Cited by 114Pacific and Southeast Asian StudiesMaritime and Coastal ArchaeologyPleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology

Early human settlement of Sahul was not an accident

Open access
Bird, Michael I., Condie, Scott A., O’Connor, Sue, O’Grady, Damien, Reepmeyer, Christian, Ulm, Sean, Zega, Mojca, Saltré, Frédérik +1 more·2019·Scientific Reports

Abstract

The first peopling of Sahul (Australia, New Guinea and the Aru Islands joined at lower sea levels) by anatomically modern humans required multiple maritime crossings through Wallacea, with at least one approaching 100 km. Whether these crossings were accidental or intentional is unknown. Using coastal-viewshed analysis and ocean drift modelling combined with population projections, we show that the probability of randomly reaching Sahul by any route is <5% until ≥40 adults are ‘washed off’ an island at least once every 20 years. We then demonstrate that choosing a time of departure and making minimal headway (0.5 knots) toward a destination greatly increases the likelihood of arrival. While drift modelling demonstrates the existence of ‘bottleneck’ crossings on all routes, arrival via New Guinea is more likely than via northwestern Australia. We conclude that anatomically modern humans had the capacity to plan and make open-sea voyages lasting several days by at least 50,000 years ago.

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1038/s41598-019-42946-9

Cites

48 of 48 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Claims the paper makes

The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.

Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.

A few free checks a day · papers already verified open instantly · results are public

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

  • The first anatomically modern human populations to arrive in Island Southeast Asia most likely encountered a variety of hominin populations, no matter which route they took to enter Sahul.

    “Nonetheless, the current fossil and archaeological records, together mounting genetic evidence from across ISEA, point to the widespread presence of archaic hominins east of Wallace's Line 26 , and indicate that the first AMH populations to arrive in ISEA most likely encountered a variety of hominin populations, no matter which route they took to enter Sahul 4752 .”

    From Widespread Denisovan ancestry in Island Southeast Asia but no evidence of substantial super-archaic hominin admixture (2021) · cites this paper as [52]

    The Introduction (page unavailable) says pre-modern hominins reached some western Wallacean islands before modern humans and describes northern and southern routes into Sahul. The Results (page unavailable) identify evidence from Sulawesi and Flores, but do not establish that the first modern humans encountered a variety of hominin populations on either route. (LLM, conf=0.83)

    Experimental — accuracy not yet measured

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

The self-check needs the paper’s full text.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Research works printed but not linked: 2

  1. [23]O’Connell, J. F, Allen, J. & Hawkes, K. Pleistocene Sahul and the origins of seafaring. The Global Origins and Development of Seafaring, eds Anderson, A., Barrett, J. H., Boyle, K. V. (McDonald Institute of Archaeological Research, Cambridge), pp 57–68 (2010).
  2. [41]Bellwood P 35,000 years of prehistory in the northern Moluccas. In Bartstra, G. J. (ed.) Bird’s head approaches, Irian Jaya studies, a programme for interdisciplinary research. Modern Quaternary Research in Southeast Asia. 1998 15 233 275

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Bird, M. I., Condie, S. A., O’Connor, S., O’Grady, D., Reepmeyer, C., Ulm, S., Zega, M., Saltré, F., & Bradshaw, C. J. A.
Affiliations
  • James Cook University (AU)
  • CSIRO Oceans and Atmosphere (AU)
  • Australian National University (AU)
  • Flinders University (AU)
Corresponding author
Bird, Michael I.
Venue
Scientific Reports
Published
2019-06-17
Volume
9
Issue
1
Pages
8220-8220
ISSN
2045-2322 (ISSN-L)
OpenAlex
W2953120749
Cited by
114
References
48
Citations by year
2026: 8 · 2025: 12 · 2024: 15 · 2023: 11 · 2022: 14 · 2021: 27 · 2020: 22 · 2019: 5
FWCI
79.77
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Scientific Reports (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • ResearchOnline - JCU (James Cook University) (submittedVersion)
  • Adelaide Research & Scholarship (AR&S) (University of Adelaide) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
  • ANU Open Research (Australian National University) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
Funders
Department of Education and Training | Australian Research Council (CE170100015, FL140100044, FT120100656)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Geography, Planning and Development › Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies
  • Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Archeology › Maritime and Coastal Archaeology
  • Social Sciences › Anthropology › Pleistocene-Era Hominins and Archaeology
Keywords
Wallacea, population projections, sea-level lowstand, anatomically modern humans, New Guinea, northwestern Australia, Aru Islands, human dispersal
MeSH terms
Archaeology, Australia, Humans, New Guinea, Oceans and Seas, Human Migration

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review