Theme edition. The dingo dilemma: cull; contain or conserve, edited by Thomas Newsome, Chris Dickman and Daniel Lunney. THE WATERFINDERS. A cultural history of the Australian dingo Justine Philip PhD Ecosystem Management. Le Moulin Neuf, Pont Melvez 22390 FRANCE Honorary Associate, Museums Victoria, AUSTRALIA Email: [email protected]; [email protected] Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021

For thousands of years, the water-finding abilities of the Australian dingo (Canis dingo), has assisted human survival in one of the most extreme, arid environments on earth. In addition to their contribution to Traditional Aboriginal society as a guardian, living blanket, hunting assistant and companion, the dingo’s role as intermediary between the earth’s surface and the river systems that flow beneath the continent is legendary. Both the ancestral/mythical dingo and the contemporary dingo are attributed with having assisted people in the location of aquifers, billabongs, inland lakes. They guided people safely across hundreds of kilometers of desert, locating the places where water sources reach up closest to the earth’s surface from the underground lakes and waterways that flow beneath the continent. The dingo’s status in Aboriginal culture is celebrated in the naming of waterholes, soaks, river systems and aquifers. This paper follows the path of the ancient dingo, tracing how, as a cultural keystone species, dingoes have shaped human society and belief systems, encouraging cultures of reciprocity and laws of protection for vital resources. Post-colonization, these traditions have not been recognized outside of Aboriginal communities, and this loss of cultural heritage comes at great cost to the Australian environment, biodiversity and the health and preservation of vital resources. ABSTRACT

Key words: Water, dingo, dogs, Australian history, cultural keystone species, environmental history, Aboriginal cultural heritage. DOI: https://doi.org/10.7882/AZ.2020.034

Introduction This paper traces dingo (Canis dingo) water history, a key point of vulnerability to their traditional human examining historical records and accounts that illustrate communities – the deliberate eradication of these dingoes the value of dingo’s life-saving water knowledge, and was employed as an effective method of disempowering and how dingoes have shaped human cultural and social undermining traditional communities. Techniques involved systems. The research draws from ethnographic and systematic violence, lethal controls and legal constraints - cultural archives, historical narratives and media reports. all still endorsed continent-wide against the dingo today. This report reveals how dingo water knowledge and Their marginalization resulted in a great loss of cultural sophisticated navigational skills – path integration knowledge, and loss to traditional ways of life and mobility. or “Dead Reckoning” examined in the report, have enhanced human mobility and survival. The dingo is a cultural keystone species – a species of high Methods ethnographic value to human society. The dingo’s The research employs grounded theory and an iterative heritage value is comparable to that of the northern process (Neuman, 2011) to the examination of archival hemisphere water dogs such as the Yukaghir River dogs, data and historical narrative, where the meanings and or the ocean travelling Kuri dogs of the New Zealand values I assign to water dogs and dingoes have been Maori. The importance of these ancient canines to shaped and influenced through story telling, narrative and human society has been embedded within cultural contextual history. narratives, rituals, ceremonies, dances and songs of their human communities, and visible in the everyday lives of The data were gathered from museum collections, their human communities. original manuscripts, scientific documents and media records. These narratives were collated into individual Accounts of European beneficiaries of dingo water knowledge accounts and constructed into prosopographies or also are examined in this paper. These accounts were largely collective biographies. A prosopography encompasses opportunistic and failed to translate into any lasting benefit a simple, systematic organization of relatively rare data for either human or non-human communities. Furthermore, in a way that “reveals connections and patterns influencing post-colonization relationships with the dingo (as with the historical processes” (Verboven et al., 2007, p. 37). Yukaghir River dogs and the extinct Kuri) presented Australian 2020 Zoologist A Philip

