Jane Balme
Dados Biográficos
| ID | 106511 |
|---|---|
| NOME | Jane Balme |
| PRENOMES | Jane |
| SOBRENOME | Balme |
| ASSINATURA | BALME J |
| AFILIAÇÕES | The University of Western Australia |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-1387-9379 |
| VERIFICADO | Sim |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 69 |
| TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES | 655 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 69 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 1990 |
| ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2026 |
| ÍNDICE H | 16 |
Garli
The deliberate burial of dingoes by Aboriginal people is a widespread and significant Late Holocene practice in Australia, yet the details of this practice remain poorly understood, in part due to the scarcity of well-documented archaeological excavations. Here, we report on the excavation of a dingo burial in Kinchega National Park on Barkindji Country, in the Menindee Lakes region of western New South Wales. First identified by Barkindji Elders…
Graman Revisited Once Again
The archaeological site Graman B4 provided one of the first records of substantial dietary change in ancient Australian Aboriginal society. Initial examination of the faunal remains from this site suggested that Late Holocene hunters reduced their focus on high‐ranked kangaroos to increasingly rely on arboreal possums; and that these subsistence changes were concurrent with changes in foragers’ toolkits, namely discontinuation of backed artefacts…
Holocene subsistence change in eastern Australia
The Holocene in Australia is characterised as a period of dramatic social and economic reorganisation in Aboriginal culture across the continent, with some of the most evident changes visible in the archaeological record of subsistence patterns. The zooarchaeology of key sites suggests that during the Mid- to Late Holocene, hunters switched emphasis away from high-yield large macropods to a diversity of smaller-bodied animals as a response to cha…
If trees could talk
Arboreal Alterations
Culturally modified trees (CMTs) were once ubiquitous throughout the Australian landscape but they have been significantly affected by tree‐clearing practices associated with pastoralism, residential expansion and forestry. These, in addition to effects of bushfires and floods have had a massive impact on the survival of both dead and living CMTs. Despite their past ubiquity and current threats, they are probably one of the most under‐researched …
Snake and Moon ‘Right Way Marriage’ Stories on Stone and Bark
In northwest Australia, boab trees hold significant cultural values for First Nations people. Their leaves, bark, roots and nuts are important as traditional resources for food, medicine, fibre, water and shade and serve as reference points in the landscape. Some of the tree trunks are inscribed with images and symbols which tell of events and narratives that took place during the time when the landscape was created. One boab tree, at Karunjie St…
A recent date for the dog ( Canis familiaris ) from Mapala Rockshelter and implications for associated mammal community changes in subalpine Highland West New Guinea
The arrival of the dog (Canis familiaris) in Australasia is believed to have had major impacts on the region’s ecosystems as well as human society and organisation. Very little is known about the antiquity of the dog in New Guinea due to a paucity of fossil specimens of secure antiquity, particularly in the Highlands. Here, we report the direct dating of a partial dog cranium from Mapala Rockshelter, a subalpine site at ∼4000 m asl in the Sudirma…
From ‘Jane roughed it with the men’ – the last 50 years
Late Holocene hunting economies in coastal southeastern Australia
Curracurrang 1 (1CU5) is a rockshelter site located in the Royal National Park (RNP) on the coast south of Sydney. Excavated from 1962 to 1966, the site's rich Holocene cultural deposit has become important for understanding regional Late Holocene developments in Australian lithic and shell technologies. Our comprehensive analysis of 1CU5's faunal remains is presented here, accompanied by new AMS radiocarbon dates and a reinterpretation of the si…
Trees to remember
Culturally modified trees (CMTs) are a unique form of archaeology and cultural heritage. There are several factors affecting the survival of culturally modified trees in Australia, and these will all likely be exacerbated by climate change. Boab trees (Adansonia gregorii), which are endemic to northwest Australia, have been subject to modification by Indigenous people both prior to and following the settlement of the Kimberley region by European …
Australia’s First People
Mainland Australia was connected to New Guinea and Tasmania at various times throughout the Pleistocene and formed the supercontinent of Sahul. Sahul contains some of the earliest known archaeological evidence for Homo sapiens outside of Africa, with a growing record of early complex social, technological, and artistic life. Here we present an overview of the oldest known sites in Australia along with key evidence pertaining to the dynamic cultur…
