tag:theconversation.com,2011:/us/topics/captain-cook-43377/articlesCaptain Cook – The Conversation2022-02-03T03:30:57Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1763632022-02-03T03:30:57Z2022-02-03T03:30:57ZHas Captain Cook’s ship Endeavour been found? Debate rages, but here’s what’s usually involved in identifying a shipwreck<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/444204/original/file-20220203-17157-okuidt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C4%2C1424%2C1018&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Endeavour#/media/File:HMS_Endeavour_off_the_coast_of_New_Holland,_by_Samuel_Atkins_c.1794.jpg">WikiCommons/Illustration by Samuel Atkins </a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Australian National Maritime Museum has <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-02-03/endeavour-found-in-us-after-22-year-search/100800894">announced</a> a shipwreck found in Newport Harbour, off Rhode Island in the United States, has been confirmed as Captain Cook’s ship, HMB Endeavour. </p>
<p>There have been very similar <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/captain-cook-endeavour-boat-intl/index.html">announcements</a> made over the years but have they finally made a definitive case?</p>
<p>By making its <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-02-03/captain-james-cook-endeavour-found-museum-says/100800894">announcement</a>, the Australian National Maritime Museum seems to have decided so, and there does seem to have been significant recent progress, centred on one shipwreck that matches the known details of the Endeavour closely.</p>
<p>However, reports soon emerged lead investigator on the Endeavour discovery – Dr Kathy Abbass from the Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project – described the announcement as “premature” and that there “has been no indisputable data found.”</p>
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<p>The announcement by the museum includes <a href="https://youtu.be/3QPqxsRYjm4">recognition</a> that there is not, and may never be, definitive proof but they appear satisfied the case has been made within reasonable doubt. </p>
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<figcaption><span class="caption">Video: Australian National Maritime Museum.</span></figcaption>
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<p>I wasn’t part of this particular investigation so it’s not for me to say if this ship is Endeavour or not. But I have worked on many shipwreck investigations and have been involved in the discovery of a couple of shipwreck sites of this period. </p>
<p>So I can share a little bit about what’s usually involved in trying to piece together the identity of a ship when a wreck is found.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/sunken-history-how-to-study-and-care-for-shipwrecks-6450">Sunken history: how to study and care for shipwrecks</a>
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<h2>From the survey site to the lab</h2>
<p>The first thing you will need is a detailed survey of the site. The process is similar to an archaeological survey on land, but for most shipwrecks you will be underwater. That makes it more difficult to take measurements precisely. Nowadays we also use 3D imaging techniques, high-resolution sonar and other specialist equipment to achieve a survey that is objective and highly accurate.</p>
<p>We focus on identifying “diagnostic features”, things that can identify the site and tie it to a particular period and ship-building tradition. </p>
<p>This could be the way the keel is built and how it is attached, or dimensions of timber frames. Often it is the smallest details that can hint at a certain ship-building tradition. One really useful indicator is the way the wood has been fastened together. Is it done with iron nails? In layers? Or tied with rope in a certain way?</p>
<p>Once your survey is complete, you might undertake some sampling to recover artefacts. We generally try to remove as little as possible of a shipwreck. The gold standard is to leave as much in-situ as possible but it is common to recover some material for analysis in the lab, such as bricks, cannon balls, timber, coins; anything that can help establish a chronology for a shipwreck.</p>
<p>Once you have got your evidence from the site, you can move onto analysis in the lab.</p>
<p>For timber, we often use a technique called <a href="https://www.britannica.com/science/dendrochronology">dendrochronology</a>, which is analysis of tree growth patterns. If you have enough timber of the right type, you can work out almost to the year when the timber was felled and even where it was grown.</p>
<p>We might x-ray metal materials, trying to work out what the objects originally looked like.</p>
<h2>Sifting through historical records</h2>
<p>Then we move onto historical research, analysing records of all ships lost in that general area. </p>
<p>We may draw on newspaper reports from the time, salvage records and marine insurance claims. Indeed, marine insurance was the original insurance because shipwreck was once so common and so costly.</p>
<p>We might look for court records to see if there was a dispute about the disposal of shipwreck material in that area at some point.</p>
<p>Historical attempts to salvage valuable material may also leave a paper trail and it was common to try to recover brass cannons (which were extremely valuable).</p>
<p>Shipwreck survivor accounts can be very valuable – these were often published as a popular reading material from the 17th century onward.</p>
<p>One of the best sources can be oral traditions and community memories; the story of a significant shipwreck can survive in local memory for generations. Just talking to local people can provide quite a lot of unique information.</p>
<h2>It isn’t easy</h2>
<p>Identification of a shipwreck is not easy.</p>
<p>In any given area, there are likely to be multiple records of shipwrecks. The task is usually to eliminate those recorded ship losses that don’t match up with the clues you have collected. </p>
<p>And there are often close similarities between ship types that make it hard to identify an exact ship. The Spanish Armada, for instance, resulted in the loss of many ships from the same area at the same time, so if you find one, it is easy to know it is an Armada ship, but much harder to say which one. </p>
<p>Working in a marine environment complicates matters greatly. Wooden shipwrecks tend to be poorly preserved on the seabed. If they are quite old, what you really get is the survival of the non-wooden parts; cannon balls, cannons, metal objects and glass. </p>
<p>That makes it difficult because shipwrecks are a huge collection of material and some of the material may be much older than the shipwreck itself, which can suggest a wreck is older than it really is.</p>
<p>You can also have shipwrecks that have more recent material on the site that has drifted there from elsewhere in the sea or even from another shipwreck. In Iceland we investigated a <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/8812007/">17th century shipwreck</a> which had been partially covered by a later shipwreck.</p>
<p>Identifying ships is a long, arduous and painstaking process that usually takes many years and involves a host of challenges along the way. At all times, it is vital as a maritime archaeologist to remain objective and not fall into the trap of trying to bend evidence to fit a theory you have fallen in love with. </p>
<p>The repeated headlines about the Endeavour may have made some of the project team wary about definitive claims, but there will also be sites that we cannot prove the identity of with absolute certainty, and we will be forced to make our best judgement call.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-happens-now-weve-found-the-site-of-the-lost-australian-freighter-ss-iron-crown-sunk-in-wwii-115848">What happens now we've found the site of the lost Australian freighter SS Iron Crown, sunk in WWII</a>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John McCarthy receives funding from the ARC and the Dutch Embassy in Australia. He is a regional councillor for the Australasian Institute for Maritime Archaeology and assistant editor of their journal.</span></em></p>I have worked on many shipwreck investigations and have been involved in the discovery of a couple of shipwreck sites of this period. Here’s what’s usually involved in identifying a ship.John McCarthy, ARC DECRA Fellow, Flinders UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1723022021-12-01T17:12:00Z2021-12-01T17:12:00ZWe identified 39,000 Indigenous Australian objects in UK museums. Repatriation is one option, but takes time to get right<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/434364/original/file-20211129-13-nhpyf9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Shield, collected by Admiral John Elphinstone Erskine, c.1851. National Museums Scotland. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo: National Museums Scotland, Edinburgh.</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Campaigns for the repatriation of certain objects in prominent museums dominate media reporting on the fraught legacies of historical collections. The Parthenon (Elgin) Marbles, Benin Bronzes, and the <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-01-25/gweagal-shield-and-captain-cook-origins-questions/12941610">“Gweagal” shield</a> are among the most conspicuous examples.</p>
<p>Regularly discussed in books, featured on podcasts like <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/stuff-the-british-stole/">Stuff the British Stole</a>, and cited by journalists and commentators, these high-profile, highly charged objects encapsulate many of the issues at stake in how museums should go about redressing the violent colonial histories that contributed to the creation of their collections and ongoing injustices.</p>
<p>In Australia, the federal government has funded the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies to pursue <a href="https://aiatsis.gov.au/about/what-we-do/return-cultural-heritage">the repatriation of collections in international museums</a></p>
<p>The program was funded initially as part of its commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the Endeavour voyage led by Lieutenant James Cook – an expedition that marks the beginning of a long history of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander material culture being taken from Country to Britain and Europe where it entered public and private institutions.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-failure-to-say-hello-how-captain-cook-blundered-his-first-impression-with-indigenous-people-126673">A failure to say hello: how Captain Cook blundered his first impression with Indigenous people</a>
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<p>During the same period this program was identifying collections for repatriation, we were researching Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander material culture in UK and Irish museums. For three years, we carried out a survey, led by Gaye Sculthorpe, Curator and Section Head, Oceania at The British Museum, and assisted by Indigenous research fellows<a href="https://researchers.anu.edu.au/researchers/andrews-j"> Dr Jilda Andrews</a> and <a href="https://social-science.uq.edu.au/profile/102/michael-aird">Michael Aird</a> to answer the question: “What Indigenous Australian material culture actually exists in museums in the UK and Ireland now?” </p>
<p>Much of the discussion about the future of collections proceeds without a clear sense of what has survived – and misunderstandings about what does. Between 2016 and 2019, Sculthorpe visited over 45 museums in the UK to look at their collections. Indigenous Australian objects identified number about 38,400 in institutions across the UK and about 600 in Ireland. The total number includes around 16,000 stone tools from Tasmania. </p>
<p>The material includes bags and baskets, wooden artefacts like clubs, boomerangs and shields, shell items such as fishing hooks and decorative shellwork, as well as contemporary art.</p>
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<span class="caption">Map showing British and Irish museums which hold collections of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander objects. Reproduced in Sculthorpe et al, Ancestors, artefacts, empire: Indigenous Australia in British and Irish museums, British Museum Press, 2021.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">C. British Museum Press</span></span>
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<p>There is a mammoth task to rebuild knowledge about these objects and collections widely distributed in the UK and Ireland. Over time, knowledge has dissipated, and documentation and information lost. In many cases historical and contextual details for objects are scant, unreliable, illegible, or replete with misnomers, if not missing altogether. </p>
<h2>Deserving serious attention</h2>
<p>Today’s bland and stubborn characterisations of museums as nothing other than engines of colonial theft, trickery and violence, as well as irredeemable essences of empire, are often easily unsettled and complicated by close and critical examinations of the objects they hold.</p>
<p>Contemporary critiques tend to focus on 19th-century attitudes, shaped at a time when museums imagined they were collecting from cultures and peoples facing extinction. Even then, however, interactions between cultures were transforming objects, object-making and other art practices.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-5-museum-objects-that-tell-a-story-of-colonialism-and-its-legacy-150642">Friday essay: 5 museum objects that tell a story of colonialism and its legacy</a>
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<p>Some Indigenous people collaborated with anthropologists in gift exchanges and in making collections of material culture, both to provide a resource for future generations to access and as an assertion of the value of their ways of life. </p>
<p>Three boomerangs in Paisley Museum, near Glasgow in Scotland, were made by Kirwallie Sandy, one of the best known Aboriginal men in the Moreton Bay region. He sold them for a shilling each on 15 December 1875 at Sandgate near Brisbane to traveller and naturalist James W. Craig. </p>
<p>Craig documented these details in his journal, although this information was not included in the museum records or exhibition labels. Michael Aird, with his deep knowledge of Brisbane’s Aboriginal people and history, has reconstructed the boomerangs’ story with Kirwallie Sandy at the centre. </p>
<p>Trade, purchase, exchange, gifting, commissions and agency – as well as theft, exploitation, violence and trauma – were all in evidence for the objects we researched, and sometimes in respect to the same one. </p>
<h2>Partnerships</h2>
<p>Working in partnership with Indigenous people and organisations to better understand the multiple meanings of surviving material culture is the foundation on which the future development and building of collections is taking place. </p>
<p>Some of the least documented objects are potentially of the most interest to contemporary people. For instance, a single, shell-worked bootie of the kind long made in Aboriginal settlements on the New South Wales south coast and at La Perouse in Sydney was identified by Sculthorpe in a box of undocumented, unidentified objects handed to her by a curator at Warrington Museum & Art Gallery near Liverpool in England. </p>
<p>This baby shoe was one of the first pieces of shell work identified in collections outside Australia. It was likely bought at auction after being exhibited – perhaps in a missionary exhibition or a display of women’s work. </p>
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<span class="caption">Shellwork baby shoe, c,1920, likely from La Perouse, Sydney. Warrington Museum & Art Gallery.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Photo: The Trustees of the British Museum & Culture Warrington.</span></span>
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<p>A shield at National Museums Scotland in Edinburgh was labelled only as “Australia”, but its form and the travels of its collector, Admiral John Elphinstone Erksine, in the mid-1800s suggest a NSW, possibly greater Sydney, origin.</p>
<p>The shield, remarkable for its intricate designs, has not (yet) garnered the attention it warrants. </p>
<p>If scholarship on Britain’s colonisation of Australia from the late 18th century onwards has produced anything it is an insistence on the plurality of encounters, experiences, and legacies. </p>
<p>This is due not only to the diversity of imperial travellers and colonial immigrants. There is growing recognition that Indigenous groups were diverse and distinct, sometimes <a href="https://www.arts.gov.au/pm-literary-awards/current-awards/meeting-waylo-aboriginal-encounters-archipelago">as different from each other as they were to outsiders</a>. The surviving material record is a testament to this; and its significance for expanding understanding and challenging conventional thought cannot be overestimated. </p>
<p>What emerged as we shared information about objects and collections with – and learnt from Indigenous people and “communities” in turn – was that repatriation was only one of several options they were interested in pursuing. </p>
<p>And this is only when there is certainty about details regarding where objects came from, the conditions under which they had been acquired, the pathways by which they travelled, and the conditions under which and into which they would return.</p>
<p>Recent experience of the repercussions of misinformation, leading to senior people being excluded from discussions, as Noeleen Timbery from the La Perouse Local Aboriginal Land Council in Sydney <a href="https://www.gujaga.org.au/stories">has explained</a>, makes some groups cautious about how to proceed. </p>
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<p>The La Perouse Aboriginal Land Council and other local groups are interested in working with overseas museums to ensure access to collections for educational and other purposes.</p>
<p>A new collaborative Australian Research Council-funded project with the Australian National University, the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Cambridge, and The British Museum is working with them towards this aim. </p>
<p>It is vital to get things right. And getting things right takes time and resources. A concern for care, diligence, caution and time to work through the emotions that collections provoke – as well as to take charge of the decision-making about what should happen – are at the forefront of people’s minds when they learn of the objects in international museums their ancestors made. </p>
<p><em>This book <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/57699445-ancestors-artefacts-empire">Ancestors, artefacts, empire: Indigenous Australia in British and Irish Museums</a>, edited by Gaye Sculthorpe, Maria Nugent and Howard Morphy (British Museum Press) will be launched at the National Museum of Australia in Canberra on December 2.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/172302/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Maria Nugent receives funding from the Australian Research Council through a Linkage Grant involving the Australian National University and The British Museum, which published the book 'Ancestors, artefacts, empire: Indigenous Australia in British and Irish Museums' from which this article derives.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gaye Sculthorpe receives funding from the Australian Research Council through a Linkage Grant involving the Australian National University and The British Museum, which published the book 'Ancestors, artefacts, empire: Indigenous Australia in British and Irish Museums' from which this article derives.
</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Howard Morphy received funding from the Australian Research Council through a Linkage Grant involving the Australian National University, the National Museum of Australia, the Museum of the Riverina and The British Museum. The British Museum are the publishers of the book 'Ancestors, artefacts, empire: Indigenous Australia in British and Irish Museums' from which this article derives.</span></em></p>Stone tools, clubs, boomerangs, decorative shellwork: a survey of 45 museums in the UK has found a vast number of Indigenous Australian objects. Not all were stolen; some were gifted or traded.Maria Nugent, Co-Director, Australian Centre for Indigenous History, Australian National UniversityGaye Sculthorpe, Curator & Section Head, Oceania, The British MuseumHoward Morphy, Head of Centre for Digital Humanities Research , Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1582262021-04-26T02:38:02Z2021-04-26T02:38:02ZFerdinand Magellan’s death 500 years ago is being remembered as an act of Indigenous resistance<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/396975/original/file-20210426-13-10row4o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=47%2C95%2C6821%2C5202&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption"></span> </figcaption></figure><p>This week, the Philippines is marking a significant event in the history of European colonialism in the Asia-Pacific region — the 500th anniversary of the death of Portuguese explorer Fernão de Magalhães (more commonly known as Ferdinand Magellan).</p>
<p>The Philippines government is hosting a series of events to mark the role that Indigenous people played in Magellan’s contested <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/article/magellan-first-sail-around-world-think-again">first circumnavigation of the earth</a> in the 16th century. </p>
<p>European history books celebrate the expedition as a three-year Spanish-led voyage, carrying 270 men on five ships. But Filipino commemorations remind audiences that Magellan died halfway through the expedition in the Philippines and that only one ship with just 18 survivors limped home to Seville. </p>
<p>In particular, Filipinos remember how Lapu Lapu, the <em>datu</em> (leader) of the island of Mactan, inspired a force of Indigenous warriors to defeat Magellan’s crew — and the Spanish threat to their sovereignty — on April 27, 1521. </p>
<p>The Filipino commemorations show what an Indigenous-centred government approach to imperial history in the Pacific can look like. They also sit in stark contrast to the exhibitions, reenactments and publications that marked the 250th anniversary of James Cook’s arrival in Australia and New Zealand in recent years. </p>
<p>These commemorations mostly upheld the unique bravery of the British navigator, sidelining potentially deeper discussions of the violence to Indigenous people he and his crew also brought. </p>
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<h2>What happened to Magellan in 1521</h2>
<p>Magellan reached what are now the Philippines in March 1521 after an arduous 100-day Pacific crossing. He set about using a combination of diplomacy and force to get local leaders and their followers to convert to Catholicism and submit to the authority of the far-away Spanish king. </p>
<p>Rajah Humabon of Cebu and other local rulers embraced an alliance with the Spanish, hoping to gain an advantage against their rivals. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/500-years-after-ferdinand-magellan-landed-in-patagonia-theres-nothing-to-celebrate-for-its-indigenous-peoples-132939">500 years after Ferdinand Magellan landed in Patagonia, there's nothing to celebrate for its indigenous peoples</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Magellan decided to attack Mactan, however, when Lapu Lapu refused to negotiate. About 60 European sailors and soldiers joined forces with Humabon and attacked Mactan at dawn, but they were met on the beach by Lapu Lapu and his armed warriors. </p>
<p>Weighed down by their armour, the Europeans stumbled in the shallows under arrow fire. Filipino folk histories say that an army of sea animals were also part of the resistance. Octopus wound their tentacles around the legs of the invaders, dragging them to their deaths. The battle was over within an hour. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/396976/original/file-20210426-23-4b8eic.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/396976/original/file-20210426-23-4b8eic.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396976/original/file-20210426-23-4b8eic.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396976/original/file-20210426-23-4b8eic.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396976/original/file-20210426-23-4b8eic.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396976/original/file-20210426-23-4b8eic.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396976/original/file-20210426-23-4b8eic.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A mural painting of the Mactan battle at the Mactan shrine in Cebu, Philippines.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Celebrating the victory at Mactan</h2>
<p>The events organised by the Filipino government’s National Quincentennial Committee to mark Magellan’s death include a drone show, military parade and the televised unveiling of a new shrine to Lapu Lapu. All of these commemorations are <a href="https://nqc.gov.ph/en/event/ground-breaking-of-the-lapulapu-memorial-shrine-and-museum/">designed</a> to pay “tribute and recognition to Lapu Lapu and the Mactan heroes”.</p>
<p>The NQC also sponsored a national art competition centred on four themes connected to the Mactan victory — <a href="https://www.pna.gov.ph/articles/1123274">sovereignty, magnanimity, unity and legacy</a>. </p>
<p>Matthius B. Garcia’s painting, Hindi Pasisiil (Never to be Conquered), recently took the grand prize in the “sovereignty” category. </p>
<p>In his work, the viewer’s eyes are drawn to the strong figure of Lapu Lapu. He is covered in Visayan tattoos and wears the bright red bandana and thick gold chains of a warrior and ruler. He leaps into the centre of the canvas, <em>kampilan</em> (sword) raised above his head, leading the charge of men rushing at the European invaders. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1367655691154907136"}"></div></p>
<p>Magellan and his men, decked out in armour over puffy sleeves and stockings, fall over each other and into the sea to their deaths. </p>
<p>The artwork is Indigenous-centred because it was crafted by a Filipino artist for a Filipino audience. It is telling the story of what happened at Mactan from the point of view of the locals rather than the strangers. </p>
<p>Ordinary Filipinos have also been sharing their own artistic representations of the battle of Mactan on the NQC’s Facebook page, such as 5-year-old Miguel Alfonso Manzano Noriel’s painting, entitled The Battle of Mactan, below. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="The Battle of Mactan by Miguel Alfonso Manzano Noriel." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/396954/original/file-20210426-13-1tizd6p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/396954/original/file-20210426-13-1tizd6p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396954/original/file-20210426-13-1tizd6p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396954/original/file-20210426-13-1tizd6p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=448&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396954/original/file-20210426-13-1tizd6p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396954/original/file-20210426-13-1tizd6p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396954/original/file-20210426-13-1tizd6p.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=563&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Battle of Mactan by Miguel Alfonso Manzano Noriel.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The NCQ has also <a href="https://www.goodnewspilipinas.com/lapulapu-meets-catriona-in-paper-dolls-crafted-for-philippines-quincentennial-celebrations/">encouraged children</a> to print paper doll figures of Lapu Lapu and Magellan so they can re-enact the battle of Mactan at home.</p>
<p>In contrast to Garcia and Noriel’s fiery scenes of mayhem, the winning entries in the art competition’s “magnanimity” section remember the compassion that Filipinos showed to the explorers. </p>
<p>In Romane Elmira D. Contawi’s prize-winning painting, a local man holds out fruit to a bedraggled, hollow-eyed white man. The work illustrates the key role locals played in the expedition, giving provisions to Magellan’s fleet and sharing their expert knowledge on surviving the dangerous seas. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1367655658674298880"}"></div></p>
<h2>Remembering Cook in Australia and NZ</h2>
<p>From 2018–20, the Australian and New Zealand governments also <a href="https://www.endeavour250.gov.au/about-anniversary">sponsored</a> events related to a significant anniversary of European incursion into their lands — the arrival of Cook’s ship, the Endeavour, in 1769–70.</p>
<p>Some did aspire to take an Indigenous-centred viewpoint. But the majority ended up pushing, at best, a “shared histories” approach. They encouraged audiences to consider “both sides” of the beach when the Endeavour docked on Indigenous shores. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/explorer-navigator-coloniser-revisit-captain-cooks-legacy-with-the-click-of-a-mouse-137390">Explorer, navigator, coloniser: revisit Captain Cook’s legacy with the click of a mouse</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>National institutions in Australia held exhibitions entitled “<a href="https://www.nla.gov.au/exhibitions/cook-and-the-pacific">Cook and the Pacific</a>” or “<a href="https://www.nma.gov.au/exhibitions/endeavour-voyage">Cook and the First Australians</a>”. The New Zealand centrepiece event was a six-vessel flotilla — three European, three Pasifika — that stopped off at 14 communities to instigate “<a href="https://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/116927527/tuia-250-historical-fleet-moors-in-auckland-harbour">a balanced telling of a shared Māori and Pākehā history</a>.” </p>
<p>In these performances, Cook was made to forego some of the limelight, but never to step off his pedestal entirely. </p>
<p>Other memorials did not achieve even this fuzzy sense of mutuality. Pre-existing statues of Cook, for instance, not only remained standing through the anniversary years, they were often protected from being defaced. In the case of the Cook statue in Sydney’s Hyde Park, this came in the form of dozens of police officers. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Police encircling the Cook statue in Sydney last year." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/396469/original/file-20210422-23-1wevvly.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/396469/original/file-20210422-23-1wevvly.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396469/original/file-20210422-23-1wevvly.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396469/original/file-20210422-23-1wevvly.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=417&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396469/original/file-20210422-23-1wevvly.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=525&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396469/original/file-20210422-23-1wevvly.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=525&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/396469/original/file-20210422-23-1wevvly.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=525&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Police encircling the Cook statue in Sydney last year.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Rick Rycroft/AP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Decolonised public histories</h2>
<p>The Philippines’ approach to a more Indigenous-focused and critical form of public history is imperfect. The government has come under attack for <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/11/world/asia/carlos-celdran-dead.html">silencing “unpatriotic” criticism"</a> of national leaders today — and in the past. </p>
<p>And the government was criticised for its handling of the death of another Ferdinand – the Philippines’ former president Ferdinand Marcos, who ruled the country through martial law for nearly a decade. He was <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-38022704">given a hero’s burial</a> to the outrage of many.</p>
<p>Similarly, public histories that happily remember 16th-century rebellions against Spanish conquistadors so as to “<a href="https://nqc.gov.ph/en/event/quincentennial-tv-special/">uplift the cultural confidence of the Filipino people</a>” can render invisible some modern Indigenous struggles for autonomy, particularly in the Philippines’ Islamic south. There is only room for patriotic versions of the country’s history that emphasise unity. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/cooking-the-books-how-re-enactments-of-the-endeavours-voyage-perpetuate-myths-of-australias-discovery-126751">Cooking the books: how re-enactments of the Endeavour's voyage perpetuate myths of Australia's 'discovery'</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Despite these serious concerns, the Filipino approach to the era of European expansion offers a refreshing contrast to the dominant stories about Cook in Australia and New Zealand. It is not simply adding in Indigenous voices or awarding Indigenous people co-star status on commemorative occasions. </p>
<p>Rather, the Filipino attitude to Magellan flips colonial history on its head by focusing on Indigenous resistance. </p>
