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The Indigenous Australians of Victoria, Australia occupied the land for tens of thousands of years prior to European settlement.〔Richard Broome, pp xviii-xxii, ''Aboriginal Victorians: A History Since 1800'', Allen & Unwin, 2005, ISBN 1-74114-569-4, ISBN 978-1-74114-569-4〕 According to Gary Presland Aborigines have lived in Victoria for about 40,000 years living a semi-nomadic existence of fishing, hunting and gathering, and farming eels.〔Gary Presland, ''The First Residents of Melbourne's Western Region'', (revised edition), Harriland Press, 1997. ISBN 0-646-33150-7.〕 The aborigines of Victoria had developed a varied and complex set of languages, tribal alliances and trading routes, beliefs and social customs that involved totemism, superstition, initiation and burial rites, and tribal moeties that regulated sexual relationships and marriage.〔Colin Leslie Dean, ''(The Religions of the Pre-contact Victorian Aborigines )'', Gamahucher Press, Geelong West, Geelong, Victoria, Australia, 1998. Accessed on 10 September 2011〕〔James Dawson, (1881) ''Australian Aborigines:the languages and customs of several tribes of Aborigines in the western district of Victoria, Australia'', Originally published George Robertson Melbourne in 1881, Facsimile edition AIAS 1981.〕 ==Prehistory== "There is some evidence to show that people were living in the Maribyrnong River valley, near present day Keilor, about 40,000 years ago." explains Gary Presland〔Gary Presland, pg1, ''Aboriginal Melbourne: The Lost Land of the Kulin People'', Harriland Press (1985), Second edition 1994, ISBN 0-9577004-2-3. This book describes in some detail the archaeological evidence regarding aboriginal life, culture, food gathering and land management〕 At the Keilor Archaeological Site a human hearth excavated in 1971 was radiocarbon-dated to about 31,000 years BP, making Keilor one of the earliest sites of human habitation in Australia.〔Gary Presland, ''(Keilor Archaeological Site )'', eMelbourne website. Accessed 3 November 2008〕 A cranium found at the site has been dated at between 12,000〔Peter Brown, ''(The Keilor Cranium )'', Peter Brown's Australian and Asian Palaeoanthropology, Accessed 3 November 2008〕 and 14,700 years BP.〔 Similar archaeological sites in Tasmania and on the Bass Strait Islands have been dated to between 20,000 – 35,000 years ago, when sea levels were 130 metres below present level allowing Aboriginal people to move across the region of southern Victoria and on to the land bridge of the Bassian plain to Tasmania by at least 35,000 years ago.〔Hanna Steyne, ''(Investigating the Submerged Landscapes of Port Phillip Bay, Victoria )'' Heritage Victoria, Accessed 3 November 2008〕〔David Rhodes, Terra Culture Heritage Consultants, ''(Channel Deepening Existing Conditions Final Report - Aboriginal Heritage )'', Prepared for Parsons Brinckerhoff & Port of Melbourne Corporation, August 2003. Accessed 3 November 2008〕 There is evidence of occupation in Gariwerd - the territory of the Jardwadjali people - many thousands of years before the last ice-age. One site in the Victoria Range (Billawin Range) has been dated from 22,000 years ago.〔Parks Victoria, ''(Management Plan for Grampians National Park )'', 2003, ISBN 0-7311-3131-2 . Accessed 19 November 2008〕 During the Ice Age about 20,000 years BP, the area now the bay of Port Phillip would have been dry land, and the Yarra and Werribee river would have joined to flow through the heads then south and south west through the Bassian plain before meeting the ocean to the west. Between 16,000 and 14,000 years BP the rate of sea level rise was most rapid rising about 50 feet in 300 years according to Peter D. Ward.〔Peter D. Ward, pp30, ''The Flooded Earth. Our Future in a World Without Ice Caps'', Basic Books, New York, 2010, ISBN 978-0-465-00949-7〕 Tasmania and the Bass Strait islands became separated from mainland Australia around 12,000 BP, when the sea level was approximately 50m below present levels.〔Hanna Steyne, ''(Investigating the Submerged Landscapes of Port Phillip Bay, Victoria )'' Heritage Victoria, who sources (Lambeck & Chappell 2001) Accessed 3 November 2008〕 Port Phillip was flooded by post-glacial rising sea levels between 8000 and 6000 years ago.