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Home , The Dreaming

ISSN 1442-679X

9"771442"679017 PRINT POST APPROVED PP 331379/0032 Dreaming BY RAY NORRIS

The Milky Way and other heavenly bodies have been inspiration for a rich aboriginal culture that "westerners" should appreciate as bridges towards mutual understanding and reconciliation.

As an astrophysicist with an interest in the of magnificent rock art of Europe are unaware that asttonomy, my curiosity was piqued but it was not until 3 M anythousandsSydneysidersof wonderfulwho paysacredsmall fortunesrock engravingsto visit thelie ago that I finally had the opportunity to put these rumours to within a few kilometres of their home, showing animals, people, the test. My mild curiosity quickly became an absorbing research creator spirits and strange symbols whose meaning is unknown. project. These beautiful works of art were created by the Aboriginal Only recently has it been recognised that there is a deep vein people who lived there until the British arrived in 1788. of astronomy threading through many Aboriginal cultures. Twenty years ago my wife and I used to take our kids walking With hindsight, we shouldn't be surprised. If you live in the in Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park, just north of , and outback of , each night gazing up at the magnificent became fascinated by the and strange figures on the Milky Way threads through the coal-black sky, then of course Basin Track. Someone had told me that the group of kanga• the night sky becomes important to you. It becomes an integral roos represented the Pleiades, or Seven Sisters, and I wondered part of your understanding of the world. idly how much evidence supported that story. Over the years I Most of the 400-odd Aboriginal cultures in Australia share began to hear more about these astronomical connections, and the belief that the world was created in the "Dreaming" by even came across the statement that Australia's Aboriginal people ancestral spirits who have left symbols all atound us to guide us were the world's first astronomers. in our lives. If you can understand these symbols then you have a complete understanding of the world and of the meaning of life. It should come as no surprise that the night sky contains many of these symbols. For example, the appearance of a star or constellation can tell people when it's to move to a new food source. When the Mallee-fowl constellation (Lyra) appears in March, the Boorong people in Victoria know that the Mallee-fowl are about to build their nests. When she disappears in October, the eggs are laid and are ready to be collected. The people in know that when the star Spica sets just after the Sun, the raika nuts are ready for harvesting, and the appearance of Scorpius once signalled the imminent arrival of the Macassan (Indonesian) fishermen. Sometimes these astronomical themes are marked in stone. At the Ngaut Ngaut site in South Australia, tally-marks carved into a rock face, along with images of the Sun and Moon, are said to record Moon cycles. The Aboriginal stone ring in Victoria seems to point to the position on the horizon where the Sun sets at midsummer and midwinter .

An Aboriginal rock engraving of a man and two wallabies at Terrey But what about the Sydney engravings? Is there any Hills, north of Sydney. Photo: Ray Norri, asttonomy there?

.16 I SCI'ence I May 2008 Shortly after the First Fleet arrived in Sydney in 1788, Governor Phillip explored the region and noted the friendliness of the Guringai people. Within 2 years, most had been killed by smallpox. Within a few decades, the remaining Guringai had been driven out by white settlers, and nobody thought to ask them about the engravings. Now, only the engravings themselves can tell their story.

STORIES IN THE SKY On an evening in late Autumn, find a remote spot away from streetlights and admire the spectacular band of the Mill..)' Way stretching across the sky from horizon to horizon. Yolngu people tell us that it is a mighty river, and either side of it can be seen the campfires - nebulae - of their ancestors next to the river. Now look at the Southern Cross - a possum in a tree, according to the Boorong people - and look at the dark cloud to the left of it. That cloud is called the Coalsack by astronomers, and is the birthplace of new stars, but to many Aboriginal groups it's one of the best known constellations - the Emu in the Sky.The Coalsack is the head of the emu. Stretching away to its left you should be able to see its long, dark neck, round body and finally the legs. It's a spectacular sight - far better than the contrived European constellations that most of us grew up with. Once you've seen it, the Milky Way will never look the same again. In Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park, close to the Elvina Track, is a rock The Emu in the Sky, seen as dark clouds in the Milky Way, stands above her engraving in Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park. She is only in this position when real-life are engraving of an emu. Its legs are trailing laying their eggs. Photographing the shallow engravings is tricky, but Barnaby Norris back in a position that would be unnat• devised lighting solutions in the field and enhanced the images digitally. ural for a real emu but, as Sydney Photo and digital montage: Barnaby Norris academic Hugh Cairns pointed out a few years ago, in just the same pose as the strange half-man with a club foot who is perhaps we can learn about them from Emu in the Sky. This might sound like believed to be Daramulan, a creator-hero the rock art. wild speculation until you notice that, from of the Guringai astonishingly, the Emu in the Sky stands people, and related to , a creator• THE SUN, MOON AND ECLIPSES above her portrait, in the correct orien• hero found in many Aboriginal cultures In most Aboriginal cultures the Moon is tation, at just the time when the real-life across the south-east of Australia. Only male and the Sun is female. For example, emus are laying their eggs. fragments of information have survived the Yolngu people of Arnhem Land, in Next to the emu is an engraving of a about Baiame and Daramulan, but the far north of Australia, tell how the

