Aboriginal site types

Below is an overview of the various types of sites that can be found in Western Australia. For more information about site recording for the purpose of an application to use land (S18) click here.

Type of Site: Artefacts

An artefact site is a place where human activity is identifiable by the presence of a portable object/s (e.g., stone, glass, bone, shell) utilised or modified by Aboriginal people in relation to traditional cultural life past or present.

Isolated artefact/s are also considered under this type of site.

  

Type of Site : Fish Trap

A stone, wood, or other similar structure made by Aboriginal people for catching fish. Such structures are generally found on the coast of Western Australia, and in its lakes and rivers.

     

Type of site: Man-made structure

The placement or arrangement, by Aboriginal people, of stone, wood or other material made into a structure for ceremonial or utilitarian purposes.

        

Site Type: Repository / Cache

A place were cultural or utilitarian objects are/were taken, or stored, by Aboriginal people, either past or present.

Type of Site: Ceremonial

A place used for a formal act or series of acts prescribed by ritual, belief in a mythological manifestation, religious belief or observance, protocol or convention that is connected with the traditional cultural life of Aboriginal people past or present.

Type of Site: Grinding patches/Grooves

A place where grinding patches or grooves can be found. Grinding patches or grooves are smoothed areas or grooves on rock surfaces (non-portable) that have been created by grinding activity associated with food production such as seed milling, preparation of pigments, tool manufacture and/or maintenance and ritual.

  

Site Type: Midden

A place where there is an accumulation of shell refuse that is derived from exploitation of a mollusc resource by Aboriginal people. Such sites may also contain artefacts, fireplaces, burnt shell and bones.

Note: Natural events (e.g. storms) may result in the formation of "midden like" features. Such features are distinguishable from middens by their lack of artefactual material, burnt shell or their composition being of non-edible mollusc species. Therefore, at least two of the following pieces of evidence are required to establish that the accumulation of shells is of Aboriginal origin:

• Presence of charcoal, burnt wood, blackened shells, hearths.
• Presence of bones of other edible species.
• Presence of artefactual material.
• Presence of layers indicating cultural rather than natural deposition.
• Evidence that the shell fish have been exploited by human beings, e.g., broken open backs, edible size.
• Demonstrable selection of edible, mature, shell fish species.
• Ethnographic and/or historical evidence related to the accumulated shell refuse.

    

Type of Site: Painting

Places where Aboriginal people have painted on surfaces. Paintings (including daubings, drawings, stencils, prints) can be figurative or non-figurative markings or motifs on surfaces such as rocks, rock walls and trees at fixed locations that are produced by adding pigments and or mediums, such as ochre, blood, beeswax, animal fats, vegetable dyes, tree saps.

    

Type of Site: Skeletal material/Burial

A place where Aboriginal skeletal material is buried and/or where mortuary practices occurred.

At least one of the following pieces of evidence are required to establish that the reported place is of Aboriginal origin:

• Aboriginal skeletal material is visible.
• Aboriginal mortuary/burial markers and or ethnographic evidence about the burial/skeletal material.

Type of Site: Engraving

A motif (either figurative or non-figurative) on a rock surface produced by percussion or abrasion. Engravings are also often referred to as petroglyphs.

  

Type of Site: Historical

A place that has historical associations with Aboriginal people and may or may not contain physical evidence of those associations.

Type of Site: Modified or Scarred tree

A place with one or more tree(s), living or dead, that has been modified by Aboriginal people by removing the bark or wood resulting in the formation of a scar. This sort of modification was and is frequently done for the making of implements, tools or other materials that were used in traditional cultural practices.

At least two of the following pieces of evidence are required to establish that a scar is of Aboriginal origin:

• The scarred tree is an indigenous species and a mature individual.
• The scar base normally begins above ground level.
• The scar is roughly parallel-sided and fairly symmetrical in its overall shape.
• The bark regrowth is generally regular.
• The scar terminations are either squared off or pointed as a result of bark regrowth.
• Axe marks are present.
• Suspected toe holes are arranged in a usable pattern.

    

Site Type: Quarry

Places where there is evidence for the extraction of stone or ochre.

At least two of the following pieces of evidence are required to establish that a natural occurrence of raw material has been used as a quarry:

• Evidence for the removal of material/modified surfaces in the form of negative scarring, crushing, areas of excavation etc.
• Presence of implements used during extraction (e.g. hammerstones, fire-hardened sticks) at the source.
• Evidence of flaking and reduction of the stone material at the source.
• Presence of partially-worked material at the source.
• Ethnographic evidence relating to the extraction of raw material at the source.

  

Definitions for places with information supporting the site types

Archaeological Deposit

An accumulation of cultural material and sediment deposited over time.

Birthplace

A place at which an Aboriginal person was born and is significant based on tradition, historical association or Aboriginal sentiment.

Camping Place

A place at which Aboriginal people have camped in association with traditional cultural life past or present.

Hunting Place

A place where Aboriginal people have hunted in association with traditional cultural life past or present.

Massacre

A place where a significant conflict occurred between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal groups which resulted in the deaths of numerous Aboriginal people.

Meeting Place

An area that was traditionally used by Aboriginal people as a gathering and meeting ground.

Named Place

A place that has a traditional Aboriginal name.

Mission

A place established by missionaries to convert Aboriginal people to Christianity. Such places typically assimilated residents by training and indoctrination.

Ochre

A mineral pigment used by Aboriginal people for painting and ceremonial purposes.

Plant Resource

A source of plant material used by Aboriginal people for a variety of functions such as food and medicine.

Shell

A place with fragments of entire examples of molluscan shell material, appearing as a surface scatter or an isolated find. The place may represent either a natural deposit, relocated fill or the remains of a mealtime camp by Aboriginal people (midden).

Rock shelter

A place recognisable as a cave or overhang that may have been utilised by Aboriginal people.

Water source

A source of water, (e.g., gnamma holes, soaks, springs, rockholes), with ethnographic evidence of its use or modification for use by Aboriginal people in connection with traditional cultural life past or present.