Fibre technologies in Indigenous Australia: Evidence from archaeological excavations in the Kimberley region

Abstract

The extent to which fibre technology was used in the past is difficult to assess because soft organic remains rarely preserve well. The oldest direct evidence for twisted fibre cordage is dated to between 41 and 52 ka in western Eurasia but indirect evidence suggests that it may have a much greater antiquity. The diverse use of string made from fibres of plants, animal and human hair by Indigenous Australians is well documented but poorly represented in archaeological sites. No fibre remains have been recovered from Pleistocene contexts and they are only rarely recorded in later deposits, usually as isolated fragments. Nineteen pieces of twisted fibre recovered from deposits in two limestone caves, Carpenter’s Gap 1 and Riwi in the southern Kimberley, are made from a variety of raw materials and manufacturing techniques. These same techniques and raw materials are documented in anthropological and historical records and in museum collections, demonstrating a continuity of spun fibre practice from the Mid-to-Late Holocene to the present. A comparison of the archaeological twisted fibres with Kimberley objects incorporating string held in the Western Australian Museum, provides further insight into the technology used by Indigenous Australians before the arrival of Europeans.

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Fibre technologies in Indigenous Australia:
Evidence from archaeological excavations in the
Kimberley region
Jane Balme, Sue O’Connor, Tim Ryan Maloney, Kim Akerman, Ben Keaney &
India Ella Dilkes-Hall
To cite this article: Jane Balme, Sue O’Connor, Tim Ryan Maloney, Kim Akerman, Ben
Keaney & India Ella Dilkes-Hall (2022): Fibre technologies in Indigenous Australia: Evidence
from archaeological excavations in the Kimberley region, Australian Archaeology, DOI:
10.1080/03122417.2022.2054510
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/03122417.2022.2054510
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RESEARCH ARTICLE
Fibre technologies in Indigenous Australia: Evidence from archaeological
excavations in the Kimberley region
Jane Balme
a
, Sue O’Connor
b,c
, Tim Ryan Maloney
d
, Kim Akerman
a
, Ben Keaney
b
and
India Ella Dilkes-Hall
a
a
Archaeology, School of Social Sciences, University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia;
b
Department of Archaeology and
Natural History, School of Culture History and Language, College of Asia and the Pacific, Australian National University, Canberra,
Australia;
c
ARC Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage, Australian National University, Canberra, Australia;
d
Griffith Centre for Social and Cultural Research, School of Humanities, Languages and Social Science, Griffith University,
Queensland, Australia
ABSTRACT
The extent to which fibre technology was used in the past is difficult to assess because soft
organic remains rarely preserve well. The oldest direct evidence for twisted fibre cordage is
dated to between 41 and 52 ka in western Eurasia but indirect evidence suggests that it may
have a much greater antiquity. The diverse use of string made from fibres of plants, animal
and human hair by Indigenous Australians is well documented but poorly represented in arch-
aeological sites. No fibre remains have been recovered from Pleistocene contexts and they are
only rarely recorded in later deposits, usually as isolated fragments. Nineteen pieces of twisted
fibre recovered from deposits in two limestone caves, Carpenter’s Gap 1 and Riwi in the south-
ern Kimberley, are made from a variety of raw materials and manufacturing techniques. These
same techniques and raw materials are documented in anthropological and historical records
and in museum collections, demonstrating a continuity of spun fibre practice from the Mid-to-
Late Holocene to the present. A comparison of the archaeological twisted fibres with Kimberley
objects incorporating string held in the Western Australian Museum, provides further insight
into the technology used by Indigenous Australians before the arrival of Europeans.
ARTICLE HISTORY
Received 20 January 2022
Accepted 15 March 2022
KEYWORDS
Fibre technology; Australian
archaeology; Holocene
archaeology; Kimberley;
string manufacture
Introduction
The oldest published direct evidence for twisted
fibre is a fragment of three ply cordage found
adhering to a Levallois flake recovered from deposits
dated to between 41 and 52 ka from the site of Abri
du Maras in France (Hardy et al. 2020). Other
objects, such as perforated shell, may imply the use
of string. Shell beads and pendants have been found
in Middle Palaeolithic sites in north Africa (d’Errico
et al. 2009), Middle Stone Age sites in South Africa
(e.g. d’Errico et al. 2005; Vanhaeren et al. 2019) and
from Cueva Anton on the Iberian Peninsula where
the context is thought to date to 115 ka
(Hoffmann et al. 2018; Zilh~
ao et al. 2010). However,
these beads and pendants may have been just as eas-
ily suspended by sinew or a length of unprocessed,
untwisted plant (such as a reed). More convincing,
but indirect, evidence for string are the impressions
of fibre in clay recovered from Upper Palaeolithic
sites in the Czech Republic, Russia, France, and
Germany (Adovasio et al. 1996; Soffer et al. 2000).
