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Resisting the cold in ice age Tasmania: thermal environment and settlement strategies

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2015

Ian Gilligan
Ian Gilligan*
Affiliation:
School of Archaeology & Anthropology, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, 0200 Australia
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Extract

Humans had reached Tasmania by 35 000 years bp and were in residence at the peak of the last ice age. Curiously, the settlements in the coldest period are concentrated in the highest and most southerly places, and the colder the weather became, the more sites were occupied. The author deduces that early people specially sought out the rock shelters of the highlands to combat wind chill.

Keywords

cave sitescold adaptationshelterTasmanian Aborigines
Type
Research
Information
Antiquity , Volume 81 , Issue 313 , 1 September 2007 , pp. 555 - 568
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd. 2007

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