Artefacts suggest Australia's first people lived in mountains
A team of archaeologists have made a discovery in Australia that suggest that the continent's first people may have lived in high up in mountain caves.They found rare artefacts that dated back to the last Ice Age at a cave in Australia's Blue Mountains - which is west of Sydney.Researchers have found that site known as the Dargan Shelter was lived in by early humans around 20,000 years ago.Dr Amy Mosig Way, who lead the study said: "Until now, we thought the Australian high country was too difficult to occupy during the last Ice Age."
The study was published in the journal Nature Human Behaviour and makes the case that humans once lived above 700m in Australia - with this particular cave being 1073m above sea level.Scientists say the area would be been much cooler during the last Ice Age and there wouldn't have been as much vegetation as now.They also say there wouldn't have been much firewood available at that time and sources of water would likely have been frozen during the winter.The study has raised questions about how some of the continents first people managed to adapt to the difficult conditions.
Archaeologists from the Australian Museum, the University of Sydney and the Australian National University worked together with First Nations community members to unearth the artefacts during a digs at the site - they found almost 700.Lots of these items were prehistoric tools which researchers believe people used for cutting or scraping.It is thought that most of those tools were made locally to the cave site, but not all.Researchers say that some seem to have come from an area around 31 miles away.
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