In a new study, Professor Mike Archer of the University of New South Wales and colleagues re-examined the fossilized tibia (leg bone) of a now-extinct giant sthenurine kangaroo. Found in Mammoth Cave in southwest Australia around the time of World War I, the bone was later determined to be hard evidence that indigenous Australians hunted megafauna. Professor Archer was involved in the 1980 study which found that a distinctive cut in the fossilized bone was evidence of butchery. But he now happily admits that that initial conclusion was wrong.
Animals from the megafauna of Mammoth Cave about 50,000 years ago: the giant long-beaked echidna Murrayglossus hackettithe giant kangaroo Procoptodon browneumthe giant diprotodontid Zygomaturus trilobusand thylacine (Cynocephalus thylacinus). Image credit: Peter Schouten.
“As a scientist, it is not just my job but my responsibility to update the archive when new evidence emerges,” Professor Archer said.
“In 1980, we interpreted this cut as evidence of butchery because it was the best conclusion we could draw with the tools available at the time.”
“Thanks to advances in technology, we can now see that our initial interpretation was wrong.”
“When the bones were analyzed starting in the 1960s, there was much debate about whether or not the First Peoples lived compatibly with the prehistoric megafauna of Australia or whether they were responsible for the extinction of these megafauna animals.”
“Many considered the incision in the bone to have been made by humans with tools – and that it ultimately showed that the extinction of megafauna and the arrival of humans around 65,000 years ago was not a coincidence.”
“For decades, the Mammoth Cave bone was ‘smoking proof’ of the idea that Australia’s first people hunted megafauna, but with this evidence now overturned, the debate over the causes of the extinction of these giant animals is once again wide open, and the role of humans is less clear than ever.”
To rescan the same sthenurine leg bone with the incision, Professor Archer and his co-authors used high-tech 3D scanning to examine the inside of the bone without damaging it.
They also used updated radiometric dating technology to try to determine the true age of the bone and the cut, as well as detailed microscopic analysis of the cut surfaces.
Their analyzes revealed that the cut was made after the bone had dried and developed shrinkage cracks, meaning it was likely already fossilized at the time of the incision.
Paleontologists also analyzed a fossil tooth “charm” given by a Worora Nations man from the Mowanjum Mission to Kim Akerman, an archaeologist working with Kimberley First Nations people in the 1960s.
The tooth belonged to Zygomaturus trilobusa type of giant marsupial, distantly related to wombats, which was part of the Pleistocene Australian megafauna.
Although the tooth was received in the Kimberley in northwest Washington, its characteristics and composition closely matched those of other fossils from Mammoth Cave in southwest Washington.
“The presence of the tooth in the Kimberley, far from its likely origin at Mammoth Cave, suggests it may have been transported by humans or traded over vast distances,” said Dr Kenny Travouillon, a researcher at the Western Australian Museum.
“This implies a cultural appreciation or symbolic use of fossils long before European science.”
“It could be said that the First Peoples may have been the first paleontologists on the continent – and perhaps the world.
Researchers do not completely rule out the possibility that First Peoples hunted Australian megafauna.
But without concrete evidence, it is not possible to say with certainty that Australian Aborigines are responsible for its extinction.
“While these are hypotheses, solid evidence is needed before we can conclude that predation of now-extinct megafauna species by First Peoples contributed to their extinction, particularly given the long history of First Nations peoples valuing and sustainably using wildlife in Australia,” Professor Archer said.
“If humans were truly responsible for the unsustainable hunting of Australian megafauna, we would expect to find much more evidence of hunting or butchering in the fossil record. Instead, the only hard evidence we ever had was this bone – and now we have strong evidence that the cutting was not done while the animal was alive.”
So, if humans weren’t solely responsible for the disappearance of Australia’s ancient megafauna, what could have been the cause?
Researchers cite evidence that many megafauna species went extinct long before humans arrived, while others coexisted with humans for thousands of years, but their disappearance often coincides with periods of significant climate change.
“What we can conclude is that the first people in Australia to demonstrate keen interest and collect fossils were the First Peoples, probably thousands of years before Europeans set foot on this continent,” the researchers said.
Their article was published in the journal Royal Society Open Science.
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Michael Archer and others. 2025. The first peoples of Australia: hunters of extinct megafauna or Australia’s first fossil collectors. R. Soc. Open Sci 12(10):250078; two: 10.1098/rsos.250078