Embedded in the Bark
This paper discusses the Australian boab tree and its potential for research as living historical archaeology. Boab trees play an important role in the economy, culture, and cosmology of Indigenous people in northwest Australia and continue to hold a powerful presence in the Kimberley region today. Working with Nyikina and Mangala Traditional Owners we have undertaken to document examples of this iconic tree and its cultural and historical associ…
Fibre technologies in Indigenous Australia
The extent to which fibre technology was used in the past is difficult to assess because soft organic remains rarely preserve well. The oldest direct evidence for twisted fibre cordage is dated to between 41 and 52 ka in western Eurasia but indirect evidence suggests that it may have a much greater antiquity. The diverse use of string made from fibres of plants, animal and human hair by Indigenous Australians is well documented but poorly represe…
Art in the bark
Found only in a restricted area of north-west Australia, the Australian boab (Adansonia gregorii) is recognisable by its massive, bottle-shaped trunk, and is an economically important species for Indigenous Australians, with the pith, seeds and young roots all eaten. Many of these trees are also culturally significant and are sometimes carved with images and symbols. The authors discuss the history of research into carved boabs in Australia, and …
The Coming of the Dingo
The dingo, or native dog, arrived in Australia with people traveling on watercraft in the Late Holocene. By the time Europeans colonized the continent, dingoes were incorporated into the lives of Indigenous Australians, integrated into their kin systems and songlines, and used for a variety of purposes, including as companion animals, as guards, and as a biotechnology for hunting. Women, in particular, formed close bonds with dingoes, and they we…
Bone artifacts from Riwi Cave, south-central Kimberley
Here, we describe eight bone artifacts recovered from Pleistocene and Holocene contexts at Riwi, a cave site located in Mimbi country of the south-central Kimberley. These artifacts reflect a range of activities occurring at the site-including the manufacture of plant-fiber items, the processing of spinifex resin, and fish or bird hunting. As the oldest four artifacts were found within the Pleistocene deposit and therefore date to older than 35,0…
Bowdler, Sandra E.
An examination of rockshelter palynology
Carpenter’s Gap 1 is a large rockshelter located within the Kimberley region of northwestern Australia. The site provides valuable archives of late Quaternary palaeoecological information within an area known for a lack of deposits preserving long-term continuous botanical records. Previous studies of the macrobotanic, phytolith and wood charcoal records from Carpenter’s Gap 1 are in general agreement about changes in broad vegetation patterns ov…
Evaluating human responses to Enso driven climate change during the Holocene in northwest Australia through macrobotanical analyses
The Holocene is recognised as a period through which a number of climatic fluctuations and environmental stresses occur—associated with intensifying El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) climatic conditions from c. 5000 years—contemporaneous with technological and social changes in Australian Aboriginal lifeways. In the Kimberley region of northwest Western Australia, human responses to ENSO driven climate change are most evident archaeologically i…
People-plant interaction and economic botany over 47,000 years of occupation at Carpenter’s Gap 1, south central Kimberley
Systematic archaeobotanical analysis, conducted in conjunction with archaeological enquiry at Australian archaeological sites, is still rare despite recent developments. It is still rarer that previously analysed macrobotanical assemblages are revisited over time. Extending on macrobotanical research conducted by McConnell in 1997, this paper presents the results of a recent analysis of Carpenter’s Gap 1 non-woody macrobotanical remains (seeds, f…
Gendered archaeology
I Reckon They Should Keep That Hut'
We have investigated the mechanism by which constitutive and regulated secretory proteins are sorted in the trans Golgi network (TGN). Although this mechanism is believed to involved the selective aggregation of regulated secretory proteins, the factors responsible for the formation of these aggregates, which can be detected by electron microscopy as electron dense material in the lumen of the TGN, were unknown. The mechanism involved in the sort…
An Analysis of Charred Bone From Devil's Lair, Western Australia
CHARRED bone from Devil's Lair is mostly the remains of meals eaten by people who lived there. The cave was most intensively occupied between 23,000 and 13,000 years ago when it was never less than 25 km and at times as much as 40 km from the sea. The charred bone sample indicates that large mammals, including kangaroos and wallabies, were important food sources during this time and that the human occupants of the cave had a well established land…
