WEST KIMBERLEY PLACE REPORT - Department of Sustainability ...

phased out' (Morwood 2002, 162). But there are also significant regional differences:
'The 'spade handle' spear thrower depicted in the Kimberley never appears in Arnhem
Land rock paintings…and the broad spear thrower cited by Lewis to define a regional
art period in Arnhem Land is not depicted in the Kimberley'' (Morwood 2002).
The Gwion Gwion/Girrigirro painted images also provide insight into other aspects of
material culture, particularly perishable items that do not preserve well in the deposits
of north Australian archaeological sites. Armbands, belts, bags, strings, skirts, hats,
headdresses, tasselled objects and other forms of elaborate body adornment are
common in the images (Taçon et al. 1999). While earlier researchers (Bradshaw 1892;
Mathew 1894; Thomas 1906; Sollas 1915; Elkin 1930; Davidson 1938; Schulz 1956;
Lommel 1997 [1952]; Walsh 1994) suggested that the Gwion Gwion/Girrigirro
paintings have a non-Indigenous origin, more recent experts (Welch 1993 1996,
Lewis 1997, Barry and White 2004) have demonstrated links to historic and
contemporary Aboriginal material culture and other north Australian rock art
traditions, such as the Mimi or Dynamic figures of the Arnhem Land and Kakadu
region (Taçon 2000). Welch (1993) notes that splayed neck dilly bags similar to those
portrayed in painted Gwion Gwion/Girrigirro figures were collected in 1912 from
western Arnhem Land (Isaacs 1984). However, dilly bags have not been made in the
northern Kimberley region in historic times, instead bark has been used to make
various containers (Welch 1993).
The technical detail of some of the painted images in the north Kimberley has also
allowed researchers to identify animals to the species level, including species that are
now extinct such as the Tasmanian Tiger (Thylacinus cynocephalus). Akerman and
Willing (2009) recently described the painted image of a large, striped quadruped and
suggest that it might depict a Marsupial Lion (Thylacaleo carnifex), one of the socalled
megafauna that disappeared from the continent during the Pleistocene. Also of
scientific interest is the painted depiction of eight roosting flying foxes that have a
distinctive white facial stripe and pale belly (Pettigrew et al. 2008). None of
Australia's eight species of mega bat has this white facial marking. The closest flying
foxes to Australia that do are those found in Sulawesi and the Maluku Islands
(formerly the Moluccas).
A painted panel of 25 deer-like animals standing in a line has also been recently
recorded (Wilson 2006; Playford 2008; Crawford 2009). Playford suggests that these
four legged animals with obvious antlers may represent the Timor Deer (Cervus
timorensis) a species that at one time was abundant on Timor. This deer is no longer
found on Timor, but it has survived on reserves elsewhere in Indonesia, including
some isolated islands where it has been suggested that they were introduced by
Indonesian fishermen. The interpretation of the deer frieze remains controversial.
Playford (2008) and Walsh (2000) suggested that the images reflect a migratory event
of considerable antiquity, whilst Crawford (2009) notes that the deer painting may
simply reflect things seen by Aboriginal people during the Indonesian contact period.
Rock shelters in the Wanjina-Wunggurr homeland and in the Balanggarra native title
claim area also contain painted images of a variety of watercraft that are instructive in
better understanding the interactions between Aboriginal people and outsiders, both
pre and post-European contact. In the Kimberley and in western Arnhem Land,
European vessels and canoes are the most common watercraft depicted (O'Connor and
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