Journal of Archaeological Science 40 (2013) 3e10

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Journal of Archaeological Science

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Review

How old are Australias pictographs? A review of rock art dating

Bruno David a, *, Jean-Michel Geneste b, Fiona Petchey c, Jean-Jacques Delannoy d, Bryce Barker e,
Mark Eccleston f
a
School of Geography and Environmental Science, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria 3800, Australia
b
Centre National de Prhistoire, Ministre la Culture et de la Communication, UMR PACEA, Universit de Bordeaux 1, 24000 Prigueux, France
c
Radiocarbon Dating Laboratory, University of Waikato, Hamilton 3240, New Zealand
d
Laboratoire EDYTEM e Universit de Savoie/CNRS, 73373 Le Bourget du lac, France
e
School of Humanities and Communication, Public Memory Centre, University of Southern Queensland, Toowoomba 4350, Queensland, Australia
f
Aboriginal Affairs Victoria, G.P.O. Box 2392, Melbourne, Victoria 3001, Australia

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Australia contains some of the worlds richest and apparently longest traditions of rock pictographs.
Received 7 May 2012 Dating this art, however, has been problematic, with few direct and reliable dates of Pleistocene or early
Received in revised form Holocene age having been obtained from visible, representational imagery. This paper critically reviews
23 August 2012
the evidence for the antiquity of pigment rock art in Australia by examining the various dating tech-
Accepted 26 August 2012
niques employed. The accurate and reliable dating of rock art worldwide is crucial to understanding the
evolution of modern human symbolism and whether cognitive modernism came about after, rather than
Keywords:
with, the rst signs of full biological modernism; understanding the pitfalls and devising proper methods
Pictographs
Rock art dating
are crucial prerequisites. Towards these ends, this paper reviews the results and techniques that have
Australia been employed to date the apparently earliest known pictographs in Australia.
Archaeology of symbolism 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction developments in radiocarbon dating, including associated devel-

Rock art is of particular signicance to world archaeology: it is
the most direct material expression of aesthetics and symbolism
that we have access to for the distant past. Despite its privileged
ability to shed light on the cognitive evolution of our species,
however, until recently the difculties of dating rock art e and thus
to situate it in time e had resulted in its archaeological margin-
alisation worldwide.
The onset of AMS radiocarbon dating in the mid to late 1980s,
and the ability to obtain ages on milligrams of carbon, saw a major
shift in the archaeology of rock art across the globe. For the rst
time, rock images could now be dated directly and, with this, rock
art research became closely integrated in conventional archaeo-
logical programs (keeping in mind that what radiocarbon dating
measures is the time of cessation of replenishment to the dated
material of carbon isotopes in equilibrium with the environment,
rather than directly the painting or other cultural event itself).
Potentially one of the great beneciaries of these technical
* Corresponding author. Tel.: 61 (0)3 99052938.
E-mail addresses: bruno.david@monash.edu (B. David), jean-michel.geneste@
culture.gouv.fr (J.-M. Geneste), fpetchey@waikato.ac.nz (F. Petchey), jean-
jacques.delannoy@univ-savoie.fr (J.-J. Delannoy), bryce.barker@usq.edu.au
(B. Barker), mark.eccleston@dpcd.vic.gov.au (M. Eccleston).
opments in sample pre-treatment, are those regions of the world
with apparently long sequences of more or less distinctive rock art
styles. Depending on its age and geographical location, the antiq-
uity of rock art has the potential to illuminate the homologous
inheritance of rock art symbolism at early crossroads closer to our
species homeland in Africa. As evidence for the emergence of
representational, referential behaviour and thus complex
symbolism, understanding the spatial history of rock art relative to
that of biologically modern humans is critical to understanding at
a global scale the geography of developing cognitive abilities in our
species and, with this, when and how we came to be who we are
today.
With these aims in mind, we review the dating of rock picto-
graphs in Australia, in global perspective, to apply chronometric
hygiene (Spriggs, 1989) to the current evidence for rock art
symbolism in the Sahul region at the eastern end of the Out-of-
Africa 2 Southern Arc route. In the face of oft-made popular and
professional statements that Australian rock art could have been
[made] 50,000 years ago (Eime, no date), provides a unique
documentation of perhaps 50,000 years or more of human
endeavour and evidence that from the very beginning the Aborig-
inal artist expressed himself in forms which transcended simple
symbols (Chaloupka, 1993: 246), that The Kimberley rock art
sequence is likely to prove one of the longest and most complex

0305-4403/$ e see front matter 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2012.08.019
4 B. David et al. / Journal of Archaeological Science 40 (2013) 3e10
anywhere in the world (Morwood et al., 1994: 79) and the like, we
review the Australian evidence and ask: what works in dating rock
pictographs and what does not, with critical assessment of
successes and problems associated with the different techniques
that have been applied. In the process, we aim to decipher where
we are at, both methodologically and chronologically, in the dating
of rock art in Australia and beyond.