Twisted fibre is an important technology in all
known human societies and may have ‘helped to
shape the world’(Hardy 2008:271). In places with
very good preservation, fibre artefacts can be recov-
ered in greater numbers than stone artefacts (see
Soffer et al. 2000). However, the poor preservation
of plant materials other than in exceptional condi-
tions, such as water-logged environments and very
dry caves, means that the evidence for fibre technol-
ogy is rare. Furthermore, as women are more often
associated with the manufacture of fibre artefacts
than men, this poor preservation of plants has led
to biases in interpretation of subsistence and gender
roles and status (Adovasio and Dillehay 2020;
Soffer, Adovasio and Hyland 2000; Soffer et al.
2000; Soffer and Adovasio 2004).
In a series of papers with various colleagues,
Adovasio (initially Adovasio 1977:vii) has argued for
the importance of fibre technologies for the success-
ful colonisation of the New World. This argument
is supported by many examples of early finds of
cordage and fragments of a variety of fibre craft
CONTACT Jane Balme jane.balme@uwa.edu.au Archaeology, School of Social Sciences, University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia
ß2022 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/
licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited, and is not
altered, transformed, or built upon in any way.
AUSTRALIAN ARCHAEOLOGY
https://doi.org/10.1080/03122417.2022.2054510

objects (see Adovasio and Dillehay 2020). One of us
(JB), has argued, largely based on indirect evidence,
that the successful colonisation of Sahul, perhaps as
much as 65 ka ago (Clarkson et al. 2017) relied on
the presence of fibre technology (Balme 2013).
However, unlike the Americas, conditions for the
preservation of fibre are rarely present in
Australian sites.
While fibre is represented in imagery in many
rock art sites across northern Australia either as
objects or as prints (e.g. Miller 2021; Moore et al.
2020; Veth et al. 2018) and there are reports of
string and fragments of fibre objects found cached
or on surface deposits in some northern sites (e.g.
Clarke 1987:139; Gunn et al. 2017:183–185;
Morwood 1984:542), excavated spun fibre (a series
of overlapping individual fibres spun together to
form a continuous piece of string or cordage), is
very rare. Apart from the fibres reported here, we
have only found six sites from which spun fibre has
been recovered –four of which are in north-
ern Australia.
The largest assemblage comes from Holocene
deposits in Anbangbang I, a sandstone rockshelter
in Arnhem Land (Figure 1), where 65 finds of single
segments and seven bundles of string, including one
example of netting were recorded (Clarke 1987:157).
Some of the pieces have knots (Clarke 1985:Figure
5.6). The string is made from bast, fur and hair
fibres, and is variably two, three, and four ply
(Clarke 1985:90). The antiquity of these string pieces
is difficult to ascertain. The analysis presented in
Clarke (1985:Table 5.5), which was later superseded
by a more detailed analysis (Clarke 1987), initially
reported only 35 pieces of identified string. This
suggests that at least nine of the 35 were found on
the surface of the deposit, and all pieces were recov-
ered from the upper units of the deposit that date
to the past 1,000 years (see Clarke 1985:98).
However, Clarke (1987:157) argues that the string
derives from both the surface and ‘throughout the
occupation deposit’. Jones and Johnson (1985:57)
say that ‘human occupation occurred at a time
period unknown but considerably in excess of 6
kyr’. Finally, Allen and Brockwell (2020:147), who
studied the wooden artefacts from the site, specify
that the organic remains are confined to the most
recent 1,000 years.
Two pieces of rolled spun plant fibres were also
recovered from ‘the top level’of Paribari, another
sandstone shelter in Arnhem Land (Schrire
1982:66). Two four-centimetre-long pieces of
‘braided’human hair are reported to have been
recovered from Holocene deposits in Juukan 2 rock-
shelter in the Pilbara (Reynen 2019:159). A fragment
of two ply string made from plant material, about
1.5 cm long and adhering to a small piece of quartz-
ite, came from deposits dating to the past 500 years
at Brremangurry, a sandstone shelter site in the
northwest Kimberley (Mark Moore, pers. comm.
2021). Two pieces of string are preserved in the dry,
late Holocene sediments of Ken’s Cave in the
Central Queensland highlands (Morwood 1981:10).
Further south, in the dry and protected deposits at
Kawambarai, a sandstone rockshelter near
Coonabarabran in central New South Wales, several
pieces of knotted spun and unspun fibre were found
on the surface (Beck and Dotte-Sarout 2013), and at
least three spun pieces were recovered from the
excavation. All of these are made from plant fibre.
One is two ply and knotted with a half hitch. It was
found in the top excavation unit above a date of
761–498 cal BP. Below this, but above a date of
2,310–1,619 cal BP, are a two ply fragment and one
ply fragment both made from bark fibre (Wendy
Beck, pers. comm. 2021).
This study reports the presence of 19 fibre frag-
ments recovered from Holocene deposits from Riwi
and Carpenter’s Gap 1 in the southern Kimberley of
northern Australia (Figure 1). These finds add to
Figure 1. Location of sites mentioned in the text.
2 J. BALME ET AL.

the growing Australian fibre assemblage and provide
an insight into the diversity of raw materials used in
fibre production and some of the uses to which
fibre was put in pre-European contact times.
