suggested by ochre use and stone artefact working. Evidence from other regional sites implies a subsequent focus for settlement to the south and east.
described in the archaeological literature, however less attention has been paid to smaller, regionally and locally significant quarries. In this paper a small yellow ochre quarry (VSTA_20140611_1) from the Central Pilbara, where evidence of paint preparation is preserved in the form of residues in two in situ grinding hollows, is described in order to address this oversight. Portable XRF (pXRF) analysis of the pigment in the quarry itself and the paint in the hollows was undertaken to understand the chemistry of the pigmentaceous minerals, to explore the taphonomy of the ochre seam, and to gauge variation within the source. Chemistry indicates that the VSTA_20140611_1 quarry is composed of an iron mineral (likely a hydroxide such as goethite), with Fe abundances consistently between 10.7 and 30%. Typical of the regional geology, the yellow
pigment is consistently siliceous, with an Si abundance of between 5.8 and 20.4%. As there are no painted motifs in the rockshelter containing the VSTA_20140611_1 quarry, nor on the suitable BIF surfaces nearby, it is considered highly likely that the surviving paint produced on-site was used for
either body decoration or the adornment of artefacts, rather than for rock art production. Nevertheless, the similarity in chemical composition between the
VSTA_20140611_1 pigments and that of motifs painted in sites a few kilometres away suggests that, in addition to immediate processing and use at the site, ochre
from this quarry may have been transported to rockshelters in the vicinity and used for rock art production.
Book Chapters by Jillian Huntley
We show how quickly rock art panels have degraded in recent decades, contending that climate catalysed salt efflorescence is responsible for increasing exfoliation of the limestone cave surfaces that house the ~ 45 to 20-thousand-year-old paintings. These artworks are located in the world’s most atmospherically dynamic region, the Australasian monsoon domain. The rising frequency and severity of El Niño-induced droughts from anthropogenic climate change (that is, higher ambient temperatures and more consecutive dry days), combined with seasonal moisture injected via monsoonal rains retained as standing water in the rice fields and aquaculture ponds of the region, increasingly provide ideal conditions for evaporation and haloclasty, accelerating rock art deterioration.
important advances in instruments and capabilities that can be employed to study art and archaeology. In this article, we describe the capabilities at the Australian Synchrotron that are well-suited to investigating art, archaeology, and cultural heritage. We also present some case studies that demonstrate the breadth and impact of science that has been performed by researchers using these capabilities.
an extensive rockshelter. Excavations at Gunu Rock provide evidence for two phases of occupation, the first from 7–8 to 2.7 ka, and the second from 1064 cal BP. Excavations at Gunu Rock provide evidence for occupation from the end of the second phase to the recent past. Stone for tools in the early phase were procured from a variety of sources, but quartz crystal reduction dominated the second occupation phase. Small quartz crystals were reduced by freehand percussion to provide small flake tools and blanks for manufacturing small points called nguni by the Wunambal people today. Quartz crystals were prominent in historic ritual practices associated with the Wanjina belief system. Complex methods of making bifacially-thinned and pressure flaked quartzite projectile points emerged after 2.7 ka. Ochre pigments were common in both occupation phases, but evidence for occupation contemporaneous with the putative age of the oldest rock art styles was not discovered in the excavations. Our results show that developing a complete understanding of rock art production and local occupation patterns requires paired excavations inside and outside of the rockshelters that dominate the Kimberley.
here begins to fill this gap by illustrating differences in Indigenous land-use at two sites only a few kilometres apart and both dating to c.1,000 years ago. Located on the lower reaches of the South Alligator River within what is now Kakadu National Park, the earth mound Myaranji 1 and the shell midden Djindibi 1 provide a snapshot of settlement and subsistence strategies practiced on the floodplains in the late Holocene. This paper presents the analyses of the cultural materials recovered from these two open sites, including those of invertebrate and vertebrate faunal remains, shell and stone artefacts, and pigment on artefacts. Interpretation of the data suggests that occupation was relatively short-lived. Differential representation of food resources indicates that each site was occupied in different seasons. Both local manufacture and regional connectivity are suggested by ochre use and stone artefact working. Evidence from other regional sites implies a subsequent focus for settlement to the south and east.
described in the archaeological literature, however less attention has been paid to smaller, regionally and locally significant quarries. In this paper a small yellow ochre quarry (VSTA_20140611_1) from the Central Pilbara, where evidence of paint preparation is preserved in the form of residues in two in situ grinding hollows, is described in order to address this oversight. Portable XRF (pXRF) analysis of the pigment in the quarry itself and the paint in the hollows was undertaken to understand the chemistry of the pigmentaceous minerals, to explore the taphonomy of the ochre seam, and to gauge variation within the source. Chemistry indicates that the VSTA_20140611_1 quarry is composed of an iron mineral (likely a hydroxide such as goethite), with Fe abundances consistently between 10.7 and 30%. Typical of the regional geology, the yellow
pigment is consistently siliceous, with an Si abundance of between 5.8 and 20.4%. As there are no painted motifs in the rockshelter containing the VSTA_20140611_1 quarry, nor on the suitable BIF surfaces nearby, it is considered highly likely that the surviving paint produced on-site was used for
either body decoration or the adornment of artefacts, rather than for rock art production. Nevertheless, the similarity in chemical composition between the
VSTA_20140611_1 pigments and that of motifs painted in sites a few kilometres away suggests that, in addition to immediate processing and use at the site, ochre
from this quarry may have been transported to rockshelters in the vicinity and used for rock art production.
practices of the people who created it: their technologies, movements, and social
interactions. The number of studies of archaeological pigments in the recent literature
demonstrates how fruitful such enquiries can be. In this chapter, the authors discuss the
physicochemical characterization of rock art pigments, outline the history of research in
this area, differentiate key concepts and terminology, and describe principal methods.
They conclude with illustrative case studies from France, South Africa, and Australia to
demonstrate the kinds of archaeological information that can be preserved in rock art
pigments.
The tributes in this book are necessarily as individual as the man they honour, and John Clegg was certainly an individual. The longevity of ideas and perspectives Clegg brought to the pursuit of rock art research is demonstrated in this collection of works. Clegg’s continued relevance is testament to the value and magnitude of his contribution. He is a deserving subject for a Festschrift.
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