Australian Aboriginal artefacts


Australian Aboriginal artefacts include a variety of cultural artefacts used by Aboriginal Australians for occupations such as hunting, warfare, food preparation and making music or art. These include boomerangs, spears, shields, dillybags and many other items. Some artefacts have ceremonial uses, and are regarded as ritual or secret sacred objects.

Purposes

Many Aboriginal artefacts were multi-purpose, for example boomerangs could be used:
Aboriginal people used several different types of weapons including shields, spears, Spear-throwers, boomerangs and clubs. Peoples from different regions used different weapons. Some peoples, for example, would fight with boomerangs and shields, whereas in another region they would fight with clubs. Not all weapons were for warfare; many were used primarily for hunting game.
Weapons were of different styles in different areas. For example, a shield from Central Australia is very different from a shield from North Queensland.

Everyday items

Everyday items include digging sticks, stone axes, coolamons and dilly bags. These items were mainly used in food-gathering, but were sometimes also used on ceremonial occasions.

Sacred items

Artefacts sometimes regarded as sacred items and/or used in ceremonies include bullroarers, didgeridoos and carved boards called churinga.

Art

Most Aboriginal art is not considered artefact, but often the designs in Aboriginal art are similar designs to those originally on sacred artefacts.