Cultural keystone species Humans’ fellow oceanic travellers include the extinct Kuri ‘Keystone species’ is an ecological term used to describe dogs (Canis familiaris) of New Zealand. They arrived on New species that are pivotal to the structure and resilience of Zealand shores around c1300 with Maori seafarers (Wilson, ecosystems (Levin, 2013). They are described as ecosystem 2005). They were companions, guardians, navigational architects – species that exert a disproportionately large aids, hunters, and a ritual food source. Their coats were influence on the configuration and functioning of the harvested and made into kahu kurī (cloaks) worn as a status environment, despite a relatively small population base. symbol by Maori chiefs (Beattie, 1947). The Kuri dog was They utilize and support the continued health and important to Maori economy, and associated with water fitness of the biota. Where the role of a species provides magic and storm incarnations, revered as intermediaries an important service to human society, they become between the physical world and the afterlife (Titcomb Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 embedded in cultural systems, and can be referred to & Pukui, 1969). In legend a Kuri dog travelling with the as cultural keystone species. These are defined as plant captain Manaia on the Tokomaru canoe, jumped into the and animal species that are valuable companions, used ocean at night as they were approaching New Zealand. It for medicinal purposes, clothing, food sources, or of is said that the canoe was guided to land following the calls high ethnographic value. This involves ornamental or of the dog. Kuri dogs did not survive the first century of ritual applications, mythic representations (stories with British colonisation in New Zealand. They were actively spiritual, sacred and often instructive elements) and the eradicated with poisons and guns to make way for the use of metaphor in celestial and geological forms (Smith emerging pastoral industry (White, 1889). & Litchfield, 2009). This is further described by social geographers Garibaldi & Turner (2004, p. 1): Thousands of years before the Kuri made it to New Zealand, the dingo is believed to have arrived on the North These species often feature prominently in the language, Australian coastline in the company of Asiatic seafarers. ceremonies, and narratives of native peoples and can This represents perhaps one of the earliest successful be considered cultural icons. Without these “cultural human-assisted oceanic migrations, and genetic indicators keystone species,” the societies they support would be estimate this occurred 5000 to 10,000 years ago (Cairns completely different ... These are the species that become & Wilton, 2016; Mattias et al., 2011). Aboriginal legends embedded in a people’s cultural traditions and narratives, place the dingo within the geological landscape over 6,000 their ceremonies, dances, songs, and discourse. years ago (Roughsey, 1971). Archaeological remains point to a more conservative date, of less than 3348 years (Balme Historically, interconnections between nature and culture et al., 2018), however this can perhaps be attributed to the played an essential role in the maintenance of resilient low chances of preservation of remains, and initial small ecosystems and biodiversity (Garibaldi & Turner, 2004). population numbers (Koungoulos & Fillios, 2020). The marginalization of cultural and ecological keystones resulted in the degradation of ecosystems, the loss of Dingoes provided a new hunting technology (Balme & traditions and cultural diversity. Their loss led to changes O’Connor, 2016; Philip, 2017), they were a navigational in the health and resilience of the complex social and aid, living blanket and valuable item of trade and exchange. ecological matrix (Balme & O’Connor, 2016; Johnson et They were adopted into Aboriginal communities across al., 2007). Australia is currently experiencing a biodiversity the continent, becoming integral to Aboriginal society crisis, with 1,700 species and ecological communities and culture. Philip (2017) records the traditions of listed as threatened with extinction (EPBC Act, 2016) nursing dingo pups beside human infants, and their role The country holds the highest mammalian extinction rate in guardianship, ceremonial processes, economic and in the world. The loss of cultural heritage is reflected in utilitarian functions specific to women and children. “The ≈90% of Aboriginal languages currently endangered or loss of the dingo [post-colonization] was perhaps a double extinct (AIATSIS, 2020). tragedy for the Aboriginal women, impacting on their health and welfare, along with a great loss in status and cultural knowledge.” (Philip, 2017, p. 83) Ocean migrations The history of human-canine cohabitation dates back Dingoes were described from early European accounts as over 16,000 to 32,000 years (Miklosi, 2018). Evidence ubiquitous with Aboriginal society. Archaeologists Balme of the cultural status of ancient canines is apparent & O’Connor state (2016, p. 777): “it is difficult to find an by the Mesolithic period, with the discovery of ritual ethnographic/historical image of mainland Aboriginal camp burials across many regions dated >10,000 years. As life or gatherings that does not include dingoes.” Of all their human populations migrated, they were accompanied by contributions to Traditional life, the dingo’s water finding canines, crossing oceans and colonizing new lands. These abilities are perhaps their most indispensable skill, however ancestral dogs were indispensable for their polyfunctional this was often secret knowledge held only by the elder and polysemic roles within human society. As humans women or men in the community (Phelan, 2007, p. 4): migrated into increasingly inhospitable lands, canine companions enabled their survival in these challenging Individuals will carry with them “dog dreaming”, that is, and remote environments. they are the custodians of the law and history of dingoes and Australian B Zoologist 2020 THE WATERFINDERS. A cultural history of the Australian dingo

