ancient australia. how they lived lived in central australia lived in small groups made shelters out...
DESCRIPTION
Men Hunted large animals with spears, woomeras and boomerangs Dug pits to trap other animals Put plants that killed fish or sent animals to sleep in waterholes Collected most of the food Fruits, seeds to grind into flour, roots, ant larvae, witchetty grubs, lizards and snakes Hunted with digging sticks Collected in wooden dishes WomenTRANSCRIPT
Ancient Australia
A Land of Many Countries
How they lived
Lived in Central AustraliaLived in small groupsMade shelters out of grass & saplingsWhy do you think the Aranda people didn’t build houses?
The Aranda People
Men
Hunted large animals with spears, woomeras and boomerangs
Dug pits to trap other animals
Put plants that killed fish or sent animals to sleep in waterholes
Collected most of the food
Fruits, seeds to grind into flour, roots, ant larvae, witchetty grubs, lizards and snakes
Hunted with digging sticksCollected in wooden dishes
How they got their foodWomen
Initiation practices at puberty: included circumcision and cuts across chest
Further initiations continued throughout life, only if elders approved & considered worthy
Only outstanding people ever received the whole of their ancestor’s secrets
Growing Up
Wore no clothes
Wore prized decorations
like necklaces and headbands
Carried what they needed on
their heads and in their
hands
Food was shared
Other information
Getting to Tasmania
About 35,000 years agoWalked across a land bridge now covered by Bass StraitAbout 12,000 years ago the waters of Bass Strait began to close over the bridgeBy 8,000 years ago Tasmania was cut off
Aboriginal people in Tasmania
Tended to move about and camp close to food sources and mines
Spent about a quarter of each year in small villages of dome-shaped huts
Huts were thatched with bark, grass or turf and lined with bark, skins or feathers
How They Lived
Originally the same chunky
stone implements used on the mainland
Over the next 10,000 years Tasmanian
tools became smaller and
more efficient
Never developed
the handles used on the mainland
Tasmanian Tools
People in Tasmania developed boats made of bundles of bark
About 4,000 years ago
• No paddles – were pushed along or punted with long poles
• Couldn’t be taken more than about 15km out to sea or would get waterlogged
• Voyaged through rough seas and high winds to the Bass Strait islands to hunt seals or mutton birds
• Gathered sea bird eggs from Maatsukyer Islands off the south coast of Tasmania
Boating in Tasmania
Women did most of the work:Work done by women• They built the huts; mined
ochre and mined rock for tools; hunted possums for food and skins; carried the spears, game and babies; wove baskets; made shell necklaces; gathered most of the food
Swimming• Many men couldn’t swim, but
the women were extraordinary swimmers. • They dived for shellfish, and
stayed underwater for long periods of time
• They could swim as far as 2km through rough seas to go after mutton birds and their eggs
• They rubbed themselves with a mix of mutton bird fat and red ochre to keep out the cold
Women in Tasmania
Where?
• South-West Western Australia
• Unlike rest of Australia, stayed fertile after the Ice Age
• Camp site is about 40,000 years old
Tools
• Unique to the area
• long-handled serrated knives
• saws made of small flakes of quartz fastened with resin along lengths of wood
Clothing
• Kangaroo-skin cloaks, possum-skin belts, feather necklaces
• Carried smouldering banksia cones, wrapped in thick skins, under clothes to warm them in Winter
The Nyungar
Lots of shell middens,
rock shelters, ochre &
stone quarries
Extraordinary fish traps:
Oyster Harbour fish
trap has walls of
about 1km long
Fish swam into traps at high tide and
were stranded when tide went out
Finds of south Western Australia
Ancient Surfers ParadiseWho? People of the
Durrubul, Guwar, Njula, Quandamooka, Noonuccal, Kombumeri, and Yugambeh language groupsAt least 20,000 years ago, but older sites may be hidden under the waters of Moreton Bay
• huge groups met to hunt the sea mullet in Moreton Bay
Winter
• people came from as far as the Bundaberg region or the Tweed River to feast on bunya nuts in the Bunya Mountains.
• At the feasts, people traded for possum-skin rugs, woven bags, jewellery, shells, tools & weapons.
• Marriages were arranged and ceremonies performed.
Summer
• another main event. • Cycads had to be carefully washed to
get rid of their poison.
The cycad harvest
All information is from:
Jackie French
Fair Dinkum Histories: Shipwreck, Sailors & 60,000 YearsScholastic Press, Lindfield, NSW 2006, pp. 46-52
References