Use, raw materials, and manufacture of
string by Indigenous people in the Kimberley
Use of string by Indigenous people in
the Kimberley
The versatility of spun fibre is revealed in the great
diversity of its uses by Indigenous Australians. A
range of these —including dilly bags, baskets, han-
dles for bags made from woven plant strips, hunting
and fishing nets, eel traps, rope for harpoons, sew-
ing thread, binding objects, and strands for suspend-
ing ornaments —are illustrated in Philip Clarke’s
(2012) volume. The variety and purpose of these
and other objects varies substantially across
the continent.
The Western Australian Museum (WAM) has an
extensive collection from the Kimberley, including
balls of string and objects in which string is a com-
ponent. These include ornaments that are bound
with ochred string, headdresses and objects made
for ceremonies that include wood, feathers, and
bark, pendants with pearl shell suspended by string,
neckpieces or ornaments formed from string with
shells, kangaroo lower incisors and, in one case, a
Zygomaturus trilobus tooth embedded in resin
(Akerman 1973). Akerman (2018:215) provides
references to similar objects referred to as charms,
belts, armbands, or neckpieces with or without tas-
sels made from animal fur string, including one
with a dingo tail, and for stringing beads. String is
used to tie packages, bind pegs to spear throwers, to
bind split wood used to haft stone (or shell) axe
heads, and sometimes to secure the axe head pos-
ition on the handle to prevent slippage, and as han-
dles for woven baskets and bark buckets. Headbands
made of bark and secured to the head with string
are also included in the collection (e.g. WAM 352,
collected at Mowanjum) as are pleated bark contain-
ers with their ends secured by string.
String was also used in conjunction with other
objects for everyday activities, for example, as an aid
to seed grinding. Crawford (1982:9) records that
Kalumburu people put three or four strands of
string around the periphery of the anvil stone used
to crush seeds to prevent the seeds flying off onto
the ground.
Despite the wide variety of uses of spun fibre in
the Kimberley, apart from two recent dilly bags, one
bought from an art shop and one from
Oombulgurri on the Forest River (which may have
been traded in), there are no items in the WAM
collection made from netted string and there is very
little evidence in the literature for knotted string
netting being made. In fact, early written records
remark on the absence of netting. Love (1936:99),
for example, observed in the early 1930s that the
Worrorra make string but no nets. Davidson
(1933:261) noted the absence of knotted or looped
‘netting’baskets in northwest Australia. However,
Davidson’s(1933:258) distribution map and notes
on knotted and netted objects in Australia records a
fishing net from Beagle Bay being in the WAM col-
lection. A search of the museum collection found
no nets from this area. However, one net from the
Pilbara has ‘(BB)’written on the label in pencil
(Moya Smith, pers. comm. 2021) and it is possible
that Davidson had interpreted those letters as indi-
cating that it came from Beagle Bay. Satterthwait’s
(2010:34) thorough review of hunting with nets in
Australia found no evidence of their use in the
Kimberley and he remarks upon the absence of net
hunting in the seasonally reliable habitats of north-
ern Australia. Kaberry (1939:163) says that dilly
bags were made by ‘weaving’and, although she does
not say whether these were woven with spun fibre
or plant strips, it is assumed that, like those in the
Western Australian Museum, it was the latter.
This lack of netted goods is peculiar considering
the importance of such goods in adjacent geo-
graphic areas. In the Pilbara region to the south,
nets made of spinifex were used for hunting and for
fishing (Clement 1903; Withnell 1901). Bates
(1985:248) also notes the manufacture and use of
nets made from spinifex for fishing and trapping
and for fibre bags for storage and transport in the
Pilbara. East of the Kimberley net hunting is not
recorded in northern Australia (Satterthwait 2010)
but fishing nets and netted dilly bags (made by
knotting or looping) are important parts of the tech-
nology (Davidson 1933).
The absence of netted objects in the Kimberley is
also curious in the context of their representation in
some of the Kimberley rock art. Some images clearly
show the netting construction (Veth et al.
2018:Figure 5). Gwion Gwion figures have recently
been dated to about 12,000 years ago (Finch et al.
2020) and are often depicted with netted dilly bags
and other accoutrements (see Veth et al. 2011).
Raw materials for string making in
the Kimberleys
In 1974 one of us (KA) recorded Worrorra people
at Mowanjum in the west Kimberley, using the
inner bark of both kurrajong (Brachychiton spp.)
and boab (Adansonia gregorii) trees to make string,
as well as human hair and animal fur. He also
AUSTRALIAN ARCHAEOLOGY 3

reports that fur for string was taken from female
macropods –usually agile wallabies, and that the
very fine fur fibres are taken from female possum.
Moya Smith, who worked with Bardi people of
the west Kimberley to record economic plants,
records string being made from the aerial roots of
Ficus virens (Smith and Kalotas 1985:329) and the
vine of Gymnanthera nitida –now known as G.
oblonga (Smith and Kalotas 1985:338), with ‘strong
string made from Brachychiton diversifolius’(Smith
and Kalotas 1985:339). The bark of Acacia tumida
was used to make short-lived string (Smith and
Kalotas 1985:352). At the Forest River Mission (now
Oombulgurri) in the northeast Kimberley, Kaberry
(1939:163) records string being made from ‘certain
kinds of gum trees or the ‘boababs’as well as from
kangaroo and possum fur’. Love (1917:26) also
noted string being made from the inner bark of sev-
eral species of eucalypts or boab as well as from
hair or kangaroo fur but says that only the fur of
female kangaroos was used as it is softer than the
male (Love 1917:27).