<p>The promise of decolonised public histories in the Pacific is not to punish, shame or settle scores. It is instead intended to help forge as-yet undreamed futures for the region that place original sovereigns at their heart.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/158226/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kate Fullagar has received funding from the Australian Research Council. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kristie Patricia Flannery does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Philippines is taking an Indigenous-led approach to remembering European colonialism in the Pacific — a refreshing contrast to the dominant stories about James Cook in Australia and New Zealand.Kate Fullagar, Professor of History, Institute for Humanities and Social Sciences, Australian Catholic UniversityKristie Patricia Flannery, Research Fellow, Institute for Humanities and Social Sciences, Australian Catholic UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1303222020-05-01T03:57:33Z2020-05-01T03:57:33ZCook commemorations are mute on intimate encounters and their profound impact on Indigenous women<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/331654/original/file-20200430-42908-4h3fmy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=41%2C269%2C4559%2C3180&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Artist: John Pickles</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a> and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>History is always selective, particularly when it is tied up with national identity. Certain stories are recovered, while others remain silent. </p>
<p>Intimate encounters are often muted, even though we know they played a central part in first encounters during the colonial era.</p>
<p><a href="https://mch.govt.nz/tuia250">Tuia 250</a>, a government-sponsored series of events to commemorate 250 years since Captain James Cook arrived in New Zealand, focused on Pacific voyaging and first onshore encounters between Māori and Pākehā (non-Māori) during 1769–70, at the expense of reconsidering private history.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/my-ancestors-met-cook-in-aotearoa-250-years-ago-for-us-its-time-to-reinterpret-a-painful-history-128771">My ancestors met Cook in Aotearoa 250 years ago. For us, it's time to reinterpret a painful history</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Colonial comfort</h2>
<p>The laborious maps and longhand entries in explorers’ journals, their sketches of specimens gathered during their long journeys - these can all be seen as skillful antiques of a bygone era. But they also represent potent past tools of imperialism.</p>
<p>Tuia 250 was about both voyaging and encounter histories, but it seems that re-enacting traditional sailing was easier than restaging the intimate encounters that were <a href="https://www.justice.govt.nz/assets/Documents/Publications/sex-industry-in-nz.pdf">central to the colonial enterprise</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314353/original/file-20200210-27519-nzw1ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314353/original/file-20200210-27519-nzw1ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=768&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314353/original/file-20200210-27519-nzw1ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=768&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314353/original/file-20200210-27519-nzw1ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=768&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314353/original/file-20200210-27519-nzw1ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=965&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314353/original/file-20200210-27519-nzw1ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=965&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314353/original/file-20200210-27519-nzw1ph.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=965&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Captain Cook charted New Zealand during his voyage in 1769.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Chart_of_New_Zealand,_explored_in_1769_and_1770_by_Lieut._I-_Cook,Commander_of_His_Majesty%27s_Bark_Endeavour._RMG_D9254.tiff">Wikimedia Commons</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Commemorations of voyages across the open oceans sailed clear of the awkward topic of intimacy. The history of intimate encounters remained consigned to a private space, perceived as outside of the making of history and national identity.</p>
<p>But as <a href="http://www.arts.auckland.ac.nz/people/msal020">historian Anne Salmond</a> has written, bodily contact involved Cook’s sailors <a href="https://www.penguin.co.nz/books/the-trial-of-the-cannibal-dog-captain-cook-in-the-south-seas-9780141021331">exchanging items such as nails for sex with women</a>. </p>
<p>In her book <a href="https://www.penguin.co.nz/books/the-trial-of-the-cannibal-dog-captain-cook-in-the-south-seas-9780141021331">The Trial of the Cannibal Dog</a>, Salmond describes the Endeavour’s arrival at Anaura Bay, where Cook’s party went ashore, and the expedition’s official botanist Joseph Banks commented about Māori women being less accessible than Tahitian women. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Banks remarked ruefully that they ‘were as great coquettes as any Europeans could be and the young ones as skittish as unbroke fillies’. If the local women were reluctant to make love with the strangers, however, they were wise, because by Cook’s own reckoning several of his men had stubborn venereal infections, and at least half of the rest had contracted venereal diseases in Tahiti. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>In <a href="https://www.history.ox.ac.uk/people/professor-james-belich">historian James Belich</a>’s view, described in his book Making Peoples, sexual contact became the <a href="https://www.penguin.co.nz/books/making-peoples-a-history-of-the-new-zealanders-from-polynesian-9780143007043">initial intercultural trade in New Zealand</a>.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The sex industry began at first contact in 1769, and from the 1810s it became large and important - very probably preceding wool, gold and dairy products as New Zealand’s leading earner of overseas exchange. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>But <a href="https://aucklanduniversitypress.co.nz/authors-and-editors/hazel-petrie/">Hazel Petrie</a> has argued that intimate encounters have to be considered within the context of <a href="https://aucklanduniversitypress.co.nz/chiefs-of-industry-maori-tribal-enterprise-in-early-colonial-new-zealand/">cultural practices that emphasised hospitality</a>. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Contemporary Western attitudes sometimes led to characterisations of more casual sexual activity between Māori women and visiting Pākehā men as ‘prostitution’, and in our own time such liaisons have been deemed to represent a ‘sex industry’. But these perceptions may be in large part the result of the different moral codes of the narrators and seeing sexual relationships through different lenses. Māori society may have more typically viewed short- to medium-term relationships with sailors or other visitors in terms of manaakitanga or the normal extension of hospitality with expectations of a courteous material response. </p>
</blockquote>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/an-honest-reckoning-with-captain-cooks-legacy-wont-heal-things-overnight-but-its-a-start-130389">An honest reckoning with Captain Cook's legacy won't heal things overnight. But it's a start</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Women as agents of history</h2>
<p>According to historians, Cook <a href="http://nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-BeaCapt.html">disapproved of the sexual behaviour</a> of his officers and men, but was unable to stop it. In his journal, Cook wrote:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>A connection with Women I allow because I cannot prevent it, but never encourage tho many Men are of opinion it is one of the greatest securities amongst Indians, and it may hold good when you intend to settle amongst them; but with travelers and strangers, it is generally otherwise and more men are betrayed than saved by having connection with their women, and how can it be otherwise since all their Views are selfish without the least mixture of regard or attachment whatever; at least my observations which have been pretty general, have not pointed out to me one instance to the contrary. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Sailors embodied the complex, disease-ridden, sexual shipboard culture of the 18th century, combined with western <a href="http://www.helsinki.fi/science/xantippa/wee/weetext/wee214.html">unequal attitudes towards women</a> and the perception of Polynesian women as exotic. </p>
<p>As indigenous and cultural studies scholar Alice Te Punga Somerville <a href="http://oncewerepacific.blogspot.com/">puts it</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Gender is so central to the story of Cook. And how Cook, and everything that came after, has done so much to gender in this region. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Māori women were entangled in the encounters as two worlds met. First contact marked the beginning of changes to customary processes (tikanga Māori), ended pre-colonial balance and had profound effects on Māori women’s lives, as the work of <a href="https://www.waikato.ac.nz/law/research/waikato_law_review/pubs/volume_2_1994/7">indigenous scholar Ani Mikaere</a> has shown. </p>
<p>Mikaere has argued that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>It is often assumed that, according to tikanga Māori, leadership was primarily the domain of men and that men in Māori society exercised power over women. However, evidence abounds which refutes the notion that traditional Māori society attached greater significance to male roles than to female roles. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>It came to pass that Māori women, white women missionaries and settlers were all integral to history. As <a href="https://gss.princeton.edu/anne-mcclintock">feminist scholar Anne McClintock</a> pointed out of women in imperialism, they were not “hapless onlookers”. They were variously colonisers and colonised. </p>
<p>Just as women were a central part of those first encounters in 1769-70, they continued to be <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0308653042000329003">agents of history</a>. Some women, as the helpmeets of Empire, taught generations of schoolchildren about Cook the hero as part of an imperial curriculum. </p>
<p>Navigating a shared future needs to recognise women’s part in colonial encounters. It needs to consider that in the present, as with the past, public and private spaces are interconnected.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/130322/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Katie Pickles receives funding from Royal Society of New Zealand Te Apārangi. </span></em></p>Captain Cook’s sailors traded nails for sex, but the history of intimate encounters and their impact on women throughout the Pacific is still largely ignored.Katie Pickles, Professor of History at the University of Canterbury and current Royal Society of New Zealand Te Apārangi James Cook Research Fellow, University of CanterburyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1320982020-04-28T20:33:09Z2020-04-28T20:33:09Z250 years since Captain Cook landed in Australia, it’s time to acknowledge the violence of first encounters<p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a> and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<p><em>Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander listeners should be aware the podcast accompanying this story contains the names of people who are deceased.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>It’s 250 years since Captain James Cook set foot in Australia, and there’s a growing push to fully acknowledge the violence of Australia’s colonial past.</p>
<p>On today’s episode of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/podcasts/trust-me-podcast">podcast</a>, historian Kate Darian-Smith of the University of Tasmania explains that the way Australia has commemorated Cook’s arrival has changed over time – from military displays in 1870 to waning interest in Cook in the 1950s, followed by the fever-pitch celebrations of 1970.</p>
<p>Now, though, a more nuanced debate is required, she says, adding that it’s time to discuss the violence that Cook’s crew meted out to Indigenous people after stepping ashore at Botany Bay.</p>
<p>“I think discussing those violent moments is quite confronting for many Australians, but also sits within wider discussions about Aboriginal rights and equality in today’s Australia,” Darian-Smith told The Conversation’s Phoebe Roth. </p>
<p>In her companion essay <a href="https://theconversation.com/cooking-the-books-how-re-enactments-of-the-endeavours-voyage-perpetuate-myths-of-australias-discovery-126751">here</a>, co-authored with Katrina Schlunke, Darian-Smith argues many of the popular “re-enactments” of national “foundation moments” in Australia’s past have elements of fantasy, compressing time and history into palatable narratives for mainstream Australia. </p>
<h2>New to podcasts?</h2>
<p>Everything you need to know about how to listen to a podcast is <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-listen-to-podcasts-130882">here</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/trust-me-im-an-expert/id1290047736?mt=2&ign-mpt=uo%3D8"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233721/original/file-20180827-75984-1gfuvlr.png" alt="Listen on Apple Podcasts" width="268" height="68"></a> <a href="https://www.google.com/podcasts?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly90aGVjb252ZXJzYXRpb24uY29tL2F1L3BvZGNhc3RzL3RydXN0LW1lLXBvZGNhc3QucnNz"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233720/original/file-20180827-75978-3mdxcf.png" alt="" width="268" height="68"></a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/the-conversation/trust-me-im-an-expert"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233716/original/file-20180827-75981-pdp50i.png" alt="Stitcher" width="300" height="88"></a> <a href="https://tunein.com/podcasts/News--Politics-Podcasts/Trust-Me-Im-An-Expert-p1035757/"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233723/original/file-20180827-75984-f0y2gb.png" alt="Listen on TuneIn" width="318" height="125"></a></p>
<p><a href="https://radiopublic.com/trust-me-im-an-expert-Wa3E5A"><img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-152" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233717/original/file-20180827-75990-86y5tg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=268&fit=clip" alt="Listen on RadioPublic" width="268" height="87"></a> <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/7myc7drbLJVaRitAMXLB7V"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/237984/original/file-20180925-149976-1ks72uy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=268&fit=clip" width="268" height="82"></a> </p>
<p><strong>Additional audio credits</strong></p>
<p><em>Kindergarten by Unkle Ho, from <a href="https://www.elefanttraks.com/">Elefant Traks.</a></em></p>
<p><em>Podcast episode recorded by Phoebe Roth and edited by Sophia Morris.</em></p>
<p><em>Tasfilm <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcnI2g_wxOw">report</a> on the 1970 commemorations of Cook’s arrival.</em> </p>
<p><em>1970 news <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6WqGDhn7XU">report</a> of protest.</em></p>
<h2>Lead image</h2>
<p><em>David Crosling/AAP</em></p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/as-we-celebrate-the-rediscovery-of-the-endeavour-lets-acknowledge-its-complicated-legacy-103524">As we celebrate the rediscovery of the Endeavour let's acknowledge its complicated legacy</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/132098/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
The way Australia has commemorated Cook's arrival has changed over time – from military displays in 1870 to waning interest in Cook in the 1950s, followed by the fever pitch celebrations of 1970.Sunanda Creagh, Senior EditorPhoebe Roth, Deputy Health EditorSophia Morris, Editorial InternLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1280022020-04-28T20:32:51Z2020-04-28T20:32:51ZFrom Captain Cook to the First Fleet: how Botany Bay was chosen over Africa as a new British penal colony<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314391/original/file-20200210-52356-svzc68.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=54%2C243%2C1209%2C779&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'The Founding of Australia 1788', an oil painting by Algernon Talmage</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a>, and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>After Captain Cook’s Endeavour voyage in 1770, the east coast of Australia was drawn on European maps of the globe for the first time. Yet, in terms of European contact with the continent, there was an 18-year lull in between Cook’s 1770 landings and the arrival of the First Fleet in 1788. </p>
<p>The main reason for this was Britain’s preoccupation with subduing its rebellious colonists in the War of American Independence from 1776-83. </p>
<p>Britain’s defeat in that war brought forth an urgent problem that eventually led to the colonisation of Australia: what it saw as a need to dispose of convicts who were overflowing the available prisons at home. </p>
<p>Previously, many British convicts were transported to the American colonies but after independence this option was no longer available. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310759/original/file-20200119-118343-l0lw70.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310759/original/file-20200119-118343-l0lw70.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310759/original/file-20200119-118343-l0lw70.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310759/original/file-20200119-118343-l0lw70.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=446&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310759/original/file-20200119-118343-l0lw70.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=561&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310759/original/file-20200119-118343-l0lw70.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=561&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310759/original/file-20200119-118343-l0lw70.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=561&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Cook’s chart of Botany Bay.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.bl.uk/collection-items/a-chart-of-botany-bay-by-james-cook">British Library</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The next penal colony: let the search begin</h2>
<p>Discussions about alternative penal colonies meshed with Britain’s larger strategic and commercial goals at the time. Many hoped a new convict settlement would provide a base for extending British power in the wake of the American debacle and be “<a href="https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/324301">advantageous both to navigation and commerce</a>”.</p>
<p>The search began in 1779 when the House of Commons established a committee under the chairmanship of British politician Sir Charles Bunbury. Various locations were considered, in particular, Senegal and Gambia on the west African coast. </p>
<p>But a new destination soon emerged with the testimony of Joseph Banks, the botanist on board the Endeavour, who had recently been elected president of the Royal Society. Botany Bay on the Australian coast, he contended, would be the best site for a penal colony since it had a Mediterranean climate and would be fertile. <a href="https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/324301">Banks added</a>, too, that </p>
<blockquote>
<p>there would be little Probability of any Opposition from the Natives</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It was a prediction that would ultimately prove <a href="https://www.nma.gov.au/defining-moments/resources/pemulwuy">incorrect</a>.</p>
<h2>Why Botany Bay?</h2>
<p>The search for a penal settlement lost momentum during the war, but regained some sense of urgency with its end in 1783. </p>
<p>James Matra, an American-born seaman aboard the Endeavour, circulated a proposal among policy-makers about establishing a new settlement at Botany Bay. It was based on his own first-hand knowledge of the coast, as well as his discussions with Banks, who remained the most influential advocate for the site. </p>
<p>Matra’s most immediate concern was to provide a home for the American loyalists – those, like his own family, who had lost their property in the new United States because of their loyalty to the British crown during the war. </p>
<p>Matra’s proposal also appealed to some key strategic and commercial concerns:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>flax and timbers could be brought from New Zealand to grow in the new colony, providing the British navy with much-needed supplies;</p></li>
<li><p>the planting of spices and sugarcane would reduce Britain’s reliance on the Dutch East Indies; </p></li>
<li><p>the site could be used as a base for those engaged in the lucrative fur trade in America; and </p></li>
<li><p>the settlement could act as a strategic base to challenge the Dutch in the East Indies and the Spanish in the Philippines and even South America. </p></li>
</ul>
<h2>Another serious contender emerges</h2>
<p>After Matra submitted his proposal, another House of Commons committee was established in 1785, chaired by Lord Beauchamp. Both Matra and Banks gave evidence in favour of Botany Bay, with Banks <a href="https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/324301">arguing</a>, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>from the fertility of the soil, the timid disposition of the inhabitants and the climate being so analogous to that of Europe I give the place the preference to all that I have seen</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The committee, however, opted for an African site. It believed Das Voltas Bay, in southwest Africa, could reduce British dependence on the Dutch Cape of Good Hope in what is now South Africa and serve as a refuge for the American loyalists. </p>
<p>Before venturing down the path of establishing a colony, however, an exploratory voyage was sent to the African coast. It concluded the site was unsuitable as it lacked an effective harbour and fertile land. </p>
<p>Botany Bay was back in serious contention.</p>
<h2>Dreams of Pacific trade</h2>
<p>Other supporters soon emerged to sing the praises of Botany Bay. </p>
<p>Sir George Young, a naval officer and former East India Company officer, argued a colony at the site could serve as a base for trade with South America and underlined its strategic importance. If war broke out with Spain in the region, Botany Bay could be a place of refuge for British naval vessels. </p>
<p>Another advocate, John Call, an engineer with the East India Company, saw the advantages of a secondary settlement on nearby Norfolk Island. Flax grew in abundance on the island, he said, and the mighty Norfolk pine tree would be ideal for the masts of ships.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/terra-nullius-interruptus-captain-james-cook-and-absent-presence-in-first-nations-art-129688">Terra nullius interruptus: Captain James Cook and absent presence in First Nations art</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>These observations were based on reports from Cook’s second and third Pacific voyages. The second included a visit to Norfolk Island, while the third ventured to the northwestern coast of America and traded furs in China, further fuelling British aspirations for Pacific trade.</p>
<p>Such arguments eventually led Prime Minister William Pitt and his Cabinet to accept the proposal to establish the settlement at Botany Bay.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314398/original/file-20200210-52360-1uzg5vd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314398/original/file-20200210-52360-1uzg5vd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314398/original/file-20200210-52360-1uzg5vd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314398/original/file-20200210-52360-1uzg5vd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=449&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314398/original/file-20200210-52360-1uzg5vd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=564&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314398/original/file-20200210-52360-1uzg5vd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=564&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314398/original/file-20200210-52360-1uzg5vd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=564&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A drawing by John Webber depicting the arrival of Cook’s ship in Nootka Sound in April 1778 on his search for the Northwest Passage.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">British Library</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A costly endeavour</h2>
<p>Such a settlement demanded an unprecedented degree of state planning and financing. </p>
<p>The First Fleet, for example, consisted of 11 ships (no larger than the <a href="http://www.migrationheritage.nsw.gov.au/exhibition/objectsthroughtime-history/ott1788/index.html">Manly ferry</a>) that carried, among other things, a supply of seeds from Banks to help establish a “new Europe” on the other side of the Earth.</p>
<p>The convicts sent to New South Wales also incurred considerable state expense compared to those sent to America. From 1788-89, the new colony accumulated expenses of over 250,000 pounds, which equated to 100 pounds per convict per annum.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/cooking-the-books-how-re-enactments-of-the-endeavours-voyage-perpetuate-myths-of-australias-discovery-126751">Cooking the books: how re-enactments of the Endeavour's voyage perpetuate myths of Australia's 'discovery'</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The fact it cost considerably more to transport a convict to New South Wales than to keep him or her in a British jail supported the view held by some in England that the penal colony was a subterfuge for broader strategic goals. </p>
<p>Rival nations also thought the British were trying to deceive them. Alejandro Malaspina, who captained a Spanish expedition that visited Sydney in 1793, thought the settlement could be a potential naval base for an attack on Spanish America.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314387/original/file-20200210-52356-1ss6sak.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314387/original/file-20200210-52356-1ss6sak.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314387/original/file-20200210-52356-1ss6sak.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314387/original/file-20200210-52356-1ss6sak.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314387/original/file-20200210-52356-1ss6sak.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=585&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314387/original/file-20200210-52356-1ss6sak.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=585&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314387/original/file-20200210-52356-1ss6sak.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=585&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A list of female convicts onboard the Lady Penrhyn in the First Fleet.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A repository for convicts</h2>
<p>And yet, in the end, the settlement at New South Wales did little to advance British strategic goals.</p>
<p>The site lacked a naval base and its defences were so weak, François Péron, a naturalist aboard the French <a href="http://museum.wa.gov.au/fc/aos/dj">Baudin expedition</a> that circumnavigated much of Australia from 1801-03, thought it could be easily captured.</p>
<p>In fact, no naval expedition was mounted from New South Wales during the Napoleonic wars of 1803-15. Nor did New South Wales live up to the commercial benefits some had invested in it. Tropical fruits and spices would not grow in Sydney, and Norfolk Island proved a disappointment as a source for naval supplies. </p>
<p>The American loyalists also chose to resettle in nearby Canada instead of distant New South Wales. </p>
<p>But New South Wales proved to cater to the most immediate reason for British settlement: a repository for convicts.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/128002/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>John Gascoigne is the author of several books on James Cook and Joseph Banks. His most recent book is Encountering the Pacific in the Age of the Enlightenment. </span></em></p>Britain had an urgent problem after it lost its American colonies: where to send its convicts. It settled on NSW after rejecting other options, but the new spot didn’t exactly live up to its billing.John Gascoigne, Emeritus Professor, UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1290642020-04-28T20:32:32Z2020-04-28T20:32:32Z‘I spoke about Dreamtime, I ticked a box’: teachers say they lack confidence to teach Indigenous perspectives<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/313481/original/file-20200204-41507-5qyleb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a> and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>The Australian government has <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-captain-cook-became-a-contested-national-symbol-96344">allocated tens of millions of dollars</a> to commemorate the anniversary of Cook’s voyage to the South Pacific and Australia in 1770. Though several events have now been suspended due to the coronavirus pandemic, others will take place online.</p>
<p>This could also be an opportunity for teachers to disrupt the same white-washed versions of colonisation (brave, heroic and necessary) taught in Australian schools for centuries.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/captain-cook-discovered-australia-and-other-myths-from-old-school-text-books-128926">Captain Cook 'discovered' Australia, and other myths from old school text books</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>There is a plethora of <a href="https://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/f-10-curriculum/cross-curriculum-priorities/aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander-histories-and-cultures/">education policy</a> mandating teachers incorporate Indigenous perspectives across year levels and subject areas. But in practice, this is much harder to do without Indigenous perspectives becoming trivialised or tokenistic. </p>
<h2>Policy isn’t enough</h2>
<p>Many teachers <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/286450721_Aboriginal_education_More_than_adding_different_perspectives">don’t feel confident or capable</a> to include Indigenous perspectives in their classrooms. </p>
<p>In <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/TVIJZWVUZUIBFH32JMIM/full?target=10.1080/14681366.2019.1704844">our recent study</a> in a cluster of primary and secondary schools, teachers were paired with Aboriginal community members to plan and deliver lessons. Initially, teachers reported feeling ill-equipped to genuinely include an Aboriginal perspective. </p>
<p>One teacher said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I’ve always felt that I wasn’t very good at embedding Aboriginal perspectives in my lessons. It was always, for me, seen as a tick-box, and I spoke about Dreamtime, I ticked a box, and that’s it[…] you didn’t want to step on any toes, and you didn’t want to offend anyone, so you just touched – you just skimmed the surface.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Teachers involved in the project had the best of intentions and a fierce willingness to learn. Some had been teaching for more than 20 years and openly admitted their ignorance towards Indigenous dispossession and the way schooling was used as a vehicle of colonisation. </p>
<p>Another teacher expressed the problem of not having adequate skills to teach Indigenous perspectives: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>I’m blatantly aware how Anglo the room looks. But I guess I don’t want to do something that is tokenistic […] I don’t agree with tokenistic things. I think you’ve got to do it and do it well and I think to just have an Aboriginal flag in the corner, oh and now we’re going to do dot painting and, oh, right, now we’re going to do – you know? It’s kind of a bit insulting, really.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Without Indigenous perspectives in the classroom, or with only tokenistic inclusion, students’ views on Aboriginal peoples, colonialism and “Australian history” are more susceptible to negative media and social attitudes. </p>
<p>This leaves many non-Indigenous students ill-equipped to think critically about the world they live in.</p>
<p>As one teacher said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>If at school we teach it as tokenistic and then the media teaches it as, you know, stereotypical, then how are we going to produce the next generation of people that will work towards reconciliation and recognise the things of the past but move forward without these stereotypes, you know?</p>
</blockquote>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/captain-cook-discovered-australia-and-other-myths-from-old-school-text-books-128926">Captain Cook 'discovered' Australia, and other myths from old school text books</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>I’m just following the syllabus</h2>
<p>Some teachers feel protective of the formal curriculum. In this instance, Indigenous perspectives become a tick-the-box policy, something to add into the lesson, but not so much that it interferes with the “real” learning outcomes.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314385/original/file-20200210-52389-1t5hr9m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314385/original/file-20200210-52389-1t5hr9m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314385/original/file-20200210-52389-1t5hr9m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314385/original/file-20200210-52389-1t5hr9m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314385/original/file-20200210-52389-1t5hr9m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=434&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314385/original/file-20200210-52389-1t5hr9m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314385/original/file-20200210-52389-1t5hr9m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314385/original/file-20200210-52389-1t5hr9m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=545&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Many Indigenous students feel frustrated at the way ‘Australian history’ is being taught.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">From Shutterstock.com</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But what are these “real outcomes”? </p>
