Mem. Nat. Mus. Vicr., 13, 1943. 
THE PROBLEM OF ANTIQUITY OF MAN IN 
AUSTRALIA. 
By D. J. Mahony, M.Se., 
Director, National Museum of Victoria. 
Plates I-III. 
To appreciate what is meant by antiquity of man, the signifi- 
cance of the term antiquity in this connection should be considered. 
The word may be used in the historical or in the geological 
sense. In the historical sense it applies to events or to man’s 
handiwork during early Egyptian and Mesopotamian civilizations 
or even later; in the geological sense it involves much longer 
periods of time. The earliest historical traditions are generally 
supposed to date back 7,000 years; but the Pleistocene period is 
estimated to have ended some 15,000 or 20,000 years ago and all 
that has happened since then is geologically recent. In Europe 
the earliest fossil human bones are probably 130,000 years old, and 
the oldest stone implements 400,000 years. To grasp what these 
figures mean we may imagine ourselves walking down the avenue 
of time into the past and covering a thousand years at each pace. 
The first step takes us back to William the Conqueror, the second 
to the beginning of the Christian era, the third to Helen of Troy, 
the fourth to Abraham and the seventh to the earliest traditional 
history of Babylon and Egypt; but we have to continue more than 
twice as far before leaving geologically recent (Holocene) times 
and entering the Pleistocene period, 130 paces to Heidelberg man, 
and about a quarter of a mile to the oldest undoubted stone imple- 
ments of Europe. Should we decide to continue our journey until 
we meet the most ancient fossil organisms, we would probably 
require a time-car, for the journey on the same scale would exceed 
250 miles according to the latest estimates. 
There is convincing evidence of the historical antiquity of man 
in Australia, and good reason to believe that he migrated there 
before the end of Pleistocene times. The data are set out in the 
following pages. 
The problem is bound up with several others. Before Europeans 
arrived two types of mankind inhabited the Australian region, 
one being confined to the mainland, the other to Tasmania. 
Tasmanians, now extinct, differed from Australians in physical 
appearance and in cultural level. What are the affinities of these 
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