Crawford’s(1982:34) records of traditional plant
uses in the Kalumburu area list Brachychiton spp.,
B. paradoxum, and B. diversifolium bast, including
the root bast, being used to make string. This is
supported by a handwritten note found in the
Western Australian Museum on a visit to the
museum collection in May 1979, which records the
observations of Mary Pandilow (an Indigenous
woman who worked with Crawford at Kalumburu),
saying that string was made from both boab roots
and bark. The former produced a string of a
‘reddish or pink colour’and the latter a ‘pale flax’
colour. In the same note she said that, although
boab is the most popular source of material for
string today, in the past they used many plants
including palm tree and Brachychiton species.
The raw material used for string in the WAM is
not consistently stated, and where it is, it is mostly
recorded simply as fur, hair, or fibre. When further
details are added they are either kangaroo and pos-
sum fur, boab, or human hair. It is also worth not-
ing that collection notes containing taxonomic
information of plants may have been inaccurate at
the time of collection and, further, that taxonomic
names of plants are subject to change over time.
There do seem to be different uses of hair, fur,
and plant fibre string. These differences are
undoubtedly because hair and fur are not as easily
procurable as plant fibre. Thus, everyday domestic
objects are made from plant fibre. In the WAM col-
lections, plant fibre is used for purposes such as
handles for buckets, to tie stone axe handles (e.g.
A25550, 6779) and for sewing the pleats in bark
carrying dishes –although one of these (A25362) is
tied with hair fibre.
Fur and hair string are more likely to be used for
personal ornaments and in ceremonial contexts. In
the WAM collection there are belts made from
human hair and belts with animal tassels made
from fur. Ornaments, such as the diprotodon object
referred to above, are attached to hair, as are similar
objects with kangaroo teeth (e.g. A00571).
Headdresses used for ceremonies are strung with
human hair (e.g. E3109) and ceremonial objects
made from bunches of feathers are tied with human
hair (e.g. A8485 collected in 1923) –although some-
times with plant (e.g. E6899a). Other ceremonial
objects include a belt made of human hair to which
groups of between three and six abalone shell rattles
are attached. Neckpieces are made from fur or
ochred plant fibre. Despite the ritual context,
Akerman was told that hair string is not often used
to secure burial bundles as it was apt to be attacked
by insects.
Love (1936) makes some observations that sug-
gest there may have been some gender differences
in the use of raw materials for belts. Fur string is
used on children’s and women’s belts. For example,
Love (1936:125) includes an image of a child with a
belt and tassel made of kangaroo fur string, and
another of three children with kangaroo fur belts,
one with a pearl shell attached and two with tassels
of fur string (Love 1936:150). A photograph shows
three women with fur string belts (Love 1936:157),
while images of men show them wearing belts made
of fibre hair string (Love 1936:44, 45, 155, 156).
String manufacture
The manufacture of tree-fibre string in the
Kimberley is usually described as being done by
twisting the raw material on the thigh or lower leg.
Kaberry (1939:163) says that the tree fibre was
soaked, beaten, then rolled on the legs. Love
(1917:26) refers to tree fibre being beaten before
being spun on the legs but does not suggest that it
was soaked first. In 1974, Akerman recorded tree
fibre string making in the west Kimberley. Bark
fibre is first teased out (Figure 2(a)) and then the
two ply string can be made in one of two ways. In
one method two fibre pieces are rolled on the mak-
er’s leg resulting in the individual fibres being
twisted in a clockwise direction (Figures 2(b)).
Fibres are added to the single ply string while roll-
ing (Figure 2(c)). Two pieces are then back rolled
up the leg but, as the hand moves back, more pres-
sure is placed on the area beneath the thumb. The
hand slides at an angle and the two pieces are plied
4 J. BALME ET AL.

together in an anti-clockwise direction forming the
two ply string.
The second method is shown in Figure 3. In this
method a single piece of fibre is rolled on the leg.
The resulting twisted string is then folded into two
(Figure 3(b)) and the pieces back spun up the leg to
create two ply string (Figure 3(c)). Length can be
added to the two ply string by splicing in further
pieces of fibre (Figure 3(d)).
Love (1917:27) says that string made from fur by
the Worrorra people was spun with a spindle. In the
1970s Akerman also observed that a spindle is needed
to make both fur and hair string throughout the
Kimberley. Presumably the spindle was used because
fur and hair are finer and recovered in shorter pieces
than plant fibre. Love (1917:27) records the process of
making fur string in the west Kimberley; the fur is
first beaten into a ‘tangled mass’from which pieces
were fed onto the spindle. The spindles that Love
describesweremadefromapieceofstickabout30cm
long which passed through an oval-shaped piece of
wood (the spindle whorl) about 10 cm long –although
spindle whorls on examples held in the WAM are
often one or two smoothed sticks, set at right angles
on the shaft (e.g. 271, 1,416). This cross spindle
appears like the ‘Turkish drop spindle’, although they
are turned on the thigh with the whorls uppermost,
whileonthedropspindlethewhorlsareplacedatthe
bottom of the shaft which is twisted by the fingers
and thumb alone.
