cicatrices

In Australia, scarring was practised widely, but is now restricted almost entirely to parts of Arnhem Land. Scarring is like a language inscribed on the body, where each deliberately placed scar tells a story of pain, endurance, identity, status, beauty, courage, sorrow or grief. Source: australian.museum/about/history/exhibitions/body-art/abor...

Traditionally in Indigenous Australian culture, scarification was a signifier of a person's place in the community and an expression of identity, experience and beauty — almost a non-verbal language carved right onto the skin. "Once you became initiated, you'd get a scarring done, so that when you're out in the world people would know that you had gone through lore," Torres explains. Torres is an educator in the Broome Regional Aboriginal Medical Service (BRAMS), where he counsels prisoners to quit smoking. Source: www.abc.net.au/news/2018-05-13/michael-jalaru-torres-expl...

Indigenous Australians have occupied the Atherton Tablelands for tens of thousands of years. While the oldest human occupation site found in the region is Walkunder Arch Cave at Chillagoe, which dates to 18 000 years,1 pollen analysis shows that the frequency of fires beginning around 45 000 years ago is indicative of human occupation. At the time of European arrival, the eastern, rainforest-covered part of the tableland was the home of the Djirrbal and Ngadjonji tribes who were part of the Djirrbalngan language group. The drier, more open forests to the west were peopled by the Jidabal and Barbarum, while the northern end around Kuranda was the domain of the Yidinji. There were elements of aboriginal culture on the Atherton Tablelands that differed from other areas of Australia. As around Cairns and the coastal region, it was observed by J.V. Mulligan, and others that some of the aboriginal camps were 'semi-permanent,' and resembled townships. Cleared areas and walking tracks were maintained, and the people were not strictly nomadic. The coming of white settlers caused great disruption to the aboriginal traditional way of life. There was frontier warfare, dislocation, starvation, and instances of wholesale massacres of groups of blacks. It is estimated that the population of aborigines in the Cairns-Tableland region was reduced to less than 20% in just 20 years. After the period of frontier warfare, surviving aborigines were subject to the protectionist policies of the government. Aborigines were removed from their traditional lands and placed on government reservations or church missions. Despite attempts to exterminate the original people of the tablelands, and policies designed to remove them from their homeland, indigenous people have survived, and have more recently been recognized as the original owners of the land. Source: athertontablelandnetguide.com/history/tableland-history.htm

The Girramay was an Australian Aboriginal tribe of northern Queensland. The Girramay people's traditional lands extended over some 1000mi2 south from Rockingham Bay to Cardwell. Northwards, their boundaries reached close to the upper Murray River and the Cardwell Range, and also took in inland areas of the Herbert River. The Girramay spoke the most southerly dialect of Dyirbal. The Girramay lived in a mixture of rainforest and open forest environments. Source: everything.explained.today/Girramay/

The Girramay People are now recognised native title holders of around 475 ha in north Queensland as a key part of a broad agreement package with the Queensland Government and the Cassowary Coast Regional Council (2009). nativetitle.org.au/find/pbc/4739 www.nntt.gov.au/News-and-Publications/latest-news/Pages/G...