Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T06:05:52.523Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

So ends this day: American whalers in Yaburara country, Dampier Archipelago

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 February 2019

Alistair Paterson Open the ORCID record for Alistair Paterson [Opens in a new window] ,
Ross Anderson ,
Ken Mulvaney ,
Sarah de Koning ,
Joe Dortch  and
Jo McDonald
Alistair Paterson*
Affiliation:
Centre for Rock Art Research and Management, University of Western Australia, M257, Perth 6009, Australia Archaeology, University of Western Australia, M257, Perth 6009, Australia
Ross Anderson
Affiliation:
Department of Maritime Archaeology, Western Australian Museum, Cliff Street, Fremantle 6160, Australia
Ken Mulvaney
Affiliation:
Centre for Rock Art Research and Management, University of Western Australia, M257, Perth 6009, Australia Rio Tinto, Dampier, PO Box 842, Karratha 6714, Western Australia
Sarah de Koning
Affiliation:
Centre for Rock Art Research and Management, University of Western Australia, M257, Perth 6009, Australia
Joe Dortch
Affiliation:
Centre for Rock Art Research and Management, University of Western Australia, M257, Perth 6009, Australia
Jo McDonald
Affiliation:
Centre for Rock Art Research and Management, University of Western Australia, M257, Perth 6009, Australia Archaeology, University of Western Australia, M257, Perth 6009, Australia
*
*Author for correspondence (Email: alistair.paterson@uwa.edu.au)
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Research to document Aboriginal occupation across the Dampier Archipelago has also encountered the earliest archaeological evidence for the presence of American whalers in North West Australia. Inscriptions in the form of rock engravings made by the crews of the whaling ships Connecticut (1842) and Delta (1849) have been discovered on Rosemary and West Lewis Islands. These maritime inscriptions are uniquely superimposed over earlier Indigenous rock art motifs, appearing to represent distinct mark-making practices by the whalers on encountering an already-inscribed landscape, and thus providing insight into the earliest phases of North West Australia's colonial history.