A Pleistocene tradition
The economic life of the early colonisers of semi-arid western New South Wales is represented by many small open sites mainly preserved within sand dunes. Preservation of organic materials in this environment has been dependent upon rapid deposition of overlying sediments to protect them from erosion and degradation. Once uncovered, fragile material such as freshwater crustacea carapace and fish bone rapidly decays, shell fragments and disperses,…
Bead Making in Aboriginal Australia From the Deep Past to European Arrival
This paper reviews the raw materials used by Indigenous Australians to make beads. It includes beads recovered from archaeological sites, as well as beads collected before 1940 held in museum collections, and those that are described in pre-1940 literature and other archival material. All three sources of information indicate that people were highly selective in their choice of materials for bead production and that availability and abundance onl…
Symbolic behaviour and the peopling of the southern arc route to Australia
Excavations revealing 40,000 years of occupation at Mimbi Caves, south central Kimberley, Western Australia
Mimbi is the name given by Gooniyandi people to a place about 90km east of Fitzroy Crossing in the southern Kimberley. Its western boundary is defined by the Emanuel Range and the eastern boundary by Lawford Range. Both of these ranges are composed of Devonian limestone. Caves have formed within the limestone and in some, perennial water pools are present. The width between the ranges varies between two and five kilometres. It is a relatively fla…
Shell beads and social behaviour in Pleistocene Australia
Why did Palaeolithic people wear shells, and why was the practice so widespread in the world? The authors' own researches in Western Australia show that specific marine shells were targeted, subject to special processes of manufacture into beads and that some had travelled hundreds of kilometres from their source. Whether they were brought in land by the manufacturers, or by specially ornamented people, these beads provided a symbolic language th…
Of boats and string
Years of fishery in western New South Wales
Two hundred and sixteen open midden sites from the lower Darling River area of western NSW demonstrate that people have fished for many aquatic resources in diverse hydrological environments since about 30,000 years ago. Some of the earliest of these sites, which have been interpreted as single foraging expeditions, contain evidence of highly organised food collecting strategies which at times allowed large gatherings of people. There appears to …
World’s earliest ground-edge axe production coincides with human colonisation of Australia
We report evidence for the world’s earliest ground-edge axe, 44–49,000 years old. Its antiquity \ncoincides with or immediately follows the arrival of humans on the Australian landmass. \nGround/polished axes are not associated with the eastward dispersal of Homo sapiens across \nEurasia and the discovery of axes in Australia at the point of colonisation exemplifies a diversification \nof technological practices that occurred as modern humans dis…
Radiocarbon dates from midden sites in the lower Darling River area of western New South Wales
Seventy two of the 88 radiocarbon determinations available for archaeological sites and the sediments associated with the Darling River, its anabranches and associated lakes between Wilcannia and the Murray River in western NSW, are on shell samples collected from middens. The geographic distribution of the dated sites reflects the past hydrology of the region and distribution of preservational sediments in the area as well as past human use of t…
Occupation at Carpenters Gap 3, Windjana Gorge, Kimberley, Western Australia
Carpenters Gap 3 (CG3), a limestone cave and shelter complex in the Napier Range, Western Australia, was occupied by Aboriginal people intermittently from over 30,000 years ago through to the historic period. Excavations at CG3 provide only slight evidence for occupation following first settlement in the late Pleistocene. Analysis of the radiocarbon dates indicates that following this there was a hiatus in occupation during the Last Glacial Maxim…
New dates for point technology in the Kimberley
New data from Bunuba country in the southern Kimberley provide more robust dates for point technology in the Kimberley than have been previously available. Direct percussion points have been recovered from three sites in the southern Kimberley associated with radiocarbon dates of ∼5000 calBP, whereas the earliest pressure‐flaked points are consistently associated with dates within the past 1000 years. This suggests that pressure‐flaked point tech…
Starch and Charcoal
The effect of retouch intensity on mid to late Holocene unifacial and bifacial points from the Kimberley
