Postcards from the outside: European-contact rock art imagery and occupation on the southern Arnhem Land plateau, Jawoyn lands

Abstract

The northwestern region of the Arnhem Land plateau has long been relatively well-documented and is renowned worldwide for its wealth of rock art, including numerous paintings referencing items of material culture, people and events of contact between local Aboriginal peoples, Macassans, Chinese and Europeans (e.g. Chaloupka 1993:190–206; Edwards 1979:32; May et al. 2010, 2013; Mountford 1956:162, 179; Wesley 2013). Many of these contact motifs depict Macassan and 19th- to early 20th-century European ships (Chaloupka 1993:190–205; Taçon et al. 2010); some are of newly acquired artefacts, such as rifles, knives and Macassan kris, and horses (May et al. 2013; Wesley 2013); others depict events from the 1880 gold rush in Pine Creek to the west of the plateau (Chinese miners; e.g. Edwards 1979); still others show themes relating to the Second World War (aeroplanes, Darwin wharf; Chaloupka 1993).