<p>In the NSW curriculum, the stage two (years three and four) unit “First Contacts”, provides the earliest comprehensive glimpse of world exploration and the colonisation of Australia. The <a href="https://educationstandards.nsw.edu.au/wps/portal/nesa/k-10/learning-areas/hsie/history-k-10/content/803/!ut/p/z1/tVPLbsIwEPyWHnK0vHZCkh5ToLzLqwHiC3KCAVNwQrCg9Ovr9HWDtEL1wZK1szOz9hgzPMNM8aNccS1TxbfmHDF37rSaADbQbqMzrMKwMR55fr3V7U4cPP0A0IC4pOmQTr_hEw">key questions for inquiry include</a>:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>why did the great journeys of exploration occur?</p></li>
<li><p>what was life like for Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander peoples before the arrival of the Europeans?</p></li>
<li><p>why did Europeans settle in Australia?</p></li>
<li><p>what was the nature and consequence of contact between Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander peoples and early traders, explorers and settlers?</p></li>
</ul>
<p>Note the use of presumptive (“great”) and passive (“settle”, “explorers”) language in these questions. The last dot point also raises concerns about how teachers will challenge entrenched whitewashed versions of history.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-failure-to-say-hello-how-captain-cook-blundered-his-first-impression-with-indigenous-people-126673">A failure to say hello: how Captain Cook blundered his first impression with Indigenous people</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p><a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1440783318794295">Research</a> with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander high school students highlights the frustration Indigenous students feel, particularly during history lessons. </p>
<p>As one student said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>You always have to learn from a white perspective, especially in history. Why don’t they learn from us for once?</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Another student described the tension in the classroom as their teacher downloaded information from the internet:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Usually half of the class would get into a very heated racial discussion, which we had to sit through. Because the teacher had no idea what he was going on about. Some of the stuff he had on the board, because he just copies it from the Internet, so some of the stuff he has got on the board is racist, and he is teaching us. So it’s like very […] uncomfortable.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>What will it take?</h2>
<p>Teachers must critically reflect on their own identity and how it potentially influences their personal bias and worldview. They must also be willing to confront the ongoing effects of colonialism in and outside the classroom and listen to Indigenous people. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/they-are-all-dead-for-indigenous-people-cooks-voyage-of-discovery-was-a-ghostly-visitation-126430">'They are all dead': for Indigenous people, Cook's voyage of 'discovery' was a ghostly visitation</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Teachers must aspire to adequately and systemically overturn the harm schooling continues to inflict on many Indigenous people. A critical dialogue of Cook’s arrival that familiarises students with topics like racial hierarchies and white supremacy is long overdue.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/129064/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michelle Bishop's research with the 'Culture, Community and Curriculum Project' (CCCP) received funding from the Ian Potter Foundation. She is a Gamilaroi woman from Western NSW and grew up on Dhawaral Country in south-west Sydney. Her PhD focuses on Indigenous education sovereignty.</span></em></p>Many teachers want to teach Indigenous perspectives but often lack confidence or know-how. Teachers must be willing to confront the ongoing effects of colonialism in and outside the classroom.Michelle Bishop, Associate Lecturer, Macquarie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1303892020-04-28T19:56:10Z2020-04-28T19:56:10ZAn honest reckoning with Captain Cook’s legacy won’t heal things overnight. But it’s a start<p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a> and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This is an edited transcript of an interview with John Maynard for our podcast <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/trust-me-im-an-expert-43810">Trust Me, I’m An Expert</a>. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised this article contains names of deceased people.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>There are a multitude of Aboriginal oral memories about Captain James Cook, right across the continent.</p>
<p>As the <a href="https://www.nla.gov.au/events/cooks-treasures/papers/Deborah-Rose-Captain-Cook.pdf">research</a> from Deborah Bird Rose shows, many Aboriginal people in remote locations are certainly under the impression that Cook came there as well, shooting people in a kind of Cook-led invasion of Australia. Many of these communities, of course, never met James Cook; the man never even went there. </p>
<p>But the deep impact of James Cook that spread across the country and he came to represent the bogeyman for Aboriginal Australia. </p>
<p>Even back in the Protection and Welfare Board days, a government car would turn up and Aboriginal people would be running around <a href="https://www.nla.gov.au/stories/audio/professor-john-maynard">screaming</a>, “Lookie, lookie, here comes Cookie!” </p>
<p>I <a href="https://www.nla.gov.au/digital-classroom/senior/Cook/Indigenous-Response/Maynard">wrote</a> about Uncle Ray Rose, sadly recently departed, who’d had a stroke. Someone said, “How do you feel?” And he said, “No good. I’m Captain Cooked.” </p>
<p>Cook, wherever he went up the coast, was giving names where names already existed. <a href="https://www.redbilby.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/East_Coast_Encounter_Sample.pdf">Yuin oral memory</a> in the south coast of NSW gives the example of what they called <a href="https://www.visitnsw.com/destinations/south-coast/batemans-bay-and-eurobodalla/tilba/attractions/mount-gulaga-mount-dromedary-walk">Gulaga</a> and Cook called “Mount Dromedary”:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>[…] that name can be seen as the first of the changes that come for our people […] Cook’s maps were very good, but they did not show our names for places. He didn’t ask us. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Cook has been <a href="https://www.nla.gov.au/digital-classroom/senior/Cook/Indigenous-Response/Maynard">incorporated</a> into songs, jokes, stories and Aboriginal oral histories right across the country. </p>
<p>Why? I think it’s an Aboriginal response to the way we’ve been taught about our history. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/captain-cook-wanted-to-introduce-british-justice-to-indigenous-people-instead-he-became-increasingly-cruel-and-violent-127025">Captain Cook wanted to introduce British justice to Indigenous people. Instead, he became increasingly cruel and violent</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Myth-making persists but a shift is underway</h2>
<p>I came through a school system of the 50s and 60s, and we weren’t weren’t even mentioned in the history books except as a people belonging to the Stone Age or as a dying race. </p>
<p>It was all about discoverers, explorers, settlers and Phar Lap or Don Bradman. But us Aboriginal people? Not there. </p>
<p>We had this high exposure of the public celebration of Cook, the statues of Cook, the reenactments of Cook – it was really in your face. For Aboriginal people, how do we make sense of all of this, faced with the reality of our experience and the catastrophic impact?</p>
<p>We’ve got to make sense of it the best way we can, and I think that’s why Cook turns up in so many oral histories. </p>
<p>I think wider Australia is moving towards a more balanced understanding of our history. Lots of people now recognise the richest cultural treasure the country possesses is 65,000 years of Aboriginal cultural connection to this continent. </p>
<p>That’s unlike anywhere else in the world. I mean no disrespect, but 250 years is a drop in a lake compared to 65,000 years. From our perspective, in fact, we’ve always been here. Our people came out of the Dreamtime of the creative ancestors and lived and kept the Earth as it was in the very first day. </p>
<p>With global warming, rising sea levels, rising temperatures and catastrophic storms, Aboriginal people did keep the Earth as it was in the very first day to ensure that it was passed to each surviving generation. </p>
<p>There was going to be a (now-<a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/captain-cook-250th-anniversary-voyage-suspended-due-to-coronavirus">cancelled</a>) <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-22/endeavour-replica-to-sail-around-australia/10734998">circumnavigation</a> of Australia in the official proceedings this year, which the prime minister supported. But James Cook didn’t circumnavigate Australia. He only sailed up the east coast. So that’s creating more myths again, which is a senseless way to go.</p>
<h2>‘With the consent of the Natives to take possession’</h2>
<p>Personally, I have high regard for James Cook as a navigator, as a cartographer, and certainly as an inspiring captain of his crew. He encouraged incredible loyalty among those that sailed with him on those three voyages. And that has to be recognised. </p>
<p>But against that, of course, is the reality that he was given <a href="https://www.nla.gov.au/content/secret">secret instructions</a> by the Navy to:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>With the consent of the Natives to take possession of the convenient situations in the country in the name of the king of Great Britain.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Well, consent was never given. When they went ashore at Botany Bay, two Aboriginal men <a href="https://www.bl.uk/the-voyages-of-captain-james-cook/articles/an-indigenous-australian-perspective-on-cooks-arrival">brandished spears</a> and made it quite clear they didn’t want him there. Those men were wounded and Cook was one of those firing a musket.</p>
<p>There was no gaining any consent when he sailed on to Possession Island and planted that flag down. Totally the opposite, in fact.</p>
<p>And the most insightful viewpoint is from Cook himself, who <a href="http://southseas.nla.gov.au/journals/cook/17700430.html">wrote</a> that: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>all they seem’d to want was for us to be gone.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Cook’s background gave him insight</h2>
<p>James Cook wasn’t your normal British naval officer of that time period. To get into such a position, you normally had to be born into the right family, to come from money and privilege. </p>
<p>James Cook was none of those things. He came from a poor family. His father was a labourer. Cook got to where he was by skill, endeavour, and, unquestionably, because he was a very smart man and brilliant at sea. But it’s also from that background that he’s able to offer insight. </p>
<p>There’s an incredible quotation of Cook’s where he <a href="http://southseas.nla.gov.au/journals/cook_remarks/092.html">says</a> of Aboriginal people:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>They live in a Tranquillity which is not disturb’d by the Inequality of Condition… they live in a warm and fine Climate and enjoy a very wholsome Air.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Now, Cook is comparing what he is seeing in Australia with life back Britain, where there is an incredible amount of inequality. London, at the time, was filthy. Sewerage pouring through the streets. Disease was rife. Underprivilege is everywhere. </p>
<p>In Australia, though, Cook sees what to him looks like this incredible egalitarian society and it makes an impact on him because of where he comes from. </p>
<p>But deeper misunderstandings persisted. In what’s now called Cooktown there are, at first, amicable relationships with the Guugu Yimithirr people, but when they <a href="http://setis.library.usyd.edu.au/ozlit/banks/banksvo2.pdf">come aboard the Endeavour</a> they see this incredible profusion of turtles that the crew has captured. </p>
<p>They’re probably thinking, “these are our turtles.” They would quite happily share some of those turtles but the Bristish response is: you get <em>none</em>. </p>
<p>So the Guugu Yimithirr people go off the ship and set the grass on fire. Eventually, there’s a kind of peace settlement but the incident reveals a complete blindness on the part of the British to the idea of reciprocity in Aboriginal society.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/they-are-all-dead-for-indigenous-people-cooks-voyage-of-discovery-was-a-ghostly-visitation-126430">'They are all dead': for Indigenous people, Cook's voyage of 'discovery' was a ghostly visitation</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>A collision of catastrophic proportions</h2>
<p>The impact of 1770 has never eased for Aboriginal people. It was a collision of catastrophic proportions. The whole impact of 1788 – of invasion, dispossession, cultural destruction, occupation onto assimilation, segregation – all of these things that came after 1770.</p>
<p>Anything you want to measure – Aboriginal health, education, employment, housing, youth suicide, incarceration – we have the worst stats. That has been a continuation, a reality of the failure of government to recognise what has happened in the past and actually do something about it in the present to fix it for the future. </p>
<p>We’ve had decades and decades of governments saying to us, “We know what’s best for you.” But the fact is that when it comes to Aboriginal well being, the only people to listen to are Aboriginal people and we’ve never been put in the position.</p>
<p>We’ve been raising our voices for a long time now, but some people see that as a threat and are not prepared to listen.</p>
<p>An honest reckoning of the reality of Cook and what came after won’t heal things overnight. But it’s a starting point, from which we can join hands and walk together toward a shared future. </p>
<p>A balanced understanding of the past will help us build a future – it is of critical importance.</p>
<h2>New to podcasts?</h2>
<p>Everything you need to know about how to listen to a podcast is <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-listen-to-podcasts-130882">here</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/trust-me-im-an-expert/id1290047736?mt=2&ign-mpt=uo%3D8"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233721/original/file-20180827-75984-1gfuvlr.png" alt="Listen on Apple Podcasts" width="268" height="68"></a> <a href="https://www.google.com/podcasts?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly90aGVjb252ZXJzYXRpb24uY29tL2F1L3BvZGNhc3RzL3RydXN0LW1lLXBvZGNhc3QucnNz"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233720/original/file-20180827-75978-3mdxcf.png" alt="" width="268" height="68"></a></p>
<p><a href="https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/the-conversation/trust-me-im-an-expert"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233716/original/file-20180827-75981-pdp50i.png" alt="Stitcher" width="300" height="88"></a> <a href="https://tunein.com/podcasts/News--Politics-Podcasts/Trust-Me-Im-An-Expert-p1035757/"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233723/original/file-20180827-75984-f0y2gb.png" alt="Listen on TuneIn" width="318" height="125"></a></p>
<p><a href="https://radiopublic.com/trust-me-im-an-expert-Wa3E5A"><img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-152" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/233717/original/file-20180827-75990-86y5tg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=268&fit=clip" alt="Listen on RadioPublic" width="268" height="87"></a> <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/7myc7drbLJVaRitAMXLB7V"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/237984/original/file-20180925-149976-1ks72uy.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=268&fit=clip" width="268" height="82"></a> </p>
<p><strong>Additional audio credits</strong></p>
<p><em>Kindergarten by Unkle Ho, from <a href="https://www.elefanttraks.com/">Elefant Traks.</a></em></p>
<p><em><a href="https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Daniel_Birch/Music_For_Audio_Drama_Podcasts_Vol1/Marimba_On_The_Loose">Marimba On the Loose</a> by Daniel Birch, from Free Music Archive.</em></p>
<p><em>Podcast episode recorded and edited by Sunanda Creagh.</em></p>
<h2>Lead image</h2>
<p><em>Uncle Fred Deeral as little old man in the film The Message, a film by Zakpage, to be shown at the National Museum of Australia in April. Nik Lachajczak of Zakpage.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/130389/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
The impact of 1770 has never eased for Aboriginal people. It was a collision of catastrophic proportions.Sunanda Creagh, Senior EditorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1264302020-04-28T19:55:55Z2020-04-28T19:55:55Z‘They are all dead’: for Indigenous people, Cook’s voyage of ‘discovery’ was a ghostly visitation<p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a> and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>On a recent trip to Cape York, I was privileged to sit with Kaurareg/Gudang Yadhaykenu man Uncle Tommy Savage, on a beach in the town of Umagico.</p>
<p>We listened as he sang a song called Markai an Ghule (meaning “ghost ship”), composed by his ancestors when James Cook arrived at Possession Island in August 1770. </p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/cook250-78244"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/328303/original/file-20200416-192709-qmy2nf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=113&fit=crop&dpr=2" alt="A new series from The Conversation." width="100%"></a></p>
<p>A sad lilt permeated the song, an expression of the grief the Kaurareg people felt at having to hide their cultural system, while they determined what the arrival of this preternatural being and his big ship was all about. </p>
<p>We recorded Uncle Tommy’s song for inclusion in The Message, a film commissioned by the National Museum of Australia and opening in April to coincide with 250 years since Cook arrived.</p>
<p>While researching the film, I spent much of last year travelling Australia’s east coast interviewing historians, curators and traditional owners, piecing together stories from the ship and the shore. Here are the stories that have stuck with me.</p>
<h2>A voyage of the dead</h2>
<p>What is so often described as Cook’s “voyage of discovery” has been viewed consistently by Indigenous people as a voyage of the dead; a giant canoe carrying the reincarnation of ancestral beings.</p>
<p>At the first encounter in Botany Bay, two Gweagal warriors throw stones and spears to Cook, saying “warrawarrawa,” <a href="https://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/livinglanguage_mr_120719.pdf">meaning</a> “they are all dead” (not “go away”, as it is often translated).</p>
<p>Perhaps this explains why Banks and Cook write of Aboriginal people persistently declining any of the gifts they were offered. You would have to be crazy to take gifts from the dead! </p>
<p>The warnings about these ghostly visitors were quickly and accurately sent by fire, smoke and message stick up the coast, adding a deeper meaning to the many <a href="https://www.nla.gov.au/digital-classroom/senior/Cook/Indigenous-Response/Endeavour-Journal">fires</a> Banks and Cook noted as they travelled north (“Saw several smooks along shore before dark and two or three times afire in the night,” Cook <a href="https://www.nla.gov.au/digital-classroom/senior/Cook/Indigenous-Response/Endeavour-Journal">writes</a>).</p>
<h2>A collision of beliefs</h2>
<p>When the Endeavour smashes into the reef in Cooktown and is forced to stay for 48 days on the river for repairs, Cook and his crew captured “<a href="http://setis.library.usyd.edu.au/ozlit/pdf/p00021.pdf">eight or nine</a>” turtles (tellingly, Banks refers repeatedly to “our turtles”). </p>
<p>A contingent of local Guugu Yimithirr men board HMS Endeavour and try to take at least one turtle back, but Cook’s men soon wrest it away – refusing to share or acknowledge the possibility they’d taken too many.</p>
<p>Lamenting this environmental loss, a group of warriors light the grass fires in protest (“I had little Idea of the fury with which the grass burnt in this hot climate, nor of the dificulty of extinguishing it when once lighted”, Banks <a href="http://setis.library.usyd.edu.au/ozlit/pdf/p00021.pdf">writes</a>) and Cook shoots one of the Guugu Yimithirr men.</p>
<p>The rising tension is then released by an older man who stands forward in an extraordinary act of governance and breaks the tip off a spear to signify “weapons down”. </p>
<h2>‘… in reality they are far more happier than we Europeans’</h2>
<p>The incident brought together threads still relevant in Indigenous-settler relations today: environmental care, reconciliation and cultural governance. And this collision of beliefs, it seems, was not lost on Cook. </p>
<p>As he sailed off from the tip of Cape York, Cook wrote an unusual diary <a href="http://southseas.nla.gov.au/journals/cook_remarks/092.html">entry</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>From what I have said of the Natives of New-Holland, they may appear to some to be the most wretched people upon Earth, but in reality they are far more happier than we Europeans; being wholy unacquainted not only with the superfluous but the necessary conveniencies so much sought after in Europe, they are happy in not knowing the use of them. </p>
<p>They live in a Tranquillity which is not disturb’d by the Inequality of Condition: The Earth and sea of their own accord furnishes them with all things necessary for life; they covet not Magnificent Houses, Houshold-stuff […]</p>
<p>[…] they live in a warm and fine Climate and enjoy a very wholsome Air, so that they have very little need of Clothing and this they seem to be fully sencible of, for many to whome we gave Cloth to, left it carlessly upon the Sea beach and in the woods as a thing they had no manner of use for. </p>
<p>In short they seem’d to set no Value upon any thing we gave them, nor would they ever part with any thing of their own for any one article we could offer them; this, in my opinion argues that they think themselves provided with all the necessarys of Life and that they have no Superfluities —</p>
</blockquote>
<p>For a working class man from Georgian England to see and appreciate the cultural values of Indigenous people is remarkable, considering that clarity of understanding is only just dawning on the average Australian. </p>
<h2>The role of Joseph Banks</h2>
<p>After all the conversations I’ve had over the last year with historians, traditional owners and curators, I’ve come to believe that history has been unkind to Cook. He is blamed for the many wrongs inflicted on my people. </p>
<p>Joseph Banks, however, emerges as a much colder, unkinder figure. It was Banks who <a href="http://www.migrationheritage.nsw.gov.au/exhibition/objectsthroughtime/barrallier-letter/index.html">convinced the British government</a> that Australia would be perfect for a penal colony, given it could no longer send convicts to America. </p>
<p>Banks’s view that Australia was “<a href="http://setis.library.usyd.edu.au/ozlit/pdf/p00021.pdf">thinly inhabited</a>” (and he speaks frequently of savagery and simplicity of its people) fed directly into the declaration of <em><a href="https://theconversation.com/henry-reynolds-australia-was-founded-on-a-hypocrisy-that-haunts-us-to-this-day-101679">terra nullius.</a></em> Banks never went inland, but declared with great hubris that it was almost certainly “<a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=XiuKJC5Izb0C&pg=PA16&lpg=PA16&dq=joseph+banks+%22totally+uninhabited%22&source=bl&ots=lQfFdObesz&sig=ACfU3U0LLSIqhWC8D37BSZGhFuC-fseyOA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiDjYvG1YbnAhXLZSsKHQXJDrEQ6AEwBHoECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=joseph%20banks%20%22totally%20uninhabited%22&f=false">totally uninhabited</a>”.</p>
<p>In the end, the decisions made in the 18 years between Cook leaving and the First Fleet arriving have shaped modern Australia far more than those early fleeting ethereal encounters.</p>
<p>There are so many lost chapters in the story of Australia.</p>
<p>But as a nation, we can invite Uncle Tommy and his people – and all those other excluded songs and stories – to come out of hiding. </p>
<p>Revealing our shared history is the only way to make peace with those ghostly visitors of the past. But we will only find that peace in the truth and it’s the truth of our history, which will be our new voyage of discovery. </p>
<hr>
<p><em>Alison Page was commissioned by the National Museum of Australia to create the film The Message for the museum’s Endeavour 250 exhibition, opening on April 8.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/126430/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alison Page of Zakpage is a descendant of the Walbanga and Wadi Wadi people of the Yuin nation. She was commissioned by the National Museum of Australia to create the film The Message. She is a councillor on the Australian National Maritime Museum, won a sculpture commission for Kamay Commemorative Installation and is on the Indigenous Reference Group of the National Museum of Australia.</span></em></p>Incidents from Cook’s first voyage highlight themes relevant in Indigenous-settler relations today: environmental care, reconciliation and governance. This collision of beliefs, it seems, wasn’t lost on Cook.Alison Page, Adjunct Associate Professor, University of Technology SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1289262020-04-28T19:55:20Z2020-04-28T19:55:20ZCaptain Cook ‘discovered’ Australia, and other myths from old school text books<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315828/original/file-20200218-10976-1jdyuep.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C91%2C998%2C788&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A picture titled 'Captain Cook taking possession of the Australian continent on behalf of the British crown, AD 1770'. Drawn and engraved by Samuel Calvert from an historical painting by Gilfillan in the possession of the Royal Society of Victoria.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://nla.gov.au/nla.obj-135699884/view">Trove/National Library of Australia</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a>, and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>Approaching the 250th anniversary of Cook’s first journey to the Pacific, The Conversation asked readers what they remembered learning at school about his arrival in Australia. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1203872299801178112"}"></div></p>
<p>Most people said they learnt Cook “discovered” Australia – especially if they were at school before the 1990s. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314392/original/file-20200210-52405-nr1g1c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314392/original/file-20200210-52405-nr1g1c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314392/original/file-20200210-52405-nr1g1c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=277&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314392/original/file-20200210-52405-nr1g1c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=277&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314392/original/file-20200210-52405-nr1g1c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=277&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314392/original/file-20200210-52405-nr1g1c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=348&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314392/original/file-20200210-52405-nr1g1c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=348&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314392/original/file-20200210-52405-nr1g1c.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=348&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.facebook.com/ConversationEDU/photos/a.452035984824035/3047783871915887/?type=3&theater&ifg=1">Screenshot from Facebook.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Depending on when you went to school, you may have learnt differently about Captain Cook’s role in Australian history. To find out how the teaching of Cook in Australian schools has changed, I examined textbooks used in the 1950s until today. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314394/original/file-20200210-52405-1rcqf4q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314394/original/file-20200210-52405-1rcqf4q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314394/original/file-20200210-52405-1rcqf4q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=183&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314394/original/file-20200210-52405-1rcqf4q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=183&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314394/original/file-20200210-52405-1rcqf4q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=183&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314394/original/file-20200210-52405-1rcqf4q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=230&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314394/original/file-20200210-52405-1rcqf4q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=230&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314394/original/file-20200210-52405-1rcqf4q.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=230&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.facebook.com/ConversationEDU/photos/a.452035984824035/3047783871915887/?type=3&theater&ifg=1">Screenshot from Facebook.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>School years 1950s and early 1960s</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314608/original/file-20200210-109935-13lqaos.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314608/original/file-20200210-109935-13lqaos.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314608/original/file-20200210-109935-13lqaos.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=853&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314608/original/file-20200210-109935-13lqaos.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=853&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314608/original/file-20200210-109935-13lqaos.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=853&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314608/original/file-20200210-109935-13lqaos.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1072&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314608/original/file-20200210-109935-13lqaos.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1072&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314608/original/file-20200210-109935-13lqaos.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1072&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Conquering the Continent, 1961.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>If you were at school after the second world war to the mid-1960s, Australia still had strong links to the British Empire. </p>
<p>Cook was portrayed as a one of the greatest explorers in history and textbooks presented clear messages Cook “discovered” Australia and “took possession” of the land for England.</p>
<p>The 1959 Queensland text Social Studies for Standard VIII (Queensland) by G.T Roscoe said Cook “landed on Possession Island, hoisted the Union Jack, claiming the country for the King of England”.</p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/cook250-78244"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/328303/original/file-20200416-192709-qmy2nf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=113&fit=crop&dpr=2" alt="A new series from The Conversation." width="100%"></a></p>
<p>In Conquering the Continent (1961), C.H. Wright mentions some contact with Indigenous people at Botany Bay, but there is no mention of conflict. Wright writes</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The blacks offered little resistance; they quickly stood off after being frightened by gun shots.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314110/original/file-20200207-43084-p0cabx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314110/original/file-20200207-43084-p0cabx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314110/original/file-20200207-43084-p0cabx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314110/original/file-20200207-43084-p0cabx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=462&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314110/original/file-20200207-43084-p0cabx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314110/original/file-20200207-43084-p0cabx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314110/original/file-20200207-43084-p0cabx.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=581&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">C.H. Wright, 1961. Conquering the Continent: The story of the Exploration and settlement of Australia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>School years 1965 to 1979</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314606/original/file-20200210-109891-17u0p0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314606/original/file-20200210-109891-17u0p0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314606/original/file-20200210-109891-17u0p0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=759&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314606/original/file-20200210-109891-17u0p0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=759&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314606/original/file-20200210-109891-17u0p0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=759&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314606/original/file-20200210-109891-17u0p0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=954&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314606/original/file-20200210-109891-17u0p0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=954&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314606/original/file-20200210-109891-17u0p0w.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=954&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Birth of a Nation, 1974.</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>If you went to school between 1965 and 1979, you were learning during the era of the Menzies, Whitlam and Fraser governments (among a few others). </p>
