Page 44 - THE MELANESIA DIASPORA FILE CETAK ISI 10022017

The Tiger Cave, one of the
pre-historic settlements with the
finding of tens of human burial
sites, and the remains of early
human inhabitants.

The sites above are not likely to be representative of the real number, considering that
there are still many sites not yet researched. In the meantime, those have already been or
are being excavated are still limited to the inhabited layer of the Holocene period. We should
also note that evidence also comes from outside Indonesia, the Niah Cave, Tabon Cave and
Callao Cave, some sites in West Melanesia and dozens of sites in Australia (Simanjuntak
and Fauzi, 2015). Unlike in Indonesia, these cave sites in Australia and West Melanesia
predominantly are open natural sites. They include the site at Lake Mungo where a human
skeleton of at least 45,000 years ago was found (Gorecki et al., 1991, Gosden, 1995, Smith
and Sharp, 1993), and the sites at Maribyrnong river terrace, Keilor (36,000-25,000 years
ago) and Greenough river, West Australia of around 37,000 years ago (Hiscock, 2008). All of
these findings showed that EMH had been living at the same time in Southeast Asia, West
Melanesia, and Australia since at least around 30 years ago.

Life Style and Behavior
Different from the life styles of Homo erectus, the predecessors, who led a solely outdoor
existence, EMH started to settle down in caves and natural niches although still relying
on their subsistence lifestyle of hunting and gathering. The caves were not just used for

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