May 2008 I SCl'ence I 17 An ancient rock painting of Baiame, a creator-spirit, by the Wanaruuah people, near Singleton, NSW. Photo: Ray Norri,

but was mortally wounded and died, tions onto the Moon-man, who causing the new Moon. After 3 days he constantly tries to evade her by following rose from the dead and gradually regained a zigzag path through the sky.From these his health, giving us the waxing Moon. stories, we know that traditional Aborig• After 2 , when he was round and inal people had long ago noticed the fat again, his wives attacked him, and so complex path of the Moon compared the cycle continues to repeat every . with the Sun, and had worked out that Until Ngalindi first died, everyone on eclipses happened when their paths cross. Do crescent-shaped engravings represent Earth was immortal, but Ngalindi cursed A recurring motif in the Ku-ring-gai the crescent moon or a ? humans and animals so that only he could engravings is a crescent, which has been Photos: Ray Norris return to life. For everyone else death interpreted by archaeologists as a Sun-woman, Walu, travels steadily across would henceforth be final. boomerang. But a closer look suggests a the skyfrom east to west each day carrying These Yolngu stories also explain the different explanation. The illustration on her blazing torch, creating daylight. As connection between the tides and the page 23 shows a man and woman she descends to the western horizon she Moon. The Moon fills and empties as it reaching up to a boomerang in the sky. puts out her torch and starts the long rises through the horizon, raising the tides But why would a giant boomerang be journey underground back to the when it is full and lowering them when it sailing over their heads? And morning camp in the east. is half- full. generally don't have pointed ends, and The Moon-man, Ngalindi, was origi• Solar eclipses are explained by the usually have two straight lengths rather nally a fat, lazy man (corresponding to as the covering of the than a single curved crescent. the full Moon) who expected others to Sun-woman by the Moon-man as he It seems much more likely that the feed him. His wives attacked him with makes love to her. On the other hand, a engraving represents the crescent moon. their axes, making the waning Moon. He lunar eclipse occurs when the Sun-woman But the only time you see a crescent moon managed to escape by climbing a tall tree, successfully forces her unwelcome atten- with its horns pointing downwards is at

18 I SCl'eanCe I May 2008 The Bulgandry rock engraving near Woy-Woy, NSW (left), and the drawing by W.D. Campbell of 1893. Photo and drawing: Ray No,,;s and wD. Campbell

Moon, but my science background forces aren't that much different from the early me to acknowledge that this is no more British settlers who shot indigenous than speculation. Australians for sport. To make sense of these engravings will How can we help poor Dave to under• take years of detective work, amassing stand indigenous Australian people? clues and piecing them together. But we Many of the esoteric indigenous stories now know that astronomy is an impor• and tales, let alone complex kinship Illustration of a rock engraving from the tant pan of the culture for Aboriginal systems, are just too different, and there• Basin Track, Ku-ring-gai Chase National fore difficult, for Dave to understand. On Park, showing a man and woman with a groups elsewhere in Australia, and so my crescent above their heads. IlIust'at;on: Ray No,,;s hunch is that astronomy will turn out to the other hand, Dave lovesthe bark paint• be an important component of the ings that he sees in the tourist shops, an eclipse. If this picture represents an Sydney rock engravings. or the music he hears at eclipse, then it might explain why the Circular Quay and is spellbound by the man is standing in front of the woman, CULTURAL MOTIVATION intricate traditional dances and songs. All partly obscuring her. Why should we be interested? I have to these art forms have successfully forged a admit that one factor is personal curiosity, bridge of understanding because they are BULGANDRY but it goes much deeper than that. First, understandable, and accessible - even by Near Woy-Woy on the central coast of if we succeed in understanding these Dave. is a rock engraving of engravings, perhaps we can give back to I hope that, like music and art, a figure named Bulgandry, who may be the Aboriginal people some of the culture astronomy can build an important bridge related to Baiame. In one hand is a disc, that we destroyed when we invaded their of understanding between indigenous and in the other is a crescent shape. Now• land 200 years ago. and non- because adays the crescent is badly eroded and , there still exists a gulf of we all share the same sky, and even Dave barely visible, but fortunately we have a misunderstanding between indigenous is entranced by the sight of the majestic drawing made by W.D. Campbell in the and non-indigenous Australians. Over a Milky Way stretching across the unknow• 1890s that shows it clearly. beer at a barbecue one of my mates, Dave, able black heavens in outback Australia. Archaeologists label these objects as a sniggered some insensitive and plain We can't help being intrigued by the shield and a boomerang, but the shield stupid comments about "secret women's beauty and mystery of the sky,and we all is the wrong shape and has none of the business", not understanding that this is love to swap stories about it. By doing so, markings that are usually shown on an something real and sacred to many of his this project aims to promote a greater engraving of a shield, and the crescent is fellow-Australians. appreciation of the depth and richness of Moon-shaped rather than boomerang• Dave isn't evil, but he doesn't have indigenous Australian cultures. shaped. It is tempting to speculate that much understanding of the cultures of Or Ray Norris is an astrophysicist with CSIRO's this engraving may refer to a Dreaming and the complex Australia Telescope National Facility. More information is available at www.atnf.csiro.auj story about the creation of the Sun and issues now facing them. His attitudes research / Aborig inalAstronomy /

May 2008 I SCI'ence I 19