〔Hanna Steyne, ''(Investigating the Submerged Landscapes of Port Phillip Bay, Victoria )'' Heritage Victoria, who sources(Bird 1993, Bowler 1966, Holdgate et al. 2001). Accessed 3 November 2008〕 Oral history and creation stories from the Wada wurrung, Woiwurrung and Bun wurrung languages describe the flooding of the bay. Hobsons Bay was once a kangaroo hunting ground. Creation stories describe how Bunjil was responsible for the formation of the bay,〔 or the bay was flooded when the Yarra river was created (Yarra Creation Story.〔Ian Hunter, ''(Yarra Creation Story )'', Wurundjeri Dreaming. Recorded 2004-5. Accessed 3 November 2008〕) The Wurundjeri mined diorite at Mount William Quarry which was a source of the highly valued greenstone hatchet heads, which were highly prized and traded across a wide area as far as New South Wales and Adelaide. The mine provided a complex network of trading for economic and social exchange among the different aboriginal nations in Victoria.〔Isabel McBryde, ''(Kulin Greenstone Quarries: The Social Contexts of Production and Distribution for the Mt William Site )'', in ''World Archaeology'', Vol. 16, No. 2, Mines and Quarries (Oct. 1984), pp. 267-285 (article consists of 19 pages) Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. Accessed 3 November 2008〕〔Isabel Ellender and Peter Christiansen, pp44, ''People of the Merri Merri. The Wurundjeri in Colonial Days'', Merri Creek Management Committee, 2001 ISBN 0-9577728-0-7〕〔Gary Presland, ''Aboriginal Melbourne. The lost land of the Kulin people'', Harriland Press, 1985. New edition 2001. ISBN 0-9577004-2-3〕 The Quarry had been in use for more than 1,500 years and covered 18 hectares including underground pits of several metres. In February 2008 the site was placed on the National heritage list for its cultural importance and archeological value.〔National Heritage List, ''(Mount William Stone Hatchet Quarry )'', Australian Government, Department of the Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts. Accessed 3 November 2008〕 In some areas semi-permanent huts were constructed and a sophisticated network of water channels were constructed for farming eels. During winter the Djab Wurrung encampments were more permanent, sometimes consisting of substantial huts as attested by Major Thomas Mitchell near Mount Napier in 1836: :"''Two very substantial huts showed that even the natives had been attracted by the beauty of the land, and as the day was showery, I wished to return if possible, to pass the night there, for I began to learn that such huts, with a good fire between them, made comfortable quarters in bad weather.''"〔Major Mitchell quoted in ''(Two Native Tribes Shared Shire Area )'' Shire of Mt. Rouse Centenary booklet, 1964, as detailed by the MT. Rouse & District Historical Society website, 20 October 2007. Accessed 25 November 2008〕 During early Autumn there were often large gatherings of up to 1000 people for one to two months hosted at the Mount William swamp or at Lake Bolac for the annual eel migration. Several tribes attended these gatherings including the Girai wurrung, Djargurd wurrung, Dhauwurd wurrung and Wada wurrung. Near Mount William, an elaborate network of channels, weirs and eel traps and stone shelters had been constructed, indicative of a semi-permanent lifestyle in which eels were an important economic component for food and bartering, particularly the Short-finned eel.〔''(Victorian Eel Fishery - Management Plan )'' Accessed 25 November 2008〕 Near Lake Bolac a semi-permanent village extended some 35 kilometres along the river bank during autumn. George Augustus Robinson on 7 July 1841 described some of the infrastructure that had been constructed near Mount William: :"''...an area of at least 15 acres was thus traced out... These works must have been executed at great cost of labour... There must have been some thousands of yards of this trenching and banking. The whole of the water from the mountain rivulets is made to pass through this trenching ere it reaches the marsh...''"〔Harry Lourandos, pp63-65, ''Continent of Hunter-gatherers: New Perspectives in Australian Prehistory'', Cambridge University Press, 1997, ISBN 0-521-35946-5〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Victorian Aborigines」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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