Aboriginal shell middens at the mouth of the Maroochy River, southeast Queensland

Abstract

This paper examines a series of shell midden and stone artefact sites located at the mouth of the Maroochy River, southeast Queensland. It represents the first detailed archaeological research undertaken on the Sunshine Coast since Jackson (1939) investigated a series of middens near Point Cartwright in the 1930's. The present study details the results of survey and excavation work, with a number of tentative hypotheses concerning late Holocene shellfishing behaviour, bevel-edged tool use, and "regionalization" of societal groupings.