Traded Tasmanian Devil Tooth Uncovered in Australia

PILBARA, AUSTRALIA—ABC News Australia reports that an excavation conducted at the site of a rock shelter destroyed by mine blasting in 2020 in north Western Australia’s Juukan Gorge has uncovered a tooth from a Tasmanian devil. Archaeologist Michael Slack said that the tooth likely reached the rock shelter through trade with people living on the coast to the south, since there is no evidence that Tasmanian devils ever lived in the region surrounding the rock shelter. Evidence does indicate that the animals lived in southwestern Western Australia some 3,000 years ago, however. Pieces of braided human hair, a shell bead, and artifacts made of quartz held together with resin were also found. Pieces of braided human hair discovered at the rock shelter in 2014 have been dated to about 5,000 years ago and linked to Aboriginal people living in the Pilbara today. To read about 20,000-year-old butchered kangaroo bones that archaeologists found in a Pilbara cave, go to "World Roundup: Australia."