<p>This was when awareness was beginning to grow of the negative impact of colonisation on Australia’s Indigenous people.</p>
<p>E.S. Elphick’s 1974 <a href="https://trove.nla.gov.au/work/9406903?selectedversion=NBD1631494">Birth of a Nation</a> continued the “discovery and possession” narrative, but acknowledged Indigenous people were in Australia beforehand: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The first Australians came here at least 30,000 years ago, and for all but the last 200 years of this period enjoyed uninterrupted possession of the land they came to[…] The white man, in fact, took a very long time to arrive.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Paul Ashton’s chapter in David Stewart’s <a href="https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/1350865">Investigating Australian History Using Evidence</a> (1985) encouraged students to “work as historians” by examining primary sources (in this case old maps) and evaluating interpretations of history. </p>
<p>Ashton emphasised the importance of the scientific “discovery”: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Cook’s achievements were indeed great, as were his talents as a navigator. At last, a reasonably accurate chart of the east coast of Australia could be added to European knowledge of the continent, along with a mass of natural and scientific discoveries. However, the discovery was not as yet completed […] </p>
</blockquote>
<h2>School in 1981 to 1995</h2>
<p>If you went to school in the 1980s and early to mid ‘90s, you may have learnt history from a more inclusive perspective that included the lived experiences of those who were largely left out of the traditional narrative, such as children, women and Indigenous people.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/i-spoke-about-dreamtime-i-ticked-a-box-teachers-say-they-lack-confidence-to-teach-indigenous-perspectives-129064">'I spoke about Dreamtime, I ticked a box': teachers say they lack confidence to teach Indigenous perspectives</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>But in <a href="https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/1646582">Australia: All Our Yesterdays</a> (1999), author Meg Grey Blanden presented a benign account of Cook facing no resistance from Indigenous people: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>On a small island now named Possession Island, Cook performed the last and most important official task of his entire voyage. Like others of his time, Cook was undeterred by the presence of native people on the island. He noted that they obligingly departed and left the Europeans to get on with their ceremony.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>School in 1996 to 2015</h2>
<p>In the first decade of the 21st century, history was embedded into social studies in all states and territories, except New South Wales. Australian colonial history focused on “discovery”, foundation and expansion was relegated to years four to six.</p>
<p>Some teachers may have chosen to use critical inquiry to teach about Cook’s expedition in year nine. Most tended to focus on the more complicated 20th century history of world wars and progress in year nine and ten syllabuses. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314399/original/file-20200210-52346-1xqy84i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314399/original/file-20200210-52346-1xqy84i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314399/original/file-20200210-52346-1xqy84i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=196&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314399/original/file-20200210-52346-1xqy84i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=196&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314399/original/file-20200210-52346-1xqy84i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=196&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314399/original/file-20200210-52346-1xqy84i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=247&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314399/original/file-20200210-52346-1xqy84i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=247&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314399/original/file-20200210-52346-1xqy84i.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=247&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.facebook.com/ConversationEDU/photos/a.452035984824035/3047783871915887/?type=3&theater&ifg=1">Screenshot from Facebook.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Australian Curriculum, which was implemented in all schools from 2012, has maintained this chronological divide of historical knowledge. In year four, students <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?hl=en&lr=&id=vkc-uvbLy8EC&oi=fnd&pg=PA223&dq=memories+of+learning+history+at+school&ots=O1FOAnCKKj&sig=qWRgyRrstW-inquPTrEgZnIY09Y&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=memories%20of%20learning%20history%20at%20school&f=false">learn about Cook</a> by “examining the journey of one or more explorers of the Australian coastline … using navigation maps to reconstruct their journeys”.</p>
<p>It would be unusual for secondary teachers these days to teach their students about Cook because the topic is not in the secondary curriculum. </p>
<p>This means if children do not learn about Cook’s achievements in the primary years it’s quite possible if they were asked what they learnt about Cook in school, they may not know anything about him. </p>
<hr>
<p><em>Correction: this article previously included the Hawke government in the years 1965-1979, while leaving out Menzies. This has now been corrected.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/128926/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Louise Zarmati does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>To find out how the teaching of Captain Cook in Australian schools has changed, I examined textbooks used in the 1950s until today.Louise Zarmati, Lecturer in Humanities and Social Sciences, Faculty of Education, University of TasmaniaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1284692020-04-28T19:55:09Z2020-04-28T19:55:09ZBotany and the colonisation of Australia in 1770<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315880/original/file-20200218-10985-kndbtu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C5%2C3494%2C1267&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Botanist Joseph Banks recommended Botany Bay as the site for a penal colony.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/collection-items/botany-bay-new-south-wales-ca-1789-watercolour-charles-gore">Charles Gore (1788) / State Library of NSW</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a> and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>James Cook and his companions aboard the Endeavour landed at a harbour on Australia’s southeast coast in April of 1770. Cook named the place Botany Bay for
“the great quantity of plants Mr. Banks and Dr. Solander found in this place”.</p>
<p>Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander were aboard the Endeavour as gentleman botanists, collecting specimens and applying names in Latin to plants Europeans had not previously seen. The place name hints at the importance of plants to Britain’s Empire, and to botany’s pivotal place in Europe’s Enlightenment and Australia’s early colonisation.</p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/cook250-78244"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/328303/original/file-20200416-192709-qmy2nf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=113&fit=crop&dpr=2" alt="A new series from The Conversation." width="100%"></a></p>
<h2>‘Nothing like people’</h2>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310790/original/file-20200120-118347-vgurex.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310790/original/file-20200120-118347-vgurex.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310790/original/file-20200120-118347-vgurex.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=682&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310790/original/file-20200120-118347-vgurex.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=682&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310790/original/file-20200120-118347-vgurex.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=682&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310790/original/file-20200120-118347-vgurex.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=857&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310790/original/file-20200120-118347-vgurex.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=857&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310790/original/file-20200120-118347-vgurex.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=857&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Joseph Banks became one of Britain’s most influential scientists.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.nla.gov.au/digital-classroom/senior/Cook/Science/Science">National Library of Australia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Cook has always loomed large in Australia’s colonial history. White Australians have long commemorated and celebrated him as the symbolic link to the “civilisation” of Enlightenment and Empire. The two botanists have been less well remembered, yet Banks in particular was an influential figure in Australia’s early colonisation. </p>
<p>When Banks and his friend Solander went ashore on April 29, 1770 to collect plants for naming and classification, the Englishman recollected they saw “nothing like people”. Banks knew that the land on which he and Solander sought plants was inhabited (and in fact, as we now know, had been so for at least 65,000 years). Yet the two botanists were engaged in an activity that implied the land was blank and unknown. </p>
<p>They were both botanical adventurers. Solander was among the first and most favoured of the students of Carl Linnaeus, the Swedish botanist and colonial traveller who devised the method still used today for naming species. Both Solander and Banks were advocates for the Linnaean method of taxonomy: a systematic classification of newly named plants and animals. </p>
<p>When they stepped ashore at “Botany Bay” in 1770, the pair saw themselves as pioneers in a double sense: as Linnaean botanists in a new land, its places and plants unnamed by any other; as if they were in a veritable <em>terra nullius</em>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310792/original/file-20200120-118319-i3m170.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310792/original/file-20200120-118319-i3m170.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310792/original/file-20200120-118319-i3m170.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310792/original/file-20200120-118319-i3m170.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310792/original/file-20200120-118319-i3m170.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310792/original/file-20200120-118319-i3m170.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310792/original/file-20200120-118319-i3m170.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The plant specimens Joseph Banks collected were taken back to England, where they remain today in the Natural History Museum.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/joseph-banks-scientist-explorer-botanist.html">Natural History Museum</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Botany in ‘nobody’s land’</h2>
<p><em>Terra nullius</em>, meaning “nobody’s land”, refers to a legal doctrine derived from European traditions stretching back to the ancient Romans. The idea was that land could be declared “empty” and “unowned” if there were no signs of occupation such as cultivation of the soil, towns, cities, or sacred temples. </p>
<p>As a legal doctrine it was not applied in Australia until the late 1880s, and there is dispute about its effects in law until its final elimination by the High Court in <em>Mabo v Queensland (No. II)</em> in 1992. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/terra-nullius-interruptus-captain-james-cook-and-absent-presence-in-first-nations-art-129688">Terra nullius interruptus: Captain James Cook and absent presence in First Nations art</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Cook never used this formulation, nor did Banks or Solander. Yet each in their way acted as if it were true. That the land, its plants, and animals, and even its peoples, were theirs to name and classify according to their own standards of “scientific” knowledge.</p>
<p>In the late eighteenth century, no form of scientific knowledge was more useful to empire than botany. It was the science <em>par excellence</em> of colonisation and empire. Botany promised a way to transform the “waste” of nature into economic productivity on a global scale. </p>
<h2>Plant power</h2>
<p>Wealth and power in Britain’s eighteenth century empire came from harnessing economically useful crops: tobacco, sugar, tea, coffee, rice, potatoes, flax. Hence Banks and Solander’s avid botanical activity was not merely a manifestation of Enlightenment “science”. It was an integral feature of Britain’s colonial and imperial ambitions. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311301/original/file-20200122-117962-7d0ad5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311301/original/file-20200122-117962-7d0ad5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311301/original/file-20200122-117962-7d0ad5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=953&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311301/original/file-20200122-117962-7d0ad5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=953&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311301/original/file-20200122-117962-7d0ad5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=953&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311301/original/file-20200122-117962-7d0ad5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1197&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311301/original/file-20200122-117962-7d0ad5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1197&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311301/original/file-20200122-117962-7d0ad5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1197&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"><em>Banksia ericifolia</em> was one of the many species given a new name by Banks.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Natural History Museum</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Throughout the Endeavour’s voyage, Banks, Solander, and their assistants collected more than 30,000 plant specimens, naming more than 1,400 species. </p>
<p>By doing so, they were claiming new ground for European knowledge, just as Cook meticulously charted the coastlines of territories he claimed for His Majesty, King George III. Together they extended a new dispensation, inscribed in new names for places and for plants written over the ones that were already there. </p>
<p>Long after the Endeavour returned to Britain, Banks testified before two House of Commons committees in 1779 and 1785 that “Botany Bay” would be an “advantageous” site for a new penal colony. Among his reasons for this conclusion were not only its botanical qualities – fertile soils, abundant trees and grasses – but its virtual emptiness. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/from-captain-cook-to-the-first-fleet-how-botany-bay-was-chosen-over-africa-as-a-new-british-penal-colony-128002">From Captain Cook to the First Fleet: how Botany Bay was chosen over Africa as a new British penal colony</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Turning emptiness to empire</h2>
<p>When Banks described in his own Endeavour journal the land Cook had named “New South Wales”, he recalled: “This immense tract of Land … is thinly inhabited even to admiration …”. It was the science of botany that connected emptiness and empire to the Enlightened pursuit of knowledge. </p>
<p>One of Banks’s correspondents was the Scottish botanist and professor of natural history, John Walker. Botany, Walker wrote, was one of the “few Sciences” that “can promise any discovery or improvement”. Botany was the scientific means to master the global emporium of commodities on which empire grew. </p>
<p>Botany was also the reason why it had not been necessary for Banks or Solander to affirm the land on which they trod was empty. For in a very real sense, their science presupposed it. The land, its plants and its people were theirs to name and thereby claim by “discovery”. </p>
<p>When Walker reflected on his own botanical expeditions in the Scottish Highlands, he described them as akin to voyages of discovery to lands as “inanimate & unfrequented as any in the Terra australis”. </p>
<p>As we reflect on the 250-year commemoration of Cook’s landing in Australia, we ought also to consider his companions Banks and Solander, and their science of turning supposed emptiness to empire.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/128469/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bruce Buchan receives research funding from the Swedish Foundation for the Humanities and Social Sciences, and from the Swedish Research Council, for two projects with Dr Linda Andersson Burnett: ‘The Borders of Humanity: Linnaean Natural Historians and the Colonial Legacies of Enlightenment’ (P15-0423:1) 2016-19, and 'Collecting Mankind: Prehistory, Race and Instructions for ‘Scientific Travelers’, circa 1750-1850' (2019-03358) 2020-24.</span></em></p>Botany was an integral feature of Britain’s colonial and imperial ambitions.Bruce Buchan, Associate Professor, Griffith UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1267512020-04-28T19:54:32Z2020-04-28T19:54:32ZCooking the books: how re-enactments of the Endeavour’s voyage perpetuate myths of Australia’s ‘discovery’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/309582/original/file-20200113-103971-r8lxn7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C5%2C3468%2C2273&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Kath Walker (Oodgeroo Noonuccal) with Doug Nicholls on Frenchman's Beach, La Perouse, on April 29 1970. During the Cook bicentenary protest, activists declared a day of mourning for Aboriginal nations.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Image from the Tribune collection from the 1970 Cook Bi-centenary protest, to be featured in the State Library of NSW's upcoming exhibition 'Eight Days in Gamay.'</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a> and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<p><em>Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised this article contains names and images of deceased people.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>Prime Minister Scott Morrison stumbled on the word “re-enactment” when outlining his government’s (now <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/captain-cook-250th-anniversary-voyage-suspended-due-to-coronavirus">suspended</a>) plans for commemorating the 250th anniversary of Captain James Cook’s mythologised “discovery” of Australia. </p>
<p>Certainly, the planned route of the replica HMB Endeavour with 39 stops (and funded at A$6.7 million) could not be described as such: Cook never circumnavigated mainland Australia nor visited Tasmania on the Endeavour. </p>
<p>Morrison quickly clarified that the only gesture of historical accuracy would be a <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-22/endeavour-replica-to-sail-around-australia/10734998">“retracing”</a> of Cook’s voyage up the eastern seaboard. </p>
<p>Historical <a href="https://www.sea.museum/2015/05/11/commemoration-and-contestation-at-kurnell/">re-enactments</a> of Cook’s landing are not new to settler Australia. They have focused on Cook’s landfall at Botany Bay, south of Sydney, where the Endeavour’s crew first stepped onto the continent on April 29 1770. </p>
<p>His <a href="http://southseas.nla.gov.au/journals/cook/17700429.html">journal</a> recorded they were greeted by two Dharawal men “who seem’d resolved to oppose our landing”. Cook fired his musket at the men three times, including aiming directly, forcing their retreat. </p>
<p>Cook’s active role in British hostility to Aboriginal peoples was erased from subsequent performances of the Botany Bay landing. </p>
<p>These have also been embellished with Cook claiming the east coast of Australia — this actually occurred some months later at Possession Island in the Torres Strait. </p>
<p>Such popular “re-enactments” of national “foundation moments” have elements of fantasy, compressing time and history into palatable narratives for mainstream Australia. </p>
<h2>The history of Cook re-enactments</h2>
<p>Cook’s arrival was commemorated as early as 1822, when Sydney’s Philosophical Society erected a plaque at Kurnell, on the headland of Botany Bay. By 1864, the Australian Patriotic Association had located the “exact” site a kilometre away. </p>
<p>Following the 1870 centenary of Cook’s landfall, annual pro-British “celebrations” at Botany Bay involved the presence of the governor, flag-raising, gun salutes, and military displays. </p>
<p>In a society eager to erase its convict stain, Cook was a more acceptable founder than Governor Arthur Phillip, who had established the penal colony in Sydney Cove in 1788. </p>
<p>Considerable confusion existed then – and continues today — about the historical roles of Cook and Phillip. Even during the 1888 Centennial of the First Fleet, the largest triumphal arch in Sydney was adorned with Cook’s image and a model of the Endeavour. </p>
<p>The inauguration of the Commonwealth of Australia in January 1901 provided the impetus for a major re-enactment at Kurnell, headlined as the “Second Coming of Cook”. The spectacle attracted a crowd of over 5,000, with 1,000 enjoying a champagne luncheon in an enormous marquee. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310829/original/file-20200120-118343-9ce99k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310829/original/file-20200120-118343-9ce99k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=777&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310829/original/file-20200120-118343-9ce99k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=777&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310829/original/file-20200120-118343-9ce99k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=777&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310829/original/file-20200120-118343-9ce99k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=977&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310829/original/file-20200120-118343-9ce99k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=977&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310829/original/file-20200120-118343-9ce99k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=977&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Monument of Captain Cook in Kurnell, Sydney.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://maas.museum/observations/2011/10/20/when-did-captain-cook-land-in-australia-and-did-any-changes-in-the-international-date-line-lead-to-a-change-in-dates-in-australia/">Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The re-enactment began with the arrival of the Endeavour, represented by local fishing vessel “Fanny Fisher”. Once ashore, Cook and his sailors and marines encountered 25 Aboriginal men armed with spears and decorated with feathers and ochre. A gun was fired overhead, then Cook ordered a sailor to shoot at the Aborigines before making his imperial claim on the continent. Cook, Joseph Banks and a nymph symbolising Australia gave speeches on the “greatness” and unity of the Britannia of the Southern Ocean. </p>
<p>Although an Aboriginal community lived at La Perouse on the opposite shore of Botany Bay, the re-enactment involved a troupe of Indigenous men from Queensland. They were directed by parliamentarian and entrepreneur Archibald Meston, who had previously toured Indigenous performers in his “Wild Australia” show. </p>
<p>It is unknown under what circumstances the Aboriginal men were recruited for the Federation re-enactment, or if they were paid. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314889/original/file-20200212-61935-1xmhqpg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314889/original/file-20200212-61935-1xmhqpg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314889/original/file-20200212-61935-1xmhqpg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314889/original/file-20200212-61935-1xmhqpg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314889/original/file-20200212-61935-1xmhqpg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=551&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314889/original/file-20200212-61935-1xmhqpg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=551&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314889/original/file-20200212-61935-1xmhqpg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=551&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Landing of Captain Cook at Botany Bay, 1770, by E. Phillips Fox (1902)</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">National Gallery of Victoria</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Despite dramatising a beach-side skirmish between the Aborigines and British, the Federation performance cemented Cook as the conquering peacemaker. This was promoted by E. Phillips Fox, who was commissioned by the National Gallery of Victoria to paint The Landing of Captain Cook at Botany Bay, 1770 (1902). </p>
<p>This <a href="https://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/explore/collection/work/5576">monumental work</a> is a tableau – or frozen re-enactment — of Cook striding purposefully up the beach, stretching out his hand as he takes territorial possession. It was widely reproduced and circulated, becoming the best-known and influential image of Cook’s landing across Australia.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/an-honest-reckoning-with-captain-cooks-legacy-wont-heal-things-overnight-but-its-a-start-130389">An honest reckoning with Captain Cook's legacy won't heal things overnight. But it's a start</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<h2>The evolution of performances</h2>
<p>Throughout the first half of the 20th century, the anniversary of the Endeavour’s arrival at Botany Bay was marked by performative gestures to the past. Dignitaries arrived by steamship, coming ashore to give speeches situating Cook as founder of the nation. </p>
<p>For instance, in 1930 at the height of the Depression, spectators were exhorted to “practice self-denial and self-reliance as exemplified in Captain Cook’s exploits”. </p>
<p>Although a full-scale re-enactment was staged in 1951 for the Federation jubilee, interest in Cook waned and the formalities were abandoned. </p>
<p>This changed dramatically in 1970, with the bicentenary of Cook’s Australian landing. Cook was suddenly everywhere, with government funding supporting pageants, memorials and other Cook novelties around the nation. </p>
<p>The nationalistic climax of months of events was an elaborate re-enactment at Kurnell, performed for the visiting Queen Elizabeth and her entourage. Directed by musical theatre aficionado Hayes Gordon, the spectacle was designed for global television, with actors selected after a nationwide search. Held on “Discovery Day”, it attracted a crowd of over 50,000 people. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311315/original/file-20200122-117933-1r42hda.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311315/original/file-20200122-117933-1r42hda.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=931&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311315/original/file-20200122-117933-1r42hda.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=931&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311315/original/file-20200122-117933-1r42hda.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=931&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311315/original/file-20200122-117933-1r42hda.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1170&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311315/original/file-20200122-117933-1r42hda.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1170&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311315/original/file-20200122-117933-1r42hda.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1170&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Re-enactment of the first fleet arrival in Domain, Sydney, in 1938.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/Stories/2018/The-Domain-Sydney-s-stage">The Royal Botanical Gardens Sydney</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Promoted as portraying the “birth of modern Australia”, this re-enactment capitalised on the groundswell of popular interest in Australia’s past. Emphasis was placed on historical accuracy, although nothing challenged the well-established nonsense of Cook’s party briefly confronting Indigenous peoples before peacefully claiming the continent. </p>
<p>To show how far the nation had progressed, “multicultural” schoolchildren and boy scouts and girl guides rose and fell in waves along the beach. </p>
<h2>Protesting and mourning</h2>
<p>Amid this “celebration”, diverse Aboriginal protests were under way, although they were little covered by the press. </p>
<p>At La Perouse, Aboriginal poet and activist Oodgeroo Noonuccal (Kath Walker) was among hundreds of protesters who boycotted the re-enactment and released funeral wreaths into the sea.</p>
<p>A silent vigil had been held the night before, and a “day of mourning” was observed at Sydney Town Hall and in other Australian cities. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/309580/original/file-20200113-103994-1rkkthz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/309580/original/file-20200113-103994-1rkkthz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/309580/original/file-20200113-103994-1rkkthz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309580/original/file-20200113-103994-1rkkthz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309580/original/file-20200113-103994-1rkkthz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309580/original/file-20200113-103994-1rkkthz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309580/original/file-20200113-103994-1rkkthz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309580/original/file-20200113-103994-1rkkthz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wreaths thrown into Botany Bay to mark the day of mourning, April 29 1970.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Image from the Tribune collection from the 1970 Cook Bicentenary protest, featured in the State Library of NSW's upcoming exhibition, Eight Days in Gamay, opening late April.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 1970, a second re-enactment was held in Cooktown, also witnessed by the queen. The original Endeavour had spent seven weeks there, undergoing repairs after running into the Great Barrier Reef. </p>
<p>Cooktown has a long record of Cook-related performances, though initially these were sporadic. But from 1960, the Cooktown Re-enactment Association organised an annual event. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6076mu47pfk">performances</a> evolved from a battle with Aboriginal people to Cook landing and taking possession and, more recently, celebrations of acts of conciliation. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310832/original/file-20200120-69543-sx8ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310832/original/file-20200120-69543-sx8ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310832/original/file-20200120-69543-sx8ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310832/original/file-20200120-69543-sx8ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310832/original/file-20200120-69543-sx8ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310832/original/file-20200120-69543-sx8ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310832/original/file-20200120-69543-sx8ar8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Queen Elizabeth greeted by a group of Indigenous children at a ceremony marking the bicentenary of Cook’s arrival in Cooktown.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-25/queen-in-cooktown,1970/10749604">www.abc.net.au</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Future direction: same old or new path forward?</h2>
<p>Until coronavirus and social distancing made all public events impossible, the federal government had slated to spend A$5.45 million on the <a href="https://cooktown2020.com/program/">Cooktown 2020 Expo</a>, including a re-enactment of the landing of Captain Cook and his interactions with the Guugu Yimithirr bama. </p>
<p>As this historical overview of over a century of re-enactments of Cook’s landing has shown, these events have served to reinforce Australia’s imperial and British connections. They ignore the violence of Cook’s encounters with Aboriginal people and Indigenous resistance, and perpetuate the myth of Cook’s discovery of Australia.</p>