dogs. Much of the law as it pertains to dogs remains secret tracing the footsteps of totem animals and mythological and is often held in the hands of only a few in a community. beings. These graphemic maps (unwritten maps) trace water sources across country, extending across hundreds of Secret or “restricted” knowledge involves areas of sacred kilometers (Rose, 2011). Dingoes travelled with Aboriginal knowledge and cultural expression that may only be used people on these journeys, and also retained memory of within an appropriate context, for example, in ceremony, these well-travelled paths. Phelan records (2007, p. 4): at a particular time of year, or by specific members of the community. Not abiding by these laws, or disclosing secret There are many dog dreaming sites located around information is believed to have dangerous consequences, the Australian continent. Each has its own and often and could result in spiritual agitation or harm (Janke & interconnected story of creation and movement of the Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 Sentina, 2018). dingo through the country. Stories are told covering areas over thousands of kilometers and across different language Each tribe has its own level of inclusion of the dingo into groups. Ceremonies that are based around the dingo and ceremonial life, and this varies across Australia. Some dog continue to be practiced across northern Australia with associations are negative or cautionary in nature, as relevant songs, dances and stories being very much intact. Parker notes (2016 p. iii): “A pragmatic Dreaming Dingo teaches humans to live harmoniously and cautiously in an Dreamtime stories are a powerful educational tool for the environment which is both nurturing and dangerous.” passing on of ecological knowledge and intergenerational obligations of care. Rose describes this as a system of renewal and reciprocity (2002, p. 4): Water Dogs While the dingo’s association with water primarily The term Dreaming refers to the beings who made concerns navigation and cooperation, other canines have the world to be as it is, and it further refers to the also played central roles in the economy of their human process of coming forth into the world. In terms societies and interactions with vital water sources pre- of connection, Dreaming speaks to relationships that industrialisation. Water dogs of the northern hemisphere structure obligations of care, and that constitute webs of were conspicuous with their webbed paws, waterproof reciprocities within the created world. coat and rudder-like tail (Coile, 2015). Known for their stamina, they worked in the North Atlantic Ocean, Both the mythological dingo and the physical dingo, as herding fish and nets to the fishing vessels. demonstrated later through historical accounts in this paper, helped guide people to water in their travels across Snow dogs have a history reaching back over 9500 years in country. They are attributed with creating the waterways the Artic region (Sinding et al., 2020). The River dogs of (Parker, 2006, p. 133): [The dingo] appeared in creative Arctic Siberia, revered by the Yukaghir people, transported myths as a Dreaming ancestor, giving birth to the first people, people and supplies by sled over the snow and ice in winter making rivers and scratching out waterholes. (Wrangell, 1844). In summer they towed small fishing vessels across the thawing lakes and rivers. They were Dreamtime canvas known for their uncanny precision, their ability to navigate Aboriginal artworks both celebrate and disseminate their way home or to a previous destination through snow cultural and ecological knowledge. They often feature an storms and blizzards, in zero visibility. Records of the abstract map of the landscape, and are used as an effective Yukaghir River dogs initiated Charles Darwin’s theories on medium for the transmission of local knowledge involving animal navigation, what Darwin termed “dead reckoning” ecology, native food sources, stewardship and history. (an ancient nautical concept). Their ability to keeping true course “with no guide, in the heavens or on the frozen sea” Visual Anthropologist Howard Morphy (1999) describes (Darwin 1873, p. 418) is a skill also well understood by the artworks as an encoding system of secret and non- the dingo and the Aboriginal people traversing Australia’s secret knowledge. Dingo paintings are generally not in vast arid interior. Termed “path integration” or “graphemic the figurative style of ‘public art,’ but in the interpretative maps”, this navigational skill involves a process of spatial, style of restricted topics, using geometric forms rather temporal and social memory, assisted by heightened visual than recognizable figures – it is the artists themselves who and olfactory senses, described by neurobiologists as “an interpret the paintings and allow a non-Aboriginal audience independent navigational system that can work without reference to gain insight into the themes and information contained to landmarks” (Collett & Graham, 2004, p. 475). In within the images. The stories within the artworks are Aboriginal culture, these pathways are known as songlines. heavily encoded and require interpretation. This system of representation “conceals meaning and is thus suited to a system Songlines and the Dreamtime of restricted knowledge” (Morphy, 1999, p. 20). Songlines are journeys, told through the oral history of Dreamtime stories and songs that weave their way Figure 1 is an encoded painting of Dingo Dreaming through the physical landscape, forming invisible pathways by Eubena Nampitjin, Aboriginal elder and custodian from waterhole to waterhole throughout the continent, of women’s law, Kunawarritji. The painting is entitled Australian 2020 Zoologist C Philip

ancestral being, the location, and the story as one (Art Gallery of NSW 1991).

The importance of the site was recorded by local Martu film-maker, Morika Biljabu, in Kunawarritji (National Museum of Australia, 2008):

Jarntu is like a guide dog for the old people, a protector. It’s the belly button of the Country. Right in the middle. The Canning Stock Route cut the body in half. Jarntu is like Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 the veins of the body.

Jarntu’s waterhole was seized by the Government/pastoralists in 1910, becoming Well 35 on the infamous Canning Stock Route, a path for transferring cattle (Davenport et al., 2010). The stock route weaves its way from the Western Kimberly region of north of Australia, through the Pilbara desert, and down to the markets in Wiluna, Central Western Australia. It took 12-16 weeks for mobs of cattle to traverse the 52 wells spread along the 1780 km route, all of them ancient Aboriginal waterholes, and sacred places.

Morika Biljabu records (National Museum of Australia, 2008, Section 4):

Jarntu is the ancestral mother dingo whose puppies inhabit the surrounding rockholes and soak waters, which are linked by a network of underground tunnels. Jarntu has healing powers, but she is also a fierce protector of her home and people. Aboriginal people enter the site ritually and with great respect, sweeping the ground with branches, announcing strangers and leaving food for Jarntu. Jarntu returns this generosity by ensuring successful hunting for her Countrymen and by protecting them from danger.