Hair must be teased out before it is fed into a
spindle (Figure 4(a)). The longer piece of the stick
is then rolled along the leg to twist the fibre in a
clockwise direction (Figure 4(b)). Unlike the thigh
method, the spindle method produces a single
twisted thread that is not plied. Thus, to make two
ply string, two pieces of spun thread must be spun
together. Akerman’s 1974 observations of women
using spindles in Mowanjum show this process
(Figure 5). After the hair is teased out, a small piece
spun on the thigh to create a lead end is tied to the
Figure 2. Senior Worrorra woman the late Gertie Yabu making tree fibre string: (a) teasing bark fibre in preparation; (b) spin-
ning the first lengths of bark fibre on her leg; (c) adding length to the string; and (d) back spinning the two lengths of bark
to make a two ply twine (Photographs: Kim Akerman, Mowanjum 1974). Produced with thanks from Mr Donny Woolagoodja
and Mrs Janet Oobagooma.
Figure 3. Method of hand spinning two ply fibre: (a) indi-
vidual fibres are rolled down the leg; (b) the resulting fibre
is folded in half; (c) spun up the leg; and (d) adding new
fibre to the twist.
AUSTRALIAN ARCHAEOLOGY 5

propeller (Figure 5(b)). Small pieces of fibre are
continually added to the previous fibre as the spin-
dle is spun (Figure 5(c)). When the spindle is full of
single ply (Figure 5(d)), the axis of the spindle is
withdrawn, and the propeller is pulled out with the
first section of the ply exposed (Figure 5(e)).
Proximal and distal ends of the yarn are exposed,
laid side by side (Figure 5(f)) and then replaced on
the spindle and back spun –that is, the spindle is
rolled up, not down, the thigh. This melds the yarn
into a two ply strand.
The string assemblages from Riwi and
Carpenter’s Gap 1
Riwi and Carpenter’s Gap 1 (CG1) are two lime-
stone shelter sites, about 250 km apart in the south
central Kimberley (Figure 1). Details of the excava-
tion techniques and chronologies for each site are
described in Maloney et al. (2018) and Balme et al.
(2019). Both sites were first occupied by people
from just after 50,000 years ago and both have evi-
dence for continued but sporadic use to the present
(Balme et al. 2019; Maloney et al. 2018). The alka-
line, dry sediments have provided excellent preser-
vation conditions with small fragments of bone
preserved in the deepest layers at both sites and
hard plant remains, such as seeds, nuts and phyto-
liths are preserved to the base of CG1 (Dilkes-Hall
et al. 2019,2020; McConnell and O’Connor 1997;
Wallis 2001). Soft plants parts are also preserved in
the Holocene levels of these two sites, and it is
from these deposits that the spun fibre frag-
ments derive.
Figure 4. Senior Worrorra woman May Langi using the spindle method: (a) teasing out human hair before spinning it into
yarn; and (b) using a spindle to spin hair string (Photographs: Kim Akerman, Mowanjum 1974). Produced with thanks from Mr
Donny Woolagoodja and Mrs Janet Oobagooma.
Figure 5. Process of spindle spinning: (a) lead end hand spun; (b) lead end tied to propeller; (c) small pieces of fibre continu-
ally added as the spindle is spun; (d) spindle full of single ply; (e) axis of the spindle withdrawn and propeller removed; and
(f) proximal and distal ends of the yarn are replaced on the spindle and back spun.
6 J. BALME ET AL.

A total of 19 fragments of twisted spun fibre
(string) were recovered from the two sites, eight
from Riwi and 11 from CG1. Tables 1 and 2sum-
marise the location, raw material and age of the
spun fibre fragments recovered from Riwi and CG1
respectively. None of the fibre fragments is directly
dated and the ages given in the tables are the radio-
carbon dates obtained for charcoal and OSL samples
from the same stratigraphic units and from the
Bayesian models created for Riwi (Wood et al.
2016) and CG1 (Maloney et al. 2018). Radiocarbon
dates recovered from the same units as the string
pieces, given as 95.4%, calibrated against SHCal13
(Hogg et al. 2013) in OxCal v.4.3 (Bronk Ramsey
2009) and previously published in Wood et al.
(2016) and Maloney et al. (2018) are also listed.
Raw material identification
A lack of comparative reference material means that
we are currently not able to taxonomically identify
the plant species used in string production.
However, it is clear from differences in fibre thick-
nesses discussed below that more than one plant
type is represented in the assemblages.
Human hair and animal fur were identified using
microscopic analysis of hair morphology developed
in trichology. Each strand is formed by three con-
centric layers of keratinised cells; the cuticle, cortex,
and medulla (Teerink 1991) which, when viewed
microscopically, show patterns and specific morpho-
logical traits that can be used for taxonomic identifi-
cation. For animals, outer and thicker coat of hairs
(overhair), and the smaller undercoat (underhairs)
can be distinguished (Teerink 1991). Identification
of hair from animal species was undertaken by one
of us (BK). The morphology of animal hair present
in the CG1 assemblage was compared with reference
collection materials held at the Australian National
University to identify mammal species. Animal fur
samples were identified under transmitted light
using a Zeiss EL- Einsatz 451889 Axiophot micro-
scope with 250, 400, 630, and 1000magnifi-
cation. Photo-micrographs were taken at these
magnifications.
