Mandu Mandu Creek rockshelter: Pleistocene human coastal occupation of North West Cape, Western Australia

North West Cape forms the tip of a narrow peninsula with an area of some 2500km2. The western coast is bordered by Ningaloo Reef and is the nearest point on the Australian continent to the edge of the continental shelf. On the eastern side are the more sheltered and shallow waters of Exmouth Gulf. These contrasting marine environments are divided by Cape Range, an extremely rugged limestone range which forms the backbone of the peninsula (Fig 1; May et al 1983:38). By plotting late Quaternary sea level curves (Chappell and Thorn 1977:277) on a local hydrographie chart (Australian Nautical Chart 330), it is estimated that even at the height of late Pleistocene glacial conditions, when sea levels were up to 150m lower than present, the current western shore of Cape Range peninsula was never more than about 12km from the sea. The proximity of the edge of the continental shelf, together with the unusually steep local topography, has created a situation where the generally destructive effects of rising seas on archaeological sites located near Pleistocene coastlines have been, at least in part, contained (cf. Perlman 1980:286). In addition, the limestone environment of rockshelters in Cape Range should preserve organic archaeological material, the evidence of human adaptation to a late Pleistocene coastal environment.