Desert dingo Archaeologists Paul Tacon and Colin Pardoe (2002) record that the rainbow snake and the dingo are two of the most represented creatures in the Aboriginal Dreamtime. Here I will demonstrate how, from 6000 + years ago, both rainbow serpent and dingo were present as powerful symbols of water in Aboriginal cosmology. Figure 1: Kinyu (the sacred name for Jarntu), representing They were metaphorically embodied in the geological sandhills, soak water, and Jarntus pups. Eubena Nampitjin formations of the land and waterways throughout (1925-2013) 1991. By permission of the NSW Art Gallery the continent. In this mythology, dingoes actively dig ref. 2.2003. up rivers, waterfalls and lakes. Sometimes they are involved in celestial narratives, in others they disappear Kinyu, the sacred name of a well in the central Pilbara into the earth, to re-emerge as rainbows (Cole, 2001). desert (National Museum of Australia, 2008). Kinyu is Tacon writes of sequential links between geological the ceremonial name for the dingo, also referred to as changes, and the emergence of these mythological Jarntu, in the local Martu language. This is the site of beings in oral and visual records, 4000 to 6000 years the ancestral mother dingo. It is a sacred site, attributed ago (2008, p. 171): with healing and protective powers. Jarntu’s pups are said to live in the rock holes and soaks surrounding Both rising sea levels and dingoes initiated many different the area, linked together by a series of underground forms of change to fauna, ecosystems and human tunnels beneath the desert. These are represented in environments. Among other things, changes to climate Nampitjin’s work in the circular forms. “Kinyu is the meant rainbows may have appeared more frequently in one that grew me up” writes Nampitjin, referring to the the sky. Australian D Zoologist 2020 THE WATERFINDERS. A cultural history of the Australian dingo

Aboriginal Dreamtime tells of the ancestral beings that contains songlines where the ancestral dingoes walked created water sources, dug up soaks and transformed the out to the peninsular that later became Wellesley Islands landscape. In this mythic terrain, the ancestors were often in a seismic shift of the continental tectonic plates, 6,000 dingo shape-shifters – moving from human to dingo form to 8,000 years ago (Explore Sahul Time, 2007). and back again (Rose, 1992). They were capable of giving birth to dingo or human young. Linguistic researcher The quake caused the Sahul Shelf to submerge beneath Merryl Parker wrote (2006): sea level, resulting in the formation of the archipelago of Mornington, Forsyth, Manowar and Rocky Islands. The travels of the first dingoes are told and retold until Traditional mythology of the Islands includes sacred areas they forge memory paths, which take the people to water relating to dingo magic, said to hold great powers for rain Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 and food and explain how people arrived in the land and making and love magic (Roughsey, 1971). where they will finally go. Dingoes were central to the lives and customs of the Within Australian cartographic locations, names include Island people until they were exterminated by the Dingo Springs, Dingo Rock, Dingo Creek. A ‘Dingo Missionaries in 1946 (Roughsey, 1971). The Reverend Soak’ refers to specific locations on the map identifying Wilson had initiated the eradication program in 1930, waterholes that were uncovered by the diggings of a dingo distributing yearly blanket supplies to the Aboriginal – in the form of either a mythical (ancestral) or physical community. One blanket was exchanged for one dingo/ living being. The name appears at a number of locations dog carcass. (On Mornington Island, 1930 p. 43). across the Australian map today. One record from The Grieving figures can be seen in the background of the Sketcher, (1923 p. 42) reads: newspaper image, Figure 2.

Dingo Soak: It lies away out to the northward, where the Dingoes are portrayed in paintings by Dick Roughsey of long reaches of grey-green, sun-burnt plains come down Mornington Island, as participants in ceremonial dances to meet in a small, lonely gully, sparsely timbered with involving rain magic. Creation stories are sung and fire-blackened jam trees – a still, silent, grass- fringed danced at corroborees where the traditional ‘paint-up’ waterhole, where the wild folk have come to have a drink represents the totemic figures: lightning, moon, rainbow, since those mythical days. rainbow serpent, dingo (Mirndiyan Gununa, 2015). Dingo paint-up is illustrated in Figure 3. Traditional dingo knowledge and the mythic journeys of the ancestors are still celebrated in remote communities In the belief system of the Lardil people of Mornington today. AMRRIC (Animal Management in Remote Island, the Rainbow Serpent, Thuwathu, and the dingo, and Rural Indigenous Communities) Veterinarian Nyaranbi, laid down the customary laws and gave the Sophie Constable recorded first-hand accounts of dingo people their “totems, kinship system, and land and sea knowledge in 2014. The Aboriginal elders stated: story places” (Mirndiyan Gununa, 2015). This included ceremonies and laws governing the stewardship of Dingoes are important in our Dreamings. natural resources, governing conduct towards one another, and the treatment of land and sea country. Out in the bush dingoes helped us hunt and find water...

Dingoes can live without people...They can smell water and hunt very well.

They are an important part of keeping country healthy. Songlines Songlines are intricate maps of land, sea and country. They describe travel and trade routes, the location of waterholes and the presence of food. In many cases, Songlines on the earth are mirrored by sky Songlines, which allowed people to navigate vast distances of this nation and its waters. (NAIDOC, 2016)

Songlines, in western ethnographic discourse, are best described as “alternative ways in which cultures dream and map space” (Huggan, 1991, p. 66). Figure 2: Reverend Wilson put the price of a dog on Songlines also reflect ancient physical attributes of the each blanket. 2 January 1930. Source: The Queenslander/ land on a geological time scale. Northern Queensland National Library of Australia, pp.32-33 Australian 2020 Zoologist E Philip

These historical encounters are retold here to illustrate the tangible nature of dingo knowledge, a field of knowledge largely absent from Euro-Australian historical and ecological studies. Burke and Wills 1861 The last painting by German born artist Ludwig Becker, was completed before he perished on the catastrophic Burke and Wills expedition in Australia, 1861. The watercolour is titled “Border of Mud Desert near Desolation Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 Camp” (Figure 4). Here we have a rare dingo-eye, dichromatic view of the desert (Miller, 2016). The ghostly and doomed figures of Burke and Wills and their camels, are fading off into the landscape under a midday sun.