The Riwi assemblage
Six of the eight string fragments at Riwi are made
from plant fibre (Figure 6), with the remaining two
being made of human hair (Figure 7). All eight
pieces derive from two ply yarn consisting of two
separate fibres spun in a clockwise direction and
then plied in an anti-clockwise direction. Riwi 2
(Figure 6(a)) shows this clearly. The second ply is
not present in two fragments –one hair Riwi 1
(Figure 7(a)) and one plant Riwi 7 (Figure 6(e)).
However, the kinks in the fragments suggest that
they have separated from the second strand. One
piece (Riwi 8, Figure 6(f)) has a half hitch knot in
it. It is possible that the four fragments from square
5(Figure 6(c–f)) originally derived from a single
string strand. Riwi 7 and 8, in particular, probably
derive from the same piece, as both have ochre on
them. Riwi 7 (Figure 6(e)) only has ochre on the
areas of twine that would have been exposed when
Table 1. Stratigraphic, age and raw material details of twisted, spun fibre fragments from Riwi.
Fragment
number
Square/excavation
unit/quadrant
Stratigraphic
unit
Modelled age cal BP
(Balme et al. 2019:Table 1)
Associated date cal BP (Wood
et al. 2016)
Raw
material
Riwi 1 3/XU 3 QC 1 Start date: 2,530–700
End date: 660–580
670 ± 20 (1r) (date from XU8 [10 cm
below] in the same quadrant
[SANU-43337])
Hair
Riwi 2 3/XU4 QD 1 Start date: 2,530–700
End date: 660–580
670 ± 20 (1r) (date from XU8 [8 cm
below] in the same quadrant
[SANU-43337])
Plant
Riwi 3 4/XU6 QB 1 Start date: 2,530–700
End date: 660–580
816 ± 27 (1r) (D-AMS004068) Plant
Riwi 4 4/XU6 QC 1 Start date: 2,530–700
End date: 660–580
816 ± 27 (1r) (D-AMS004068) Hair
Riwi 5 5/XU2 QA 1 Not included in Bayesian model as
the square is not adjacent to
other squares.
2,746–2,486 (95%) Plant
Riwi 6 5/XU2 QD 1 Not included in Bayesian model as
the square is not adjacent to
other squares.
2,746–2,486 (95%) Plant
Riwi 7 5/XU2 QD 1 Not included in Bayesian model as
the square is not adjacent to
other squares.
2,746–2,486 (95%) Plant
Riwi 8 5/XU3 QC 1 Not included in Bayesian model as
the square is not adjacent to
other squares.
2,746–2,486 (95%) Plant
AUSTRALIAN ARCHAEOLOGY 7

twisted suggesting that ochre was applied after the
string was plied. Riwi 5 (Figure 6(c)) has flatter
fibres but this may be the result of the unravelling
of end string pieces.
The Carpenter’s Gap 1 assemblage
The string fragments recovered from CG1 are more
or less evenly divided between plant fibres (six) and
animal hair fibres (five). Nine of the pieces consist
of two fibre lengths spun clockwise that are plied in
an anticlockwise direction. One (CG1/2) is sin-
gle ply.
Plant string fragments
Figure 8 shows the six string fragments made from
plant fibres. CG1/1 is a loosely plied string fragment
folded over at one end suggesting that the piece was
rolled without a spindle (Figure 8(a)). The looseness
may indicate that the fragment was never part of a
longer piece of string. CG1/2, 3 and 4 are all
Table 2. Stratigraphic, age and raw material details of twisted, spun fibre fragments from Carpenter’s Gap 1. Square AA
pieces were not included in the Bayesian model as the square does not join the main excavation.
Fragment
number
Square/excavation
unit
Stratigraphic
unit
Modelled Age cal BP
(Maloney et al. 2018)
Associated date cal BP (95.4%)
(Maloney et al. 2018) Raw material
CG1/1 AA/6 3d-1 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 Between 3,828 and 3,383 (ANU-
11294) and the surface date
of 723–664 (Wk-38362)
Plant
CG1/2 AA/10 3d-1 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 Between 3,828 and 3,383 (ANU-
11294) and the surface date
of 723–664 (Wk-38362)
Plant
CG1/3 AA/10 3d-1 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 Between 3,828 and 3,383 (ANU-
11294) and the surface date
of 723–664 (Wk-38362)
Plant
CG1/4 AA/10 3d-1 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 Between 3,828 and 3,383 (ANU-
11294) and the surface date
of 723–664 (Wk-38362)
Plant
CG1/5 AA/10 3d-1 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 Between 3,828 and 3,383 (ANU-
11294) and the surface date
of 723–664 (Wk-38362)
Plant
CG1/6 AA/12 3d 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 3,828–3,383 (ANU-11294) Plant
CG1/7 A2/2 6 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 1,530–1,405 (Wk-37968) Animal fur
Trichosurus vulpecula
CG1/8 A2/2 6 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 1,530–1,405 (Wk-37968) Animal fur
Trichosurus vulpecula
CG1/9 A2/2 6 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 1,530–1,405 (Wk-37968) Animal fur
Trichosurus vulpecula
CG1/10 A2/4 2a 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 2,725–2,434 (Wk-37970) Animal fur
Trichosurus vulpecula
CG1/11 A/3 5 7,600–4,900 to 700–300 Between XU 5: 854–601 (ANU-
11295) and XU 2: 700–690
(Wk-3075)
Animal fur
Trichosurus vulpecula
and feather of
hawk or falcon
Figure 6. String fragments made from plant fibre excavated from Riwi: (a) Riwi 2; (b) Riwi 3; (c) Riwi 5; (d) Riwi 6; (e) Riwi 7
(arrows indicate location of ochre); and (f) Riwi 8 (arrow indicates location of ochre). The bar scale is one centimetre in
all photos.
