Lake Mungo, Archaeology of
Lake Mungo came to the attention of the international
paleoanthropological community during the early 1970s following the
widely publicized discovery of what were then the oldest, well-dated
traces of human activity on the Australian continent, including the
oldest-known ritual human burials (Bowler et al. 1970, 2003; Barbetti and Allen 1972; Bowler and Thorne 1976).
However, these are only a few of the thousands of activity traces
preserved in the 33 km-long transverse, crescentic dune (lunette) that
bounds the eastern margin of Lake Mungo; and Lake Mungo is only one of
17 large and numerous smaller overflow lakes that together cover an area
of approximately 2,400 km2 on the southeast margin of the continent’s arid core (Fig. 1).
These lakes are now dry, but at times in the past when temperatures and
evaporation were reduced, they were filled via a former channel of the
Lachlan River, which flows westward from the Australian Alps.
