Peter Davies

La Trobe University, Archaeology and History, Faculty Member

La Trobe University, Faculty of Humanities & Social Sciences, Research Assistant

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Dr Peter Davies is a historical archaeologist and senior research fellow at La Trobe University. His main research interests include the industrial archaeology of resource industries, urban archaeology, environmental archaeology and material culture studies. He is currently co-Chief Investigator of two ARC projects: Lost Mines: The Troubled Legacies of Former Mining Landscapes; and Fire, Flood and Food: People and Landscape Change in Northern Victoria. Peter has extensive experience in analysing and managing large urban artefact assemblages and associated datasets. He has also conducted extensive research on the historical archaeology of water management, forestry, agriculture and mining landscapes. In 2016 he received the Vice Chancellor’s Award for Research Excellence at La Trobe University, while his most recent book, Sludge: Disaster on Victoria’s Goldfields (with Susan Lawrence) was short-listed for the 2020 Prime Minister’s Literary Awards. His book An Archaeology of Australia Since 1788 (published by Springer in 2011, also with Susan Lawrence) remains the standard reference work on the subject.
Address: Bundoora, Victoria, Australia

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Society and sediment in the Mining Rivers of California and Australia

by Peter Davies and Carrie Monohan

Water History, 2021

People and water intersect in the movement of sediment downstream in rivers. Social processes and... more People and water intersect in the movement of sediment downstream in rivers. Social processes and geomorphological processes become entangled as each system moves in ways that trigger corresponding responses from the other. Long-term dialectical relationships emerge that span multiple human generations. The power of sediment and water to change physical environments is in constant tension with the power of human actions informed by social, cultural, legal, economic and engineering imperatives. The Pacific Rim gold rushes that began in the mid-nineteenth century provide an opportunity to examine how the interplay of people, water and sediment unfolds over historic time. The mass discharge of mining sediment in California and Victoria that began over 150 years ago was a catastrophic human alteration of river systems. Subsequently, mining sediment has had a long and complex entanglement with society and rivers in both regions and continues to be an active agent in reshaping riparian environments. Mining sediments also have a toxic legacy as associated contaminants, including mercury and arsenic, that are discharged into waterways and dispersed in windblown dust. The changes to river systems caused by gold mining committed societies and rivers to new trajectories of mutual engagement. Anthropogenically induced sedimentation that resulted from mining is an issue that will continue to impact watersheds for generations to come.

Peter Davies

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