Australian Dreaming

by Isaacs, Jennifer

• ISBN13: 9781741102581
• ISBN10: 1741102588
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-04-10
• Publisher: New Holland Pub Pty Ltd

Summary

Australian Dreaming is the first Aboriginal history of the Australian continent and its people, as told by Aboriginal storytellers. It recounts epic travels of the Great Spirit Ancestors and tells how they created the animals and plants and gave birth to the earliest people of this land.

Table of Contents

Foreword	p. 5
Introduction	p. 9
The Reality of Myth	p. 11
The Earliest Memories	p. 11
The Arrival of the First Australians	p. 11
The Giants	p. 14
The Way of Life of the First People	p. 24
The Rising of the Seas	p. 26
Volcanoes	p. 29
The Creation Ancestors	p. 33
The Desert Ancestors	p. 33
The Origin of the Desert Tors	p. 34
The Origin of Lake Eyre	p. 48
The Nullarbor Plain	p. 49
The Sky Heroes of South-eastern Australia	p. 51
The Earth Mother	p. 58
The Great Serpents	p. 62
The Wandjina	p. 69
Creation Ancestors of North-eastern Arnhem Land	p. 75
Creation Heroes of North-eastern Australia	p. 81
The Great Journeys	p. 87
The Zebra Finch Journeys	p. 87
The Travels of the Kangaroo and Euro	p. 92
Earth, Fire and Water	p. 99
The Earth	p. 99
Fire	p. 102
Water	p. 108
The Seasons	p. 129
Lightning	p. 129
Thunder	p. 130
Clouds	p. 131
The Sun, Moon and Stars	p. 141
Beliefs about the Sun and the Moon	p. 141
The Milky Way	p. 150
The Southern Cross	p. 151
Orion and the Pleiades	p. 152
Scorpio	p. 153
The Morning Star	p. 154
The Cycle of Life	p. 157
Men and Women	p. 157
The Birth of the Tribes	p. 169
The Early Years	p. 176
Passage to Adulthood	p. 184
Hunting and Food Gathering	p. 190
Death and the Spirit World	p. 213
Death	p. 213
The Spirit World	p. 230
Designs from the Dreaming	p. 239
Paintings on Bark	p. 246
Art of the Earliest People	p. 250
Art from the World of the Spirit	p. 251
Continuity of Aboriginal Designs	p. 259
The Visitors	p. 261
The Baiini	p. 261
The Macassans	p. 264
The Badu Islanders	p. 276
The Invaders	p. 279
The First Encounters with White Men	p. 282
Violence	p. 286
The Spread of Disease	p. 289
The Vengeance of the Spirit Ancestors	p. 289
Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow	p. 290
Notes	p. 296
Copyright Acknowledgements	p. 299
Individual Storytellers	p. 300
Tribes and Clans Represented	p. 300
Bibliography	p. 301
Acknowledgements	p. 302
Index	p. 303
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.