2. Rock art dating in Australia
Australian archaeology since the 1990s has been studded with
nds that implicate the presence of ancient pigment art, but few of
these involve direct and reliable dating of visible, representational
imagery. In Arnhem Land, these earlier claims include excavated
facetted and use-striated haematite crayons bracketed by
61,000  13,000 and 45,000  9000 year-old TL ages from Mala-
kunanja II (Roberts et al., 1990: 153) and in close association with
a 53,400  5400 year-old TL age at Nauwalabila 1 (Jones and
Johnson, 1985; Roberts et al., 1994), but we do not know what
these pigments were used for. Elsewhere in Australia relatively early
evidence of pictographic activity is also found in the form of exca-
vated ochres with signs of use e such as striations and/or bevelled
edges at Sandy Creek 1 in Cape York Peninsula in association with
a radiocarbon determination of 31,900 700/e600 BP (Cole et al.,
1995: 154) e and in apparently pigment-stained stones, including
grinding stones (e.g. at Carpenters Gap in the Kimberley, where
OConnor excavated a painted limestone slab without a visible
motif, bracketed by radiocarbon determinations of 33,600  500 BP
and 42,800  1850 BP (OConnor and Fankhauser, 2001)).
The following review addresses all the pre-mid Holocene dates
reported for rock pictographs in Australia, structured by method of
dating. We distinguish between BP to relate only to radiocarbon
dates, cal BP to calibrated radiocarbon ages before AD 1950, and
years ago to calendar years before the time of writing. We direct
the reader to Chippindale and Taons (1998) review of relative
methods of dating rock art (e.g. superimpositions, presence of
extinct fauna in the art (e.g. Brandl, 1972)) for Arnhem Land, issues
not covered here where we only address the dating of pictographs
through chronometric methods.
We begin by noting that the direct dating of pigment from
artworks on rock walls consists either of 1) a single raw material
such as pure and uncontaminated charcoal or beeswax; or, as is
most commonly the case, 2) a blend of materials variably including
natural inclusions (e.g. insect parts originally incorporated in
a pigment) and subsequent contaminants (e.g. redeposited CaCO3
from the bedrock) as well as anthropogenic compounds combined
to form a paint paste (e.g. organic binders, crushed mondmilch,
ritual inclusions, unpuried water). It is thus important for
a researcher to understand which component of a pigment is being
dated or otherwise analysed. In this sense, the analysis of pigments
from French and other European Upper Palaeolithic caves have
usually revealed complex paint pastes incorporating a wide array of
minerals, in some cases at least arguably indicating intentional
chemistries, such as in the black artworks of Niaux and Lascaux
(Clottes et al., 1990; Chalmin et al., 2003, 2004, 2006, 2008; Reiche
et al., 2006). Organic materials such as Cervidae antler are known to
have been (purposefully) inserted into pigment pastes in French
Upper Palaeolithic caves, such as at Lascaux. Once the different
chemical, mineralogical and structural components of a pigment
have been identied, it is then possible to dene the recipe used to
make a paint, and the presence of such recipes can itself be used as
a chronological marker (Menu and Walter, 1992; Menu et al., 1993),
especially in conjunction with mobiliary art by which the age of
particular styles can be cross-checked (Clottes et al., 1990).
Furthermore, some minerals could have been transformed, for
example through heating (Pomis et al., 1999), while the subse-
quent redeposition of calcite lms over paintings, such as at Arcy-
sur-Cure and Lascaux, can bias the composition of pigments
(Chalmin et al., 2008). In effect, these subsequent layers of calcite
that cover earlier paintings can themselves be dated and thus offer
maximum ages for the underlying paintings, while they also serve
to protect the underlying artworks from various forms of contam-
ination or destruction, as has recently been revealed at Arcy-sur-
Cure (Reiche et al., 2006).
While the rock wall underlying a painting, as its support, is an
important element of rock art, it is often neglected in rock art
studies and rock art dating, whether this be the preparation of
a rock surface prior to painting, or relating to problems caused by
the interaction of rock surface materials with (more or less humid)
pigments. At Chauvet Cave, where a number of artworks involved
the pronounced shading of pigments over altered mondmilch
surfaces, crushed charcoal powders have necessarily and inten-
tionally inter-mixed with the altered soft calcite surface (Clottes,
2010) as a means of attaining an array of shades from black to
light grey. As a way of accounting for such potential problems in
rock art dating e i.e. to avoid dating charcoal mixed with other
sources of carbon e at Chauvet Cave AMS radiocarbon dates were
obtained directly on identied fragments of wood charcoal
(Valladas, 2003; Valladas et al., 2001, 2005) through an initial
programme of blind testing involving ve different laboratories
(Cuzange et al., 2007), followed by a second similar, ongoing pro-
gramme. These European experiences are salutary for rock art
dating in Australia and globally, although rarely have they been
sufciently considered worldwide.