While Becker’s painting documents a moment of great error and tragedy in Australia’s colonial history, the dingoes in the foreground, in contrast, hold a different story. They are at home in the arid zone, this is their Figure 3: Ceremonial Nyaranbi dingo paint-up, country. This is where they are born, and where they Mornington Island. Source: Mirndiyan Gununa, 2015 live out their lives. The dingoes pictured appear in good condition, unlike the malnourished Becker who later died Dingo ethnography near the scene from dysentery and scurvy. The dingoes Ethnographic collections from around Australia also hold the knowledge (even though the artist does not) that include ceremonial objects made with dingo body parts they are standing above a plentiful water source running (bone, teeth, fur, skin) constructed as talismans for rain deep beneath the desert surface. They could identify magic, and for success in hunting or combat (Philip, where the water reaches up closest to the earth’s surface, 2017). Others were used as ornamentation, or practical where they could dig to find this lifesaving resource. It was applications including dingo skin water-bags that were another 17 years after the ill-fated expedition, however, used for carrying water over long distances. The following before Europeans discovered the Great Artesian Basin record is from 1906, north west Queensland (Thomas, beneath this region. The largest artesian water source in 1906, p. 52): the world lies below one fifth of the Australian continent, and is a source of water springs that has supported unique As water-carriers a number of objects were used...When ecosystems throughout the arid landscape for thousands water has to be conveyed long distances, the skin of an of years (Ransley & Feitz, 2020). animal is a natural method of preserving it; kangaroo, opossum, or dingo skins serve in this capacity. They Herman Beckler are taken off, the neck being cut through high up and Medical surgeon and botanist on the Burke and Wills the forepaws cut off close to the body; then it is tanned expedition, Dr. Herman Beckler was one of the few with coolibar gum, the various openings are closed by Europeans to record the use of dingo water knowledge transfixion with a peg which is wound round with twine by his Aboriginal guides. He described an incident while or tendon; the two hind-legs are tied together to serve as exploring the mountain ranges near Menindee, north- handles; the whole is carried in the hand or may be slung west NSW, in a dispatch to the Royal Society of NSW in over the shoulder. 1861 (Beckler, 1861, p. 6): “we were very anxious to find water ... at the time of my visit not a drop could be found.” and These layers of representations reflect the complex matrix in his memoir “A Journey to Cooper’s Creek” 29 Dec 1860 of dingo knowledge within Aboriginal tangible (physical) (Beckler et al., 1993 p. 116): and intangible (stories, law etc.) heritage and culture. During our search for water we rode through a whole network of watercourses, broad but shallow, and mostly Colonial History consisting of coarse, loose gravel. Here and there, as well In the next accounts, I examine how dingo water as on the bank, deposits of grey slate showed through knowledge was used to advantage by a number of Euro- ... Search as we might, however often we hoped for the Australians. Parker (2006, p. 122) wrote: moment that might surprise us with a view of water—at a sudden bend, or wherever the bare rock on the banks Accounts of dingoes getting married, trying to light fires rose above their normal low level—we found none, and creating water holes are reduced to fairy tales by the and even Peter, the sharp-sighted native, thought we colonists’ facts and dates which function as their “regime would have to leave the mountains again without having of truth” (in the age of reason and science). examined them more closely. This was a disheartening Australian F Zoologist 2020 THE WATERFINDERS. A cultural history of the Australian dingo Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021

Figure 4: A dog’s eye view: Mud Desert from Desolation Camp. Ludwig Becker’s last painting before he died on the ill-fated Burke and Wills expedition, 1861. Courtesy State Library of Victoria, ID H16486

