Brewarrina Aboriginal Fish Traps
Brewarrina Aboriginal Fish Traps are heritage-listed Australian Aboriginal fish traps on the Barwon River at Brewarrina, in the Orana region of, New South Wales, Australia. They are also known as Baiame's Ngunnhu, Nonah, or Nyemba Fish Traps. The Brewarrina Aboriginal Cultural Museum, opened in 1988, adjoins the site. The fish traps were added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 11 August 2000 and to the Australian National Heritage List on 3 June 2005.
Genevieve Bell has suggested that these fish traps may be the oldest human construction in the world. The age of the fish traps is currently unknown.
History
Aboriginal land
The traditional custodians of the fish traps are the Ngemba Wayilwan people. It has been estimated that the region supported a population of about 3,000 people prior to European settlement. The river people generally settled along the main rivers in summer and moved to regular campsites located in drier country during the winter months.While the rivers acted as important travel and trade routes, each tribe had a clearly defined territory, the boundaries of which were commonly marked by prominent physical features. Evidence of the occupation and use of these places survives across the landscape in the form of open campsites, middens, scarred trees, stone quarries, stone arrangements, burial grounds, ceremonial sites and rock art. Archaeological remains are especially concentrated along riverine corridors, reflecting the intensive occupation of these areas. In 1829 Charles Sturt came across what he considered to be a permanent camp of 70 huts each capable of housing 12-15 people beside the Darling River near present-day Bourke. Similarly, Thomas Mitchell reported the existence of permanent huts on both banks of the Darling River above present-day Wilcannia in 1835.
Before the British came, thousands of people visited these fish traps for large corroborees in which each group's use of the fish traps was controlled by strict protocols. Brewarrina retains a rich collection of Aboriginal sites consisting of axe grinding grooves, burial grounds, open campsites, knapping sites, scarred trees, ceremonial sites, middens and stone quarries. Prior to European disturbance, both banks of the river at the fish traps were lined by almost continuous middens with an accumulation of shells and other objects more than a metre deep. In 1901, the anthropologist Robert Hamilton Mathews noted more than two dozen axe grinding places along the river banks at the fish traps. The Barwon Four Reserve on the northern bank of the Barwon River contains 250 recorded sites including two known burial grounds.
Creation story
The creation of the Ngunnhu is enshrined in ancient tradition. Many Aboriginal people believe that the fish traps were designed and created by Baiame, a great ancestral being who is respected by numerous cultural groups in western NSW, including the Ngemba Wayilwan, Morowari. Walkwan, Wongaibon, Ualarai, Kamilaroi and Wlradjuri. The creation story is well known to Aboriginal people of the region, having been passed down by word of mouth from generation to generation. Elements of the story have also been recorded by various European visitors to the fish traps, from Robert Hamilton Mathews in 1903 through to his granddaughter-in-law Janet Mathews in 1985.According to legend, Baiame camped at a granite outcrop called Bai near present-day Byrock. A rock-hole located here was dug by him and the small depression nearby is where Baiame and his wives did their cooking. On the rock at Bai are impressions of a number of Baiame's weapons and utensils including his fighting club or "bunid" spear and dilly bag. He moved from here to Cobar where he camped in a large cave. The visible copper at Cobar is said to have been formed by the excrement of Baiame. From Cobar he traveled north.
Baiame reached the site where the Ngunnhu now stands during a time of drought. The Ngemba Wayilwan people were facing famine as Gurrungga had completely dried up. Upon seeing their plight, Baiame conceived of a gift for the Ngemba Wayilwan - an intricate series of fish traps in the dry river bed. He designed the traps by casting his great net across the course of the river. Using the pattern of their father's net, Baiame's two sons Booma-ooma-nowi and Ghinda-inda-mui built the traps from stones.
Baiame then showed the Ngemba Wayilwan men how to call the rain through dance and song. Days of rain followed, filling the river channel and flooding Baiame's net which filled with thousands of fish. The old men rushed to block the entry of the stone traps, herding fish through the pens. Baiame instructed the Ngemba Wayilwan people in how to use and maintain the Ngunnhu. Although they were to be the custodians of the fishery, Baiame declared that the maintenance and use of the traps should be shared with other cultural groups in the area. People from all of the groups that came to use and rely upon the fish traps had deep feelings of gratitude to Baiame.