Stone points have provided key data for studies of hunter gatherer lifeways in several parts of the world. Point technologies occur widely across northern Australia, appearing around the mid-Holocene and persisting into the European Contact period. These points exhibit high-morphological variation, and include bifacial, unifacial and other forms. In the Northern Territory and north Queensland, points have been shown to form part of a reduction co…
The Antiquity Of Grinding Stones In Semi-Arid Western New South Wales
Western New South Wales is well known as one of the largest regional data sets of Pleistocene archaeological material in Australia. Dating of aeolian sediments has been possible through the archaeological accumulation and subsequent preservation of organic remains within dune sequences associated with lakes and waterways. The identifiable stratification within these, produced by fluctuations in lake and river levels, has provided good potential t…
Long‐term occupation on the edge of the desert
Aboriginal people occupied Riwi, a limestone cave in the south‐central Kimberley region at the edge of the Great Sandy Desert of Western Australia, from about 46000 years ago through to the historical period. The cultural materials recovered from the Riwi excavations provide evidence of intermittent site use, especially in climatically wet periods. Changes in hunting patterns and in hearth‐making practices about 34000 years ago appear to accompan…
Dingoes and Aboriginal social organization in Holocene Australia
Home Is Where the Hearth Is
The manipulation of fire is a technological act. The identification of the archaeological signatures of the controlled use of fire has important implications not only for the estimations of the origins and functions of the first fireplaces but also for our understanding of prehistoric technological development and resource use. At Riwi (Kimberley region, Western Australia), excavations over two field seasons have revealed a discontinuous occupati…
Settling in Sahul
Residue Analysis and Palaeodiet in Arid Australia
A study of residues and usewear on 49 provenanced and dated whole or fragmentary groundstone implements excavated from Puntutjarpa Rockshelter in Australia's Western Desert suggest that plant processing and seed grinding were important components of Aboriginal diet well before the Mid to Late Holocene. The analysis revealed the presence of starch grains in varying concentrations on the surfaces of all but four of the 49 artefacts dating back to a…
Headroom and human trampling
Going into a cave or shelter, one walks where one can stand upright or has to crouch less. That affects which zones objects are trampled on, which zones they may be kicked out of, which zones they may be kicked into. And those effects interact with the usual spatial order-with its activity zones and drop zones-that develops through occupation of the enclosed cave or shelter
Spear and digging stick
A division of labour between sexes/genders in which, although there is some overlap, men hunt large game and women collect smaller game, shellfish and most plant foods, is a characteristic of all documented hunter-gatherer societies. We argue that there is no biological reason for this behaviour and that it must be a social construct. These gender roles became part of the structure of societies at the same time as other forms of symbolic behaviou…
A 600-year-old Boomerang fragment from Riwi Cave(South Central Kimberley, Western Australia)
A small fragment of a carefully shaped wooden artefact was recovered from Riwi Cave (south central Kimberley, Western Australia) during 2013 excavations. Directly dated to 670 ± 20 BP, analysis of the artefact’s wood taxon, morphology, manufacturing traces, use wear, and residues, in addition to comparison with ethnographic examples of wooden technology from the Kimberley region, allowed for the identification of the tool from which it originated…
What happened after the Last Glacial Maximum? Transitions in site use on an arid inland island in north‐western Australia
The presence of Aboriginal people in interior refuges as climate conditions deteriorated with the onset of glacial aridity is now well documented in the Australian arid zone. Further excavation at Yurlu Kankala, a large rock shelter located on an island of high land in the inland Pilbara, demonstrates repeated human occupation from at least 47–43 cal ka BP through the Last Glacial Maximum to the mid‐Holocene. Despite the continued presence of bon…
Aboriginal responses to Late Quaternary environmental change in a Mediterranean-type region
Bone artifacts from Riwi Cave, south-central Kimberley
Here, we describe eight bone artifacts recovered from Pleistocene and Holocene contexts at Riwi, a cave site located in Mimbi country of the south-central Kimberley. These artifacts reflect a range of activities occurring at the site-including the manufacture of plant-fiber items, the processing of spinifex resin, and fish or bird hunting. As the oldest four artifacts were found within the Pleistocene deposit and therefore date to older than 35,0…