prospect ... Then Peter suddenly reined in his horse, an account of his search for land to start an orchard in dismounted, pointed to a spot on the ground and said: the south-west region. Interviewed for the Western Mail 21 “You see this? A dingo (native dog) has scratched here years later, Foley told the story of travelling through the for water and we will certainly find enough water for arid region looking for a suitable site to settle. Eventually us and our horses.” We now both looked for the most he came across land with suitable good light sandy soil advantageous spot and were soon occupied in scraping for an orchard. He arrived at the spot one evening after a away the loose stones in a small reflex angle of the slate. run of hot weather, and it was the diggings of a dingo that Our hands soon became damp; we came to several large, convinced him to buy the plot of land between Kojonup loose slabs of rock and, to our great joy, once these were and Bridgetown, that he developed into a thriving orchard removed, we had a little basin before us which quickly (In the Untamed Wilderness Anon., 1906, p. 9): filled with water again and again, however often we filled our hats to quench the thirst of our poor animals. Here a dingo in quest of water had scraped out a hole with his paws, and at the bottom of this shallow excavation lay Rather than taking advantage of Beckler’s and Becker’s a few inches of fresh water. Mr. Foley was impressed with powers of observation, Burke and Wills assigned both men the propinquity of the water to the surface. He selected a to hard manual labor on the expedition. A letter by Wills small holding covering the spot, and on having the land to the Exploration committee dated December 15, 1860 surveyed commenced to work upon it with unremitting (Wills & Wills, 1863) reads: “The whole country has a most industry. The new farm was 50 miles from Bridgetown. deplorably arid appearance; birds are very scarce, native dogs numerous”. This inability to harness dingo water knowledge, Broughton 1885 or to look to the Aboriginal keepers of knowledge for Writer/explorer Dick Broughton travelled through the guidance, was a huge loss. Yet, it reflects the long-standing, Western Desert around the same time as Foley and effective marginalization of both that remains true today. published an account of his journey under the title “Saved by a Dingo” in the Rockhampton Capricorn (9 Foley 1885 December 1926). There is rarely any mention of using dingo water knowledge with intent in Australian Exploration records, however As a young inexperienced traveller, Broughton had walked it did not go entirely unnoticed. In 1885 in Western into unknown territory while crossing the desert region Australia, Foley, a retired clerk from Fremantle, recorded of south-west Australia in mid-summer 1885. Together Australian 2020 Zoologist G Philip with an English companion, the pair took a misguided The dingo had pointed the Broughton towards a fresh ‘shortcut’ across the remote desert and rapidly lost their water spring that was flowing up to the surface from way. Over a number of days their water supply ran dry, beneath the salty pond, and certainly saved his and his and they were in serious trouble by the time Broughton, companion’s life. being of stronger constitution, left his delirious companion in the shade of a dry billabong, and went out on his own Terry, 1932 in search of water. He followed a dried riverbed for miles. Prospector Michael Terry recorded a detailed encounter with a dingo while looking for gold. on behalf of the Emu After walking for over two hours, Broughton recalled he Ming Co. of Adelaide, in the West Australian outback in turned a bend in the creek and saw a fairly big pool of 1933 (Terry, 1937). Terry’s team returned empty-handed, Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 water up ahead. Running up to it, he started shouting in with the exception of the charts and photographic disbelief; “Thank-you! ... Saved Saved!” he called out. He records of between 20 to 30 previously unknown native filled his billy, raised the can to his lips to take a mouthful, wells and rock holes across the region. These vital water then stopped short – the billy was full of saltwater sources were revealed while travelling in the company (Broughton in Saved by a Dingo 1926, p. 11): of a dingo that they found at an abandoned Aboriginal camp. Terry wrote that “Chou-Chou [the dingo] gave For a time I was a raving lunatic. In despair I threw evidence of a quite spectacular memory”, leading the myself down under the shade of a tree ... and like the expedition team to the hidden waterholes across the arid ancient mariner cried ‘water, water everywhere, but not landscape (Dewar, 1933, p. 3). a drop to drink’ ... I suppose I had been there almost five minutes when I happened to look up and to my surprise The expedition team travelled from Eridunda Station, I saw a dingo approaching ... He was about 50 yards Horseshoe Bend (130 miles south of Alice Springs), away. To my great surprise I saw him walk down to the through the Warburton and Rawlinson Range country, bank and start lapping the water. I thought the brute to Laverton (Terry, 1937). In a recurrent theme of earlier must have been perished for a drink when he drank Australian explorations, they left mid-summer. It was 1932, salt water. Having had his fill he went away ... Out and they were assured that rains were soon due to fall. of curiosity, I went to the place where he had drunk. There was a well-defined track leading to the spot. Even Terry recorded that on 1 February that water supplies were then I did not realize why this should be so. Almost running dry: “At the outset, rains which reports had led us involuntarily I dipped the billy and lifted it to my mouth to expect proved not to have fallen” (Terry, 1937). A couple to taste it. It was fresh! A miracle had happened. of miles past Mt Farewell, the expedition team found an abandoned Aboriginal campsite in a detached clump of I was tempted to tame a copious drought but I remembered. mulga, with the camp-fires still burning. There was a clear I swilled my mouth out several times. I poured it on my space in the center and a low rounded outcrop of granite head. I bathed my face. I drank a little, then a little more, which revealed the Black Shaft soakage – a small tunnel and then a little again. I felt a new man. descending 45 degrees through the granite. The water soufe was about 22 feet below and required much digging

Figure 5: Wild dingo, Western Australia, 1932 / Michael Figure 6: Chou-Chou at the head of the camel train on Terry. Source: National Library of Australia. Nitrate store the shore of Lake Mackay, 1932/Michael Terry. Source: PIC/8847/nla.obj-149274965 National Library of Australia Nitrate store PIC/8847/nla. obj-149283828.

Australian H Zoologist 2020 THE WATERFINDERS. A cultural history of the Australian dingo to access a limited water supply. “The mob had heard us unattainable without local knowledge (Figure 9, 10). coming and cleared out” wrote Terry (1969, Figure 5). As the Aboriginal helpers were from a different region, the only consistent source of local knowledge on their It was at this deserted camp that they found Chou-Chou expedition was Chou-Chou. – a semi wild dingo that “almost collected a bullet” from Terry, but was saved by one of the Aboriginal men (Tale of a dingo, 1933, p. 3). The man offered the dingo water from his tin “after which all timidity vanished and this tamed denizen of the wilderness simply attached himself to us” wrote Terry (1933, p. 3). Chou-Chou stayed with the party for Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 some months, pacing alongside the string of camels as they left the Black Shaft. He would run ahead to join Terry and his camel at the lead, then sit down and look back at the string and howl dismally as if to complain about their slowness (Terry, 1937, Figure 6).

