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Aboriginal Australian Foodways

Indigenous

⚠ A ROOT, AND THE OLDEST CONTINUOUS FOOD CULTURE DOCUMENTED ANYWHERE — at least 65,000 years, on the evidence from Madjedbebe in Arnhem Land. ⚠ AND NOT ONE PEOPLE: there are hundreds of distinct nations with their own countries, laws and languages — Yolŋu, Arrernte, Pitjantjatjara, Warlpiri, Noongar, Wurundjeri, Gunditjmara, Tiwi, Anindilyakwa and very many more — and "Aboriginal cuisine" in the singular is a settler abstraction. What is shared is a relationship: food comes from COUNTRY, which is owned by and owns particular people, and knowledge of it is held rather than public. Documented foods across regions: SEEDS ground to flour and baked — the evidence for grindstone use at Cuddie Springs is around 30,000 years old, making this arguably the oldest bread-making known; yams and other tubers; MACADAMIA, the one Australian plant to become a global commercial crop; quandong, Kakadu plum, riberry, finger lime, muntries, bush tomato; WATTLESEED; witchetty grub; kangaroo, emu, goanna, magpie goose, turtle and dugong; fish, shellfish and eel. ⚠ AND THE GUNDITJMARA EEL AQUACULTURE AT BUDJ BIM — stone channels and weirs, World Heritage-listed, dated to around 6,600 years — is documented engineering and settles the question of whether this was "only" hunting and gathering. ⚠ FIRE IS A FOOD TECHNOLOGY: cultural burning shaped the continent’s vegetation deliberately over millennia. ⚠ RESTRICTED, SACRED, GENDERED AND SITE-SPECIFIC KNOWLEDGE IS NOT PUBLISHED HERE, no current gathering or hunting location is named, and nothing on this row should be read as a licence to harvest.

Atlas — where and when

Where in the world

Communities and languages

  • Aboriginal Australians community documented
  • Yolŋu community documented
  • Arrernte community documented
  • Pitjantjatjara community documented
  • Warlpiri community documented
  • Gunditjmara community documented
  • Tiwi community documented

Languages: Pitjantjatjara, Warlpiri, Dhuwal, Tiwi, Anindilyakwa, Kriol, English

What is recorded

  • Aboriginal occupation of Australia is dated to at least 65,000 years on the evidence from Madjedbebe, making it the oldest continuous food culture documented. Aboriginal Australia comprises hundreds of distinct nations with their own countries and languages, and is not recorded here as a single cuisine. Grindstone use for seed processing at Cuddie Springs is dated to approximately 30,000 years. The Gunditjmara eel aquaculture system at Budj Bim — stone channels and weirs, World Heritage-listed — is dated to approximately 6,600 years and is documented engineering. Cultural burning is recorded as having deliberately shaped continental vegetation. Restricted, sacred, gendered and site-specific knowledge is not published here and no current gathering or hunting location is named. documented
  • Aboriginal occupation of Australia, evidenced at Madjedbebe — the oldest continuous food culture documented anywhere. documented
  • The Gunditjmara eel aquaculture system at Budj Bim — stone channels and weirs, now World Heritage-listed. documented

Related foodways

This foodway relates to

  • related to Australian Foodways documented

    ⚠ A ROOT, NOT A SUBSECTION. At least 65,000 years against about 240; filing the older beneath the newer would invert the history.

Recorded as relating to this foodway

  • related to Australian Native Foods documented

    ⚠ THE KNOWLEDGE IS ABORIGINAL AND THE PROFITS LARGELY ARE NOT: a documented estimate gives Aboriginal people only a very small share of the native-food sector’s value, and several plants have been subject to patent and trademark disputes.

  • related to Torres Strait Islander Foodways documented

    ⚠ TWO DISTINCT PEOPLES. Torres Strait Islanders are Melanesian, not Aboriginal, and Australian law names them separately.

Recipes

No recipes are filed under this cuisine yet.