3. Aborigines

Early arrivals

Ancestors of the present-day Aborigines arrived and settled the Australian continent at least 40,000 – 50,000 years ago. Anthropologists believe the first small groups could have come here in large bamboo rafts southward from Southeast Asia and walking across the land bridge which then connected New Guinea with northern Australia. Early groups lived along the shores of rivers where food was plentiful, while those who followed moved inland where conditions were also habitable but much wetter than today.

The word Aborigines means the first inhabitants of a country (from Latin ab origins – inhabitant). The Indians of North America were the Aborigines living on that continent when Europeans discovered, explored and settled the United States. The Aboriginal people of Australia are a distinctive race called Australoids, thought to be related to the Dravidians of India. The Dravidians were a dark-skinned people who lived in India before the Aryan or white invaders came to their country over 4,000 years ago.

When the Europeans began to settle Australia, the Aborigines were as primitive as many people on earth. And there are still Aborigines scattered through the great empty middle of Australia who have not changed in any way and who live exactly as they did their forefathers thousands of years ago.

Estimates by historians put the population of Aborigines prior to 1770 at more than 300,000. They spoke 500 different languages, grouped into 31 related language families. It is certain, that Aboriginal harmony with the land is based on ancient traditions of kinship with every living thing and even inanimate objects such as rocks and other geographical features.

Dreamtime

The Aboriginal culture and beliefs evolved from land. The Aborigines learned how to survive in even the harshest regions by gathering the offerings of nature.

Each tribe recognized the local landmarks and linked them with the rich mythology of the Dreamtime (or Dreaming). Various geological aspects were sacred sites with their own personality and significance. The Aborigine believed that nature and the land were inseparably bound and interdependent. In this state of unity he achieved a balance with his environment.

Dreamtime was the basis of all traditional Aboriginal thought and practice. It was the Aborigine’s cultural, historical and ancestral heritage. Dreamtime was the dawn of all creation when the land, the rivers, the rain, wind and all living things were generated.

The Aborigines lived in clan groups of 10 to 50or more people. Their economy was based on the hunting activities of the men and the fishing and gathering activities of the women. A good hunter knew intimately the habits of the creatures he stalked. He was an expert tracker and he understood the moods of the seasons and the significance of the wind. He took only what he needed to feed himself and his people and therefore kept in step with his environment. In turn, the ability of the country to support animals dictated the movements and well-being of the tribe. Conservation was the Aborigine’s way of denying starvation.

Tribal elders who possessed special knowledge of the community and the land were charged with the responsibility of maintaining the clan’s group identity through its totemistic religion. Groups of people formed special bonds with a totem, usually an animal or plant which acted as a protector and symbol of group identity. Through special ceremonies and other social and religious practices, the elders transmitted their knowledge.

Tribal elders would entrust their secrets to the young boys and they in turn would not only become trustees of tribal lore but skilled hunters. Political and religious power was rarely inherited, it had to be earned. Superstition and sorcery were common, and magic spells were used to gain power over an adversary or bring death to an enemy.

The Aborigines celebrated the adventures of their Dreamtime spirit heroes in painting, songs and sacred dances. The heroes took both human and animal form. The rock paintings were of special significance, bearing the strongest psychological and ritual values. As no Aboriginal language was written, these rock paintings, along with oration of legends by tribal leaders, were responsible for passing the Dreamtime stories from one generation to the next.

The Aboriginal ceremony of celebrating with songs and dance was called corroboree. The men dancers were experts in mimicking the movements of animals. With these skills they reconstructed legends, deeds of heroism or famous hunts. Bodies were elaborately painted and songs were chanted to the accompaniment of music sticks and boomerangs clapped together. Aborigines did not have any metals. All weapons were made of wood and rock. Their weapon consisted of a wood spear, a club and a boomerang, a curved wooden missile, when thrown it returns to its thrower if it hits nothing.

