RETHINKING THE PREHISTORY OF HUNTER-GATHERERS, FIRE AND VEGETATION CHANGE IN NORTHERN AUSTRALIA

Different types of evidence-palaeoecological, biogeographic and ethnog raphic-currently provide different perspectives on the question of hun ter-gatherer impacts on fire-sensitive components of northern Australi an vegetation. Here I analyze the apparent discrepancies, using eviden ce primarily from the Holocene. Using this more substantial body of ev idence than is available for earlier periods, we can attempt to do jus tice to both ecological and social complexity. While dry rainforest pa tches and wet rainforest massifs need to be considered separately, eac h experienced more human alteration in the late Holocene than the earl y to mid-Holocene. In the former case, hunter-gatherer burning protect ed dry rainforest from climatically induced changes in fire regime; in the latter, it contributed to disturbance. Implications for future re search into hunter-gatherer relations to land are discussed. This anal ysis does not preclude the possibility of analogous changes having occ urred during the Pleistocene.