2.1. Radiocarbon dating art through mineral crusts
The majority of Pleistocene to mid Holocene radiocarbon ages
for pictographs in Australia have been obtained by Alan Watchman,
beginning with early experimental studies in Arnhem Land. In his
early research on radiocarbon dating mineral salts in rock crusts,
Watchman (1987) analysed a number of whewellite-rich rock
surface crusts from Arnhem Land sites. He targeted whewellite for
dating because Petrological and mineralogical evidence strongly
indicates that sulphate and nitrate-rich salts found near art sites are
not derived from weathering of the quartzite substrate, here
eliminating the sandstone/quartzite bedrock itself as a potential
source of contamination (Watchman, 1987: 37). However,
Watchman also notes that The origin of the carbon in whewellite is
uncertain and is believed to come from combustion of plant
material during dry season res. Vapour and smoke released to the
atmosphere during grass res accumulates in early storm clouds
which later produce rain containing acids and organic compounds
(Watchman, 1987: 38). In this early and preliminary research,
Watchman did not isolate individual layers of whewellite from the
multi-layered crusts, and the AMS radiocarbon determinations
were thus obtained on the whewellite from the sum of layers in
each crust. It is not clear from the publications whether the
resulting radiocarbon determinations of 4850  300 BP from
Nangalor, 7040  200 BP from Baroalba Springs, 8200  460 BP and
8880  590 BP from Ngarradj Warde Djobkeng and 12,250  105 BP
from Spirit Cave at Angbangbang are from crusts underlying
(Watchman, 1987: 38), overlying (Watchman, 1987: 40), overlying
and underlying (Watchman, 1987: 39) or near but away from the art
(Watchman, 1987: 39), and thus whether they should be taken as
maximum or minimum dates for the art, although Watchman
(1987: 40) concludes that this study has established a minimum
age of 8880  590 years BP for some rock art paintings. Younger
dates were also obtained from a number of sites (Watchman, 1987;
Watchman and Campbell, 1996).
 B. David et al. / Journal of Archaeological Science 40 (2013) 3e10
Following his initial studies of Arnhem Land rock art, Watchman
rened his sampling methods by separating carbon-bearing
materials from individual micro-laminae of rock crusts, either
through laser-ablation (Watchman, 2000) or scraping (micro-
excavation) (Watchman, 1993b, 2000), and thence AMS radio-
carbon dating the dead micro-organisms or micro-organic matter
(Cole and Watchman, 2005: 671) or whewellite (CaC2O4$H2O) held
within. Micro-stratigraphic correspondence with haematite and
other foreign pigments trapped under or over the dated layers, as
observed in cross-sections of tiny akes of laminated rock crusts,
could then be used to infer ages for ancient rock art not now visible
on the rock due to the lack of opacity between the accumulated
crust and the underlying pigment layers. As Watchman
(1993b: 468) noted following his initial Arnhem Land studies,
Whewellite is suitable for 14C dating because once this oxalate salt
has precipitated its carbon isotopes are not exchanged with
atmospheric, pedogenic, or geologic sources of carbon. At the
Ancestral Figures site in the Laura sandstones of northeastern
Australia, Cole and Watchman (2005: 670e71) thus obtained
a radiocarbon determination of 6530  1380 BP immediately below
a painted anthropomorph, arguably giving a maximum but
approximate age for the painting. At the Red Lady site, also in the
Laura district, Cole and Watchman (2005: 671) obtained an AMS
radiocarbon date of 7230  750 BP for immediately above the red
paint of a large anthropomorph, again indicating that the painting
approximates that age. At Sandy Creek 2 nearby, Cole et al.
(1995: 156) obtained a sequence of AMS radiocarbon determina-
tions on oxalates from various micro-laminae, indicating the
presence of pigments some 6655  80 BP, 15,000 to 16,000 BP, and
24,600  220 BP (Cole et al., 1995; Watchman, 1993b).
While these results are broadly accepted by the archaeological
community to reect the presence of pictographs at those times,
doubts persist, and questions remain as to the 24,600  220 BP
date, as the residual paint layer purported to be of that age was
only observed in a rock crust located in an adjacent lamination at
an equivalent stratigraphic position some 2 m from the dated crust
sample (Watchman, 1993b: 471). Furthermore, the source of the
carbon forming the whewellite remains unknown, and given
micro-stratigraphic evidence for both deposition and erosion of
parts of the rock prole, there are doubts as to whether or not the
dated sample incorporates older, re-deposited carbon, and that the
result is thus older than the age of the crust layer itself. In any case,
given that the traces of pigment were only revealed in the rock
crusts cross-section, the form and nature of the pictograph
remains unknown.
