This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: New discoveries from Australia's oldest known underwater archaeological record reveal how First Peoples lived, transported goods and used different places within a vast cultural landscape that was submerged when rising seas transformed the continent after the last ice age. Published in the journal Quaternary Science Reviews, new evidence shows that significant Aboriginal cultural heritage survives on Australia's seabed.
It also shows that earlier discoveries at Murujuga, in northwestern Australia, were not isolated finds but part of a broader submerged cultural landscape across this World Heritage–listed region. The discoveries, which include stone artifacts associated with an ancient freshwater spring, provide insights into a world that existed before rising seas reshaped Australia's coastline. While the sites were submerged at least 9,000 years ago, the artifacts could be considerably older.
At the heart of this discovery is a partnership between underwater archaeology researchers from Flinders University, The University of Western Australia, James Cook University and the University of York (UK) and Murujuga Aboriginal Corporation and its rangers, who trained as scientific divers and worked alongside archaeologists to locate and document the underwater cultural sites. "The collaboration demonstrates the value of working beside trained Indigenous rangers who actively contributed to this challenging scientific research," says lead researcher and specialist in marine archaeology, professor Jonathan Benjamin from Flinders University's College of Human Sciences and Culture. Malik Churnside and Richard Variakojis—rangers from the Murujuga Aboriginal Corporation's Land and Sea Unit and co-authors on the paper—undertook scientific diving surveys and made some of the underwater discoveries.
"The Ngarda-Ngarli people have cared for Murujuga for at least 50,000 years. What this research shows is that our cultural landscape extends far beyond the shoreline and into Sea Country, where important parts of our story remain preserved beneath the sea," says Vincent Adams, director of Murujuga Aboriginal Corporation. "World Heritage recognition brings new responsibilities as well as global recognition.
Research like this strengthens our ability to identify, understand and protect the whole Murujuga cultural landscape, including Country that was submerged when sea levels rose thousands of years ago. "This partnership brings together Traditional Owner knowledge, ranger expertise and world-leading science. It is helping ensure that decisions about Murujuga continue to be guided by the people who have cared for this Country for generations," he says.
"The Murujuga rangers are critically important to this research. Their knowledge, connection to Country and enthusiasm are essential to working in the submerged cultural landscapes of Murujuga Sea Country, and diving with them is a great privilege," says Flinders Ph.D. candidate Louise Brooke. More than 2 million square kilometers (772,000 square miles) of Australia's continental shelf was submerged as sea levels rose following the end of the last ice age.
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