Mem. Nat. Mus. Vict., 15, 1947 



NOTES ON AUSTRALIAN QUATERNARY CLIMATES 



AND MIGRATION 



By R. A. Kcble, F.G.S., 

 Palaeontologist, National Museum of Victoria 



Plate 2, Figs. 1-13. 



(Received for publication June 25, 1947) 



These notes were made, in the first instance, on climates 

 suggested by the texture and fossils of some Victorian deposits 

 that contained artefacts. But to understand the diversity of 

 climates, it was found necessary to investigate the effects of the 

 Postglacial and Pleistocene interglacial and glacial stages in the 

 Southern Hemisphere and this led to their further elaboration. 

 Apart from regulating the march of the climatic belts and its 

 effect on habitability, it became evident that the interglacial and 

 glacial stages were responsible for oscillations in sea-level that 

 modified the geographical distribution of land and sea, particu- 

 larly in northern Australia, Obviously, these oscillations had a 

 profound bearing on immigration to Australia, but in a some- 

 what different way to that suggested elsewhere; the changing 

 climate has also influenced migration in Australia. 



Marctt (1938) succinctly suggests the scope of this enquiry: 



The anthropo-geographer can afford to concentrate on climate, treating 

 fauna and flora, and even avenues of migration, as dependent subjects. 

 Calculating temperature, rainfall and so on for given regions as the climate 

 varies, he can proceed to map out areas of relative habitability, suiting man 

 more or less closely, according to his degree of culture . . . Thus the study 

 of environment teaches the anthropologist where to look alike for the strong 

 and for the weak among the human candidates for survival. Geographical 

 considerations will not suffice to explain the full conditions of the struggle 

 between ethnic types but whoever aspires to understand human history as a 

 whole must at least, acquire the map-making, map-reading faculty at the start. 



In Australia, the pioneer of this class of research was Griffith 

 Taylor (1919) who showed how changes in temperature affected the 

 rain-belts now and under somewhat hotter (Pliocene) and colder 

 (Quaternary) conditions. The basic principles underlying such 

 an investigation he (Taylor, 1927) stated in the following words: 



If the land be subjected to cooler temperatures, this is equivalent to 

 increasing the factors which bring the southern rain belt to Australia 

 We should expect a strengthening of this rain belt so that it should 

 become broader; in effect, the desert would retreat to the north. If the 

 climate as a whole became hotter we should expect a movement south of the 

 desert and a deterioration in the living conditions of southern Australia. 



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