Using the same techniques of identifying pigment and dating
carbon compounds in cross-sections of akes of surface rock crusts
that had been applied at Laura, Campbell et al. (1996) obtained
a remarkable sequence of 10 AMS radiocarbon dates from
a 2.1 mm-thick gypsum-oxalate rock surface accretion at Walk-
under Arch Cave in the Chillagoe limestones to the south of the
Laura district. The dates, all in correct micro-stratigraphic sequence
progressively older from surface towards bedrock, revealed ages of
3340  60 BP, 6790  70 BP, 10,400  90 BP, 12,840  100 BP,
16,100  130 BP, 20,800  160 BP, 22,800  210 BP, 25,800  280 BP,
28,100  400 BP, 29,700  500 BP. The dates of 6790  70 BP,
16,100  130 BP and 28,100  400 BP are each associated with red
haematite paints only seen in sample cross-section, and the dates
of 22,800  210 BP and 25,800  280 BP bracket a layer of yellow
goethite (Campbell, 2000; Campbell et al., 1996). In a crust sample
from another part of the site, a maximum radiocarbon date of
9470  120 BP was obtained for a painting which has been
obscured by crustal growth (Campbell et al., 1996: 233). The oldest
of these pigment layers from Walkunder Arch Cave, the
28,100  400 BP from the long sequence of dates, calibrates to
5
31,434e33,324 cal BP at 95.4% probability on Calib 6.0.0 using the
IntCal09 curve selection, and has been argued to represent the
oldest known pictograph in Australia.
However, while Watchmans AMS radiocarbon determinations
dating pigment layers in cross-sections of accreted rock crusts from
Arnhem Land, Laura and Chillagoe are signicant pointers to the
probable presence of ancient pictographs beneath opaque rock
skins, the problem remains, as Gillespie (1997: 436) notes, that the
samples for these determinations were unpuried material ground
from individual laminations [with those of Arnhem Land being
from the sum of laminations], and carbon dioxide was recovered
from total combustion. Because no separation of components
within laminations was attempted, the radiocarbon concentrations
will represent an average of all carbon compounds present, the
dated materials have an unknown carbon source and an unknown
relationship with the absolute ages, and thus they also have an
unknown relationship with the art or inferred art. Success in
radiocarbon dating of oxalate skins requires an understanding of
the mechanism and rate of formation of the oxalate minerals, the
source(s) of carbon, and possible post-depositional contamination
or carbon transport between layers, warns Gillespie (1997: 436).
On a related note, the standard errors associated with Watch-
mans laser-ablation dates reect the reproducibility of the
radiocarbon-dating laboratorys results e they have no relationship
to the reproducibility of samples independently prepared by
Watchman using a different method of pretreatment and/or
graphite production (that is why some radiocarbon dating labora-
tories are not keen on independent researchers sending pretreated
samples or graphite, unless these are accompanied by sufcient
details of standards used). In this context, it is possible that the true
errors on Watchmans younger dates could be as large as 300yrs.
2.2. Radiocarbon dating blood proteins embedded in pigment art
Loy et al. (1990) reported an AMS radiocarbon determination of
20,320 3100/2300 BP on supposed human blood protein
embedded in what was thought to be anthropogenic pigment on
a rock surface at Laurie Creek, c.200 km to the southwest of Arnhem
Land in the Northern Territory. However, subsequent investigations
of the original sample, coupled with new samples obtained nearby
on the same rock surface, could not duplicate the immunoassay
results for blood proteins that had supposedly been isolated from
the original sample and from which the Pleistocene date had been
obtained. The new geochemistry indicated that the original sample
had come from a natural rather than painted rock skin containing
varied sources of carbon, in particular calcium oxalate, from which
an AMS radiocarbon date of 4270  85 BP was obtained on
a duplicate sample from the original sample location (Gillespie,
1997; Nelson, 1993; Watchman, 1993a; see Loy, 1994 for
a rebuttal). As a result of the re-analyses, a number of the specialist
eldworkers, chemists and radiocarbon dating scientists involved
in the original Laurie Creek dating program withdrew in print their
support for the original date as relating to a Pleistocene rock
painting, arguing that there is no demonstrable associative
connection between the material dated and human activity
(Nelson, 1993: 893; see also Gillespie, 1997). As Gillespie
(1997: 436) concluded in his response to Loys (1994) rebuttal of
Nelsons (1993) rejection of the original results interpretations,
The dated material most likely contained predominantly natural
calcium oxalate from multiple layers. Given that identical methods
were also used to originally date another, unrelated sample from
Tasmania, and by the same analysts and as part of the same
research program, the same potential problems also apply to Loy
et al.s (1990) reported radiocarbon dates of 9240  820 BP and
10,730  810 BP for diffuse pigment from a hand stencil said to also
6 B. David et al. / Journal of Archaeological Science 40 (2013) 3e10
contain human blood protein from Wargata Mina (Judds Cavern) in
Tasmania, although this site has not be re-analysed (see also
Gillespie, 1997).
