Aboriginal language had ice age origins

[Ptarmigan]

Aboriginal language had ice age origins
ABC Science Online
Wednesday, 13 December 2006

Aboriginal languages may be much older than people think, argues a linguistic anthropologist who says they originated as far back as the end of the last ice age around 13,000 years ago.

This challenges existing thinking, which suggests Aboriginal languages developed from a proto-language that spread through Australia 5000 to 6000 years ago.

The key to the new hypothesis is prehistoric Australia's single land mass 13,000 to 28,000 years ago, when New Guinea and Tasmania were still attached, says Dr Mark Clendon in the journal Current Anthropology.

Clendon says the continent, known as Sahul, was relatively densely populated on the land bridge connecting northern Australia to New Guinea, now separated by the Arafura Sea.

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I always thought the Australian Aborgines came from what is now present day Indonesia. It is possible that Ainu language could be related to Australian Aborgine.