When setting up camp east of Lake Mackay, Chou-Chou led the men to a native well (Terry, 1937):

Having passed the McEwin Hills, we reached the Sandford Breakaways close to the north-eastern shore of Lake Mackay. On a clear ti-tree flat, loads were unroped for the night without delay, as the day was far spent. Chou-Chou, however, wanted to travel further, and trotted ahead to a bush by an ant hill a few hundred yards away. Curiosity was aroused by the way he ran there and sniffed about, so we also had a look. Great was our pleasure when we found him at the mouth of the most remarkable native well – level with the ground, all the damp having been washed away by rains ages ago, was a big round hole ten feet in diameter”

The well was a slow filling soak, that had been sunk in solid sandstone to a depth of 35 feet that they measured, to reach water (Terry, 1937, Figure 7, Figure 8). Figure 8: Expedition members at O’Grady’s Well, Northern Territory, 1932, Michael Terry Source: National The photographs from Michael Terry’s expedition illustrate Library of Australia PIC Nitrate store PIC/8847 the huge challenges of finding these vital resources, nearly #PIC/8847/19/16

Figure 7: Chou-Chou had led the men to O’Grady’s Figure 9 An expedition member having a drink at a Well, Northern Territory, 1932, Michael Terry. . Source: soakage, Livingstone Pass, Northern Territory, 1932: National Library of Australia, PIC/8847/17/77 LOC Michael Terry. Source: National Library of Australia, Nitrate Store PIC/8847 Nitrate store PIC/8847/nla.obj-149278948 .

Australian 2020 Zoologist I Philip

launch two weeks later. The story made headlines across Australia: “Water Soak Dug By Dingo Saves Men”, “Men Saved By Dingo Soak”, and “Dingo’s water soak saves lives of four dying men.”

Discussion Through the examination of archival and ethnographic records, this paper reveals that dingoes in the past were well known for their water knowledge. They remain Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 revered in Aboriginal society for their ability to guide people to water, and prior knowledge of the location of water-sources above and below ground (Parker, 2006; Philip, 2017).. If this knowledge had been harnessed by early explorers, they might have experienced entirely different journeys across the Australian interior. However, the records of dingo water knowledge in European discourse are primarily opportunistic, there is little indication that the animals were intentionally enlisted or sought after for this purpose. Explorer Ludwig Leichhardt recorded an incidental encounter in 1844 (1847, p. 208):

The Pandanus and the bloodwood grew on its limited flats. At the end of our stage, we came to a rocky watercourse, which we followed down, and in which a native dog betrayed to us a deep pool of water, covered with Villarsia leaves, and surrounded by Polygonums. Figure 10: Camel drinking from a desert soak. Michael Terry 1932/Michael Terry. Source: National Library of This failure to acknowledge or integrate dingo water Australia. Nitrate store PIC/8847 knowledge in Australian History is a vast oversight, indicative of the observations made by Roland Breckwoldt Saved By Dingo, 1951 in his monograph on the dingo (1988): An account from 1951, credits a wild dingo with saving the lives of four men on the remote Lacrosse island near Our expectations and demands upon the Australian Wyndham in north-west Australia (Dingo led dying men environment are also symbolized by the dingo – its to water, 1951). The men were the crew of a 40-ton relationship with us has never been comfortable. barge that had drifted aground after the barge batteries Perhaps knowing and accepting the dingo is but part of had failed at sea four days earlier. The crew had a map reaching a much larger understanding of our place in of the island that marked out the known water sources, the Australian environment. but all the lagoons they located were sea-water, and they had been unable to locate any fresh water source further To people of the desert, the arid environment is a inland on the island. They survived the first few days on place of vitality and life (Welland, 2014). Access to a crate of tinned cream until it ran dry. On the fourth water is critical, and the Aboriginal people sustained evening after reaching land, the men were returning cultural rituals that ensured the preservation and care of to the barge severely dehydrated. Neale, the 29-year- these essential resources. These were intergenerational old skipper, said he was “saving a bullet to shoot himself, obligations of care for all species, not just human. rather than die of thirst.” The Adelaide News reported the following story (Dingo led dying men to water, 1951, p. 2): Geologist Michael Welland describes how the representation of the desert is polarised depending on The four men searched inland all the afternoon, and at whose view is engaged: to the insiders, the desert is sundown were returning to the barge with tongues swollen homeland. Outsiders, in contrast, perceive the desert when they stumbled on a dingo’s soak on the beach just as an entirely hostile zone. Welland writes (2014, below the high tidal limit. “The dog had dug about 18 p.115): “Place names tell stories, and this is nowhere inches in sand to beautiful fresh water” said the skipper more true than in the Australian deserts.” The outsiders, Allan Neale. “We wouldn’t have thought of looking for it the European explorers of the 19th century, brought there. He certainly saved our lives.” tragedy to the Australian interior, leaving a legacy well documented in local cartography: Mount Desolation, The men survived on the fresh water, shark meat and Mount Hopelessness, Mount Carnage, Mount Despair, wallaby until they were rescued by the Wyndham pilot Mount Solitude, Miserable Creek and Misery Gully. Australian J Zoologist 2020 THE WATERFINDERS. A cultural history of the Australian dingo

Naming of the geological features bears witness to their Modern celestial narratives many ill-fated ventures. In 2006, a team of NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) scientists from the Smithsonian In contrast, the Aboriginal cartographic vision of the Centre for Earth and Planetary Studies, were in Australia’s desert reveals a dynamic relationship with the land Simpson Desert studying the formation of parallel desert (Welland, 2015): dunes similar to those found on Mars.