We note in this context that the potential for bacteria and algae
to contaminate pigment surfaces and to be incorporated within
dated samples has not been investigated. This potential problem
concerns all radiocarbon dates relating to rock art.
2.3. Dating early charcoal drawings
McDonald (1998, 2000; McDonald et al., 1990) obtained two
direct AMS radiocarbon dates on charcoal from a large curvilinear
non-gurative charcoal and red drawing from Gnatalia Creek in
New South Wales. The dates of 6085  60 BP and 29,795  420 BP
for two adjacent sample locations were further investigated by
Watchman (1994), who identied the presence of fatty acids,
unrelated to the art, in nearby silica skins (McDonald, 1998, 2000).
Given the wildly differing radiocarbon results for two samples from
the same artwork, and as analysis of the charcoal within the silica
indicates a single drawing event (McDonald, 2000: 90; see also
McDonald et al., 1990), the actual age of the Gnatalia Creek drawing
remains undened.
2.4. Radiocarbon dates on beeswax gures
The most commonly dated form of rock art in Australia is
beeswax gures, found especially in Arnhem Land (e.g. Nelson,
2000; Morwood et al., 2010; Taon et al., 2010). In a recent
review, Langley and Taon (2010) report that 47.9% of dated art in
Australia consist of beeswax images. The earliest uncontested
evidence for a beeswax image are two radiocarbon ages of
4040  80 BP (Nelson et al., 1995) and 4460  80 BP (Watchman
and Jones, 2002) for a naturalistic beeswax turtle image (BW-4)
from Gunbilngmurrung in Arnhem Land (with older paintings
subimposed underneath).
The radiocarbon dating of beeswax images assumes that the
rock art was made soon after the wax was collected, as it becomes
increasingly brittle (and thus less malleable) with time. There is
therefore the reasonable assumption that radiocarbon ages on
beeswax images will approximate the age of the waxs creation by
bees and its collection by people. For these same taphonomic
reasons, Pleistocene and early Holocene beeswax images are
unlikely to have survived on rock surfaces.
2.5. Radiocarbon dates on mud-dauber wasp nests
In building their nests, mud-dauber wasps of the Vespidae and
Sphecidae Families visit owers to collect nectar and gather mud
that contains pollen, phytoliths and other organics from nearby
humid environments, typically creek banks. An insect, spider or the
like is caught, paralysed and placed in the nest by the wasp, upon
which an egg is laid and the nest is sealed. Those organic compo-
nents that have survived since the building of the mud-nest (in
particular pollen) can be isolated for radiocarbon dating and
palaeoenvironmental reconstruction (for an example from
Carpenters Gap in the Kimberley region of NW Australia, see Wallis
(2002)). While some wasp species only use newly-built nests,
others build their nests over pre-existing nest stumps, potentially
thousands of years after the original nest was built and adding new
mud and organic components (including wasp eggs/larvae) to
residual nests in the process.
Roberts et al. (1997) and Reser (2009) have dated organics
embedded within mud-dauber wasp nests overlying a Wandjina
painting (Roberts et al., 1997) in the Kimberley region, and
anthropomorphic and zoomorphic images in the Victoria River
region, obtaining ages of 990  60 BP and 2330  70 BP for the
oldest samples respectively (with the art thereby pre-dating these
overlying samples). The authors and colleagues (unpublished data)
have obtained a radiocarbon date of 10,154  40 BP (Wk-31730) for
a wasp nest near an extensively painted surface at Nawarla
Gabarnmang. While the nest did not touch the art, it shows the
potential of this method to date Pleistocene art.
2.6. OSL dates on mud-dauber wasp nests
At an unnamed site near the King Edward River Crossing in the
Kimberley region, Roberts et al. (1997) undertook optically stimu-
lated luminescence (OSL) dating of quartz sand grains embedded in
the residual stump and later lateral extension of a mud-dauber
wasp nest (KERC4) built on top of the head-dress of a mulberry-
coloured human gure with an elongated torso, hanging arms .
and a narrow head from whose apex radiates a semi-circular tufted
head-dress; the painting looks archaic, and may be related to the
Bradshaw style (Roberts et al., 1997: 697). This painting, in turn,
overlies a hand stencil. Roberts et al. also dated quartz grains
extracted from the light-safe core of another nest (KERC5) that
was situated, at its nearest edge, only 1 cm from KERC4 and was
connected to it by a narrow bridge of cemented mud. Photographs
of these two nests in situ, and the mud bridge connecting them, are
given in Jacobs and Roberts (2007: gure 5) and in a recent review
of the age of Kimberley rock art (Aubert, 2012: gure 1).
In his review, Aubert (2012: 575) says that the two nests do not
appear to be physically connected, but this statement is at odds
with the photographic evidence and with the eld observations
made by Roberts when the nests were originally collected for
dating (Richard Roberts, personal communication March 2012).
