Fossil footprints are from Ice Age

[ UniNews Vol. 15, No. 1  6 - 20 February 2006 ]

By Rebecca Scott

A University of Melbourne scientist has played a key role in the discovery of the oldest preserved human footprints in Australia – the world’s largest known collection of fossil tracks made by humans.

Dating up to 23 000 years old, the fossil footprints found in Mungo National Park in western NSW reveal important information about the activity of early humans in Australia.

“This is one of the most exciting archeological finds in Australia”, says Dr Matt Cupper (School of Earth Sciences), part of the research team involved in the discovery.

The 457 footprints found were made by at least a dozen children, adolescents and adults walking and running near one of the Willandra Lakes of the National Park.

Some of the footprints measured up to 30 cm in length (comparable with a size 12), which Dr Cupper says is consistent with what scientists know from studying the skeletal remains of people who lived during the era.

“Ice Age Australians were typically very large, larger than modern Aboriginal people. Some of the men making footprints at the site may have been over six feet tall (183 cm).

“The landscape of Ice Age Australia was very different from now – it was much more arid, with less vegetation and shifting sand dunes. The footprints offer a glimpse of what life might have been like for early humans in this extreme environment.”

The first of the tracks were originally spotted by an Aboriginal person of the Mutthi Mutthi people in 2003. Dr Cupper was invited to join the study by research team leader Professor Steve Webb (Bond University) to investigate the site and in particular to determine the age of the footprints.

Using one of the latest dating techniques called Optically Stimulated Luminescence (OSL) Dr Cupper was able to determine when the surface sand covered the prints and the clay in which they are imprinted formed.

The team is currently doing more excavation of the site. “There is a big sand dune covering part of the site. Ground penetrating radar shows that the clay pan extends underneath the dune. We are confident that there are hundreds more prints beneath”.