Aust Aborigines 'first' Americans.

Courier Mail - Wednesday, April 13th, 1996.

SYDNEY: The first Americans were actually Australians, according to the latest anthropological research.

Neither Columbus, the Vikings nor American Indians discovered America - the Australian Aboriginies did, a report in yesterday's Sydney Morning Herald said.

Research conducted by Brazilian and US scholars showed that the first humans to enter the new world more than 14,000 years ago were people of the same race as the Australian Aboriginies.

It was thought Aboriginies crossed the Bering Strait from Asia to the Americas, a discovery that would necessitate a reassessment of American pre-history.

The conclusion was based on computer analysis of skulls dating from 10,000 and 14,000 years ago which were discovered on archaeolgical sites in Columbia and Brazil earlier this century.

"We were very, very surprised by what we found," Brazilian Paleo-anthropologist and archaeologist from the University of Sao Paulo, Dr Walter Neves, said.