Every place is an archive; every landscape preserves a complex record of past natural and cultural interactions. This article unpacks the archive of a single place, the caves of Rocky Cape (pinmatik) in northwest Tasmania, which has been the subject of archaeological enquiry for over a century. It reflects on the creative and destructive forces in archaeological practice, and the ways in which sites are changed and charged by the process of excavation. Like all archives, archaeological sites are contested spaces. They are bound to the theories, methodologies and assumptions of those who select and interpret them. This article examines how Rocky Cape has been read, misread and reread by Western scholars: first, as the crucial piece of evidence in global debates about the origin and antiquity of the Tasmanians; second, as a window on the world at the end of the last Ice Age; and, third, as a stopping-point in a vast and interconnected cultural landscape. By exploring the challenges and opportunities of reading the archive of the earth, it seeks to enable a longer, more inclusive view of the histories of settler societies.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Book
Matthew Colloff;
(2020)
Landscapes of Our Hearts: Reconciling People and Environment
(/isis/citation/CBB830747552/)
Book
Richard Brooome;
Charles Fahey;
Andrea Gaynor;
Katie Holmes;
(2019)
Mallee Country: Land, People, History
(/isis/citation/CBB671332234/)
Book
Emily O'Gorman;
(2021)
Wetlands in a Dry Land: More-Than-Human Histories of Australia's Murray-Darling Basin
(/isis/citation/CBB547050961/)
Article
Beisaw, April M.;
(2012)
Environmental History of the Susquehanna Valley around the Time of European Contact
(/isis/citation/CBB001200341/)
Article
Michelle Gantevoort;
Duane W. Hamacher;
Savannah Lischick;
(2016)
Reconstructing the star knowledge of Aboriginal Tasmanians
(/isis/citation/CBB653546485/)
Article
Jack Ashby;
(2023)
How collections and reputation were built out of Tasmanian violence: Thylacines (Thylacinus cynocephalus) and Aboriginal remains from Morton Allport (1830–1878)
(/isis/citation/CBB983226557/)
Article
Bronwen Douglas;
(2013)
Philosophers, Naturalists, and Antipodean Encounters, 1748-1803
(/isis/citation/CBB254586561/)
Book
Jack Ashby;
(2022)
Platypus Matters: The Extraordinary Story of Australian Mammals
(/isis/citation/CBB508513425/)
Thesis
Attanucci, Timothy J.;
(2012)
Stories from Earth: Adalbert Stifter and the Poetics of Earth History
(/isis/citation/CBB001567396/)
Book
Margo Neale;
Lynne Kelly;
(2020)
First Knowledges Songlines: The Power and Promise
(/isis/citation/CBB697704304/)
Book
Holland, Peter;
(2013)
Home in the Howling Wilderness: Settlers and the Environment in Southern New Zealand
(/isis/citation/CBB001422258/)
Article
Trevor M. Leaman;
Duane W. Hamacher;
(2018)
A Methodology for Testing Horizon Astronomy in Australian Aboriginal Cultural Sites: A Case Study
(/isis/citation/CBB683468213/)
Article
Elston, M. Melissa;
(2012)
Subverting Visual Discourses of Gender and Geography: Kent Monkman's Revised Iconography of the American West
(/isis/citation/CBB001202116/)
Book
Sarah R. Hamilton;
Paul S. Sutter;
(2018)
Cultivating Nature: The Conservation of a Valencian Working Landscape
(/isis/citation/CBB704479941/)
Article
Vitte, Antonio Carlos;
Silveira, Roberison Wittgenstein Dias da;
(2010)
Considerações sobre os conceitos de natureza, espaço e morfologia em Alexander von Humboldt e a gênese da geografia física moderna
(/isis/citation/CBB001420464/)
Article
Shawna Ross;
(2020)
Sightseeing the Anthropocene: tourism, moorland management, and The Hound of the Baskervilles
(/isis/citation/CBB522136469/)
Book
Douglas, Kirsty;
(2010)
Pictures of Time Beneath: Science, Heritage and the Uses of the Deep Past
(/isis/citation/CBB001033602/)
Article
Rodriguez, Veronica Perez;
Anderson, Kirk C.;
(2013)
Terracing in the Mixteca Alta, Mexico: Cycles of Resilience of an Ancient Land-Use Strategy
(/isis/citation/CBB001421929/)
Chapter
Paolo Vingo (de);
(2021)
Il programma «Piemonte archeo-minerario»: miniere e opifici da risorsa strategica a patrimonio storico-ambientale
(/isis/citation/CBB861242855/)
Chapter
Paolo Vingo (de);
Ilaria Sanmartino;
(2022)
Estrazione, preparazione e gestione del ciclo minerario-metallurgico a Fusine e nel suo territorio tra fonti storico-archivistiche e strutture produttive
(/isis/citation/CBB583155329/)
Be the first to comment!