Aubert further notes that one nest (KERC5) is clearly seen several
centimetres distant from the painting, and that Roberts thinks that
only the lip of nest KERC4 (a few millimetres wide and less than
a millimetre thick) may have directly overlaid the painting. This
portion of the nest was not collected as it was too thin to provide
suitable grains for dating and its removal could have damaged the
painting (Roberts pers. comm.). Some of these attributions to
Roberts are not entirely accurate (Richard Roberts, personal
communication March 2012). In recent correspondence, subse-
quent to the publication of Aubert (2012), Roberts has provided the
following comments and clarications, which are reproduced here
verbatim:
The key question is did the dated grains from KERC4 originate
from the small portion of that nest which overlay the head-dress
of the mulberry-coloured painting? The portion of KERC4
collected for dating was dominated by the thickest portion of
that nest, and the thinnest portion (the lip directly overlying
the painting) may [his emphasis] not have been removed as it
was quite thin. I cant be certain (not least because the sample
was collected at night using only red torchlight for illumination)
and I didnt photograph the site after collecting the nests. To be
sure about whether I did or didnt sample the lip would require
another visit to the site; the lip would still be there if I hadnt
removed it.
If I had removed the lip, then would the OSL ages for any of the
grains embedded in that portion of the nest accurately record its
time of construction? The lip was so thin that sunlight would
likely have ltered all the way through, emptying the OSL traps
in the process. So, even if I had sampled the lip, any grains
extracted from it would probably not have yielded a meaningful
age for nest construction. The dated grains from KERC4 most
likely originated from the thickest portion of the nest, which
modern sunlight did not penetrate all the way through.
 B. David et al. / Journal of Archaeological Science 40 (2013) 3e10
Are the OSL ages for these light-safe grains reliable and
representative of the nest as a whole? I would answer yes to
both questions. KERC4 could represent a moment in time, the
entire nest constructed and reused over a short interval (e.g.
a few seasons). In this case, the dated grains from the thickest
portion would be coeval with the grains contained in the lip of
the nest, and give a minimum age for the underlying painting.
Alternatively, KERC4 might represent a multiple-generation
nest, with the stump of an earlier nest built on, possibly much
later, by another nest. If the lip overlying the painting is asso-
ciated with this later nest, then the dated grains extracted from
its thickest portion would, again, provide a minimum age esti-
mate for the painting.
Lastly, does the lip actually overlie the painting? Grahame
Walsh, Rhys Jones and I closely scrutinised the nest and the
painting to establish their stratigraphic relationship, and we
concluded that the lip of KERC4 denitely overlay the painting.
Of course, if I did not remove the lip of KERC4 when I collected
the nest, then its relationship to the painting can still be
determined. Overall, then, I stand by the OSL ages for KERC5 and
KERC4 as accurate estimates of the time of construction of those
nests. As part of KERC4 appears to overlie the painting, then the
OSL age of that nest provides a minimum age for the painting. I
consider the most reliable estimate of minimum age to be
16,400  1800 years, as this was obtained using an early form of
the regenerative-dose procedure that has since been shown to
be more accurate than its additive-dose counterpart (see Jacobs
and Roberts, 2007).
In view of the above comments, the OSL dates of 16,400  1800
and 17,500  1800 years for KERC4 and KERC5 (Roberts et al., 1997)
indicate that the anthropomorph and hand stencil were painted
around or before that time (see also Roberts, 2000). This result
represents the oldest generally accepted age for a pigment rock
image in Australia.
2.7. Dating buried paintings
One of the most reliable ways of dating rock art is to nd
decorated rocks buried beneath stratied and well-dated sedi-
ments. Although such nds are relatively rare in Australia, a small
fragment of an originally larger painted slab was recently found in
excavation unit (XU) 43 of Square E in the well-protected double-
ended rockshelter of Nawarla Gabarnmang in Arnhem Land (David
et al., in press). This XU occurs at a stratigraphic level containing
mixed radiocarbon dates of 18,047  70 BP to 30,692  308 BP in
XU36 to XU45 (bracketed by in-sequence ages of 13,289  47 BP in
XU34 and 40,228  1043 BP in XU46), indicating that the painted
rock fell from the ceiling sometime during that span of time. A
scraping of charcoal ash adhered to the back of the painted rock e
the results of campres lit after the rock had fallen from the ceiling
e revealed an age of 22,965  218 BP, consistent with chrono-
stratigraphic expectations and calibrating to 26,913e
28,348 cal BP at 95.4% probability (median age of 27,765 cal BP).
X-ray uorescence and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectros-
copy indicated a paucity of calcium oxalate, weathering products
derived from organic acids formed by the action of lichens, bacteria
and fungi on rock surfaces, and thus that this potential source of
radiocarbon contamination was minimal to absent, giving further
condence in the radiocarbon determinations. These results were
coupled with a ne-grained geomorphological investigation of the
history of the rock ceiling immediately above the excavated square
from which the painted rock came, with in situ fragments of
excavated sandstone and quartzite matched mineralogically to
individual ceiling rock strata as a means to further determine the
7
age of various episodes of roof-fall. The results led to a detailed
understanding of the chronology of the roof-fall events in this part
of the site, including that which contained the painted rock.
