Archaeological evidence for the presence of people in southeastern Australia as early as 40,000 years ago in environments substantially different from the Southeast Asian homeland of the initial colonists of Greater Australia has generated much discussion on when and how this remarkable feat of colonisation took place, and what was the nature and pace of adjustment of the early colonists to this new continent (see for example Bowdler 1976; Jones 1979; White and O'Connell 1979). Tied in with this discussion are questions of whether there was one group of colonists or several (see Thorne 1971, 1977), and to what extent they transformed the landscape through their impact on the fauna, flora and landforming processes
