The oldest story in the world - [sciencemag.org]
I have the book mentioned in the article, The Edge of Memory by Patrick Nunn, really interesting.
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None of this is overly surprising. 35,000 BP the Earth was still in the grips of the last ice age. The straits between Australia, Indonesia, and Southeast Asia were connected by a land bridge as much of the world's oceans were locked up in polar ice caps.
There was a lot of human and faunal migration during this time, worldwide. That humans arrived in Australia before 35,000 BP doesn't sound unreasonable. Oral traditions are quite durable, especially within populations like the aboriginal occupants in places like Australia where they became isolated and remained in place.
Anecdotally, oral stories differ in specifics somewhat over time with each teller and each generation. But in general they remain true to their essence as they represent important events in the life of the culture.
t1nick
Level 8
May 23, 2020
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If the story is that old, it sure is a rarity. The usual time given is 13,000 years, corresponding with the floods at the end of the last Ice Age. But the southern hemisphere, as far as I know, wasn't affected much by this disaster.One thing I find really curious is the link Julian Jaynes made between the advent of consciousness as we know it and the end of an era caused by various calamities like earthquakes and famine and the rise of the Sea Peoples. In the first situation, a civilisation was lost to memory and in the second case a pre-conscious way of thinking was lost. Jaynes called this 'the bicameral mind'. None of this affected the southern hemisphere and it makes me wonder if the people there were able to relate in an interrupted way to the pre-conscious way of looking at their world, which I think might be same as the dream-world.
brentan
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May 23, 2020
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