8 J. BALME ET AL.

relatively unseparated fibres, which have resulted in
thick pieces of string (Figure 8(b–d)). CG1/2 (Figure
8(b)), is single ply and knotted. The fibre is so wide,
that the twisting was probably done with the hands
only rather than rolled on the leg. CG1/3 (Figure
8(c)), has been folded before being twisted into two
ply. CG1/4 (Figure 8(d)), is a smaller fragment of
two ply string and it is possible that it was originally
joined to CG1/3. All three pieces appear to be from
the same plant source but the difference in thickness
between CG1/2 and the other two fragments sug-
gests possible different functions (although they may
have derived from a single artefact). The fourth
piece from square AA excavation unit 10 (Figure
8(e)), is composed of more finely teased fibre and
clearly represents a separate activity. Figure 8(f) is a
single piece of string with an overhand knot.
Animal hair string fragments
Three fibre pieces (CG1/7, CG1/8, CG1/9) all deriv-
ing from the same square and excavation unit, were
identified as being made from the hair of
Trichosurus vulpecula (brushtail possum). The hair
is primarily underhair but some overhair is also pre-
sent (Figure 9(a–c)). These pieces may have been
once joined together as they were recovered adher-
ing to one another but without being woven
together. The diagnostic features are regular wave
scale pattern in the shield region (Figure 10(a)), and
narrow aeriform lattice medulla in the shield region
(Figure 10(b)). The proximal shaft scale pattern is
diamond petal (Figure 10(c)), and in the proximal
section of the hair the medulla’s structure is uniser-
ial ladder (Figure 10(d)). These features correspond
to reference collection material properties (Figure
10(e,f)). CG1/10 (Figure 9(d)) from two excavation
units below these pieces was also identified as being
made from brushtail possum fur. The diagnostic
features are distal pigment streaks, with proximal
diamond petal scale pattern (Figure 10(c)), narrow
aeriform lattice and uniserial medulla (Figure
10(b)), and in the shield region the scale pattern has
regular wave (Figure 10(a)).
CG1/11 is made from animal hair with feather
barbs (Figures 11(a,b)) and consists of two pieces
of string that have been spliced together (Figure
11(a)). The mammal hair component was
Figure 7. String fragments made from human hair: (a) Riwi 1; and (b) Riwi 4. Bar scale is 5 mm in both photos.
Figure 8. String fragments from CG1 made from plant fibres: (a) CG1/1 folded and knotted; (b) CG1/2 single ply knot; (c)
CG1/3 two ply twist with folded end; (d) CG1/4 two ply twist; (e) CG1/5 two ply twist; and (f) CG1/6 overhand knot.
AUSTRALIAN ARCHAEOLOGY 9

identified as T. vulpecula,withdiagnosticfeatures
including a medulla with narrow aeriform lattice
distally/shield region (Figure 11(c)), a proximal
diamond petal pattern (Figure 10(c)) and scale
pattern with regular wave in the distal/shield
region (Figure 11(d)). The feather barbs (Figure
11(b)) have a stippled node junction that is colour
free, which may indicate Acciptridae (hawks, kites,
falcons, and eagles).
Discussion and conclusions
From these results we can say that during the Mid-
to-Late Holocene, Indigenous people in the
Kimberley manufactured fibre, string or cordage
from human hair, mammal fur and plant material,
which were sometimes adorned or decorated with
bird feathers. The presence of folds in the individual
fibre strands before they were plied also suggests
continuity in manufacturing technique into
recent times.
Figure 9. Animal hair string fragments from Carpenter’s Gap 1: (a) CG1/7; (b) CG1/8; (c) CG1/9; and (d) CG1/10. Bar scale is
5 mm in all photos.
Figure 10. Diagnostic features of animal hair used to identify string raw materials from CG1: (a) shield region with regular
wave scale pattern; (b) narrow aeriform lattice in the shield region; c) underhair with diamond hair scale pattern; (d) proximal
section of medulla with uniserial ladder structure; (e) reference specimen of proximal section of T. vulpecula underhair (ear);
and (f) reference specimen of distal section of tail hair of Trichosurus sp. showing narrow aeriform lattice medulla. Bar scale is
20 mm in all photos.