Because the painting on the rock was in charcoal, a fragile pigment
which has survived only because it was buried face-down in
stratied deposits in a well-protected deep rock-shelter, it was
concluded that the painting itself was likely to have been made
only a short time prior to the roof-fall, and thus itself dates to
c.28,000 years ago. This is currently the oldest reliably dated visible
image, and thus conrmed pictograph in Australia (David et al., in
press).
2.8. Determining the chemistry of accretions over and above
pigment art to understand environmental conditions and age
Goodall et al. (2009) attempted to date panels of hand stencils
from Fern Cave, in the Chillagoe limestone belt in north Queens-
land, by determining the chemistry of micro-stratied mineral
accretions underlying and overlying the pigment art as a proxy for
palaeoenvironmental conditions by which to obtain clues as to the
arts likely age. Micro-Raman spectroscopy, environmental scan-
ning electron microscopy (ESEM), X-ray microanalysis (EDX) and
FTIR imaging were used to variously identify layers of gypsum and
calcite over and below the pigment layers. As gypsum typically
forms as an evaporative layer in limestone caves during arid
environmental conditions (Goodall et al., 2009: 2622) e it is
soluble in water and tends to redissolve during wetter conditions e
the sequence of alternating gypsum (indicating dry conditions) and
calcite (indicating relatively wet conditions) were matched to
known palaeoenvironmental data for the region to conclude that
the micro-stratigraphic position of pigment layers on rock walls
indicates that the rock art was made some time before
14,000 cal BP, probably between 22,000 and 17,000 cal BP if the
sub-surface excavated ochres from nearby excavations only a few
metres away were taken into account (cf. David, 2002), and nar-
rowed even further to between 19,000 and 17,000 cal BP by refer-
ence to the regional rainfall curve. Nevertheless, these results
should be treated as indicative rather than conclusive, as they are
based on a series of indirect lines of evidence that, while comple-
mentary, are each subject to the caveats typical of circumstantial
rather than direct evidence.
2.9. Dating calcite over and above rock paintings through uranium-
series and radiocarbon determinations
A number of other techniques have been used to obtain
numerical ages for pictographs elsewhere in the world, but not in
Australia (but see Bednarik, 1999 for applications to Australian rock
petroglyphs). A promising approach is uranium-series (U-series)
(often undertaken in association with radiocarbon) dating of calcite
bracketing paint layers, as applied for example in Timor (Aubert
et al., 2006) and China (Taon et al., 2012). U-series dating
compares the frequency of the soluble 238U (half-life c.4.5 billion
years) and 234U (half-life 245,250  490 years at 2s) with the
insoluble 230Th (half-life 75,690  230 years at 2s) isotopes in
a sample, in the assumption that the originally precipitated calcite
crystals will not contain any 230Th isotopes (because of their
insolubility) (Cheng et al., 2000). The measured 230Th isotopes are
thus assumed to be derived from precipitated 234U in re-deposited
calcite layers through radioactive decay. However, it is also gener-
ally recognised that re-deposited calcite owstone contains relict
materials and detritus from both bedrock and extraneous sources
such as aeolian dust; these contaminants can involve inbuilt 230Th
and carbon from the host rock and thus inbuilt starting ages. The
difculty is accounting for such contaminants, and while in theory
8 B. David et al. / Journal of Archaeological Science 40 (2013) 3e10
they can be measured and subtracted from original U-series and
radiocarbon determinations, in practice inbuilt values are more
difcult to determine. Results obtained from re-deposited calcium
carbonate thus typically indicate maximum ages due to the pres-
ence of inbuilt 230Th and geologically ancient carbon, although the
variably porous nature of speleothems (especially tufa) imply more
or less open systems which allow transfer of more recent carbon
through water action and the like (see above and Bednarik (2002)
for discussions of this same and related problems to radiocarbon
dating rock art through mineral crusts).
2.10. Dating rock-fall events by terrestrial in situ cosmogenic
nuclides (36Cl, 10Be, 26Al)
The use of cosmogenic nuclides to date rock-fall events,
although not commonplace, remains an important method of
geochronological dating. Although 36Cl, 10Be and 26Al dating were
attempted in the 1990s to give a maximum age for the formation of
Dragony Hollow (and thus its artworks), a large, painted
conglomerate boulder that separated from its parent clifine
(David et al., 1998), cosmogenic dating has not yet revealed results
for rock art sites in Australia. At Chauvet Cave in France, however,
rock-fall has long sealed the caves palaeo-entrance. These rock-fall
events exposed previously deeply buried limestone to the surface,
and can be directly dated using in situ-produced 36Cl concentra-
tions accumulated in scar surface samples that have been contin-
uously exposed to cosmic rays (Sadier et al., in press).
