Groundbreaking archaeological research has revealed that ancient humans transported wallabies to Indonesia's Raja Ampat islands using canoes approximately 12,800 years ago, demonstrating sophisticated maritime skills and animal management practices.
The remarkable discovery shows that early seafarers captured wild wallabies and transported them across tens or even hundreds of kilometers of open ocean to establish populations on remote Indonesian islands.
This finding emerges from ongoing excavations by the Raja Ampat Archaeological Project, an international collaboration between researchers at the University of Cambridge and other institutions investigating human history at the gateway between Asia and the Pacific.
The evidence from Raja Ampat's Mololo cave, which contains human occupation dating back more than 55,000 years, represents the oldest known archaeological site in the Pacific region and provides crucial insights into early human maritime capabilities.
The wallaby transportation represents one of the earliest known examples of deliberate animal translocation by humans, highlighting the advanced seafaring knowledge and planning abilities of ancient Indonesian peoples who successfully navigated dangerous ocean passages while managing live cargo.