<p><em>You can hear Kate Darian-Smith discussing these ideas in an episode of our podcast, Trust Me, I’m An Expert, over <a href="https://theconversation.com/250-years-since-captain-cook-landed-in-australia-its-time-to-acknowledge-the-violence-of-first-encounters-132098">here</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/126751/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kate Darian-Smith has received numerous grants from the Australian Research Council to investigatesAustralian cultural history. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Katrina Schlunke has received funding from the Australian Research Council.</span></em></p>Re-enactments of James Cook’s arrival in Australia have served only to gloss over the violence of his interactions with Indigenous people and elevate Australia’s imperial and British connections.Kate Darian-Smith, Executive Dean and Pro Vice-Chancellor, College of Arts, Law and Education, University of TasmaniaKatrina Schlunke, Associate professor, University of TasmaniaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1270252020-04-28T19:53:25Z2020-04-28T19:53:25ZCaptain Cook wanted to introduce British justice to Indigenous people. Instead, he became increasingly cruel and violent<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314923/original/file-20200212-61941-3fsi3l.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">'Death of Captain Cook' by George Carter. 1781. Oil on canvas. The painting depicts the killing of Cook during a skirmish with Hawaiians on his third Pacific voyage in 1779.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">National Library of Australia collection</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a> and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<p><em>Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised this article contains names and images of deceased people.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>In The Apotheosis of Captain Cook, anthropologist Gananath Obeyesekere describes James Cook as a <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=r7uMcVV0J-UC&lpg=PA30&ots=wZsXlFm9Xk&dq=shot%20an%20Indian%20in%20the%20side%20with%20small%20shot%20as%20he%20was%20escaping%20from%20the%20ships%20he%20having%20committed%20theft%E2%80%99&pg=PA11#v=snippet&q=kurtz&f=false">Kurtz-like figure</a>, inspired by Joseph Conrad’s novella Heart of Darkness. </p>
<p>He suggests Cook initially saw himself as an enlightened “civiliser”, bringing a new vision of the world to the so-called “savage lands” of the South Seas. </p>
<p>But over the course of his three voyages, Cook instead came to embody the “savagery” he ostensibly despised, indulging in increasingly tyrannical, punitive and violent treatment of Indigenous people in the Pacific.</p>
<p>Cook’s evolution was triggered by Indigenous people’s seeming refusal to embrace the gift of civilisation he offered, such as livestock and garden beds sown with Western crops and a justice system modelled after Britain’s. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-failure-to-say-hello-how-captain-cook-blundered-his-first-impression-with-indigenous-people-126673">A failure to say hello: how Captain Cook blundered his first impression with Indigenous people</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>After revisiting Tahiti on his third voyage, <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=hjoq16FG6mYC&lpg=PA214&dq=james%20cook%20%22neither%20new%20arts%20nor%20improvements%20in%20the%20old%22&pg=PA214#v=onepage&q=james%20cook%20%22neither%20new%20arts%20nor%20improvements%20in%20the%20old%22&f=false">he was dismayed to discover</a> that despite a decade of European encounters and exchanges, he nonetheless found </p>
<blockquote>
<p>neither new arts nor improvements in the old, nor have they copied after us in any one thing.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>He became increasingly frustrated by their determination to maintain their own laws and manners, especially their tendency to “steal”.</p>
<h2>‘Hints’ for fostering good relations</h2>
<p>For his first expedition on the Endeavour, Cook received a document called <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=mIk8x6lsusQC&lpg=PA150&ots=wUkWPvZkPB&dq=Hints%20offered%20to%20the%20consideration%20of%20Captain%20Cooke%2C%20Mr%20Bankes%2C%20Doctor%20Solander%2C%20and%20the%20other%20Gentlemen%20who%20go%20upon%20the%20Expedition%20on%20Board%20the%20Endeavour%E2%80%99&pg=PA150#v=onepage&q=Hints%20offered%20to%20the%20consideration%20of%20Captain%20Cooke,%20Mr%20Bankes,%20Doctor%20Solander,%20and%20the%20other%20Gentlemen%20who%20go%20upon%20the%20Expedition%20on%20Board%20the%20Endeavour%E2%80%99&f=false">Hints</a> prepared by the Earl of Morton, president of the Royal Society, providing advice on how to deal with Indigenous people. </p>
<p>The earl reminded Cook’s crew that Indigenous peoples were the “legal possessors of the several regions they inhabit” and </p>
<blockquote>
<p>No European Nation has the right to occupy any part of their country … without their voluntary consent. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>He also advised Cook and his naturalists to:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Exercise the utmost patience and forbearance with respect to the Natives of the several lands where the ship may touch. To check the petulance of the Sailors and restrain the wanton use of Fire Arms. To have it still in view that shedding the blood of these people is a crime of the highest nature.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Cook decided the best way to prevent violence and foster good relations with Indigenous people he encountered was to demonstrate the “superiority” of European weapons, <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=AUw9AAAAYAAJ&lpg=PA223&ots=c9izgcMZ20&dq=once%20they%20are%20sensible%20of%20these%20things%2C%20a%20regard%20for%20their%20own%20safety%20will%20deter%20them%20from%20disturbing%20you&pg=PA223#v=onepage&q=once%20they%20are%20sensible%20of%20these%20things,%20a%20regard%20for%20their%20own%20safety%20will%20deter%20them%20from%20disturbing%20you&f=false">assuming</a> </p>
<blockquote>
<p>once they are sensible of these things, a regard for their own safety will deter them from disturbing you.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/309609/original/file-20200113-103990-irhoth.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/309609/original/file-20200113-103990-irhoth.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=748&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309609/original/file-20200113-103990-irhoth.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=748&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309609/original/file-20200113-103990-irhoth.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=748&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309609/original/file-20200113-103990-irhoth.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=940&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309609/original/file-20200113-103990-irhoth.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=940&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/309609/original/file-20200113-103990-irhoth.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=940&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A passage from Hints.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.nla.gov.au/cook-and-the-pacific/navigating-the-pacific">National Library of Australia, Papers of Sir Joseph Banks</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Cook’s early attempts to promote British justice</h2>
<p>Cook was determined, however, to follow Morton’s instructions to the letter and ensure his crew, under threat of punishment, treated Indigenous people respectfully. </p>
<p>He enforced this rule in April 1769 during their first sojourn in Tahiti, when the ship’s butcher threatened to slit the throat of the high chief Te Pau’s wife when she refused to exchange her hatchet for a nail. </p>
<p>Outraged, Te Pau told the botanist Joseph Banks, with whom he had developed a close relationship. Cook then ordered the butcher to be publicly flogged in front of the Tahitians so they could witness British justice. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/they-are-all-dead-for-indigenous-people-cooks-voyage-of-discovery-was-a-ghostly-visitation-126430">'They are all dead': for Indigenous people, Cook's voyage of 'discovery' was a ghostly visitation</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Yet, instead of being satisfied, the <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=2TbeAgAAQBAJ&lpg=PA107&ots=d-g6gVKBmq&dq=made%20a%20very%20Pathetick%20speech%20to%20the%20Ships%20Company&pg=PA107#v=onepage&q=made%20a%20very%20Pathetick%20speech%20to%20the%20Ships%20Company&f=false">Tahitians were appalled</a> to witness this form of corporal punishment. </p>
<p>A few days later, Cook’s resolve to maintain peaceful relations was tested again <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=j62v1iyuKqIC&lpg=PR1&pg=PA72#v=onepage&q=was%20some%20kind%20of%20ritual%20treasure%E2%80%99&f=false">when their quadrant was stolen from a guarded tent</a>. This scientific instrument was essential for observing the transit of Venus, a central aim of the expedition. </p>
<p>According to Cook’s journal, his <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=hjoq16FG6mYC&lpg=PA30&dq=seize%20upon%20Tootaha%20and%20some%20others%20of%20the%20Principle%20people%20and%20keep%20them%20in%20custody%20until%20the%20Quadt%20was%20produce%E2%80%99d&pg=PA30#v=onepage&q=seize%20upon%20Tootaha%20and%20some%20others%20of%20the%20Principle%20people%20and%20keep%20them%20in%20custody%20until%20the%20Quadt%20was%20produce%E2%80%99d&f=false">first response</a> was to “seize upon Tootaha” [Tutaha], the chief of Papara in western Tahiti, or </p>
<blockquote>
<p>some others of the Principle people and keep them in custody until the Quadt was produce’d. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>But he soon realised this would alarm the Tahitians. After realising Tutaha played no role in the theft, Cook ordered his men not to seize him. And Banks, tipped off by Te Pau as to the quadrant’s whereabouts, soon retrieved it.</p>
<p>On these occasions, Cook attempted to demonstrate what he saw as the fairness of British law to the Tahitians.</p>
<p>Johann Reinhold Forster, naturalist on Cook’s second voyage, also <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=r7uMcVV0J-UC&lpg=PA30&ots=wZsXlFm9Xk&dq=shot%20an%20Indian%20in%20the%20side%20with%20small%20shot%20as%20he%20was%20escaping%20from%20the%20ships%20he%20having%20committed%20theft%E2%80%99&pg=PA14#v=onepage&q=forster&f=false">suggested Cook’s reactions were tempered</a> by the presence of the naturalists, who were not subject to his authority.</p>
<h2>A change in temperament</h2>
<p>By his third voyage on the Resolution and Discovery from 1776-80, however, Cook would no longer be so measured in his treatment of Indigenous people. </p>
<p>This was evident during his almost three-month stay in Tonga, then known as the Friendly Islands.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314890/original/file-20200212-61925-xi3f7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/314890/original/file-20200212-61925-xi3f7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=394&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314890/original/file-20200212-61925-xi3f7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=394&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314890/original/file-20200212-61925-xi3f7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=394&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314890/original/file-20200212-61925-xi3f7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=495&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314890/original/file-20200212-61925-xi3f7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=495&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/314890/original/file-20200212-61925-xi3f7y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=495&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Chart of the Friendly Isles, published in 1777.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In May 1777, Cook visited Nomuka, and after exchanging gifts with the leading chief, Tupoulangi, he set up a market where the British received great stores of fresh meat and fruit.</p>
<p>Despite the efforts of both Cook and Tupoulangi to ensure order in the market, however, thefts still occurred. </p>
<p>On <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=TmZQDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PA865&dq=not%20releas%E2%80%99d%20till%20a%20large%20hog%20was%20brought%20for%20his%20ransom&pg=PA865#v=onepage&q=not%20releas%E2%80%99d%20till%20a%20large%20hog%20was%20brought%20for%20his%20ransom&f=false">one occasion</a>, an islander was caught trying to steal a small winch used to make rope, and Cook “ordered him a dozen lashes”. After the man was “severely flogg’d”, his hands were tied behind his back and he was carried to the market where he was </p>
<blockquote>
<p>not releas’d till a large hog was brought for his ransom.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>William Anderson, a surgeon on the expedition, thought the lashes were a justifiable punishment and deterrent. However, he <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=Ty4rDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PA101&dq=james%20cooknot%20be%20found%20consonant%20with%20the%20principles%20of%20justice%20or%20humanity&pg=PA101#v=onepage&q&f=false">said what came after</a> would</p>
<blockquote>
<p>not be found consonant with the principles of justice or humanity. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Cook later complained the chiefs were ordering their servants to steal from the market and “floging [sic] made no more impression” on them since the chiefs would “often advise us to kill them”. </p>
<p>Reluctant to resort to execution for stealing, Cook’s crew soon found an alternative method of punishment: shaving the heads of offenders. This, he said, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>was looked upon as a mark of infamy.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>A month later, <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=Ty4rDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PA102&ots=uZrhe4pF6K&dq=cook%20journal%20we%20had%20quite%20exhausted%20the%20island%20of%20all%20most%20every%20thing%20it%20produced%E2%80%99&pg=PA102#v=onepage&q=cook%20journal%20we%20had%20quite%20exhausted%20the%20island%20of%20all%20most%20every%20thing%20it%20produced%E2%80%99&f=false">the expedition moved to the island Tongatapu</a>. Here, there was a radical shift in Cook’s conduct. As anthropologist Anne Salmond described it, he was “<a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=j62v1iyuKqIC&lpg=PR1&pg=PA338#v=onepage&q=guilty%20of%20great%20cruelty&f=false">guilty of great cruelty</a>” even in the eyes of his own men.</p>
<p>Historian John Beaglehole believes Cook was “<a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=YCQxDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PT893&ots=jcvX6K7V4h&dq=james%20cook%20at%20his%20wits%E2%80%99%20end&pg=PT894#v=onepage&q=james%20cook%20at%20his%20wits%E2%80%99%20end&f=false">at his wits’ end</a>” by the thievery at Tongatapu and responded by applying “the lash as he had never done before”. </p>
<p>Instead of shaving the heads of thieves, Cook again ordered them to be severely flogged and ransomed.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/my-ancestors-met-cook-in-aotearoa-250-years-ago-for-us-its-time-to-reinterpret-a-painful-history-128771">My ancestors met Cook in Aotearoa 250 years ago. For us, it's time to reinterpret a painful history</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Cut-throat retribution</h2>
<p>The Discovery’s master, Thomas Edgar, <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=r7uMcVV0J-UC&lpg=PA30&dq=shot%20an%20Indian%20in%20the%20side%20with%20small%20shot%20as%20he%20was%20escaping%20from%20the%20ships%20he%20having%20committed%20theft%E2%80%99&pg=PA30#v=onepage&q=shot%20an%20Indian%20in%20the%20side%20with%20small%20shot%20as%20he%20was%20escaping%20from%20the%20ships%20he%20having%20committed%20theft%E2%80%99&f=false">kept a tally of these punishments</a> and noted that in a two-week span, eight men were punished with 24-72 lashes apiece for stealing items such as a “tumbler and two wine glasses”. </p>
<p>Cook even punished his own men with the maximum 12 lashes for “neglect of duty” when thefts happened on their watch. </p>
<p>He also resorted to punishments which midshipman George Gilbert deemed “<a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=Ty4rDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PA132&dq=cutting%20off%20their%20ears%3B%20firing%20at%20them%20with%20small%20shot%3B%20or%20ball%20as%20they%20were%20swimming%20or%20paddling%20to%20the%20shore%3B%20and%20suffering%20the%20people%20(as%20he%20rowed%20after%20them)%20to%20beat%20them%20with%20the%20oars%3B%20and%20stick%20the%20boat%20hook%20into%20them%3B%20wherever%20he%20could%20hit%20them&pg=PA132#v=onepage&q=cutting%20off%20their%20ears;%20firing%20at%20them%20with%20small%20shot;%20or%20ball%20as%20they%20were%20swimming%20or%20paddling%20to%20the%20shore;%20and%20suffering%20the%20people%20(as%20he%20rowed%20after%20them)%20to%20beat%20them%20with%20the%20oars;%20and%20stick%20the%20boat%20hook%20into%20them;%20wherever%20he%20could%20hit%20them&f=false">unbecoming of a European</a>”, including:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>cutting off their ears; fireing at them with small shot; or ball as they were swimming or paddling to the shore; and suffering the people (as he rowed after them) to beat them with the oars; and stick the boat hook into them; wherever he could hit them</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Edgar described <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=ElSpOmbJeIkC&lpg=PA99&dq=%22after%20this%20a%20strange%20punishment%20was%20inflicted%20on%20the%20man%20which%20received%20siz%20dozen%20as%20captain%20cooke&pg=PA99#v=onepage&q=%22after%20this%20a%20strange%20punishment%20was%20inflicted%20on%20the%20man%20which%20received%20siz%20dozen%20as%20captain%20cooke&f=false">how one Tongan prisoner</a> who received 72 lashes and then was dealt “a strange punishment” by </p>
<blockquote>
<p>scoring both his Arms with a common Knife by one of our Seamen Longitudinally and transversly [sic], into the Bone.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This horrific and excessive carving of crosses into the man’s shoulders is most reminiscent of Kurtz in Heart of Darkness. </p>
<h2>Blind hypocrisy</h2>
<p>Cook’s increasingly violent punishments reflected his sheer frustration over the refusal of Indigenous people to recognise the superiority of Western ways and Europeans’ concepts of property. </p>
<p>Of course, while they were very <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=j62v1iyuKqIC&lpg=PR1&pg=PA78#v=onepage&q=furious%20about%20these%20thefts&f=false">protective and jealous of their own possessions</a>, Cook and his crew were blind to any Indigenous concepts of property. </p>
<p>As he journeyed through the Pacific, Cook, like other European voyagers, freely collected water and fruit, netted fish and turtles, hunted birds and game and cut down trees for wood, never thinking Indigenous people would regard these valuable resources as their property nor construe such actions as theft.</p>
<p>When the expedition reached Endeavour River, near present-day Cooktown in far-north Queensland, the Guugu Yimithirr people tried to reclaim turtles Cook’s men had fished from their waters. They were rebuffed by Cook’s men and angrily set fires in retaliation. </p>
<p>Cook, however, did not recognise this as punishment or retribution for the stolen turtles. <a href="http://southseas.nla.gov.au/journals/cook/17700719.html">Instead he thought their actions were “troublesome”</a>, so was </p>
<blockquote>
<p>obliged to fire a musquet load[ed] with small short at some of the ri[n]g leaders.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Throughout his voyages, Cook faithfully followed the Earl of Morton’s advice to show off the superiority of European might, but he increasingly failed “<a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=mIk8x6lsusQC&lpg=PA150&dq=Hints%20offered%20to%20the%20consideration%20of%20Captain%20Cooke%2C%20Mr%20Bankes%2C%20Doctor%20Solander%2C%20and%20the%20other%20Gentlemen%20who%20go%20upon%20the%20Expedition%20on%20Board%20the%20Endeavour%E2%80%99&pg=PA150#v=onepage&q=to%20check%20the%20petulance%20of%20the%20sailors&f=false">to check</a>” his own “petulance” and “restrain the wanton use of Fire Arms”.</p>
<p>Most, significantly, through his administering of rough justice against Indigenous people for apparent thieving, Cook forgot Morton’s edict that </p>
<blockquote>
<p>shedding the blood of these people is a crime of the highest nature.</p>
</blockquote><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/127025/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Shino Konishi researches histories of cross-cultural encounters in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Australia and receives funding from the Australian Research Council. She is a Yawuru descendant of the Broome area.
</span></em></p>Over the course of his three voyages, Cook was frustrated by the refusal of Indigenous people to embrace Western ways. He grew increasingly punitive, embodying the ‘savagery’ he ostensibly despised.Shino Konishi, ARC Research Fellow, The University of Western AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1344042020-04-27T23:04:11Z2020-04-27T23:04:11ZMake no mistake: Cook’s voyages were part of a military mission to conquer and expand<p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a> and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>The military nature of the Endeavour’s voyage – as part of an aggressive reconnaissance and defence against Indigenous resistance – has historically been overlooked or downplayed. </p>
<p>But musket fire was used many times to teach lessons of British military superiority. Violence underscored almost all of Cook’s Pacific encounters with Indigenous peoples. </p>
<p>In the broader strategic sense – as all 18th and early 19th century scientific voyages were – Cook’s voyages were part of a European drive to conquer. The aim was to claim resources and trade in support of the British Empire’s expansion. </p>
<p>At its heart, Cook’s first voyage was first and foremost a Royal Navy expedition and he was chosen as a military commander who had a background in mathematics and cartography. </p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/cook250-78244"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/328303/original/file-20200416-192709-qmy2nf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=113&fit=crop&dpr=2" alt="A new series from The Conversation." width="100%"></a></p>
<h2>Imperial science and ‘ships of force’</h2>
<p>During the “great age” of Pacific voyaging, expeditions always had several goals at once.</p>
<p>Cook’s first voyage in 1769 occurred during the perennial cold war of Anglo-French rivalry after what has been regarded as the first global conflict, the Seven Years War (1756-1763). This was also at the height of the promotion of <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/20078549?seq=1">“imperial science”</a> – the idea that scientific advancement and colonial expansion were twin goals. </p>
<p>As industrialisation drove upheaval in Europe, scientific “discovery” was seen as a critical part of establishing, developing and controlling an empire. </p>
<p>The seeds of Cook’s “<a href="https://www.nla.gov.au/content/secret">secret instructions</a>” to seek out the fabled southern continent were sown by an astronomer, Professor <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Hornsby">Thomas Hornsby</a>. </p>
<p>In 1766 Hornsby called for a “settlement in the great Pacific Ocean” led by “<a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=-0kh4coN-mQC&lpg=PA4&dq=professor%20thomas%20hornsby%20ships%20of%20force&pg=PA4#v=onepage&q=professor%20thomas%20hornsby%20ships%20of%20force&f=false">some ships of force</a>”. This expedition would be advantageous to astronomers, but also “add a lustre” to a nation already distinguished “both in arts and arms”. It seemed a natural fit to the scientist Hornsby that the Royal Navy spearhead a British presence in the Pacific. </p>
<p>Even Cook, as was expected of any sea-going commander visiting distant stations, made military reconnaissance notes. </p>
<p>In November 1768, when the Endeavour reprovisioned at Rio de Janeiro, the local Viceroy was <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=D1MEAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA18&lpg=PA18&dq=Rio+de+Janeiro++suspicious+james+cook&source=bl&ots=tYMVWgO0zg&sig=ACfU3U1pCV1RBV2qVpsoeAiIeca_mNY5aQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjF2KuMm4fnAhVJU30KHZObAKgQ6AEwDXoECAgQAQ#v=onepage&q=Rio%20de%20Janeiro%20%20suspicious%20james%20cook&f=false">suspicious</a> of a voyage supposedly to observe the transit of Venus. He suspected Cook of seeking to extend British influence in the Pacific.</p>
<p>Cook duly <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=Ylw7DwAAQBAJ&pg=PT114&lpg=PT114&dq=it+would+require+five+or+Six+sail+of+the+Line+to+insure+Success&source=bl&ots=DMfyKIE1LC&sig=ACfU3U0dMqlVDQSNKX6OdSEWlsSaBLE8mg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjz_ealm4fnAhVSaCsKHVGkBNkQ6AEwAHoECAUQAQ#v=onepage&q=it%20would%20require%20five%20or%20Six%20sail%20of%20the%20Line%20to%20insure%20Success&f=false">noted</a> in his journal the state of local defences in and around Rio de Janeiro and that </p>
<blockquote>
<p>it would require five or Six sail of the Line to insure Success.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Cook felt insulted at being carefully watched and had a low opinion of the Viceroy’s scientific ignorance. But, in fact, the Viceroy was correct. </p>
<p>After opening his supplementary instructions (so-called “<a href="https://www.foundingdocs.gov.au/resources/transcripts/nsw1_doc_1768.pdf">secret orders</a>” issued by the British Navy) Cook headed off to attempt to find and claim for Great Britain the supposed southern land thought to exist in the vast southern ocean. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-stories-of-tupaia-and-omai-and-their-vital-role-as-captain-cooks-unsung-shipmates-126674">The stories of Tupaia and Omai and their vital role as Captain Cook's unsung shipmates</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Policy emanated from the barrel of a gun</h2>
<p>Every European ship that voyaged the Pacific was, in the first instance, a floating fortress; an independent command with the ability to send out small shore parties or to concentrate firepower as needed. </p>
<p>And this was at the heart of all contact, all encounters, all attempts at communication with Pacific and other peoples. Make no mistake, restraint in British policy and conduct with Indigenous peoples in the Pacific emanated from the barrel of a gun. </p>
<p>Cook’s voyaging did not take place on a blank canvas, but across a rich tapestry of thriving, voyaging cultures that were ultimately the target of European aggression.</p>
<p>Cook has often been feted as one of the few 18th century voyaging captains renowned for his “tolerance” of Indigenous people and cultures. But ultimately, this was a tactic used in pursuit of domination. The best military commander only rarely has to resort to open conflict.</p>
<h2>A lesson learned well before Cook</h2>
<p>Cannon – such as those Cook <a href="http://southseas.nla.gov.au/journals/cook/17700611.html">dumped overboard</a> to lighten his ship after he struck the Great Barrier Reef in 1770 – make good museum objects and monuments in public parks. </p>
<p>But like those on Cook’s ship the HMB Endeavour, the fact is many cannon on later voyages were hardly used – if ever. The power of artillery fire had been swiftly learned by Pacific peoples since Europeans first arrived in the 1500s, many years before Cook. </p>
<p>Resistance warfare occurred across the Pacific from the 1500s right through to conflicts such as Samoan resistance to German imperial rule in 1908. But like the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_frontier_wars">Australian Frontier Wars</a>, these conflicts have often been neglected by military historians. </p>
<p>Yet conflict across the Pacific was surprisingly inter-connected, and influenced military thinking back in Europe. </p>
<h2>A long history of oceanic warfare and navigation</h2>
<p>One such example is The Battle of Mactan in 1521, in which Indigenous warriors in the Philippines fought and defeated an overconfident, numerically small Spanish force fighting under Portugal’s Ferdinand Magellan (famous for circumnavigating the globe). </p>
<p>And in 1595, the Spanish navigator Alvaro de Mendana was searching for “Terra Australis” when he arrived in the Marquesas Islands. He was met by several hundred canoes and more than 200 Marquesans were killed in the ensuing conflict. </p>
<p>European voyagers were often unaware that many major island groups across the Pacific were in regular communication with each other. </p>
<p>At least 174 years years after the Spanish devastation in the Marquesan islands, Tupaia – the Tahitian priest and navigator with knowledge of more 70 islands in the Pacific – joined the Endeavour voyage, in effect as a pilot and intermediary.</p>
<p>Tupaia drew a map with more than 130 islands on it, and included the Marquesas Islands on it. He described to Cook and Joseph Banks how, in the distant past, four islands were visited by ships similar to the Endeavour. His map drew on Pacific knowledge of previous conflicts and navigation techniques. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310161/original/file-20200115-151867-19jb6w4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310161/original/file-20200115-151867-19jb6w4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310161/original/file-20200115-151867-19jb6w4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310161/original/file-20200115-151867-19jb6w4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310161/original/file-20200115-151867-19jb6w4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310161/original/file-20200115-151867-19jb6w4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310161/original/file-20200115-151867-19jb6w4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310161/original/file-20200115-151867-19jb6w4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tuaia’s first map of the Pacific islands.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=57132308">Wikimedia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When the British captain <a href="http://collections.anmm.gov.au/objects/167740/an-account-of-the-voyages-undertaken-by-the-order-of-his-maj?ctx=7a3a0802-1e40-4d51-b58f-689b8074f980&idx=43">Samuel Wallis</a> arrived at Tahiti in the HMS Dolphin in 1767, just two years before Cook, according to <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books?id=yDd7DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA16&lpg=PA16&dq=Jean-Claude+Teriierooiterai&source=bl&ots=752kS3Y4il&sig=ACfU3U1zeXVf5hkkBWqhzvGuJdfxB2UqQw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjV5bO34oHnAhWs7XMBHek5A3g4ChDoATACegQICBAB#v=onepage&q=Jean-Claude%20Teriierooiterai&f=false">Jean-Claude Teriierooiterai</a>, the Ari’i Amo (king) of Tahiti probably recognised these voyagers as the same white people who had attacked the Marquesans. </p>
<p>Around 100 double war canoes loaded with stones attacked the Dolphin for four days until Wallis fired his cannon into the Tahitian fleet (and at villages ashore for good measure). The Tahitians rightly regarded this firepower as all but invincible and soon became hospitable. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310167/original/file-20200115-151862-1w5c7m4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/310167/original/file-20200115-151862-1w5c7m4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310167/original/file-20200115-151862-1w5c7m4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310167/original/file-20200115-151862-1w5c7m4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310167/original/file-20200115-151862-1w5c7m4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310167/original/file-20200115-151862-1w5c7m4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/310167/original/file-20200115-151862-1w5c7m4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=504&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Attack of Samuel Wallis and his crew aboard The Dolphin by the people of Otaheite, Tahiti.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://lib-dbserver.princeton.edu/visual_materials/maps/websites/pacific/wallis-carteret/wallis-carteret.html">Royal Museums Greenwich</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>When the French voyager Louis-Antoine de Bougainville arrived at Tahiti a year later, he thought the Tahitians the friendliest people in the world, living in a paradise. He did not know that he had Wallis’ cannon fire to thank for his reception. </p>
<p>It is important to remember the military factors in Cook’s and all other voyagers experiences in the Pacific and around Australia. They remind us of what underlined, if not defined, cross-cultural encounter moments. </p>
<p>Addressing the fact that these expeditions were all of a military nature reminds us that European colonisation was resisted from its very first moments.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/134404/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stephen Gapps is a curator at the Australian National Maritime Museum. He is the author of The Sydney Wars: Conflict in the early colony, 1788-1817.</span></em></p>Every European ship that voyaged the Pacific was, in the first instance, a floating fortress, an independent command that could send out small shore parties or to concentrate firepower as needed.Stephen Gapps, Conjoint Lecturer, University of NewcastleLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1299782020-04-25T11:03:55Z2020-04-25T11:03:55ZTall ship tales: oral accounts illuminate past encounters and objects, but we need to get our story straight<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/326324/original/file-20200408-108576-6pvzjk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=68%2C63%2C1698%2C2072&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Two Dharawal men opposing Cook’s arrival at Kurnell.
