Traditional Indigenous people found useful foods, tools and other materials throughout the natural environment. Gum under the bark of native trees was used as glue.
TRADITIONAL TOOLS, WEAPONS & UTENSILS
Indigenous tools and weapons were basic but well designed to suit their hunting and gathering culture. Except in WA’s South-West, fishing was also part of the food-gathering process.
Generally, men used spears, spear-throwers (woomeras), clubs and stone axes to hunt animals, reptiles and fish, and women used digging sticks, carrying dishes and grinding stones to collect flowers, fruit, seeds and other foods from plants and insects.
Implements were needed to catch, collect, prepare, eat and store food. Kangaroo, goanna, barramundi, dugong, quandong, native fig and ants were among the food sources.
Implements were made from stone, wood, bone, shell, teeth, plant fibre or animal hide.
Boomerang (or throwing stick): Light versions of this arc-shaped wooden implement easily returned to the thrower, but bigger boomerangs were used to knock a person or animal to the ground and did not return. They were also used to clear ground or grass, rake coals, chisel out objects embedded in the ground or, if decorated, for trading or rituals.
Clubs: These ranged from light, for throwing, and heavy, for fighting, and varied depending on the region of origin. Heads could be round, pointed or jagged. Throwing clubs would move about in flight and would bounce off the ground.
Spears: Made from wood, root or stem, shaped over hot ashes, smoothed by hands or feet, then bark removed and polished with stone and greased with animal fat. Used in battle, fishing or hunting, and carved for use in ceremonies or shaken in a bundle as a warning signal. Thrown by hand or with a spear-thrower, for extra force. Timber varied depending on local materials. Reed spears were used in riverine areas.
Spear blades: Made from bone, stone or by sharpening the head of the wooden shaft. Some had barbs or prongs.
Traditional Indigenous people started fires by turning a stick over leaves or kindling on another piece of wood. This is a contemporary demonstration of this technique.
Spear-throwers: Made to increase the spear’s speed. Highly decorated as very personal items and made to last many years. Made from a piece of wood, bark removed, content excavated, small hook fitted to grip the end of the spear and a small piece of stone glued on the thrower’s end. Also used as a container, woodworker, shield, knife, chisel, fire-starter, palette, scoop, or tapped or bounced to accompany singing.
Fire-starters: A thin ‘drill’ stick inserted into a hole in a piece of wood and rapidly turned between the palms to cause a spark. Seeds and wood shavings could be used as kindling. In desert areas a sawing method is used to start fires: a branch is split, wedged open, dry kangaroo dung placed inside, then a spear-thrower is sawed over the dung until a fire ignites.
Digging stick: Short wooden rod, sharp at one end and fire-hardened at both, used to dig for tubers, knock down fruit or nuts, scour out wombats from smoked-out holes, poke at animals or beat them on the head, fire-making or as a weapon.
Carrying utensils: Dilly bags or bundles, wooden curled-sided dishes, fibre-woven bags, kangaroo skin bags, two-ply bulrush twine used in baskets and nets.
Cooking aids: Grinding stones; toasting over hot rocks or on fire-hardened clay lumps; food sometimes cooked between layers of wet grass, with hot stones above and below, over hot coals.
Pitfalls, nets, traps: Used to catch prey after tracking.
Tracking: Indigenous people are renowned for their tracking ability. It is passed down from adults to children who learn to observe the faintest impressions on the ground and to see signs and symbols everywhere.
Boats: Dugout canoes, bark canoes, bamboo craft, rafts and log crafts powered by outriggers and paddles are among the early water craft. South-West people did not use water craft, perhaps because of the rugged coastline and inhospitable climate.