10 J. BALME ET AL.

At least some of the plant materials used for the
string are root fibre and most of the mammal
material is brushtail possum underhair. These raw
materials, with the addition of human hair, suggest
a continuity of string manufacturing resources into
the recent past. It is perhaps surprising that all the
animal hair string is made from possum fur despite
macropods being more common in the assemblage
during the Mid-to-Late Holocene at CG1 (Maloney
et al. 2018:Supplementary Table E). It is possible
that the fragments of possum string all derive from
a single artefact, such as a tasselled belt, and the dif-
ferences in thickness of the string fragments results
from their different placement in the artefact.
Alternatively, the explanation may lie in the relative
fineness, and consequent softness of possum fur
compared to macropod fur, which may have made
it especially sought after. In this respect it is inter-
esting that there are no string fragments made of
fur at Riwi despite the preponderance of such
remains at CG1. So far only the identification of
fauna from square 3 is available and no possum
remains were identified –although there is an abun-
dance of remains from macropods of different sizes.
Thus, it is possible that possum fur was difficult to
obtain, if possum was indeed the prime choice for
animal string.
It is difficult to suggest the purposes of the string
based on these small fragments. The fact that the
bulk are made from plant fibre, which is more
accessible than either animal fur or human hair,
indicates that as in recent times, the string was used
for a wide variety of domestic goods. The presence
of ochre on two of the Riwi string pieces suggests
an ornamental function, but not necessarily a cere-
monial function, as some hafted Kimberley points
in the WAM collection have ochre on the hafting
string. Other archaeological materials from CG1 and
Riwi are consistent with the interpretation that these
two sites were domestic campsites.
The finds also suggest that Maloney et al.’s
(2015:38) proposal that the hafting tie impressed in
resin on a stone point from CG1 was formed by an
organic fibre or string binder, is unlikely to be cor-
rect. The diameter of the impressions made on the
resin hafted stone point is probably too fine, at
0.3 mm (Maloney et al. 2015:38), to be made by
these string pieces, which we would expect to leave
depressions more than, or around, their average
diameter of 1.5 mm. This direct comparison now
leads us to strongly suggest sinew as a likely product
responsible for these impressions. While no such
sinew survives in the CG1 deposit, use of sinew is
widely documented in the region in more recent
hafting of stone points (Akerman 2010:486;
Carnegie 1898:340).
Both sites contain artefacts of personal adorn-
ment in the form of beads made from scaphopod
shell segments (Balme et al. 2018; Balme and
O’Connor 2017). It is possible that some of the
string was used to string these segments, or beads
made of perishable organic material such as reed,
that have not survived. For example, the diameter of
the string fragments, particularly those made from
animal fur (between 2 mm and 0.5 mm), would have
accommodated the shell bead apertures which vary
from 4.9 mm to 3.5 mm (Balme et al. 2018:263). The
very fine possum hair may have been selected to
create the tasselled fur belts that Love (1936) records
were worn by women and children in the
west Kimberley.
The pieces of human hair string at Riwi recov-
ered from two non-adjacent excavation squares may
suggest a ceremonial, or at least symbolic function,
given the use of this fibre type today. However, their
presence in an otherwise domestic site suggests that
the string was either made in a domestic setting for
Figure 11. CG1/11: (a) arrows indicate location of splicing; (b) feathers barbs/barbules and hooks; (c) medulla with narrow
aeriform lattice distally/shield region; and (d) scale pattern with regular wave in the distal/shield region.
AUSTRALIAN ARCHAEOLOGY 11

later ceremonial use, or was a symbolic accoutre-
ment that was worn in a domestic location. The fur
string fragment with feather adornment from CG1
can be similarly interpreted.
It is unlikely that nets would be made of animal
fur as they would disintegrate and rot when wet.
None of the plant fibre fragments bears any indica-
tion that they were part of a net, and the possibility
that nets may have been used to catch small fish in
CG1 that Maloney and colleagues (2018:222) raise,
is not supported. However, the fibre assemblage
from CG1 is very small and we are not able to say
whether nets were ever part of the technology in
this region. While Gwion Gwion and other rock art
shows that net bags were used in the past, our finds
shed no light on when the manufacture of netting
ceased in this area.
Acknowledgements
We would like to acknowledge the assistance of the
Bunuba people and the Mimbi Community and the
Gooniyandi people who gave permission for and helped
with excavations on their land. We thank Ms Leah
Umbagai for help with identifying the descendants of the
Worrarra women in Figures 2 and 4.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by
the author(s).
Funding
The fieldwork and analysis of materials for this paper
were funded by an ARC Linkage Grant [LP100200415],
with contributions from the Kimberley Foundation
Australia (KFA) and the Department of Sustainability,
Water, Populations and Communities (SEWPAC).
Funding for the string analysis was supported by an ARC
grant [SR200200473]. India Ella Dilkes-Hall is a Forrest
Foundation Prospect Fellow supported by the Forrest
Research Foundation.
ORCID
Jane Balme http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1387-9379
Sue O’Connor http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9381-078X
Tim Ryan Maloney http://orcid.org/0000-0002-
1167-4743
Kim Akerman http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5823-7818
Ben Keaney http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8225-6944
India Ella Dilkes-Hall http://orcid.org/0000-0002-
6487-0043
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