Find on the maps the indigenous names (or their anglicised Senior scientist Ted Maxwell took a photo of a wild dingo versions) and the story is utterly different. For Aboriginal (Figure 11) casually observing the scientists while they peoples, almost everything in the landscape has a name, were staking out a dune on the Colson Track. Maxwell Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 because they themselves are part of the landscape and the recorded the co-ordinates of their location, noting that living land is their culture ... (p. 115) it was a 60-kilometre walk across the desert to Dalhousie Springs, the nearest known permanent water source. The By far the most dominant names are those associated with dingo is clearly at ease in the remote, arid landscape. the journeys and activities of the ancestral spirits, and sources of water, hardly surprisingly, figure prominently in A dingo appears again in NASA records in 2014, NASA’s these (p. 117)” Curiosity Mars Rover was photographed crossing a place called “Dingo Gap” in its Martian landscape, giving a new It is here in the Australian cartography that we find the dimension to the celestial narratives: rich array of Aboriginal place names and their Dreamtime stories: Warrigal Rock, Jarntu spring, Dingo Soak, Dingo Before landing in Gale crater, the science team divided up Creek, Dingo Gap. These indicate the location of water the landing ellipse into pieces called quadrangles (same as sources that have been attributed to their ancient dingo on Earth) and mapped them using orbital data to get a water finders. sense of what geology we could expect to encounter on the

Figure 11: Dingo photographed in the heart of the Simpson Desert, May 26, 2006, 60 km from the nearest permanent water source at Dalhousie Springs. PHOTO: Ted Maxwell, NASA 2006 Australian 2020 Zoologist K Philip

surface. The quadrangles were named by team members evidence of the role of the dingo in assisting human using the names of places on Earth where important/ survival in the arid environment. geologically interesting and ancient geologic rocks are found. The names of features and landforms within those The dingo, as with other ancient canines such as the quadrangles on Mars come from places near the locations Yukaghir River dog and the Maori Kuri dog, have shaped on Earth for which they are named. So in the case of Dingo the ways that people navigate and interact with their Gap, it is a location in Australia near The Kimberley and vital water sources. These canines have enabled human in the named Kimberley quadrangle in Gale crater. survival at the very edge of what is possible for mammalian existence. Traditional societies have long-standing, – John Grant, NASA Center for Earth and Planetary enduring and imaginative ways of weaving these animals Downloaded from http://meridian.allenpress.com/australian-zoologist/article-pdf/doi/10.7882/AZ.2020.034/2645734/10.7882_az.2020.034.pdf by guest on 01 October 2021 Studies, Smithsonian Institute, 11 Dec 2014 (pers. comm.) into the fabric of their communities - into their laws, religion and cosmology. The dingo features prominently Within this cultural matrix, the dingo is redefined in a in these important areas of Aboriginal cultural heritage in new context in exploration, place, cultural and ecological Australia, and deserves all the protection that this level of meaning. Here, the evolution of Western cosmology is cultural engagement demands. giving ancient celestial narratives the opportunity to re-emerge. The valley on the Martian landscape is named Their ability to guide people to water, and to locate water after a wild dog, the dingo, who thrived in the most sources above and below ground, has been an important extreme regions of the Australian desert for thousands part of dingo-human interactions for thousands of years, of years. They helped people find water, and their stories and deserves to be fully celebrated in the Australian story. featured in landmarks, waterholes, and star constellations. The themes that emerge are of the connections between dingoes, water, land and people, and of this multi-species sharing of vital water sources. Important Dreamtime Conclusion stories provide recognition not just of the value of dingoes This paper examines documents from media, ethnographic and our precious water sources, but also of our common and archival sources that record encounters between stories, mutual dependencies, mutual vulnerabilities, and people and dingo water knowledge. These were often obligations of care. recorded as life saving encounters, and provide tangible

Figure 12: Dingo on the outskirts of Purnngurr Community, near Well 33, Canning Stock Route. Justine Philip/ AMMRIC 2018

Australian L Zoologist 2020 THE WATERFINDERS. A cultural history of the Australian dingo

Acknowledgements This paper was presented at the Animal Histories Tsitas at RMIT Gallery, Jack and Debby Warner at the Conference, Kings College London, June 2019, and in an Smithsonian Institutional Archives, John Grant and Ted earlier form at the RMIT “Australia India Water+Wisdom” Maxwell at NASA, and the Animal Histories group, symposium and exhibition 2017-2018. Thanks to Nick Kings College. Thanks to Ciara Farrell at the Kennel Club Reid, Ian Reeve, Don Garden and Adam Miklosi for Library, London, and to two anonymous reviewers whose their valuable advice and feedback. Thanks to Evelyn comments greatly strengthened the final manuscript.

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