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Indig2.jpg">Wikimedia</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Captain James Cook arrived in the Pacific 250 years ago, triggering British colonisation of the region. We’re asking researchers to reflect on what happened and how it shapes us today. You can see other stories in the series <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/cook250-78244">here</a> and an interactive <a href="https://cook250.netlify.app/">here</a>.</em></p>
<p><em>Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised this article contains names and images of deceased people.</em></p>
<hr>
<p>In the early Sydney colony, newcomers commonly quizzed Indigenous locals about their <a href="http://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p171301/pdf/article031.pdf">memories</a> of Captain Cook and the Endeavour. </p>
<p>They believed the arrival of a shipload of British men who stayed for a week was an incredibly memorable event; and assumed that details of it would have been preserved — even treasured — over time. </p>
<p>The accounts given are hardly ever a straightforward recounting of what Cook did. And they rarely tally with what is recorded in the voyage accounts. </p>
<p>Rather, they carry those common <a href="https://methods.sagepub.com/foundations/oral-history">qualities</a> of remembering: telescoping, conflating, rearranging time, stripping back detail, and upping symbolism and metaphor. Unpicking the threads of these memories is vital for historians wanting to find agreement on details and interpretations, and provenance of items that changed hands during early encounters. </p>
<p><a href="http://bit.ly/2KmwdQF"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/328303/original/file-20200416-192709-qmy2nf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=113&fit=crop&dpr=2" alt="A new series from The Conversation." width="100%"></a></p>
<h2>Recollecting memories</h2>
<p>Some oral accounts were written down – either at the time they were heard or later. Records reveal accounts extracted out of curiosity, to assist with commemorations, or simply to pass the time. </p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311045/original/file-20200121-187186-1kvgctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311045/original/file-20200121-187186-1kvgctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311045/original/file-20200121-187186-1kvgctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=1101&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311045/original/file-20200121-187186-1kvgctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=1101&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311045/original/file-20200121-187186-1kvgctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=1101&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311045/original/file-20200121-187186-1kvgctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1384&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311045/original/file-20200121-187186-1kvgctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1384&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311045/original/file-20200121-187186-1kvgctj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1384&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Efforts are underway to clarify the history and provenance of items like this bark shield, held by The British Museum.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://research.britishmuseum.org/join_in/using_digital_images/using_digital_images.aspx?asset_id=585093001&objectId=490919&partId=1">The British Museum</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>One account comes from the early 1830s. Two priests stationed at St Mary’s Cathedral near Sydney’s Domain met an Aboriginal man from Botany Bay. They asked him “if he had any recollections of the landing of Captain Cook”? He was born too late to have witnessed it himself, but he shared a reasonably <a href="https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/13077664?searchTerm=domain%20wall&searchLimits=dateFrom=1863-04-27%7C%7C%7CdateTo=1863-04-27%7C%7C%7Cl-advtitle=35">long story</a> he had inherited from his father, the recollection of which one of the priests later published.</p>
<p>Similarly, in a recent prize-winning <a href="https://www.australianbookreview.com.au/abr-online/archive/2019/371-august-2019-no-413/5667-2019-calibre-essay-prize-winner-nah-doongh-s-song-by-grace-karskens">essay</a>, historian Grace Karskens reconstructs a tantalising conversation between Aboriginal woman Nah Doongh and her settler friend Sarah Shand. </p>
<p>“Shand was intensely curious about Nah Doongh’s memory of her first contact with white people”, Karsken explains, but was frustratingly incapable of seeing she was implicated in the dispossession of Aboriginal people, including Nah Doongh. </p>
<p>Nah Doongh offered her a story about Cook, whom she presented as big and evil, violent and greedy, in a way that anticipates late 20th-century Aboriginal oral narratives.</p>
<p>Cook emerged as an erstwhile topic in cross-cultural conversations across colonial Sydney, but the substance of what was said and why was less dependent on the details of what Cook and his crew had done in 1770 than on the conditions, contexts and purposes of the chats. </p>
<p>As many have noted, <a href="https://timetoeatthedogs.com/2019/05/17/replay-aboriginal-australians-first-encounter-with-captain-cook/">discourses about Cook</a> in Australia are neverending; but their contours and emphases change in relation to – and contribute to change in — broader Australian culture and politics.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/from-captain-cook-to-the-first-fleet-how-botany-bay-was-chosen-over-africa-as-a-new-british-penal-colony-128002">From Captain Cook to the First Fleet: how Botany Bay was chosen over Africa as a new British penal colony</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Who is speaking?</h2>
<p>Sometimes it is not the account given of Cook that is of primary interest, but the identity of the narrator. </p>
<p>Dharawal woman <a href="https://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/giles_biddy">Biddy Giles</a> lived around the Botany Bay area for much of the 19th century. An account she gave of Cook’s landing was written down after her death by a white settler. </p>
<p>He recalled she’d said: “They all run away; two fellows stand; Cook shot them in the legs; and they run away too!”. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311312/original/file-20200122-117962-zdw7d5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=11%2C3%2C1086%2C782&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311312/original/file-20200122-117962-zdw7d5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=11%2C3%2C1086%2C782&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311312/original/file-20200122-117962-zdw7d5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311312/original/file-20200122-117962-zdw7d5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311312/original/file-20200122-117962-zdw7d5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311312/original/file-20200122-117962-zdw7d5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=542&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311312/original/file-20200122-117962-zdw7d5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=542&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311312/original/file-20200122-117962-zdw7d5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=542&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Dharawal woman Biddy Giles (left) with Jim Brown, Joe Brown, Joey, and Jimmy Lowndes.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://digital.sl.nsw.gov.au/delivery/DeliveryManagerServlet?dps_pid=FL3269806&embedded=true&toolbar=false">State Library of NSW</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This economical account is faithful to longer Endeavour voyage renditions. But researchers are more exercised by biographical information showing Giles was briefly married to a much older man, Cooman. Speculation swirls that Cooman’s grandfather, also called Cooman, was one of the two fellows shot. </p>
<p>When historian Heather Goodall in her book <a href="https://www.newsouthbooks.com.au/books/rivers-and-resilience_aboriginal-people-on-sydneys-georges-river/">Rivers and Resilience</a> returned to Giles’ life, she made it clear she thought historians who relied on documentary sources should not attempt such jumps. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/i-spoke-about-dreamtime-i-ticked-a-box-teachers-say-they-lack-confidence-to-teach-indigenous-perspectives-129064">'I spoke about Dreamtime, I ticked a box': teachers say they lack confidence to teach Indigenous perspectives</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Repatriation requests</h2>
<p>Not all researchers have been so circumspect. In 2016, speculations about the identity of one of the two men shot contributed to formal requests to museums in Britain for the return of artefacts either known to have been collected at Botany Bay during the Endeavour voyage (four spears at the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Cambridge) or believed to have been (a shield at the British Museum in London). </p>
<p>The repatriation claim repeated historian <a href="http://www.keepingplace.net.au/2016/09/">Keith Vincent Smith</a>’s assertion one of the two men was Cooman.</p>
<p>When asked for advice on this repatriation request, I (Nugent) concluded there was no consensus about that assertion, noting it was unfortunate that: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>historical claims which derive from inconclusive evidence, are based on questionable interpretative leaps, and are not presented in ways that recognise and respect the complexities of writing “early contact” history from fragmentary sources […] were being relied upon. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Other arguments would serve applications for return far better.</p>
<p>The request was unsuccessful, but the process was productive and generally positive. More work has taken place since, both further historical research and object analysis, and importantly, renewed and enriched relationship-building.</p>
<h2>Building a material history</h2>
<p>Retracing the speculative leaps made between the historical encounters, collected objects, and related written, oral and visual sources reinforces the urgent need for well-resourced, critically reflexive, and multimodal methods of interpretation. This is particularly true when the return of an object and the knowledge it embodies is strongly desired.</p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311047/original/file-20200121-187134-58zrpq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311047/original/file-20200121-187134-58zrpq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311047/original/file-20200121-187134-58zrpq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311047/original/file-20200121-187134-58zrpq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=810&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311047/original/file-20200121-187134-58zrpq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1018&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311047/original/file-20200121-187134-58zrpq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1018&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311047/original/file-20200121-187134-58zrpq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1018&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A variety of fishing spears, shields, stone hatchets, clubs and swords by Charles Alexandre Lesueur (1807)</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://search.sl.nsw.gov.au/primo-explore/search?query=any,contains,b2142884*&vid=SLNSW">Mitchell Collection/State Library of NSW</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This year we will commence a new ARC-funded project, <a href="https://app.dimensions.ai/details/grant/grant.8676651">Mobilising Objects</a> to draw together objects in international collections, images, written records, oral accounts, and contemporary expertise to generate a material history of early colonial Sydney. </p>
<p>The project aims to build knowledge about exceptional, but poorly-documented, Aboriginal objects from Sydney and the NSW coast (circa 1770-1920s) in British and European museums. We hope to build strong relations between Aboriginal communities and overseas museums and lay robust foundations for future projects seeking the return of Indigenous cultural heritage. </p>
<p>Gathering together records of oral accounts given by Aboriginal people about Cook and other seaborne interlopers, and grappling with the interpretive challenges they present, will be a vital aspect of this work.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/129978/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Maria Nugent is an investigator on the ARC Linkage project, 'The Relational Museum and its Objects' (LP150100423).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr Gaye Sculthorpe is an investigator on two active ARC Linkage projects, "The Relational Museum and its Objects;" (LP150100423) and "Collecting the West: How collections create Western Australia" (LP160100078).</span></em></p>Unpicking the threads of the stories told about Captain Cook’s arrival is vital to find agreement on the provenance of materials that changed hands during colonisation.Maria Nugent, Co-Director, Australian Centre for Indigenous History, Australian National UniversityGaye Sculthorpe, Curator & Section Head, Oceania, The British MuseumLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1353152020-04-24T02:58:10Z2020-04-24T02:58:10ZBuried under colonial concrete, Botany Bay has even been robbed of its botany<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329983/original/file-20200423-47810-1hgswxn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=20%2C20%2C4473%2C2970&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The HMS Endeavour’s week-long stay on the shores of <a href="https://australianmuseum.net.au/learn/cultures/atsi-collection/sydney/place-names-chart/">Kamay</a> in 1770 yielded so many botanical specimens unknown to western science, Captain James Cook <a href="https://trove.nla.gov.au/work/8348311?q&sort=holdings+desc&_=1586087209239&versionId=215424905">called</a> the area Botany Bay. </p>
<p>During this visit, the ship’s natural history expert Joseph Banks spoke <a href="https://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/joseph-banks-endeavour-journal">favourably</a> of the landscape, saying it resembled the “moorlands of England” with “knee-high brushes of plants stretching over gentle and treeless hills as far as the eye could see”. </p>
<p>Since then, Kamay has become an icon of Australia’s convict history and emblematic of the dispossession of Indigenous people from country. </p>
<p><a href="http://bit.ly/2KmwdQF"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/328303/original/file-20200416-192709-qmy2nf.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=113&fit=crop&dpr=2" alt="A new series from The Conversation." width="100%"></a></p>
<p>However, memories of the pre-British flora have largely been lost. Ongoing research drawing on <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/environmental-conservation/article/ecological-history-of-lachlan-nature-reserve-centennial-park-sydney-australia-a-palaeoecological-approach-to-conservation/89433C9CADC8596CFB1ACFDFD5B33088">ecological</a> data, and <a href="https://www.gujaga.org.au/">Indigenous</a> and <a href="https://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/about-library/fellowships/merewether-fellowship">European</a> histories, reveals what this environment once looked like. It shows many of the assumptions about the historical landscape we hold today may actually be wrong.</p>
<p>The site better reflects 20th-century European exploitation of the landscape than it does early or pre-British Botany Bay. </p>
<h2>From swamps to suburbs</h2>
<p>Today, the northern shore of Kamay acts as Australia’s gateway to the world. It hosts Australia’s busiest international airport and one of Australia’s largest container ports, major arterial roads and a rapidly <a href="http://stat.data.abs.gov.au/">growing</a> residential population. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/black-skies-and-raging-seas-how-the-first-fleet-got-a-first-taste-of-australias-unforgiving-climate-94168">Black skies and raging seas: how the First Fleet got a first taste of Australia's unforgiving climate</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>From the early 19th century, urban development gradually overprinted a vast network of groundwater-fed swamplands, whose catchment extended north from Kamay to what is now the southern boundary of Sydney’s CBD. </p>
<p>These swamps have largely disappeared under the suburbs, or have been corralled into golf course ponds or narrow wetlands alongside Southern Cross Drive - a sight familiar to anyone who has driven between Sydney city and its airport. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329984/original/file-20200423-47804-46gnkt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329984/original/file-20200423-47804-46gnkt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329984/original/file-20200423-47804-46gnkt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329984/original/file-20200423-47804-46gnkt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329984/original/file-20200423-47804-46gnkt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329984/original/file-20200423-47804-46gnkt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329984/original/file-20200423-47804-46gnkt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329984/original/file-20200423-47804-46gnkt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Kamay holds a rapidly growing residential population.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Viewed by British colonial authorities as both an <a href="https://search.sl.nsw.gov.au/permalink/f/lg5tom/SLNSW_ALMA21106791780002626">unhealthy nuisance</a> and a <a href="https://search.sl.nsw.gov.au/permalink/f/1ocrdrt/SLNSW_ALMA2195526240002626">critical resource</a>, the ever-shrinking wetlands played a crucial role in the <a href="https://search.sl.nsw.gov.au/permalink/f/1ocrdrt/SLNSW_ALMA21137351410002626">water supply</a> and industrial development of early Sydney, before becoming polluted and a <a href="https://search.sl.nsw.gov.au/permalink/f/1ocrdrt/SLNSW_ALMA21135053950002626">disease-causing miasma</a>.</p>
<h2>A misremembered past</h2>
<p>“Natural” remnants of the former swamplands are today considered to have high conservation value under both <a href="http://classic.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/nsw/consol_act/bca2016309/">state</a> and <a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdb/au/legis/cth/consol_act/epabca1999588">federal</a> environmental and heritage protection legislation. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/friday-essay-histories-written-in-the-land-a-journey-through-adnyamathanha-yarta-124001">Friday essay: histories written in the land - a journey through Adnyamathanha Yarta</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>But attempting to protect ecosystems that reflect a version of the past has a major constraint. Long-term information about their past species composition and structure can be fragmented, misremembered, or absent. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329975/original/file-20200423-47810-fdk1jh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329975/original/file-20200423-47810-fdk1jh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329975/original/file-20200423-47810-fdk1jh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=850&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329975/original/file-20200423-47810-fdk1jh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=850&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329975/original/file-20200423-47810-fdk1jh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=850&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329975/original/file-20200423-47810-fdk1jh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1068&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329975/original/file-20200423-47810-fdk1jh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1068&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329975/original/file-20200423-47810-fdk1jh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1068&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A map showing the Kamay (Botany Bay) Swamplands from 1894.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://search.sl.nsw.gov.au/permalink/f/1ocrdrt/SLNSW_ALMA21141590170002626">Image from the Mitchell Collection, State Library of NSW</a>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This is especially problematic in the case of the Kamay swamplands, which, like many urban ecosystems, have been fragmented, hydrologically altered, and polluted. </p>
<p>Yet not all is lost. We studied pollen released from flowering plants and conifers, which can accumulate and preserve in sediment layers through time. </p>
<p>Looking at this preserved pollen lets us develop a timeline of vegetation change over hundreds to thousands of years. </p>
<h2>Lachlan swamp</h2>
<p>One wetland remnant, called Lachlan Swamp, occurs at the springhead of the swamplands in Centennial Parklands. Boardwalks and signs at the site encourage visitors to imagine the swamps and the paperbark forest (<em>Melaleuca quinquenervia</em>) surrounding them as a relic of pre-British Sydney.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329969/original/file-20200423-47804-1bdkgux.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329969/original/file-20200423-47804-1bdkgux.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329969/original/file-20200423-47804-1bdkgux.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329969/original/file-20200423-47804-1bdkgux.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329969/original/file-20200423-47804-1bdkgux.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329969/original/file-20200423-47804-1bdkgux.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329969/original/file-20200423-47804-1bdkgux.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329969/original/file-20200423-47804-1bdkgux.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Paperbark trees dominate the landscape at Lachlan Swamp.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/environmental-conservation/article/ecological-history-of-lachlan-nature-reserve-centennial-park-sydney-australia-a-palaeoecological-approach-to-conservation/89433C9CADC8596CFB1ACFDFD5B33088">used</a> the pollen technique at Lachlan Swamp to determine whether the contemporary ecosystem reflects the pre-European landscape being protected. </p>
<p>And our results reveal that, at the time of British occupation, the swampland was surrounded by an open, Ericaceae-dominated heath. <em>Casuarina</em> and <em>Leptospermum</em> species were the dominant swamp trees, not the swamp paperbark. </p>
<p>This plant community was present at the site for at least the previous 2,000 years, and was only replaced by the contemporary paperbark forest between the 1890s and 1970s.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329971/original/file-20200423-47784-11wic6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329971/original/file-20200423-47784-11wic6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329971/original/file-20200423-47784-11wic6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=341&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329971/original/file-20200423-47784-11wic6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=341&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329971/original/file-20200423-47784-11wic6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=341&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329971/original/file-20200423-47784-11wic6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329971/original/file-20200423-47784-11wic6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329971/original/file-20200423-47784-11wic6c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An 1844 drawing of Lachlan Swamp showing an open landscape.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://search.sl.nsw.gov.au/permalink/f/1ocrdrt/ADLIB110349998">Image from the Dixon Collection, State Library of NSW</a>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Cultural knowledge</h2>
<p>Ongoing work from the <a href="https://www.gujaga.org.au">La Perouse Aboriginal Community</a> led research team drawing on Indigenous knowledge and European history suggests this open heathland vegetation grew consistently across the Lachlan and Botany Swamps during and prior to European colonisation of Sydney. </p>
<p>Continuous cultural knowledge about the environment, held by local Dharawal people, can provide a rich picture of Kamay’s botany and how it was used – well before the arrival of the HMS Endeavour. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-memory-code-how-oral-cultures-memorise-so-much-information-65649">The Memory Code: how oral cultures memorise so much information</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>For instance, the Garrara or grass tree (<em>Xanthorrhoea</em>), which is depicted in many early colonial paintings, is a multi-use plant used to construct fishing spears – a tradition upheld today within the La Perouse Aboriginal community. </p>
<p>Similarly, other food and medicinal plants have been long been used by this community. This includes Five Corners (Ericaceae), Native Sarsaparilla (<em>Smilax</em>), Lomandra (<em>Lomandra</em>) and multi-use heath and swamp plants such as the coastal wattle (<em>Acacia longifolia</em>), swamp oak (<em>Casuarina glauca</em>) and coastal tea tree (<em>Leptospermum laevigatum</em>). </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329973/original/file-20200423-47804-19yz9xd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329973/original/file-20200423-47804-19yz9xd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/329973/original/file-20200423-47804-19yz9xd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329973/original/file-20200423-47804-19yz9xd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329973/original/file-20200423-47804-19yz9xd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329973/original/file-20200423-47804-19yz9xd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329973/original/file-20200423-47804-19yz9xd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/329973/original/file-20200423-47804-19yz9xd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Xanthorrhoea plants grew throughout Botany Bay before European colonisation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The plant species described and utilised by the local people correlates with the pre-European vegetation reconstructed from the Lachlan Swamp pollen record, and with what is described in early British <a href="https://search.sl.nsw.gov.au/permalink/f/s8mhc3/SLNSW_ALMA21146148800002626">records</a>.</p>
<h2>Not all is lost</h2>
<p>Our common understanding of the Kamay landscape, as recognised in the protected swamp remnant in Centennial Park, is based on a misremembering of the past.</p>
<p>If our future goals are to conserve beautiful, unique ecosystems that have escaped European exploitation and mismanagement – such as the version of Botany Bay described by Banks – it’s crucial to start including and listening to long-term environmental histories to compliment our scientific research. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-dreamtime-science-and-narratives-of-indigenous-australia-95919">The Dreamtime, science and narratives of Indigenous Australia</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>We must protect a resilient, ecosystem-rich landscape informed by accumulated Indigenous knowledge, passed down over many generations.</p>
<p>Though Sydney’s environmental past may be misremembered, it’s not lost entirely. Its legacy is subtly coded into the remnant landscapes of pre-British occupation, and preserved in the continuous knowledge systems of the land’s first peoples.</p>
<p>With care, it can be read and used to support resilient and authentic urban ecosystems.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/135315/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Rebecca Hamilton received fellowship funding from The State Library of NSW for this work.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Shane Ingrey is a member of the Gujaga Foundation and the La Perouse Aboriginal Community led research team.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dan Penny and Josephine Gillespie do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>If we want to conserve ecosystems that escaped European exploitation and mismanagement, we must start listening to environmental histories to compliment scientific research.Rebecca Hamilton, Postdoctoral Researcher in Palaeoecology, Max Planck Institute of GeoanthropologyDan Penny, Associate Professor, University of SydneyJosephine Gillespie, Senior lecturer, University of SydneyShane Ingrey, Postdoctoral research fellow, ARC Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage (CABAH), UNSW SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1328192020-03-16T15:48:03Z2020-03-16T15:48:03ZMeet the meat-eating ducks of South Georgia<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/320776/original/file-20200316-27680-b3nsp4.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The South Georgia pintail duck scavenges on dead seals.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Joshua Powell</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>A meat-eating duck.</p>
<p>It sounds like something out of a bizarre horror movie – or from the tall tales of an 18th-century explorer. But that is exactly what Captain James Cook’s expedition found in 1775 when its members set foot on the remote subantarctic island of South Georgia. Not that the expedition’s naturalists knew about the duck’s diet at the time, simply that it was remarkable to have found a duck this far south.</p>
<p>What Cook had discovered is now known as the South Georgia pintail (<em>Anas georgica georgica</em>), a rare subspecies of pintail duck only found on this remote island in the Southern Ocean, and one that actively scavenges on dead seals.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/318737/original/file-20200304-66089-s71nv4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/318737/original/file-20200304-66089-s71nv4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/318737/original/file-20200304-66089-s71nv4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/318737/original/file-20200304-66089-s71nv4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/318737/original/file-20200304-66089-s71nv4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=407&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/318737/original/file-20200304-66089-s71nv4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/318737/original/file-20200304-66089-s71nv4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/318737/original/file-20200304-66089-s71nv4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=511&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">South Georgia (left) and the South Sandwich Islands (right) are nearer to Antarctica than any other continent.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Georgia_and_the_South_Sandwich_Islands#/media/File:South_Georgia_and_the_South_Sandwich_Islands_in_United_Kingdom.svg">wiki</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As a conservation biologist, I was working on a <a href="https://www.wcmt.org.uk/users/joshuapowell2017">Churchill Fellowship</a> that involved time on a number of islands around the world where conservation strategies have been successful in halting biodiversity loss. This final leg involved heading to the southernmost tip of the Atlantic Ocean and then crossing the Antarctic circumpolar current, <a href="https://www.geo.uni-bremen.de/%7Eapau/dynamicclimate/course_materials_2012/articles/orsi_et_al_1995.pdf">a band of cold water that flows around Antarctica</a> and cuts it off from the rest of the world. Our target was the remote and mountainous British Overseas Territory of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, more than 2,000km from South America.</p>
<p>Finding a duck at this latitude is a surreal experience. After vast colonies of king penguins and beaches of jousting bull elephant seals, encountering something that seems better suited to the ponds and gardens of Europe is quite remarkable. But there it was: just inland from a beach patrolled by aggressive skua birds and the “vultures of the Southern Ocean”, southern giant petrels.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/320782/original/file-20200316-27664-110u2mu.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/320782/original/file-20200316-27664-110u2mu.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/320782/original/file-20200316-27664-110u2mu.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/320782/original/file-20200316-27664-110u2mu.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/320782/original/file-20200316-27664-110u2mu.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/320782/original/file-20200316-27664-110u2mu.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/320782/original/file-20200316-27664-110u2mu.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/320782/original/file-20200316-27664-110u2mu.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">South Georgia is covered by glaciers and steep mountains.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Joshua Powell</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>What comes most as a surprise about the South Georgia pintail is <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1474-919X.1975.tb04207.x">its diet</a>. The duck’s meat-eating has only been witnessed a handful of times (and I only know of <a href="https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-south-georgia-pintail-anas-georgia-georgia-scavenging-on-dead-fur-26622346.html">one photo</a>) but one scientist who saw it <a href="https://catalogue.nla.gov.au/Record/1199012">reported</a> that, “as soon as there is a small opening in the seal carcass, the ducks dive headlong into the hole”. </p>
<p>This is all the more remarkable because the South Georgia pintail possesses none of the morphological characteristics and adaptations usually associated with such behaviour: unlike mammals, it does not have teeth, and its duck bill and webbed feet are hardly the curved beaks and sharp talons possessed by birds of prey. </p>
<p>There is actually a precedent for this carnivorous behaviour in another, perhaps equally surprising, species. A well publicised <a href="https://bioone.org/journals/Northwestern-Naturalist/volume-99/issue-3/NWN18-05.1/Scavenging-By-Snowshoe-Hares-iLepus-americanusi-In-Yukon-Canada/10.1898/NWN18-05.1.short">study in northern Canada</a> recently found that snowshoe hares scavenge on meat, especially in winter when food sources are limited. In an ironic twist to the tale, researchers found this even included the hare’s main predator, the Canada lynx.</p>
<p>This study may give clues to the South Georgia pintail’s meat-eating habits. Like their counterparts in northern Canada, species living in South Georgia experience extreme weather and challenging environmental conditions, and it may be that fresh meat simply provides these ducks with a readily available source of food and nutrients. The South Georgia pintail’s apparent lack of any particular adaptation to their unusual eating habits also supports the assessment that this is opportunistic feeding, possibly in response to environmental conditions, rather than being a core part of their diet.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/320786/original/file-20200316-27627-1rcnpw0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/320786/original/file-20200316-27627-1rcnpw0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/320786/original/file-20200316-27627-1rcnpw0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=315&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/320786/original/file-20200316-27627-1rcnpw0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=315&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/320786/original/file-20200316-27627-1rcnpw0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=315&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/320786/original/file-20200316-27627-1rcnpw0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=396&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/320786/original/file-20200316-27627-1rcnpw0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=396&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/320786/original/file-20200316-27627-1rcnpw0.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=396&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Serengeti of the Southern Ocean: seal carcasses form a gruesome meal for different bird species in South Georgia, including these giant petrels.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Joshua Powell</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Despite its remarkable adaptation to life in the subantarctic, the South Georgia pintail has an uncertain future. For a long time, the survival of the species was threatened by invasive rats, unwittingly brought to the island by sailors and whalers over the years since Cook’s 1775 expedition.</p>
<p>But in 2018 the South Georgia Heritage Trust completed an ambitious project to <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2018/05/south-georgia-island-rat-free-animals-spd/">eradicate all the rats on the island</a>, something that had never been attempted on this scale before. Returning South Georgia to “predator-free” status was essential because, as there are no trees on the island, all of its unique birds – including the pintail and the South Georgia pipit, the only songbird in Antarctic waters – nest on the ground, meaning they are <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15448269">vulnerable to decimation by rodent invaders</a>.</p>
<p>All around the world, wildlife populations are being pushed to the brink by human activities – whether that is direct exploitation, the loss of habitat, or the introduction of invasive species. But here on South Georgia, the rat eradication programme shows how ambitious conservation interventions can help protect rare species and restore wild places. For the South Georgia pintail at least – alone on its remote subantarctic island and little-troubled by humans – the future may be looking bright.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/132819/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joshua Powell receives funding from the UK's Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). His work in South Georgia was supported by the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust UK and Poseidon Expeditions. </span></em></p>On one of the world’s most remote islands, a species of duck has learned to scavenge on dead seals.Joshua Elves-Powell, PhD Researcher, Conservation Biology, UCLLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1297942020-01-23T03:32:55Z2020-01-23T03:32:55ZThe Visitors review: a witty imagining of what went before that fateful encounter<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311491/original/file-20200123-32188-nrtlzw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=29%2C29%2C3934%2C2610&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">In The Visitors, seven senior law men discuss what to do about approaching ships, unlike anything they've seen before. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Victor Frankowski</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Review: The Visitors, directed by Frederick Copperwaite for Sydney Festival</em></p>