Keywords

AustraliaAmericaAboriginal historywhalingrock art
Type
Research
Information
Antiquity , Volume 93 , Issue 367 , February 2019 , pp. 218 - 235
Copyright
Copyright © Antiquity Publications Ltd, 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, R. 2008. Discovering new ground—AIMA's mapping the Australian Coast database. Bulletin of the Australasian Institute for Maritime Archaeology 32: 58–78.Google Scholar
Anderson, R. 2016. Beneath the colonial gaze: modelling maritime society and cross-cultural contact on the Southern Ocean frontier—the Archipelago of the Recherche, Western Australia. Unpublished PhD dissertation, University of Western Australia.Google Scholar
Bashford, A., Hobbins, P., Clarke, A. & Frederick, U.K.. 2016. Geographies of commemoration: Angel Island, San Francisco and North Head, Sydney. Journal of Historical Geography 52: 16–25. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhg.2015.12.003Google Scholar
Bradley, R. 2009. Image and audience: rethinking prehistoric art. NewYork: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Casella, E. 2014. Enmeshed inscriptions: reading the graffiti of Australia's convict past. Australian Archaeology 78: 108–12. https://doi.org/10.1080/03122417.2014.11682006Google Scholar
Clarke, A. & Frederick, U.K.. 2016. ‘Born to be a stoway’: inscriptions, graffiti, and the rupture of space at the North Head Quarantine Station, Sydney. International Journal of Historical Archaeology 20: 521–35. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10761-016-0357-2Google Scholar
Cunningham, A. 1816–1819. Journal and Correspondence, (1816–19) 20 September 1816–7 May 1819. Melbourne: State Library of Victoria.Google Scholar
Dickson, R. 2007. The history of the whalers on the south coast of New Holland from 1800–1888. Carlisle: Hesperian.Google Scholar
Farr, J. 1983. A slow boat to nowhere: the multi-racial crews of the American whaling industry. Journal of Negro History 68: 159–70. https://doi.org/10.2307/2717719Google Scholar
Frederick, U.K. & Clarke, A.. 2014. Signs of the times: archaeological approaches to historical and contemporary graffiti. Australian Archaeology 78: 93–99.Google Scholar
Gara, T.J. 1983. The Flying Foam Massacre: an incident on the North West frontier, Western Australia, in Smith, M. (ed.) Archaeology at ANZAAS: 86–94. Perth: Western Australian Museum.Google Scholar
Gibbs, M. 2010. The shore whalers of Western Australia: historical archaeology of a maritime frontier (Studies in Australasian Historical Archaeology 2). Sydney: Australasian Society for Australian Archaeology.Google Scholar
Gibbs, M. & Duncan, B.. 2015. The Dirk Hartog Island post site: early European encounters with Australia and the establishment of a maritime cultural landscape, in von Arbin, S., Nymoen, P., Stylegar, F.-A., Sylvester, M. & Gutehall, A. (ed.) Tjop tjop! Vänbok till Christer Westerdahl med anledning av hans 70-årsdag den 13 november 2015: 209–28. Skärhamn: Båtdokgruppen.Google Scholar
Gibson, A.M. & Whitehead, J.S.. 1993. Yankees in paradise: the Pacific Basin frontier. Alberquerque: University of New Mexico Press.Google Scholar
Green, J. (ed.). 2007. Report on the 2006 Western Australian Museum, Department of Maritime Archaeology, Cape Inscription National Heritage Listing Archaeological Survey. Fremantle: Australian National Centre for Excellence for Maritime Archaeology, Western Australian Museum.Google Scholar
Gribble, J.B. 1987. Dark deeds in a sunny land or, blacks and whites in North-West Australia. Perth: University of Western Australia.Google Scholar
Hanlon, D. 1988. Upon a stone altar: a history of the island of Pohnpei to 1890. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press.Google Scholar
Harris, E. & Gunn, R.. 2017. The use of Harris matrices in rock art research, in David, B. & McNiven, I.J. (ed.) The Oxford handbook of the archaeology and anthropology of rock art: 1–20. Oxford: Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190607357.013.18Google Scholar
Harman, J. 2013. D-Stretch: rock art digital enhancement. Available at: http://www.dstretch.com (accessed 4 January 2019).Google Scholar
Kaiser, D.A. & Keyser, J.D.. 2008. Symbolic superimposition: overlapping shield-bearing warriors at Bear Gulch. American Indian Rock Art 34: 37–59.Google Scholar
King, P.P. 1818. December 1817–July 1818 Remark Book. Glasgow: Mitchell Library.Google Scholar
Langdon, R. (ed.). 1978. American whalers and traders in the Pacific: a guide to records on microfilm. Canberra: Australian National University.Google Scholar
Langdon, R. 1984. Where the whalers went: an index to the Pacific ports and islands visited by American whalers (and some other ships) in the 19th century. Canberra: Australian National University.Google Scholar
McDonald, J. 1999. Bedrock notions and isochrestic choice: evidence for localised stylistic patterning in the engravings of the Sydney region. Archaeology in Oceania 34: 145–60. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1834-4453.1999.tb00444.xGoogle Scholar
McDonald, J. & Berry, M.. 2016. Murujuga, Northwestern Australia: when arid hunter-gatherers became coastal foragers. Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology 12: 24–43. https://doi.org/10.1080/15564894.2015.1125971Google Scholar
Mulvaney, K. 2015. Murujuga Marni: rock art of the macropod hunters and mollusc harvesters (CRAR + M Monograph Series 1). Perth: University of Western Australia.Google Scholar
Mystic Seaport Museum. 2017. New London crew lists 1803–1878. Available at: https://research.mysticseaport.org/databases/crew-lists-new-london/ (accessed 4 January 2019).Google Scholar
National Maritime Digital Library. 2017. American offshore whaling voyages: a digital database. Available at: https://nmdl.org/projects/aowv/aowv/ (accessed 4 January 2019).Google Scholar
Paterson, A. 2006. Towards a historical archaeology of Western Australia's northwest. Australasian Historical Archaeology 24: 99–111.Google Scholar
Paterson, A. & Gregory, K.. 2015. Commemorating the colonial Pilbara: beyond memorials into difficult history. National Identities 17: 137–53. https://doi.org/10.1080/14608944.2015.1019206Google Scholar
The Perth Gazette and West Australian Journal. Shipping intelligence, 8 October 1842: 2.Google Scholar
Re, A. 2016. Superimpositions and attitudes towards pre-existing rock art: a case study in southern Patagonia, in Bednarik, R.G., Fiore, D., Basile, M., Kumar, G. & Huisheng, T. (ed.) Palaeoart and materiality: the scientific study of rock art: 15–30. Oxford: Archaeopress.Google Scholar
Rockman, M. & Steele, J.. 2003. Colonization of unfamiliar landscapes: the archaeology of adaptation. London: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203422908Google Scholar
Sackett, J.R. 1990. Style and ethnicity in archaeology: the case for isochrestism, in Conkey, M. & Hastorf, C. (ed.) The uses of style in archaeology (new directions in archaeology): 32–43. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Schürmann, F. 2012. Ships and beaches as arenas of entanglements from below: whalemen in coastal Africa, c. 1760–1900. InterDisciplines 1: 25–47.Google Scholar
Starbuck, A. 1878. A history of the American whale fishery from its earliest inception up to 1876. Washington, D.C.: Commission of Fish and Fisheries.Google Scholar
Stokes, J.L. 2006 [1846]. Discoveries in Australia; with an account of the coasts and rivers explored and surveyed during the voyage of HMS Beagle, in the years 1837–38,39,40,41,42 and 43 by command of the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, also a narrative of Captain Owen Stanley's visits to the islands in the Arafura Sea. London: Boone.Google Scholar
Tindale, N.B. 1974. Aboriginal tribes of Australia. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Wace, N. & Lovett, B.. 1973. Yankee maritime activities and the early history of Australia. Canberra: Australian National University.Google Scholar
Weeks, D. 1851. Logbook of Ship Delta, Greenport, N.Y. September 19, 1849–May 3, 1851. New Bedford Whaling Museum, Massachusetts. Available at: https://nmdl.org/projects/aowv/aowv (accessed 4 January 2019).Google Scholar
Wiessner, P. 1984. Reconsidering the behavioural basis for style: a case study among the Kalahari San. Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 3: 190–234. https://doi.org/10.1016/0278-4165(84)90002-3Google Scholar