Windows on the past? Perspectives on accumulation, formation, and significance from an Australian Holocene lithic landscape

Abstract

The generative nature of the archaeological record stands in contrast with reconstructive goals of the discipline. This is particularly evident in discussions of surface archaeology, which is often considered deficient for reconstructing human behavior in the past when compared with subsurface deposits. We look at a case study from Rutherfords Creek in arid southeastern Australia, where lithics and combustion features appear in differing densities across the surface. These have been interpreted variably in terms of settlement patterns; however, the relationships between accumulation, visibility, and preservation are complex. This study addresses these relationships in terms of formation dynamics, drawing out patterns from surface assemblages that bear on the mobility and resilience of the ancestral Aboriginal populations that occupied Rutherfords Creek during the late Holocene. A different view of the record emerges, one that foregrounds the notions of reversibility in the patterning to identify the kinds of questions the record might be most fruitfully brought to bear on, with implications for both surface and subsurface archaeology.