<p>Sydney Festival has really outdone themselves this season with a spectacular line-up of Indigenous shows to choose from including <a href="https://www.sydneyfestival.org.au/events/the-visitors">The Visitors</a>. </p>
<p>A warm greeting from Ali Murphy-Oats, the managing director of Moogahlin Performing Arts Company, and a welcome onto Gadigal Country by Uncle Charles (Chicka) Madden set the scene for what can only be described as an outstanding evening. </p>
<p>Uncle Chicka is a respected Gadigal Elder who has spent most of his life serving the Aboriginal community as Director or the Aboriginal Medical Service, Secretary of the Metropolitan Local Aboriginal Land Council, Director of the Aboriginal Hostels NSW and as a life member of the Redfern All Blacks. </p>
<p>Written by Muruwari playwright <a href="https://australianplays.org/playwright/CP-harvio">Jane Harrison</a> who also wrote Stolen and Rainbow’s End, The Visitors imagines a group of Indigenous leaders discussing what to do about the strange vessels on the horizon. </p>
<h2>That fateful day</h2>
<p>It is 1788 and six senior law men (with one young man sent as a representative) witness the arrival of the First Fleet. The play features a talented cast: John Blair, Damion Hunter, Colin Kinchela, Nathan Leslie, Leroy Parsons, Glenn Shea, Kerri Simpson. </p>
<p>As we approach the 250th anniversary of Cook’s arrival, this play is timely and fresh given the paucity of publicly available sources that document first encounters from an Indigenous perspective. </p>
<p>Visitors had come and gone for many years and the play includes reference to Cook’s visit 18 Summers prior. But previous visitors always left. </p>
<p>The script involves much discussion about whether to engage in war or allow the visitors to come ashore. After lengthy debates the men notice that the visitors are landing. They make the fatal decision to welcome them. </p>
<p>The Visitors’ dialogue is witty and satirical. The men at its centre describe the visitors in derogatory ways that mirror the way colonisers described us – “wretched people” with nothing to offer. </p>
<p>The set is beautifully designed with large trees framing the meeting place. Fog drifts in, allowing the audience to imagine a time long ago by the ocean. The sound of the sea and birds amplifies the experience. </p>
<p>The men are dressed in suits symbolising their status in contemporary terms. They are given clan names that relate to Country such as Eel clan or Bay people. This avoids any contest around traditional boundaries and clan names. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311483/original/file-20200123-32182-1l6712d.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=33%2C16%2C2724%2C1831&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311483/original/file-20200123-32182-1l6712d.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=33%2C16%2C2724%2C1831&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311483/original/file-20200123-32182-1l6712d.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311483/original/file-20200123-32182-1l6712d.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311483/original/file-20200123-32182-1l6712d.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=401&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311483/original/file-20200123-32182-1l6712d.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311483/original/file-20200123-32182-1l6712d.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311483/original/file-20200123-32182-1l6712d.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Humour provides relief to this intensely imagined moment in history.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jamie James</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Personalities, but where are the women?</h2>
<p>Aboriginal protocols are clear – the men pay respect to Country as they each arrive. Formal proceedings begin with being welcomed onto Country, just like what the audience experienced before the performance. </p>
<p>Formalities aside, there is also a lot of humour in this play. Fun is made of one of the men who has complained he can’t connect with his new wife. Grandfather Elder examines him and concludes that his new wife probably just doesn’t like him. </p>
<p>Personalities are clear – something that is often missed in colonial writing of Indigenous peoples. We are human, we laugh, we disagree and we engage in combat, revenge, grudges, and all manner of human frailty. </p>
<p>The experience could have only been improved by the inclusion of Aboriginal women in the cast. The women, we are told, are away on <a href="http://www.indigenousaustralia.info/culture.html">Women’s Business</a> and although they are often referred to, are missing from the decision making process. </p>
<p>In one scene one of the men refers to women as “spoils” of battle and in another, after hearing the younger man simulate the mooing of a cow, a comment is made that it sounds like his wife. Perhaps this is just banter between men, however, historically a range of tropes have been used to typecast Aboriginal women into roles imagined by the colonisers. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311492/original/file-20200123-32182-wt2bvb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311492/original/file-20200123-32182-wt2bvb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/311492/original/file-20200123-32182-wt2bvb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311492/original/file-20200123-32182-wt2bvb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311492/original/file-20200123-32182-wt2bvb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311492/original/file-20200123-32182-wt2bvb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311492/original/file-20200123-32182-wt2bvb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/311492/original/file-20200123-32182-wt2bvb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Visitors is part of a Sydney Festival program giving voice to First Nations artists.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Victor Frankowski</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The women’s absence suggests there was — or is — a lack of senior Aboriginal women knowledge holders. <a href="https://www.teaandbelle.com/single-post/2017/10/01/50-Amazing-Tidda-Queens">The truth</a> is far from this assumption.</p>
<p>There is ample evidence Aboriginal women were involved in early interactions, amicable and otherwise, with early settlers. For example, it is believed local fisherwoman <a href="https://dictionaryofsydney.org/entry/barangaroo_and_the_eora_fisherwomen">Barrangaroo</a> — noted for her presence and authority — was present at the first meeting between settlers and her Cammeraygal people at Manly in 1788, and also participated in warfare with settlers at North Harbour in November 1788. </p>
<p>She is remembered in early colonial documents as having a commanding presence, inciting respect and fear in those around her. Likewise across the country, there are stories of <a href="http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/tarenorerer-13212">Aboriginal women</a> emerging including their heroic efforts to defend Country.</p>
<p>This criticism notwithstanding, there is much to highly recommend this play. Funny, informative, sombre, real, imagined and very enjoyable, I would encourage everyone to see it.</p>
<p><em>The Visitors runs at Carriageworks until 26 January</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/129794/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bronwyn Carlson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Playwright Jane Harrison’s The Visitors shows audiences how a group of Indigenous leaders might have debated what to do when the First Fleet landed in 1788 - but where are the women?Bronwyn Carlson, Professor, Indigenous Studies, Macquarie UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1168152019-05-15T20:21:22Z2019-05-15T20:21:22ZThe Murujuga Mermaid: how rock art in WA sheds light on historic encounters of Australian exploration<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274268/original/file-20190514-60549-1ixbvgw.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Enderby Island ship image depicting His Majesty’s Cutter Mermaid, which visited the Dampier Archipelago in 1818.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Courtesy: Murujuga Dynamics of the Dreaming ARC Project</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>It is understandable that Captain Cook is a trigger for debates about our national identity and history. However, we often risk being blinded by the legacy of Cook. Around the continent, early encounters with outsiders occurred on other days, and in other years before 1788. Across northern Australia these did not involve Europeans, but rather Southeast Asian trepangers. </p>
<p>The earliest documented European landfall was at Cape Keerweer, Cape York, in 1606 with the landing of the crew of the Dufyken. For coastal Aboriginal communities around Australia each moment of encounter was unique, significant and – in many instances – cataclysmic.</p>
<figure class="align-left zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274270/original/file-20190514-60570-1g488xh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274270/original/file-20190514-60570-1g488xh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274270/original/file-20190514-60570-1g488xh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=869&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274270/original/file-20190514-60570-1g488xh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=869&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274270/original/file-20190514-60570-1g488xh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=869&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274270/original/file-20190514-60570-1g488xh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1092&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274270/original/file-20190514-60570-1g488xh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1092&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274270/original/file-20190514-60570-1g488xh.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1092&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Image of ‘Boon-ga-ree’ by Phillip Parker King.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Phillip Parker King, album of drawings and engravings, 1802–1902, PXC 767, Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The history of the exploration of Australia’s coast became a media story with Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s announcement that <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/australia-sinks-6-7-million-into-replica-endeavour-circumnavigation">a A$6.7 million replica of Cook’s Endeavour</a> would be built to circumnavigate Australia. Of course, James Cook never circumnavigated Australia. This was done by Abel Tasman in 1642 (albeit at a great distance) and most effectively accomplished in 1803 by Matthew Flinders. </p>
<p>Flinders was accompanied by Boongaree, an Aboriginal man from Port Jackson, now remembered as an iconic Aboriginal go-between for his ability to move between the Indigenous and settler worlds. </p>
<p>Remarkably, Boongaree would circumnavigate Australia a second time in 1817-18, accompanying <a href="http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/king-phillip-parker-2310">Phillip Parker King</a>, a consummate explorer. King would captain four expeditions circumnavigating Australia and filled in many details on the map. He and his crew remain unsung heroes of exploration compared to Cook.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274271/original/file-20190514-60537-ttrl3a.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274271/original/file-20190514-60537-ttrl3a.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274271/original/file-20190514-60537-ttrl3a.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274271/original/file-20190514-60537-ttrl3a.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274271/original/file-20190514-60537-ttrl3a.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=486&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274271/original/file-20190514-60537-ttrl3a.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=611&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274271/original/file-20190514-60537-ttrl3a.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=611&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274271/original/file-20190514-60537-ttrl3a.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=611&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Phillip Parker King c.1817, by unknown artist.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">ML 1318, Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>During archaeological field recording in the Dampier Archipelago (Murujuga), Western Australia, our team working with Murujuga Land and Sea Unit Rangers encountered an engraved depiction of a single-masted sailing ship. This image is on an elevated rock panel in an extensive Aboriginal engraving (petroglyph) site complex near a rocky water hole at the south-western end of Enderby Island. </p>
<p>We <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/X3ytMbn8fahdpA4PRGRz/full?target=10.1080/15564894.2019.1604007">argue in a new paper</a> that this image depicts His Majesty’s Cutter (HMC) Mermaid, the main vessel of the historically significant British Admiralty survey captained by King.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274272/original/file-20190514-60557-zoyrt2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274272/original/file-20190514-60557-zoyrt2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274272/original/file-20190514-60557-zoyrt2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274272/original/file-20190514-60557-zoyrt2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274272/original/file-20190514-60557-zoyrt2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274272/original/file-20190514-60557-zoyrt2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=583&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274272/original/file-20190514-60557-zoyrt2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=583&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274272/original/file-20190514-60557-zoyrt2.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=583&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">‘View of Mermaid Strait from Enderby Island (Rocky Head) Feb 25 [1818]’, in Phillip Parker King - album of drawings and engravings, 1802-1902. Mitchell Library, PXC767.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mitchell Library, PXC767.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Mermaid visited the Dampier Archipelago in 1818. It was not the first European vessel to visit - that was William Dampier in the HMS Roebuck in 1699. But King and his crew recorded encounters with Yaburara people. They observed fresh tracks and fires on the outer islands, and described how Yaburara people voyaged between islands on pegged log rafts.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274275/original/file-20190514-60563-1uluwki.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274275/original/file-20190514-60563-1uluwki.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274275/original/file-20190514-60563-1uluwki.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274275/original/file-20190514-60563-1uluwki.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274275/original/file-20190514-60563-1uluwki.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274275/original/file-20190514-60563-1uluwki.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274275/original/file-20190514-60563-1uluwki.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274275/original/file-20190514-60563-1uluwki.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Phillip Parker King, Native of Dampier’s Archipelago, on his floating log not dated, pen, ink and wash and scratching out on card, 7.9 x 11.5 cm (sheet). Transferred from the State Library Board of Western Australia, 2000.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reproduced with permission of the Art Gallery of Western Australia</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Murujuga is <a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-why-the-rock-art-of-murujuga-deserves-world-heritage-status-102100">globally renowned</a> as one of the world’s largest rock art estates. Our work has documented the tens of thousands of years of human occupation, the extraordinary <a href="https://theconversation.com/where-art-meets-industry-protecting-the-spectacular-rock-art-of-the-burrup-peninsula-72964">production of rock art</a> and the <a href="https://theconversation.com/rock-art-shows-early-contact-with-us-whalers-on-australias-remote-northwest-coast-104931">historical presence of American whalers</a>.</p>
<p>The depiction of the boat on Enderby Island overlooks the bay where the Mermaid anchored two centuries ago. When they went ashore the crew observed Aboriginal camps, and the formidable rocky landscape. Boongaree went fishing, while the expedition’s botanical collector Allan Cunningham planted a peach pip near a fig tree. While there, it appears someone scratched the image of the Mermaid. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274273/original/file-20190514-60567-4ho5u4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274273/original/file-20190514-60567-4ho5u4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274273/original/file-20190514-60567-4ho5u4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274273/original/file-20190514-60567-4ho5u4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274273/original/file-20190514-60567-4ho5u4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274273/original/file-20190514-60567-4ho5u4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274273/original/file-20190514-60567-4ho5u4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274273/original/file-20190514-60567-4ho5u4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Enderby Island ship image showing view across Mermaid Strait to the Intercourse Islands.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Courtesy: Murujuga Dynamics of the Dreaming ARC Project.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A scratched technique</h2>
<p>There are various surviving documents from the Mermaid expedition, such as log books, day books, journals, watercolours, and coastal views. Interestingly, in their writings, King, midshipman John Septimus Roe and Cunningham all neglect to mention the engravings, and they did not mention making this image of their ship. We are confident the ship was not made by Yaburara people, as the scratched technique used is very different to the surrounding Yaburara engravings. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274508/original/file-20190515-60529-3lr0o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274508/original/file-20190515-60529-3lr0o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274508/original/file-20190515-60529-3lr0o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=786&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274508/original/file-20190515-60529-3lr0o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=786&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274508/original/file-20190515-60529-3lr0o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=786&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274508/original/file-20190515-60529-3lr0o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=988&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274508/original/file-20190515-60529-3lr0o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=988&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274508/original/file-20190515-60529-3lr0o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=988&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A) line drawing (by Ken Mulvaney), b) The ship engraving, Enderby Island, c) King’s detailed section of the Mermaid (Phillip Parker King, ‘Album of drawings and engravings’, Mitchell Library, PXC767)</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Courtesy: Murujuga Dynamics of the Dreaming ARC Project.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While our investigation suggests that a metal tool was not used to make the image, the imagery – which demonstrates detailed knowledge of the ship’s rigging and proportions, and the inclusions of water in this “sketch” of the craft, leads us to the conclusion that this ship was sketched on the day that the crew of the Mermaid visited this area.</p>
<p>So, who made the image? We really don’t know (but do have some ideas).</p>
<p>The artist clearly knew the ship in great detail. The similarities to the Mermaid are profound, allowing us to rule out other possible vessels to visit the islands in later years such as two-masted whaling barques and pearling ships. </p>
<p>Both King and Roe made many images in their records of the Mermaid – was this one of theirs? Perhaps another unnamed crew member got involved. Perhaps Boongaree was impressed by the extensive rock art legacy that he encountered. Being from Sydney with a similarly rich rock art heritage – which includes the depiction of post-contact sailing ships – perhaps he depicted what was by then utterly familiar to him - a tiny sailing ship on a voyage across the unknown seas. </p>
<p>Whoever’s hand, if this is the Mermaid, as we argue, this new finding is of nautical and historical significance to Australia and Britain as well as being significant to the Aboriginal people of the west Pilbara.</p>
<h2>Significant timing</h2>
<p>The timing of King’s visit is significant. He was there for eight days in February and March, a time when monsoonal rainfall rejuvenates the rock pools on the outer islands and when turtles were hatching: a seasonal pulse in Yaburara island life. </p>
<p>During that week the crew of the Mermaid described their contact with family groups that were camped on several of the inner islands, as well as the widespread evidence for outer island use. Their encounters with people included the observations of their unique water craft, camps and a range of subsistence activities. One Yaburara man was kidnapped from his mangrove raft, and taken on board the Mermaid where Boongaree tried to reassure him by removing his own shirt to reveal his body marking and black skin. The visitors offered the Yaburara man glass beads, which he rejected.</p>
<p>King’s voyages of discovery left behind other marks along the West Australian coastline. At Careening Bay in the Kimberley in 1820, King had the name of the Mermaid carved into a boab tree, where it can still be found today. At Shark Bay, King had a post erected with “KING” spelt out in iron nails – today this is in the WA Museum.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274276/original/file-20190514-60570-r8i8w4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274276/original/file-20190514-60570-r8i8w4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/274276/original/file-20190514-60570-r8i8w4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274276/original/file-20190514-60570-r8i8w4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274276/original/file-20190514-60570-r8i8w4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=393&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274276/original/file-20190514-60570-r8i8w4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274276/original/file-20190514-60570-r8i8w4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/274276/original/file-20190514-60570-r8i8w4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=494&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Mermaid Tree, Careening Bay</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Courtesy: Kevin Kenneally</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Collections from the Archipelago included plants and stone artefacts still held in the British Natural History Museum. King’s daily journal helped him create his official account, published as two volumes in 1826 titled Narrative of a Survey of the intertropical and western coasts of Australia.</p>
<p>There was no marked national commemoration in 2017 of the 200-year anniversary of the start of King’s voyages. However, as Murujuga’s nomination to the World Heritage Tentative Listing proceeds, this new evidence adds further significance to the Mermaid’s brief encounters with the Yaburara.</p>
<p>It provides new insight to King’s Expedition around this continent’s seascape as well as adding to the deep-time record of Murujuga’s Aboriginal history – and place-making inscribed on this landscape.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/116815/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alistair Paterson receives funding from the Australian Research Council.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jo McDonald receives funding from the Australian Research Council. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tiffany Shellam receives funding from the Australian Research Council.</span></em></p>An image of a ship on a rock in Western Australia’s Dampier Archipelago depicts HMC Mermaid – the main vessel of Phillip Parker King, an unsung hero of Australian exploration.Alistair Paterson, ARC Future Fellow, The University of Western AustraliaJo McDonald, Director, Centre for Rock Art Research + Management, The University of Western AustraliaTiffany Shellam, Senior Lecturer in History, Deakin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1126922019-03-26T17:56:49Z2019-03-26T17:56:49ZWhen we celebrate Captain Cook’s voyage, let’s mark the epic journey of a Wati Wati man also<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/264988/original/file-20190320-93048-u83ct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Nicholas Chevalier, Mallee scrub, Murray River, NSW, watercolour, 1871.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://trove.nla.gov.au/work/21719864?q&versionId=26099810">National Library of Australia</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>By now, most of us would know that 2020 marks the 250th anniversary of Captain Cook’s voyage along the East Coast of Australia. The federal government has allocated <a href="https://www.pm.gov.au/media/honouring-captain-james-cooks-voyage">$48.7 million</a> to commemorate the occasion, with a replica of Cook’s HMB Endeavour to circumnavigate the country.</p>
<p>But at the time of the voyage, Indigenous Australians often travelled great distances too, with most of those journeys being unrecorded. One that was, however, was the journey of Weitchymumble, a man of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watiwati">Wati Wati</a> (Wadi Wadi) from the Murray River around Swan Hill who travelled by foot across the dry regions of northwest Victoria around 200 kilometres to Lake Hindmarsh and back. He endured extreme heat, food shortages and exhaustion during this trek.</p>
<p>Back in 1877, Peter Beveridge, a squatter on the Murray River, published an article detailing Weitchymumble’s journey in the <a href="https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/199827259">Ballarat Star</a>. It had been told to him by Turrangin, a senior elder of the Wati Wati, who was Weitchymumble’s great-grandson.</p>
<p>We don’t know exactly when this happened, but Turrangin did tell us a little about the timing (Beveridge included words in the Wati Wati language in brackets): </p>
<blockquote>
<p>When my cokernew (grandfather) was but a very small boy, long before the turrawil ngurtangies (white devils) came with their numberless stock to overrun the country, and drive away the teeming game, from whence the Woortongies (aborigines) drew their food supply […] his father, then quite a young man, was deputed by the tribe to accompany the Ngalloo Watow to the far Wimmera on tribal business.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The Ngalloo Watow was described by Beveridge as a “postman”, who carried news and conducted barters, able to travel “with impunity”. </p>
<p>At the time of the journey Turrangin’s grandfather was perhaps aged 10. Since Turrangin was a senior elder when he told the story to Beveridge in the 1850s, he might have been born around 1810. His grandfather might then have been a boy around 1770, the same time as Cook’s journey. </p>
<h2>A journey through a land of plenty</h2>
<p>Weitchymumble’s name means “welcome swallow”. The late Luise Hercus, a linguist who recorded many Indigenous languages, heard this word 50 years ago spoken by Mrs Jackson Stuart, one of the last to speak the Werkaya (Wimmera) language as a mother tongue. Hercus spelled it “wity-wity-mambel”. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-captain-cook-became-a-contested-national-symbol-96344">How Captain Cook became a contested national symbol</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>We don’t know what the business of Weitchymumble’s trip with the Ngalloo Watow was, but it started in the spring, “the season of peetchen-peetchen (flowers), when the whole country was glowing with bloom”. They reached Lake Hindmarsh after “a long weary tramp of many days”.</p>
<p>After a bath and meal of wallup (sleeping lizard), they were spotted by scouts of the Wimmera tribe, who:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>fraternised after the fashion of the Aborigines prior to the advent of European customs; […] they walked up to the fire, squatted down by its side without saying one word, until the time (which was considerable) had expired which Australian savage etiquette demands on these occasions. After that, however, they talked fast enough […]</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Returning from Lake Hindmarsh in heat described as having “the fervency of a wean chirrick (a reed bed on fire)”, soon they had run short of water and food when they came upon the nest of a lowan, or Mallee Fowl. Lowan is one of the few words from an Indigenous Victorian language borrowed into English. </p>
<p>In the Lowan’s nest, they found “politulu murnangin mirk” (eggs to the number of the fingers on both hands). The Ngalloo Watow made fire “by rubbing a narrow lath-like piece of saltbush across a sun crack in a pine log” then set the eggs on the sand until they simmered, stirring them with a thin twig, through an opening at the top end. When cooked there was a rich yellow paste of yolk and white mixed, the taste was “talko” (good).</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/264990/original/file-20190320-93048-xsefix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/264990/original/file-20190320-93048-xsefix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/264990/original/file-20190320-93048-xsefix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/264990/original/file-20190320-93048-xsefix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/264990/original/file-20190320-93048-xsefix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/264990/original/file-20190320-93048-xsefix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/264990/original/file-20190320-93048-xsefix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/264990/original/file-20190320-93048-xsefix.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=538&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ebenezer Edward Gostelow, The Mallee fowl (or lowan), watercolour, 1939.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://trove.nla.gov.au/work/18988369?q=Ebenezer+Edward+Gostelow%2C+The+Mallee+fowl+%28or+lowan%29%2C+watercolour%2C+1939&c=picture&versionId=22289267">National Library of Australia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But, within a few days, they were again short of food when they saw a sleeping “little old man” threatened by a mindi (large snake). Weitchymumble immediately dashed, grabbed the snake, rescued the old man from it, cut off the snake’s head and then collapsed from exhaustion.</p>
<p>Seeing Weitchymumble lying, the old man exclaimed “"Niniwoor wortongie birra. Yetty tumla coorrongendoo. Ka ki nginma. Boorm.” (Ah, the young man is dead. I shall cry very much. Come here you. Quickly.) These words are the longest single piece of continuous written text in this language.</p>
<p>Weitchymumble was carried into a large conical stone, where the old man gave him a special drink and he revived. The old man turned out to be the Ngowdenout, the “spirit of the Mallee”. As Beveridge wrote: “He is both good and bad by turns […] all-seeing, all-powerful, and unvulnerable to everything earthly.”</p>
<p>Because Weitchymumble had acted to save the old man, the Ngowdenout was good to both the travellers, providing them with food and then when they were sleeping, disappearing. When they woke, the stone was nowhere to be seen but a clear path for them to return home had been marked out.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-ring-trees-of-victorias-watti-watti-people-are-an-extraordinary-part-of-our-heritage-91310">The ring trees of Victoria's Watti Watti people are an extraordinary part of our heritage</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Beveridge concludes the story by noting that “the story of the Ngowdenout and his coorongandoo muckie loondhal (big stone house) is as fresh in the memory of the Watty Watty tribe as it was the day after Weitchymumble and his companion had related it”.</p>
<p>While the Ngowdenout is perhaps a mythical entity, at the core of this story is a real journey. It tells of a land of plenty, of Indigenous tribes meeting and interacting in their own customs’ manners, and of ways of life, like the method of cooking eggs. Such journeys would have happened regularly, but this is the only one from Victoria recorded in such detail.</p>
<p>Along with the Cook voyage, then, in 2020 let’s honour Weitchymumble’s journey and the people of the inland.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112692/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Stephen Morey is a chief Investigator on an Australian Research Council funded grant for the project 'Howitt & Fison’s anthropology: using new methods to reveal hidden riches.(LP160100192)</span></em></p>Captain Cook’s 1770 voyage is well known. But at this time, Indigenous Australians also travelled great distances - let’s recognise this in the 2020 commemorations.Stephen Morey, Senior Lecturer, Department of Languages and Linguistics, La Trobe UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1104452019-01-24T09:56:11Z2019-01-24T09:56:11ZGrattan on Friday: Liberals stir the culture war pot but who’s listening?<p>As a new round of the culture wars bubbles, West Australian Liberal
senator Dean Smith has urged that we should legislate to “protect” the January 26 date of Australia Day.</p>
<p>Smith came to national prominence as one of the small coterie of
Liberals who forced the Turnbull government to act on same-sex
marriage. He advances his causes with moderation and respect, and
always warrants a hearing. But in this instance he does not make a convincing argument.</p>
<p>Australia Day’s date – which marks the First Fleet’s landing – has
become increasingly contentious in recent years, opposed by Indigenous and other critics on the grounds that it is really “invasion day”.</p>
<p>If we were starting again, I think it would be better to
have Australia Day on January 1, to celebrate the birth of the
Commonwealth.</p>
<p>But given the present date has strong community support, there is not
a compelling case for change. Equally, there isn’t a case to bake in
the current date either. (This date, incidentally, only appears in
legislation as a public holiday.)</p>
<p>In an <a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/defend-australias-day-of-unity/news-story/e4240a9b0e5e69beee722737c4a5f02a">opinion piece</a> in Thursday’s Australian Smith writes: “Australia Day
remains unprotected and could easily fall victim to the whims of a
political party or special interest lobby group interested in
political point-scoring rather than celebrating the virtues of a
contemporary and forward-looking Australia.”</p>
<p>He proposes legislation to “guarantee that January 26 ceases to be
Australia Day only after the Australian people have been consulted
directly, and that to change the date of Australia Day an alternative
date must be submitted to every Australian elector.”</p>
<p>In reality, the January 26 date won’t “fall victim” to “whims”. No
government would change it lightly.</p>
<p>An alteration would only happen if there was evidence of a big
shift in community sentiment. Maybe that will come in future years –
if it does, so be it.</p>
<p>Change is certainly not on the cards any time soon. Bill Shorten remains committed
to January 26.</p>
<p>The Coalition has been using the (annual) debate about Australia Day
as political ammunition.</p>
<p>This became a little messy, however, because Warren Mundine, Scott
Morrison’s star candidate for the marginal NSW seat of Gilmore, has
been a forthright advocate of moving Australia Day to January 1.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/view-from-the-hill-morrisons-gilmore-candidate-is-the-man-whos-been-everywhere-110300">View from The Hill: Morrison's Gilmore candidate is the man who's been everywhere</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Mundine <a href="https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/rendezview/we-must-stop-celebrating-australia-day-on-january-26/news-story/36989400b8175992dddc98784358803b">wrote</a> on January 24, 2017: “The 26th of January is the wrong day to celebrate Australia Day.</p>
<p>"Firstly, Australia wasn’t founded on January 26, 1788. It was founded
on January 1, 1901 …</p>
<p>"Secondly, the tension between commemorating British conquest on the
one hand and celebrating Australian identity and independence on the
other isn’t going away. This isn’t a recent tension drummed up by
Lefties. It’s always been there, even before anyone cared about what
Indigenous people think.”</p>
<p>Despite his new status Mundine is sticking to his view – he’s just
saying now that this is not a priority issue for him. “I’ve got 100
different things in front of that, before I even get to that stage,”
he told a news conference as he stood beside his leader on Wednesday.</p>
<p>He declines to be drawn on his position if he were elected and faced a
Smith private member’s bill. He told The Conversation, “I’ll jump that
hurdle when I get there. At the moment I’m fighting a tough battle to
win the seat.”</p>
<p>As this year’s Australia Day approached Morrison ramped up the nationalistic
and culture war rhetoric in general, and accompanied it with some
controversial actions.</p>
<p>The Liberal Party <a href="https://twitter.com/LiberalAus/status/1087256359844728832">tweeted</a>: “The Government is taking action to protect Australia Day from activists.”</p>
<p>The government proposes to force local councils to hold citizenship
ceremonies on Australia Day, after the refusal of some to do so.
Councils defying the edict would not be allowed to conduct them at all.</p>
<p>This has come with a recommended dress code for these occasions – no
thongs or board shorts. “I’m a prime minister for standards,” declared
Morrison, to something of a national horse laugh.</p>
<p>Councils have been given to the end of next month to provide feedback.</p>
<p>Morrison has struggled to differentiate himself from Shorten over Australia Day, since
they are at one about the date. </p>
<p>“It’s not good enough to say that you just won’t change it. You’ve got to stand up for it and I’m standing up for it,” he declared. “Bill Shorten will let it fade
away.” </p>
<p>It’s true the level of rhetoric around Australia Day has varied over the years but the notion of it just “fading away” is ridiculous.</p>
<p>This week the debate moved on to Captain Cook, with Morrison’s
announcement of $6.7 million for the Endeavour replica to circumnavigate Australia to mark next year’s 250th anniversary of Cook’s arrival and take the story of Cook to 39 communities across the country. (The money is from $48.7 million set aside earlier to mark the anniversary.)</p>
<p>Morrison – who was visiting Cooktown in North Queensland – was
described by Shorten as having a “bizarre Captain Cook fetish”.
