aboriginal

wonderful image of an important writer. i strolled through heaps of images here on your flickr profile in search for some of australia's indiginous people but found pnly a very few. that's sad. but the lack might tell a part of australia's history too.

TRADITIONAL ABORIGINAL FOOD-GATHERING : TREE-CLIMBING People climbed trees for a number of reasons: To catch possums, lizards, snakes and other native animals. (These animals were also removed from trees by lighting a fire below and smoking them out, and by throwing stones at the animal, knocking it out of the tree.) To collect eggs and young birds from nests. To collect fruit and seeds from high branches. To reach native beehives for honey and wax. Beeswax was used as a seal on water containers, as a resin when making weapons, and as a fixative when making body decorations. (People didn’t always climb trees to obtain honey. Sometimes they chopped the whole tree down instead. Also, some species of native bee make hives at ground level.) To chop and strip long sheets of bark to be used for canoe-making and shelters. Throughout much of Australia, a small hatchet with a stone head was used to cut toe holds into trees to assist in climbing. In these photos, taken in the rainforests of northern Queensland, strong jungle vines (lawyer-vines or lawyer-cane) are used like ropes to assist climbing trees in search of both animals and native bee hives’ wax and honey. Source: www.aboriginalculture.com.au/tree-climbing/

Cultural practices, particularly language ceremonies and beliefs were all suppressed during these mission days. Traditional values were transformed swiftly to adopt clothing, and Christianity replaced traditional creation stories. Hunter gathering was discouraged and with the arrival of people from other cultural groups, Gungganji cultural protocols were dismissed. While the Christian missions did help save many Aboriginal people from perishing at the hands of new settlers under the Act of 1897 they controlled curfews, employment, wages, marriages, alcohol and movement outside the mission. Source: www.yarrabah.qld.gov.au/our-history-and-future/