People-plant interaction and economic botany over 47,000 years of occupation at Carpenter’s Gap 1, south central Kimberley
Systematic archaeobotanical analysis, conducted in conjunction with archaeological enquiry at Australian archaeological sites, is still rare despite recent developments. It is still rarer that previously analysed macrobotanical assemblages are revisited over time. Extending on macrobotanical research conducted by McConnell in 1997, this paper presents the results of a recent analysis of Carpenter’s Gap 1 non-woody macrobotanical remains (seeds, f…
Art in the bark
Found only in a restricted area of north-west Australia, the Australian boab (Adansonia gregorii) is recognisable by its massive, bottle-shaped trunk, and is an economically important species for Indigenous Australians, with the pith, seeds and young roots all eaten. Many of these trees are also culturally significant and are sometimes carved with images and symbols. The authors discuss the history of research into carved boabs in Australia, and …
Radiocarbon dates from midden sites in the lower Darling River area of western New South Wales
Seventy two of the 88 radiocarbon determinations available for archaeological sites and the sediments associated with the Darling River, its anabranches and associated lakes between Wilcannia and the Murray River in western NSW, are on shell samples collected from middens. The geographic distribution of the dated sites reflects the past hydrology of the region and distribution of preservational sediments in the area as well as past human use of t…
The Antiquity Of Grinding Stones In Semi-Arid Western New South Wales
Western New South Wales is well known as one of the largest regional data sets of Pleistocene archaeological material in Australia. Dating of aeolian sediments has been possible through the archaeological accumulation and subsequent preservation of organic remains within dune sequences associated with lakes and waterways. The identifiable stratification within these, produced by fluctuations in lake and river levels, has provided good potential t…
Years of fishery in western New South Wales
Two hundred and sixteen open midden sites from the lower Darling River area of western NSW demonstrate that people have fished for many aquatic resources in diverse hydrological environments since about 30,000 years ago. Some of the earliest of these sites, which have been interpreted as single foraging expeditions, contain evidence of highly organised food collecting strategies which at times allowed large gatherings of people. There appears to …
Earth mounds in southeastern Australia
Earth mounds are pre-European heaps of raised dirt, which consist mainly of charcoal rich sediment with fragments of burnt clay. The two objectives of this paper are to describe the earth mounds which occur in the Macquarie Marshes in northern New South Wales and to advance a speculative hypothesis that the earth mounds in southeastern Australia could have functioned as gardens
The Illustrated History of Humankind
Headroom and human trampling
Going into a cave or shelter, one walks where one can stand upright or has to crouch less. That affects which zones objects are trampled on, which zones they may be kicked out of, which zones they may be kicked into. And those effects interact with the usual spatial order-with its activity zones and drop zones-that develops through occupation of the enclosed cave or shelter
Excavations revealing 40,000 years of occupation at Mimbi Caves, south central Kimberley, Western Australia
Mimbi is the name given by Gooniyandi people to a place about 90km east of Fitzroy Crossing in the southern Kimberley. Its western boundary is defined by the Emanuel Range and the eastern boundary by Lawford Range. Both of these ranges are composed of Devonian limestone. Caves have formed within the limestone and in some, perennial water pools are present. The width between the ranges varies between two and five kilometres. It is a relatively fla…
Residue Analysis and Palaeodiet in Arid Australia
A study of residues and usewear on 49 provenanced and dated whole or fragmentary groundstone implements excavated from Puntutjarpa Rockshelter in Australia's Western Desert suggest that plant processing and seed grinding were important components of Aboriginal diet well before the Mid to Late Holocene. The analysis revealed the presence of starch grains in varying concentrations on the surfaces of all but four of the 49 artefacts dating back to a…
Starch and Charcoal
Perceptions of Archaeology in Australia amongst educated young Australians
AbstarctA survey of Western Australian undergraduate students asking them about their knowledge of and interest in archaeology as well as their beliefs in other explanations for the past was undertaken in 2001. The results of this show that most of these students have a fair idea of what archaeologists do but there is much confusion between the disciplines of archaeology and palaeontology. While Australian archaeologists have been successful in p…
Benchmarking for archaeology honours degrees in Australian universities