(Liberal MP Warren Entsch recalls Morrison’s special interest in Cook
from his days in tourism. In parliament Morrison happens to represent
the seat of Cook.)</p>
<p>The prime minister, who argues that the narrative of Cook can be used as one
pillar for Indigenous reconciliation, hit back by accusing Shorten of
“sneering at Australia’s history”, declaring “you can’t trust this guy
on this stuff”.</p>
<p>He added that “political correctness … is raising kids in our country
today to despise our history”, and alleged that Shorten wanted to
“feed into that”.</p>
<p>For some in the right of the Liberal Party, the culture and history
wars are a continuing preoccupation.</p>
<p>But these issues hover on the fringe of politics in this election
year, even if they do resonate in Hansonland and similar territory.</p>
<p>It mightn’t have been front and centre, but the battle that’s been
going on this week between Treasurer Josh Frydenberg and his shadow,
Chris Bowen, about the economy, tax policy and the like is a lot more
relevant to most voters than the culture wars and political
correctness.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/110445/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>It’s true the nationalistic rhetoric around the date has varied over the years but the notion of the date just “fading away” is surely ridiculous.Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1035242018-09-19T05:25:35Z2018-09-19T05:25:35ZAs we celebrate the rediscovery of the Endeavour let’s acknowledge its complicated legacy<p>Researchers, including Australian maritime archaeologists, <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/hms-endeavour-found-one-of-the-greatest-maritime-mysteries-of-all-time-solved-20180919-p504lx.html">believe they have found</a> Captain Cook’s historic ship HMB Endeavour in Newport Harbour, Rhode Island. An official announcement will be made on Friday. </p>
<p>The discovery is the culmination of decades of work by the Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project and the Australian National Maritime Museum to locate and positively identify the vessel, which had been missing from the historical record for over two centuries. Plans are now under way to raise funds to excavate and conduct scientific testing in 2019.</p>
<p>As the first European seafaring vessel to reach the east coast of Australia, the Endeavour – much like James Cook himself – has become part of Australia’s national mythology. Unlike Cook, who famously met his end on Hawaiian shores, the fate of the Endeavour had long been unknown. The discovery has therefore resolved a long-standing maritime mystery. </p>
<p>In a serendipitous twist, it coincides with two significant dates: the 250th anniversary of the Endeavour’s departure from England in 1768 on its now (in)famous voyage south, and the 240th anniversary of the ship’s scuttling in 1778 during the American War of Independence.</p>
<p>Identifying the Endeavour’s location has been a 25-year processs. Archaeologists initially identified 13 potential candidates in the harbour. Over time, the number of possible sites was narrowed to five. </p>
<p>This month, a joint diving team has worked to measure and inspect these sites, drawing upon knowledge of Endeavour’s size to identify a likely candidate. Excavation and timber analysis is expected to provide final confirmation. Those expecting an entire ship to be recovered will be disappointed, as very little of it remains.</p>
<p>But this is a controversial vessel, and celebrations of its discovery will be tempered by reflection about its complicity in the British colonisation of Indigenous Australian land. While Endeavour played an instrumental role in advancing science and exploration, its arrival in what is now known as Botany Bay in 1770 also precipitated the occupation of territory that its Aboriginal owners never ceded.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-captain-cook-became-a-contested-national-symbol-96344">How Captain Cook became a contested national symbol</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>A ship by any other name …</h2>
<p>Although Endeavour’s early days are well known, it has taken many years for researchers to piece together the rest of its story. One problem has been the many names the vessel was known by during its lifetime. </p>
<p>Built in 1764 in Whitby, England, as a collier (coal carrier), the vessel was originally named Earl of Pembroke. Its flat-bottomed hull and box-like shape, designed to transport bulk cargo, later proved helpful when navigating the treacherous coral reefs of the southern seas.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/237011/original/file-20180919-158219-1b9a33y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/237011/original/file-20180919-158219-1b9a33y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/237011/original/file-20180919-158219-1b9a33y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=329&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/237011/original/file-20180919-158219-1b9a33y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=329&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/237011/original/file-20180919-158219-1b9a33y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=329&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/237011/original/file-20180919-158219-1b9a33y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/237011/original/file-20180919-158219-1b9a33y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/237011/original/file-20180919-158219-1b9a33y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=413&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Endeavour, then known as Earl of Pembroke, leaving Whitby Harbour in 1768. Painting by Thomas Luny, c. 1790. (Some think Luny painted another ship after Endeavour became famous.)</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Endeavour,_Thomas_Luny_1768.jpg">Wikimedia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 1768, Earl of Pembroke was sold into the service of the Royal Navy and the Royal Society. It underwent a major refit to accommodate a larger crew and sufficient provisions for a long voyage. In keeping with the ambitious spirit of the era, the vessel was renamed His Majesty’s Bark (HMB) Endeavour (bark being a nautical term to describe a ship with three masts or more).</p>
<p>Endeavour departed England in 1768 under the command of then-Lieutenant Cook. Ostensibly sailing to the South Pacific to observe the 1769 Transit of Venus, Cook was also under orders to search for the fabled southern continent. So it was that a coal carrier and a rare astronomical event changed the history of the Australian continent and its people.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/transit-of-venus-a-tale-of-two-expeditions-7246">Transit of Venus: a tale of two expeditions</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Mysterious ends</h2>
<p>Following Endeavour’s circumnavigation of the globe (1768-1771), the vessel was used as a store ship before the Royal Navy sold it in 1775. Here, the ship’s fate become mysterious. </p>
<p>Many believed it had been renamed La Liberté and put to use as a French whaling ship before succumbing to rotting timbers in Newport Harbour in 1793. Others rejected this theory, suggesting instead that Endeavour had spent her final days on the river Thames. </p>
<p>A breakthrough came in 1997. Australian researchers suggested the Endeavour had in fact been <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41562984?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">renamed Lord Sandwich</a>. The theory gained weight following an archival discovery by Kathy Abbass, director of the Rhode Island project, in 2016, which indicated that Lord Sandwich had been used as a troop transport and prison ship during the American War of Independence before being scuttled in Newport Harbour in 1778.</p>
<p>Lord Sandwich was one of a number of transport ships <a href="https://anmm.blog/2016/05/06/the-search-for-endeavour-the-rhode-island-marine-archaeology-project-and-the-australian-national-maritime-museum/">deliberately sunk</a> by the British in an attempt to prevent the French fleet from approaching the shore. </p>
<p>Finding a shipwreck is not impossible, but finding the one you’re looking for is hard. Rhode Island volunteers have been searching for this vessel since 1993, slowly narrowing down the search area and eliminating potential contenders as they explore the often-murky waters of Newport Harbour. </p>
<p>They were joined in their efforts by the Australian National Maritime Museum in 1999 and, in more recent years, by the <a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/dive-into-the-murky-depths-seeks-scuppered-history/news-story/b5e74a78f18eaa6a023367c6277cdbcf">Silentworld Foundation</a>, a not-for-profit organisation with a particular interest in Australasian maritime archaeology.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/237010/original/file-20180919-158234-9ez3tb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/237010/original/file-20180919-158234-9ez3tb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/237010/original/file-20180919-158234-9ez3tb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=226&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/237010/original/file-20180919-158234-9ez3tb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=226&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/237010/original/file-20180919-158234-9ez3tb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=226&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/237010/original/file-20180919-158234-9ez3tb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=284&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/237010/original/file-20180919-158234-9ez3tb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=284&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/237010/original/file-20180919-158234-9ez3tb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=284&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Endeavour’s voyage across the Pacific Ocean.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:HM_Bark_Endeavour_(ship,_1764)#/media/File:Endeavour_track_chart.jpg">Wikimedia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Museums around the world are already turning their attention to the significant <a href="https://www.rmg.co.uk/see-do/we-recommend/attractions/pacific-encounters">Cook anniversaries</a> on the horizon and the complex legacy of these expeditions. These interpretive endeavours will only be heightened by the planned excavation of the ship’s remains in the near future. </p>
<p>Shipwrecks are a productive starting point for thinking about how we make meaning from the past because of the firm hold they have on the public imagination. They conjure images of lost treasure, pirates and, especially in the case of Endeavour, bold adventures to distant lands.</p>
<p>But as we celebrate the spirit of exploration that saw a humble coal carrier circumnavigate the globe – and the same spirit of exploration that has led to its discovery centuries later – we must also make space for the unsettling stories that will resurface as a result of this discovery.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/103524/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dr Natali Pearson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As the first European seafaring vessel to reach the east coast of Australia, the Endeavour – much like James Cook himself – has become part of Australia’s national mythology.Dr Natali Pearson, Deputy Director, Sydney Southeast Asia Centre, University of SydneyLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/963442018-05-10T20:34:22Z2018-05-10T20:34:22ZHow Captain Cook became a contested national symbol<p>Captain Cook has loomed large in the federal government’s 2018 budget. The government allocated $48.7 million over four years to commemorate the 250th anniversary of Cook’s voyages to the South Pacific and Australia in 1770. The funding has been widely debated on social media as another fray in Australia’s culture wars, particularly in the context of $84 million in cuts to the ABC. </p>
<p>Closer scrutiny suggests that this latest celebration of Cook may serve as a headline for financial resources already committed to a range of cultural programs, at least some of which could be seen as business as usual. These include the development of digital heritage resources and exhibitions at the National Maritime Museum, National Library, AIATSIS and the National Museum of Australia, as well as support for training “Indigenous cultural heritage professionals in regional areas”.</p>
<p>However, the budget package also includes unspecified support for the “voyaging of the replica HMB Endeavour” and a $25 million contribution towards redevelopment of Kamay Botany Bay National Park, including a proposed new monument to the great man. </p>
<p>So while the entire $48.7 million won’t simply go towards a monument, it’s clear that celebrating the 250th anniversary of Cook’s landing at Botany Bay is a high priority for this federal government. </p>
<p>In 1770 Lieutenant (later Captain) James Cook, on a scientific mission for the British Navy, anchored in a harbour he first called Stingray Bay. He later changed it to Botany Bay, commemorating the trove of specimens collected by the ship’s botanists, Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander. </p>
<p>Cook made contact with Aboriginal people, mapped the eastern coast of the continent, claimed it for the British Crown and named it New South Wales, allowing for the future dispossession of Australia’s First Nations. He would later return to the Pacific on two more voyages before his death in Hawaii in 1779.</p>
<p>Scholars agree that Cook had a major influence on the world during his lifetime. His actions, writings and voyages continue to resonate through modern colonial and postcolonial history.</p>
<p>Cook continues to be a potent national symbol. Partly this is due to the rich historical written and physical records we have of Cook’s journeys, which continue to reward further study and analysis. </p>
<p>But the other side to the hero story is the dispossession of Australia’s Indigenous peoples from their land. As a symbol of the nation, Cook is, and has always been, contested, political and emotional.</p>
<h2>Too many Cooks</h2>
<p>There are other European contenders for the title of “discoverer of the continent”, such as Dirk Hartog in 1616 and William Dampier in 1699. However, both inconveniently landed on the west coast. Although Englishman Dampier wrote a book about his discoveries, he never became a major figure like Cook. </p>
<p>Cook’s legend began immediately after his death, when he became one of the great humble <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books/about/Imagining_the_Pacific.html?id=aePdPAu_PTIC">heroes of the European Enlightenment</a>. <a href="https://books.google.com.au/books/about/From_the_Ruins_of_Colonialism.html?id=zrE8AAAAIAAJ&redir_esc=y">Historian Chris Healy</a> has suggested that Cook was suited to the title of founder of Australia because his journey along the entire east coast made him more acceptable in other Australian states. Importantly, unlike that other great contender for founding father, the First Fleet’s Governor Arthur Phillip, Cook was not associated with the “stain of convictism”.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218401/original/file-20180510-34024-1vu7txz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218401/original/file-20180510-34024-1vu7txz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218401/original/file-20180510-34024-1vu7txz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218401/original/file-20180510-34024-1vu7txz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218401/original/file-20180510-34024-1vu7txz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=439&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218401/original/file-20180510-34024-1vu7txz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=552&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218401/original/file-20180510-34024-1vu7txz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=552&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218401/original/file-20180510-34024-1vu7txz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=552&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Landing of Captain Cook at Botany Bay, 1770, by Emanuel Phillips Fox, 1902.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Emanuel_Phillips_Fox_Captain_Cook_Botany_Bay.jpg">Wikimedia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Australians celebrated the bicentenary of Cook’s arrival in 1970, and the bicentenary of the arrival of the First Fleet in 1988. Throughout this period it was widely accepted that Cook was the single most important actor in the British possession of Australia, despite the fact that many other political figures played significant roles.</p>
<p>This perhaps partly explains why Cook has featured so prominently in Aboriginal narratives of dispossession, and why the celebrations in 1970 and 1988 triggered debate around Aboriginal land rights. </p>
<p>Other scholars have examined the Aboriginal perspective on Cook’s landing. In the 1970s archaeologist Vincent Megaw found British artefacts in a midden at Botany Bay. He cautiously suggested that these items might have been part of the gifts given by Cook to the Aboriginal people he encountered. </p>
<p><a href="http://assets.cambridge.org/97805217/62403/frontmatter/9780521762403_frontmatter.pdf">Historian Maria Nugent</a> has assessed the narratives recounted by Percy Mumbulla and <a href="http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/danayarri-hobbles-12397">Hobbles Danaiyarri</a>. Both were senior Aboriginal lawmen and knowledge holders who, in the 1970s and ’80s, shared their sagas of the coming of Cook to their lands with anthropologists.</p>
<h2>Too pale, stale and male?</h2>
<p>Controversy over the celebration of Cook as founding father is not a new thing. It dates back to the 19th century when his first statues were raised. </p>
<p>This latest Captain Cook fanfare comes hot on the heels of <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/historian-captain-cook-statue-graffiti-indigenous-20180418-p4zade.html">broader global debates</a> about the contemporary values and meaning of civic statues of (“pale, stale, male”) heroes associated with colonialism and slavery. </p>
<p>In Australia, there has also been debate about how the events of the first world war have been commemorated so expansively by Australia. A <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/postcolonial-blog/2018/apr/09/a-500m-expansion-of-the-war-memorial-is-a-reckless-waste-of-money">further $500 million was recently allocated for the extension of the Australian War Memorial</a>, at a time when other cultural institutions in Canberra are being forced to shed jobs and tighten their belts.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218400/original/file-20180510-185500-1anfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218400/original/file-20180510-185500-1anfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218400/original/file-20180510-185500-1anfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218400/original/file-20180510-185500-1anfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218400/original/file-20180510-185500-1anfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218400/original/file-20180510-185500-1anfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218400/original/file-20180510-185500-1anfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218400/original/file-20180510-185500-1anfe6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The view from Captain Cook’s landing in Botany Bay, Kamay National Park.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Captain_Cooks_Landing_Place_Park_-_panoramio_(3).jpg">Wikimedia/Maksym Kozlenko</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The funding cycle for our contemporary cultural institutions and activities in Australia has been closely linked to anniversaries and their commemoration since at least the 1970 bicentenary. The 2018 budget lists support for programs at a number of cultural institutions and for training Indigenous cultural heritage professionals. It would be interesting to know whether these funds have been diverted away from existing operational budgets and core activities in these institutions to support the Cook celebrations. </p>
<p>The master plan for <a href="http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/research-and-publications/publications-search/kamay-botany-bay-national-park-kurnell-draft-master-plan">Kamay Botany Bay National Park</a> has also been in development for some time. While centred on the historical event of Cook’s landing, the plan itself is more about the rehabilitation and activation of this somewhat neglected landscape. Plans have been drawn up in consultation with the La Perouse Aboriginal Land Council. </p>
<p>Should we be devoting scarce financial resources to yet another celebration of Cook? Focal events such as these can divert funds into cultural activities and may allow researchers and creative practitioners to unearth new evidence and develop fresh interpretations. Some of these funds may also go to support initiatives driven by First Nations communities. </p>
<p>There is no escaping the fact that Captain Cook is a polarising national symbol, representing possession and dispossession. Another anniversary of Cook’s landing may give us much to reflect upon, but it also the highlights the need for investment in new symbols that grapple with colonial legacies and shared futures.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/96344/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tracy Ireland receives funding from the Australian Research Council.</span></em></p>The federal government will spend nearly $50 million over four years to commemorate Captain Cook’s first landing. But some have questioned the spend.Tracy Ireland, Associate Professor Cultural Heritage, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/834242017-09-18T20:05:31Z2017-09-18T20:05:31ZAustralia’s ‘big’ problem – what to do with our ageing super-sized statues?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184611/original/file-20170905-31374-vwbu0q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Big Banana, Coffs Harbour, New South Wales, 2015.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Big_Banana_50_Years.jpg">user:WikiWookie</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Australians have been fascinated by “Big Things” since the 1960s, when statues such as Adelaide’s Big Scotsman and the <a href="http://www.bigbanana.com">Big Banana</a> in Coffs Harbour were opened to great fanfare. These super-sized structures can be found in other countries, too. The United States is known for its <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randy%27s_Donuts">Big Donut</a>, Canada has the <a href="http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/world-s-largest-fiddle">world’s largest fiddle</a>, but the attachment to Big Things here has an almost patriotic quality.</p>
<p>Many will recall childhood road trips punctuated by such highlights as a <a href="http://www.bigmerino.com.au">giant Merino sheep</a> or a <a href="https://thetoyfactory.com.au">towering rocking horse</a>, or an assortment of fruits – the <a href="http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/big-avocado">Big Avocado</a>, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Orange_(South_Australia)">Big Orange</a> and the <a href="http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-big-mango">Big Mango</a>. When the latter was reported “missing” in 2014, the news made national headlines, only to be later <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/local/stories/2014/02/25/3951795.htm">revealed as a publicity stunt</a>.</p>
<p>But in a nation now littered with at least 200 Big Things, there is a sizeable problem. What to do with them as they age and wear out? Many Big Things were built cheaply from concrete and fibreglass – materials that inevitably fade and decay. </p>
<p>Some structures — such as the <a href="http://www.bigpineapple.com.au">Big Pineapple</a>, the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-03-14/big-things-sunshine-coast/7246070">Big Macadamia Nut</a>, the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-05-12/big-orange--revival-may-help-other-big-things-sa-riverland-mayor/7407942">Big Orange</a> and the <a href="https://www.discoverballina.com.au/visit/big-prawn?s=96">Big Prawn</a> — have, in recent times, either <a href="http://www.news.com.au/travel/travel-ideas/are-the-big-things-a-big-tourism-fail/news-story/cde45f18a41312cbfec402f1a5b01ee2">fallen into disrepair</a> or struggled to bring in much income. Then there are others, such as Cairns’s Big Captain Cook, which invite controversy.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184601/original/file-20170905-9717-mtuho8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184601/original/file-20170905-9717-mtuho8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184601/original/file-20170905-9717-mtuho8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184601/original/file-20170905-9717-mtuho8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184601/original/file-20170905-9717-mtuho8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184601/original/file-20170905-9717-mtuho8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184601/original/file-20170905-9717-mtuho8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Big Captain Cook in Cairns, 2007.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Fosnes/Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Big Captain Cook stands in a vacant lot on the side of the Cook Highway; its legs show signs of concrete cancer and its paint job is flaky. The hotel that once accompanied Cook is long demolished, and the local community is divided over the appropriate fate of its landmark. </p>
<p>Should he be repainted, or dismantled, or relocated to a place such as James Cook University where, in 2006, students petitioned for his adoption? (Since the university is named after Cook, they thought it would be a good match.) Earlier this year, he was <a href="http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/national/captain-cook-statue-vandalised-in-apparent-protest-against-australia-day/news-story/52b31344547505ee49af75d0653e97fc">draped with a large Sorry sign</a> to coincide with Australia Day. Indigenous artist Munganbana Norman Miller has proposed the Cook statue be given a Big Boomerang to hold.</p>
<p>Then there is South Australia’s “Larry” the Lobster. Created in 1979, the 17-metre fibreglass crustacean has been on the market intermittently since the late 1980s and reportedly <a href="http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/uncertain-future-for-kingstons-larry-the-giant-lobster-after-property-sale-falls-over-despite-30000-raised/news-story/b77545ea5a2807721e9e56043d0adf17">needed repairs</a>. The state government <a href="http://www.news.com.au/national/breaking-news/sa-govt-gives-10000-to-help-big-lobster/news-story/8ce7cc2dc9b64145cd9e7d4b103f7c9a">offered A$10,000 to help in late 2015</a>. </p>
<p>The Lobster was recently the subject of a nationwide fundraising campaign <a href="http://www.hamishandandy.com/2016/save-larry/">#PinchAMate</a> led by radio hosts Hamish and Andy. Earlier this month, Larry, who comes with a restaurant attached, failed to draw a bid at auction. But its owners said they were <a href="http://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-09/giant-lobster-fails-to-sell-at-auction/8888306">still hopeful</a> of selling Larry, which recently had a A$50,000-plus makeover.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184604/original/file-20170905-9760-1soqqhb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184604/original/file-20170905-9760-1soqqhb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184604/original/file-20170905-9760-1soqqhb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184604/original/file-20170905-9760-1soqqhb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184604/original/file-20170905-9760-1soqqhb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184604/original/file-20170905-9760-1soqqhb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184604/original/file-20170905-9760-1soqqhb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Big Lobster, ‘Larry’, in Kingston, South Australia, 2006.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">riana_dzasta/Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Yet while some Big Things, such as the Big Orange (Berri, South Australia) and the Big Macadamia Nut (Nambour, Queensland), sit abandoned, communities continue to build new monuments to attract tourists to remote corners of Australia. The <a href="http://www.tullychamber.com.au/about-tully/the-golden-gumboot">Big Golden Gumboot in Tully</a>, the <a href="http://www.bogan.nsw.gov.au/tourism/attractions/the-big-bogan">Big Bogan in Nyngan</a> and the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-10-27/augathella-councillor-hopes-big-meat-ant-mascot-can-save-town/6887638">Big Meat Ant in Augathella</a> are examples of the new generation of local symbols. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184605/original/file-20170905-9717-xo3l2h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184605/original/file-20170905-9717-xo3l2h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184605/original/file-20170905-9717-xo3l2h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184605/original/file-20170905-9717-xo3l2h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184605/original/file-20170905-9717-xo3l2h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184605/original/file-20170905-9717-xo3l2h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184605/original/file-20170905-9717-xo3l2h.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Golden Gumboot, Tully, Queensland, 2006.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">user:Frances76/Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>On the one hand, we can hardly begrudge a community that wishes to unite around a wonderfully kitschy piece of public art. On the other, we have to question why local authorities allow new structures to go ahead when these same local authorities may be asked to take on their upkeep in 30 years’ time.</p>
<p>One of Australia’s most beloved Big Things, the Big Pineapple in Nambour, was built in 1971. It was once a necessary pit-stop on the Queensland coastal tourist trail. In 1983, <a href="http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/celebrity-life/royals/princess-diana-the-big-pineapple-and-my-true-blue-muumuu/news-story/ea5fd9708bb1b2fca78d0456bb9bf089">even Prince Charles and Princess Diana visited it</a>. But in recent years the number of visitors to the Big Pineapple has fallen dramatically. It has been for sale several times since 1996, and even closed for a period during 2010-2011. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184603/original/file-20170905-31374-qfisqi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184603/original/file-20170905-31374-qfisqi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=858&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184603/original/file-20170905-31374-qfisqi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=858&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184603/original/file-20170905-31374-qfisqi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=858&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184603/original/file-20170905-31374-qfisqi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1079&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184603/original/file-20170905-31374-qfisqi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1079&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184603/original/file-20170905-31374-qfisqi.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1079&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Big Pineapple, near Nambour, Queensland, 1996.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Kaye Clarke</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In 2009, the Big Pineapple was added to the <a href="https://environment.ehp.qld.gov.au/heritage-register/detail/?id=602694">Queensland State Heritage Register</a>, giving it some legal protection. This move also imposed an expectation that the owners would maintain the structure for future generations. Some saw this as a victory, but for others — <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2009-03-24/big-pineapple-heritage-listed/1629348">including the owners at the time</a> — the listing was a burden that limited opportunities for commercial success. </p>
<p>In 2017, the Big Pineapple is in the news again. A proposal for a multi-million-dollar overhaul is before the local council, with the aim of converting it into an <a href="https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/big-pineapple-thinks-big-20170901-p4yvo9.html">“extreme tourism” attraction</a> with adventure tourism, music, a water park, camping, a brewery and winery. This is clearly another attempt to bring life (and income) back to the ageing icon.</p>
<p>The sheer volume of Australia’s Big Things makes it impossible to guarantee that all will survive. More local authorities will inevitably face emotive public debates, akin to the furore over the <a href="http://www.news.com.au/finance/real-estate/the-landmark-big-prawn-in-ballina-has-a-new-owner/news-story/6a6d5b837c85368551621d9c24d7e9f0">Ballina council’s threatened demolition of the Big Prawn in 2009</a>. (In that instance, the crustacean was bought by Bunnings, which kept it <a href="Http://www.ballinaadvocate.com.au/news/big-prawn-has-been-moved/1531067/">as part of a redevelopment</a> of the property it was attached to.) </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184608/original/file-20170905-9753-1peiifx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/184608/original/file-20170905-9753-1peiifx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184608/original/file-20170905-9753-1peiifx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184608/original/file-20170905-9753-1peiifx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=429&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184608/original/file-20170905-9753-1peiifx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184608/original/file-20170905-9753-1peiifx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/184608/original/file-20170905-9753-1peiifx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=539&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The Big Prawn, in Ballina, New South Wales, 2007. It has since been relocated and repainted.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Stuart Edwards/Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>One man’s trash is another man’s Big Pineapple. These are undeniably public landmarks of socio-cultural significance, and some — like the Pineapple — warrant preservation. </p>
<p>Still, heritage bodies and governments will need to make difficult, and probably unpopular, decisions that may likely send some of our Big Things to the scrap heap. At the time they were built, it was already clear that Big Things typically have an expiration date.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/83424/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Amy Clarke does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Australia has more than 200 Big Things, from the heritage-listed Pineapple to a giant Captain Cook. What are we to do with these structures as they age and decay? And should we be building new ones?Amy Clarke, Lecturer in History specialising in built heritage and cultural/identity politics, University of the Sunshine CoastLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.