The integrated cultural landscape of North Gidley Island: Coastal, intertidal and nearshore archaeology in Murujuga (Dampier Archipelago), Western Australia

Abstract

Recent studies conducted in Murujuga Sea Country have confirmed that Indigenous Australian archaeology does not end at the modern shore. Since the earliest peopling of the Australian continent, sea levels have fluctuated significantly, dropping as much as 130 m below modern mean sea-level during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). During this period, the continent (including Australia and New Guinea) represented a landmass one-third larger than present day Australia. As sea levels rose following the LGM, this extensive cultural landscape was inundated. The recent reporting of archaeological remains in a submerged context at Murujuga has enabled an integrated analysis of the archaeological landscape, based on direct evidence from archaeological sites that were originally formed on dry land, but are now located in intertidal and submerged environments. This study applies a landscape analysis centred on the submerged Cape Bruguieres channel site, and the Gidley Islands, where submerged, intertidal and coastal archaeology has been recorded. Aerial, pedestrian, and intertidal archaeological surveys were conducted to investigate the onshore and offshore landscape, providing new evidence with which to place the stone artefacts in the Cape Bruguieres channel into a wider context. Rock art engravings, grinding patches, quarries and upstanding stonessome of which are in the intertidal zonepoint to the use of a landscape that is now submerged and to the possibility of discovering new underwater sites. By integrating evidence from subtidal and intertidal contexts with the onshore record, we explore the cultural landscape above and below the 'waterline' as a continuum.

RETRACTED: Applying geoarchaeological principles to marine archaeology: A reappraisal of the “first marine” and “in situ” lithic scatters in the Dampier Archipelago, NW Australia

“…Where bathymetric constraints occur, such as in the Dampier Archipelago, there is greater complexity to the potential forcing mechanisms and the bedforms.Almost all the channels and passages through the Burrup Peninsula region that have their western end relatively sheltered from the seasonal reworking effect of southerly and westerly waves have prominent sediment splays indicative of net bed sediment transport to the west (including beside Keast Is., Cape Bruguieres Is., North Gidley Is., and Angel Is. ; Figure1, see also(Leach et al, 2021; their figs. 5 and 6).…”

“…For B2020, this included ∼80 separate news articles (e.g., Bradley, 2020; France‐Press, 2020; Michelmore,2020; Pinkstone, 2020; Watson, 2021; Young, 2020) in addition to numerous Twitter feeds and blog posts. The scientific literature has also uncritically referred to B2020's work (e.g., Crabtree et al, 2021; Ditchfield et al, 2021; Hale et al, 2021; Leach et al, 2021; McCarthy et al, 2021; McDonald et al, 2020; Wiseman et al, 2021, p. 154; Lebrec et al, 2022). Here, we explore the original claims.…”