3. Conclusion
The archaeological evidence from Australia clearly indicates that
in Arnhem Land pigment art of some kind had already begun to be
made by around 50,000 years ago, as indicated by use-worn ochre
crayons of that age. However, the earliest secure age in Australia for
visible paintings or drawings representing referential pictographs,
as opposed to excavated ochre crayons, stone slabs hinting at the
presence of surface pigments or microscopic traces of pigment
revealed in cross-sections of rock crusts, are the c.22,965  218 BP
(26,913e28,348 cal BP) radiocarbon determination for a buried
charcoal painting from Nawarla Gabarnmang in Arnhem Land, and
the 16,400  1800 and 17,500  1800 year old OSL determinations
from wasp nests overlying a possible Gwion Gwion/Bradshaw
gure from the Kimberley.
Yet the place of Australia in the geography of early forms of rock
art symbolism e and with this the emergence of fully modern
human cognition across the world e will not be known until the
presence or absence of art objects matching the antiquity of the
earliest occupation of Sahul is better understood. Choosing the
most appropriate techniques for the situation at hand will be
crucial to obtaining reliable ages. Recent innovations in dating and
associated pretreatment have now made such investigations within
the reach of researchers. In this context it is signicant to note the
earliest reliably and generally accepted ages for pictographs in the
world:
 U/Th ages of 40,800 years for a red disk from El Castillo in
Spain, part of a large corpus of 50 ages obtained on calcite
overlying rock art from 11 caves in northern Spain. Ten re-
ported samples associated with paintings or stencils from Tito
Bustillo, El Castillo and Altamira are more than 20,000 years old
(Pike et al., 2012).
 32,410  720 BP (35,299e38,698 cal BP) for a painted rhinoc-
eros at Chauvet Cave in France (Valladas, 2003; Valladas et al.,
2001), with further, slightly younger paintings also coming
from that site.
 Schematic, monochrome red paintings on excavated rock
fragments from Fumane Cave in northern Italy, dated by
stratigraphic association to the early Aurignacian between
c.32,000 BP and 35,000 BP (Broglio, 2002; Floss and Rouquerol,
2007), calibrating to within 36,000e41,000 cal BP.
 28,370  440 BP (31,503e34,036 cal BP) for a painted oval-
shape (with hand stencils and a painted bison also of similar
age) at Cosquer Cave, also in France (Valladas, 2003; Valladas
et al., 2001).
 27,870  250 BP (GifA11002/SacA23417) for a charcoal drawing
from the cave of Colaboia in Romania (Clottes et al., 2011),
calibrating to 31,446e32,817 cal BP.
 An excavated stone tablet with a painted quadruped at Apollo
11 Cave in Namibia is dated between 25,500 BP and 27,500 BP
(Vogelsang, 1998; Wendt, 1976), calibrating to within 30,000e
32,000 cal BP.
Early, basal Aurignacian gurative gurines are also known from
caves from southern Germany (Geissensklosterle, Vogelherd,
Hohlenstein Stadel, Hohle Fels); all are older than 30,000 BP. In
Hohle Fels (Conard, 2009), a female gurine in mammoth ivory has
been radiocarbon dated through several charcoal and bone deter-
minations to between 31,300 BP and 34,700 BP (calibrating to
within 35,000e40,500 cal BP) (all calibrations undertaken on Calib
6.0.0 and calibrated at 95.4% probability).
While abstract imagery is known from much earlier times e the
Middle Stone Age, at Blombos Cave in South Africa where an
engraved rock with a complex geometric design has been dated to
75,000 years ago (Henshilwood et al., 2002); with earlier engraved
abstract designs on ostrich eggshell and animal bone from various
sites (e.g. Diepkloof rockshelter in South Africa (Texier et al., 2010)),
and cupules from even earlier contexts (e.g. de Beaune, 1993;
Leonardi, 1988) e currently the earliest evidence of a known
painted design, and of gurative motifs of any form, date to 10,000
years or more after biologically modern humans had spread across
the full span of the Africa-Europe-Asia-Sahul region. The c.28,000
year old painted rock from Nawarla Gabarnmang adds an example
from Australia to the world corpus of early pictographs, but there is
still a dearth of reliably dated rock art from Australia. There remains
many unreconciled millennia to be bridged between 1), the earliest
conrmed paintings of Australia and Europe, representing the two
geographical ends of the Out-of-Africa 2 dispersal; and 2), the rst
arrival of modern humans and the earliest paintings in Australia.
Acknowledgements
We thank Robin Torrence for commissioning us to write this
review, Richard (Bert) Roberts for advice on the Kimberley wasp
nest ages and for permission to cite his personal communication to
BD, and the Jawoyn Association for invitations to research in
Jawoyn country. BD thanks the Australian Research Council for QEII
Fellowship DP0877782 and grant LP110200927.
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