except in the north of the Adriatic and the Aegean. The rise in sea levels continued until at least 7.5 kya (5500 BC), so evidence of human activity along Europe's coasts in the Upper Paleolithic is mostly lost, though some traces have been recovered by fishing boats and marine archaeology, especially from Doggerland, the lost area beneath the North Sea. Timeline 50,000–40,000 BP 50,000 BP Numerous Aboriginal stone tools were found in gravel sediments in Castlereagh, Sydney, Australia. At first when these results were new they were controversial; more recently dating of the same strata has revised and corroborated these dates. Start of the Mousterian Pluvial in North Africa. Occupants of the Fa-Hien Lena cave, Sri Lanka had developed bow and arrow technology 48,000 BP (though the earliest known bow and arrow technology dates to about 65,000 BP from Sibudu Cave, South Africa). 45,000–43,000 BP Earliest evidence of modern humans found in Europe, in Southern Italy. These are indirectly dated. Earliest mathematical artifact, the notched Lebombo bone, a possible tally stick or lunar calendar, dated to 44,000–43,000 BP in Eswatini (Swaziland), southern Africa Oldest-known mining in archaeological record, the Ngwenya Mine in Swaziland, at about 43,000 years ago, where humans mined hematite to make the red pigment ochre Earliest directly dated figurative cave art of mankind at Leang Bulu' Sipong on Sulawesi, Indonesia. 43,000–41,000 BP Ornaments and skeletal remains of modern humans, at Ksar Akil in Lebanon. These are directly dated. Denisova hominins live in the Altai Mountains (Russia, China, Mongolia, and Kazakhstan) 40,000–30,000 BP 40,000–35,000 BP First human inhabitants in Perth, Australia, as evidenced by archaeological findings on the Upper Swan River. During this time period, Melbourne, Australia was occupied by hunter-gatherers. Early cultural centre in the Swabian Alps, oldest depiction of a human being (Venus of Hohle Fels), beginning of the Aurignacian. figure created in Hohlenstein-Stadel, one of the earliest figurative art. It is now in Ulmer Museum, Ulm, Germany. The first flutes appear in Germany. Notational signs in caves, apparently conveying calendaric meaning about the behaviour of animal species drawn next to them, are the first known (proto-)writing in history . Most of the giant vertebrates and megafauna in Australia became extinct. Fishing of pelagic fish species at Jerimalai shelter, Timor. Examples of cave art in Spain are dated from around 40,000 BP, making them the oldest examples of cave art yet discovered in Europe (see: Caves