Two large footprints made by Baiame remained at the Ngunnhu. One was located opposite the rock called Muja, the other was some 350m downstream of the traps on the southern bank of the river. One of these imprints is still visible. It is a strong belief that wherever Baiame camped, some of his spirit remains at the site. This applies to the Ngunnhu.
After creating the Ngunnhu, Baiame's family group travelled further to the east. Their path is now the winding course of the Barwon River. The tracks of his spirit dogs who moved separately across the landscape formed the tributary streams of the Warrego, Culgoa, Bokhara and Bogan Rivers. Before rejoining Baiame at a camp between Cumborah and Walgett, the dogs camped together on an arid plain, transforming it into Narran Lake. The Ualarai people call Narran Lake "Galiburima" which means Wild Dog Water.
The story of Baiame as creator of the fish traps was reported by Kathleen Langloh Parker in her 1905 book, The Euahlayi Tribe: 'Byamee is the originator of things less archaic and important than totemism. There is a large stone fish-trap at Brewarrina, on the Barwan River. It is said to have been made by Byamee and his gigantic sons, just as later Greece attributed the walls of Tiryns to the Cyclops, or as Glasgow Cathedral has been explained in legend as the work of the Picts. Byamee also established the rule that there should be a common camping-ground for the various tribes, where, during the fishing festival, peace should be strictly kept, all meeting to enjoy the fish, and do their share towards preserving the fisheries.'
The travels of Baiame are only one of the many creation stories set within the landscape of the Brewarrina district. Others include the stories of the kurrea serpent living in Boobera Lagoon on the Barwon River, the great warrior Toolalla, an eminent man called Yooneeara, and Mullian, the eagle, at nearby Cuddie Springs.
The linkages between landscape features through long-distance creation stories means that many of them, including the fish traps, are important to Aboriginal people from distant places, as well as local communities.
Age of the fish traps
It has been suggested that these fish traps may be the oldest human construction in the world.Given the location in the bed of a river, the fish traps would have been a dynamic structure, constantly changing. The river flow itself would have modified the fish traps which would also have been continually added to or altered by Aboriginal people over the course of hundreds or thousands of years. This constant reworking of the construction means that it is difficult to assign an original date to it.
An indication of when the Brewarrina fish traps were constructed may possibly be gauged by considering changes in the flow of the Barwon River. Construction of the fish traps would only have worked if low water levels were relatively frequent and regular in the river. Evidence from the lower Darling River indicates that during the past 50,000 years prolonged periods of low flow occurred between 15,000 and 9,000 years ago, and then from about 3,000 years ago up until the present time. Whether or not these dates also apply to low flow periods in the Barwon River is currently unknown.
Early European descriptions
The earliest known reference to the fish traps by a European was made in 1848 by the then Commissioner of Crown Lands at Wellington, W. C. Mayne. His observations, albeit brief, were made within the first decade of European settlement of the district:A second, equally brief description was published in 1861 by William Richard Randell, the captain of the river boat Gemini, who had navigated the upper reaches of the Darling River as far as the "Nonah" in 1859. His report in the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society states:
The first known detailed studies of the fish traps were made in the early years of the 20th century. The surveyor Robert Hamilton Mathews, one of the pioneers of Australian anthropology, visited the fish traps in 1901. He prepared the first detailed documentation of the fish traps, relying heavily upon the knowledge of Aboriginal people he had met. In 1903, Mathews described the construction and layout of the fish traps in a paper published in the journal of the Royal Society of New South Wales. Five years after Mathews' visit, A. W. Mullen, a surveyor with the Western Lands Board of New South Wales, also surveyed the fish traps. Two versions of his plan survive. The most detailed of these is drawn in his field notebook. The second plan, dated 15 June 1906, is based upon the first but has been simplified.
When Mathews and Mullen surveyed the fish traps there were already far fewer traps than in pre-European times because of disuse or disturbance from the activities of early settlers. The key features of the construction of the fish traps as described by Mathews and Mullen are summarized in Hope and Vines.
About the same time as the first surveys of the fish traps were being conducted in the early 20th century, numerous photographs were taken of the fisheries. These are held in the Tyrell Collection in the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences in Sydney.