Bend Road archaeological site facts for kids
The Bend Road archaeological site is an ancient outdoor area near Melbourne, Australia. It was found when people were planning to build a big road called the EastLink Freeway. This important site is split into two parts, one on each side of Bend Road in Dandenong South. It used to cover a huge area, about 12 football fields!
Contents
Digging Up the Past
How the Site Was Explored
In 2006, experts from La Trobe University, led by Jim Allen, carefully dug up parts of the Bend Road site. They found that even though the ground had been disturbed by things like animal burrows (called bioturbation) and strong winds moving soil (called aeolian deflation), there were still thousands of stone tools left behind. These tools could tell us a lot about the past.
A Perfect Spot for Ancient People
The site was on a sandy area next to Dandenong Creek. It was also near the edge of a large swamp called Carrum Carrum Swamp. This made it a great place for ancient Aboriginal people to live. It was a dry spot right next to rich hunting grounds. They could find lots of birds, fish, and water plants and animals there.
What the Digging Revealed
The excavations showed that people lived here a very long time ago.
- More recent finds, from a period called the late Holocene, included hundreds of small, sharp stone tools. These were often shaped like triangles or crescents.
- Even older evidence suggests people were here as far back as 30,000 to 35,000 years ago! This makes Bend Road one of the oldest known Aboriginal sites in Victoria.
- However, some of these very old dates are still being discussed by scientists.
