Mungo Man

Lake Mungo, Mungo National Park

Mungo Man found at World Heritage listed Lake Mungo

World Heritage listed Lake Mungo is unique in both visible land formations and archaeological significance. Before the lake dried out some 18,000 years ago, Aboriginal people lived on the shores of the lake. Traces of their occupancy - camp hearths, remains of food, their clay-pan workshops - and skeletons of now extinct creatures such as the Tasmanian Tiger can still be found in the slowly eroding sand dunes of its shores.

In 1969, following the discovery of some of the oldest remains of modern man on earth, Lake Mungo became one of the world’s most significant archaeological sites.

Australian archaeologists unearthed the remains of the oldest known cremation. They found bone fragments belonging to the skeleton of a young woman, who became known as Mungo Woman. She is now believed to have lived and died some 40,000 years ago.

Only five years later, in close proximity to Mungo Woman, scientists discovered the burial site of a Mungo Man, a male who was buried about 42,000 years ago. Mungo Man is the oldest skeleton buried in a ritual using red ochre, a material which could only have reached the shores of Lake Mungo by trade.

The remains of these modern people document the longest human habitation of one area outside Africa.

Baked sediments from uneroded fireplaces also reveal another phenomenon known as the 'Mungo excursion'. They record the direction of the earth's magnetic field at the time the fire was in use, proving that about 31,000 years ago, the north-south axis moved 120 degrees from its present position and returned again over several thousand years.

The Foundation supported the creation of World Heritage listed Mungo National Park through land purchase, the funding of the visitor centre and the funding of a resident archaeologist to continue study into the world of Mungo Man and Mungo Woman.

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