A bachelor degree with honours in archaeology is still seen as the fundamental level of academic achievement required to gain entry to the profession and to higher degree research in archaeology in Australia. This is despite the recent proliferation of other kinds of similar university awards, such as specialist diplomas and coursework masters programs. A comparison of the content and standards of honours degrees currently offered by Australian u…
Shell beads and social behaviour in Pleistocene Australia
Why did Palaeolithic people wear shells, and why was the practice so widespread in the world? The authors' own researches in Western Australia show that specific marine shells were targeted, subject to special processes of manufacture into beads and that some had travelled hundreds of kilometres from their source. Whether they were brought in land by the manufacturers, or by specially ornamented people, these beads provided a symbolic language th…
Spear and digging stick
A division of labour between sexes/genders in which, although there is some overlap, men hunt large game and women collect smaller game, shellfish and most plant foods, is a characteristic of all documented hunter-gatherer societies. We argue that there is no biological reason for this behaviour and that it must be a social construct. These gender roles became part of the structure of societies at the same time as other forms of symbolic behaviou…
Introduction To Special Volume
Introduction To Special Volume: More Unconsidered Trifles." Australian Archaeology, 67(1), pp. 1–2
Engendering Origins
Feminist knowledge and its impact on other academic disciplines arose in the 1970s, but it has had an uneven impact in different disciplines. We argue that gender as a theoretical concept has challenged both sociology and archaeology but analyses of gender practices and embodiment which challenge the homogenous categories of ‘women’ and ‘men’ have made much less impact in archaeology – particularly the archaeology of deep time. The paper conclude…
Symbolic behaviour and the peopling of the southern arc route to Australia
Gatherers and Grannies
Aboriginal responses to Late Quaternary environmental change in a Mediterranean-type region
Of boats and string
The maritime factor in the colonization of Australia
Marking resistance? Change and continuity in the recent rock art of the southern Kimberley, Australia
Enhanced by recent survey, the authors define new kinds of rock art along the Lennard and Fitzroy rivers in Western Australia-black pigment and scratch-work images featuring anthropomorphic figures with elaborate head-dresses. These are shown to belong to the Contact period and represent the response of Indigenous artists to European land-taking by recalling and restating traditional themes from earlier times
Charlie Dortch
Charlie Dortch's lasting interest in the human past could be said to have begun in his childhood in Atlanta, Georgia, surrounded by Native American and Civil War heritage. After service in the US Army in Berlin from 1959-1961, he graduated in 1963 from the University of Southern Mississippi with a BSc in history and a penchant for adventure. He fulfilled the latter by working as navigator and surveyor for geophysical crews in Brazil and Libya - v…
Devils Lair
When Charlie Dortch first came to Perth to take a job at the Western Australian Museum, he almost immediately went into the field to excavate at the site of Devils Lair. The site has contributed much to knowledge of human occupation in Pleistocene Australia. Because of mixing in its deepest deposits, however, there has been some confusion about the timing of first occupation in the site. Devils Lair has also been used to suggest greater occupatio…
Intergenerational archaeology
Niche construction theory concerns the modification of environments by all organisms, and gives a new perspective on zooarchaeological records in southwest Australia. Aboriginal people in this region historically used fire to improve habitat and hunt animals, suggesting pre-European traditions of environmental management. Analysis of a new faunal record from the Leeuwin-Naturaliste Region, at the Wonitji Janga rockshelter, suggests post-European …
Occupation at Carpenters Gap 3, Windjana Gorge, Kimberley, Western Australia
Carpenters Gap 3 (CG3), a limestone cave and shelter complex in the Napier Range, Western Australia, was occupied by Aboriginal people intermittently from over 30,000 years ago through to the historic period. Excavations at CG3 provide only slight evidence for occupation following first settlement in the late Pleistocene. Analysis of the radiocarbon dates indicates that following this there was a hiatus in occupation during the Last Glacial Maxim…
Archaeology (57 obras) · Geography (53 obras) · Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology (47 obras) · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies (33 obras) · History (30 obras) · Ecology (25 obras) · Geology (25 obras) · Biology (24 obras) · History (22 obras) · Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies (22 obras)