Underwater Palaeontology: Searching for the Vertebrates of Submerged Sundaland

Harold Berghuis1*, Shinatria Adhityatama2, and Josephine Joordens3

Eastern Asia is famous for its rich Pleistocene hominin fossil record, which includes Homo erectus, the small-island species H. floresiensis and H. luzonensis, archaic Homo (including Denisovans), and modern humans. The now-submerged Sunda Shelf was exposed during most of the Pleistocene, forming a landmass known as Sundaland. This vast area, connecting mainland Asia with Java, Sumatra, and Borneo, played an important role in the dispersal and evolution of hominin populations. The recently discovered Madura Strait subsea site forms a unique window into the vertebrate community and hominins of submerged Sundaland. Although the view through this window is exciting, it shows only the situation at a single point in place and time. Major remaining research questions are: how did the vertebrate community of these (nowadays submerged) lowland plains relate to the vertebrate communities of the upland of Java? Did hominins always populate the entire land area? Can we distinguish different hominin populations, e.g., inland and coastal ones? How is the preservation of ancient proteins and DNA in fossils from submerged sites? To get a more complete image of the ancient fauna of submerged Sundaland, we need not only more detailed studies of the Madura Strait fossils, but also more fossil sites from the submerged shelf. In this presentation, we will discuss the lessons learned from the Madura Strait study, identify areas where we can expect similar subsea sites, and outline how to get access to subsea vertebrate fossils from different ages.