Basic dance themes dealt with hunting and food gathering, or sex and fertility. Some tribes used a long, hollow piece of wood which, when blown, emitted a weird droning sound. This was the didgerigoo. Its sound was said to resemble the calling of the spirits. Aborigines believed aperson’s spirit did not die upon physical death – the spirit left the body and became re-embodied elsewhere – in rocks, trees, animals, or perhaps in other human forms. Thus each person was the centre of complex relationships which gave order to the entire world. So intricate was the Aborigine’s relationship with the land that to remove him from it was to spiritually kill him. Dispossession from the land meant dispossession from the Dreamtime.

Aborigines Today

The Aboriginal culture had prepared the people for everything they might expect to face in life, everything except the coming of the white man. After the arrival of Europeans many Aborigines were killed or forced from their homes by white settlers. Since then most Aborigines have lived on the fringes of white society. In many cases they have been actively discouraged from joining white communities. In other cases they have chosen to live in tribal settlements. These communities preserve some Aboriginal ways of life, especially traditional beliefs and traditional styles of painting and craftwork.

No matter where they live, the Aborigines generally lag far behind white Australians in education and income. They also lack decent housing and proper health care.

The Aboriginal population today is about 200,000. The majority are of mixed Aboriginal and white ancestry. The rest are of unmixed ancestry. Most Aborigines live in rural areas of New South Wales, the Northern Territory. Queensland and Western Australia. Since the early 1960s, however, a growing number of younger Aborigines have moved to the cities. Rural Aborigines live and work on the great cattle stations in the interior, or on their own lands. Those who are educated speak good English, but some still speak what is called pidgin English. This is English that may be mixed with some Aboriginal words and is very simple and without correct grammar. Almost 20 per cent of the Aborigines live in the Northern Territory. Since1976 they have become the legal and permanent owners of about 390,000 square kilometers of Northern Territory land.

Aborigines who live in a tribal state usually wear little or no clothing. For the most part, a naga or loincloth is the only article of clothing. The primitive Aborigines have certain weapons and tools, but have never learned to grow any crops, and have only a very elementary system of numbers and counting. They did not live in villages. Usually a family live more or less isolated from the rest of the tribe, with only the most primitive form of bough shelter, called a wurlie.

Some families live in areas where there is almost no rain. Often they may live in areas called salt flats. This is the term given to desert parts of the country where all soil is gone. The surface of the ground is almost like rock. The Aborigine’s wife is called lubra. Along with the children, a family group usually has several dogs. When fire is needed, the man or his lubra make it by rubbing sticks together. The meat they eat is relatively uncooked by our standards. Food is so scarce that everything that moves must be considered food.

In order to survive, the tribal Aborigines have developed unusual senses and abilities. They have uncanny abilities in tracking and in finding water. They have the finest eyesight of any people on earth. A hunter can follow the tracks of a kangaroo or other animal that may have been made days before and yet truck down the animal. Australian Aborigines developed the world’s strangest hunting weapon – the boomerang.

The early governors of Australia had been instructed to establish friendly relations with the Aborigines and were empowered to protect them. Some of the governors, like Philip, took these instructions seriously and respected the Aborigines living there. But most did not. Many colonists believed that the Aborigines were an inferior race who had no rights to the land they occupied.

The squatters (farmers) distributed poisoned flour and food to Aborigines. Mass killings were frequent. The Aborigines saw the Europeans as invaders and resisted their settlement.

The creation of reserves and the encouragement of missionary activity were part of official policy toward the Aborigines from 1788. There were official responsible for the distribution of food, blankets and clothing. But the government’s efforts were not always successful. Today the Australian government has numerous programs to improve the health, education, skills and living conditions of the Aborigines.

The federal government has developed a strategy on education for Aborigines, which includes a program on training more Aboriginal teachers.

Despite the intrusion of western culture, which has modified the culture of many urban Aboriginal people, tribal Aboriginal people see traditional lifestyles as being a bulwark to protect and strengthen their lifestyle, their heritage and their future, although Aborigines still remain a disadvantaged minority in their own country disadvantaged.