The Land Downunder and it’s Ancient Lore – Australia

Australian Aboriginal Lore is the most ancient continuous Lore known in the world of man. It has been practiced and has evolved in one continuous evolutionary stream over some 50,000 – 60,000 years of the known history of man. This was on one vast secluded continent of the earth, the largest island on our globe. These clans and tribes of ancient Aus’ moved around within their ‘Country’ following their marriage and trade Lore, this, which governed their lives and practices. This Lore had evolved within boundaries and continuous practices, found in ceremonies developed over countless eons of time.

It is believed that man moved onto the isolated continent of Aus’ some 60,000 years ago and left his mark in rock carvings, ochre paintings and imprints which have impregnated into the porous rock over the passage of thousands of years.

The mark of ancient man on the Australian continent often predates the marks and ages of other developing civilizations else where on Earth by thousands upon thousands of years. While man on the vast northern lands of Asia and Europe were developing trade, religion and commerce, learning to cultivate the land and shift from a nomadic existence, turning to husbandry to develop and obtain items of commerce, Man on the Aussie continent remained fluid in his movements. Though he was not a nomadic wanderer in the true sense of the word. He (and she) moved throughout territorial domains with the seasons, the growth of native foods and the moment of animals. They called this domain, their ‘Country’ and continue to do so today. It is a term that continues to be adopted by the adopted sons and daughters of Australia who are growing lighter/darker in skin colour, when describing their homeland.

The civilisations and tribal groups endemic to Aboriginal Australia were highly structured. They saw themselves not as one apart from the land, but as people and creatures who were of this land. Like the creatures and game they hunted, they too were hunted. Their existence was mostly a spiritual existence. They listened to the voices of their world and co-existed with a world that was more spiritual than physical. This was their Lore, their religion. They were but an element of their world, like other creatures who struggled for an existence. What marked them apart from the animals around them was their Shadow, their Spirit or what also can be termed as their ‘Soul’. However their very existence was more tri-fold than bi-fold in maters of the spirit.

Where as western man developed religion that contained within it a Soul and a Body, and was guided and ruled over by a ‘Spiritual guide’ ie. God, the Aussie concept within ancient man was that of a tri-fold existence. These entities were the physical body, a Shade or Shadow and a Spirit being, all of which controlled their personal survival and existence. This existence, customs and behaviours were governed by other Spirit beings, who were not Gods that required worship, but entities that bought knowledge to man and were often depicted as Spirit animals, or half animal half man or woman of their legends or Dreamtime. Or sometimes they were even a human being, who was personally and ceremonially enlightened by the ancient spirit beings of creation and legend.

It is from here that the Kadaitcha or Featherfoot man gains his reputation, or the Illapurinja, who was known as the ‘changed one’. The Illapurinja was a female sorceress of the Kadaitcha, who was greatly feared and revered as they were often more secretive and more powerful than their male counterpart. Not only seen as the source of life as with women, but also the source of spiritual prowess.

Man and Woman in Aus’ learnt to cultivate the land using fire instead of turning the earth and cultivating crops. This in a way that attracted game, in and out of seasons, leading it into specific areas. In this way the game were driven or guided down, or along a path or route, that led not only to water, but to slaughter.

She who nurtured, learnt to forage. She found the roots and plants needed to survive, rather than cultivate the same, in a land where water was often a precious resource. He who hunted, developed vast trade routes as he encountered other men. These groups were divided by language and he learnt the value of intermarriage and trade. The Lore was developed to facilitate this trade of goods and women with the locals he encountered. In all the family groups both large and small developed ceremony and practices, which allowed these groups and families to survive.

Then civilization caught up with the Aussie tribes in the turn of the 1800’s. A world changed, unfortunately in many ways, and in many ways tragically. A great deal of knowledge and Lore was lost with the arrival of the men and Laws from the Northern civilisations, along with the decimation bought by strange diseases and what was seen as an easier way of living a life, for many.

Writing stories and novels about this hidden world is one of my greatest pleasures, and I draw on a lifetime of research, anthropology studies, both formal and informal, and a knowledge of the Aussie wilderness and bush. Bringing this ancient world to readers, recreating and imaging a way of life in which the reader can find themselves lost in, is a wonderful challenge. The world I write about is often a strange place, a place where Spirits interfere in life and often govern choices. It is a place where men and women are listening to a different song as they go about their daily lives and I try to bring this awareness to the reader.

The introduction to the stories of the Dreaming Series, and the Spirit Children series is ‘Shadow Dreaming’. It is a tale that will introduce you slowly to an awareness of a different world. In the later series ‘The Spirit Children’ you follow the growth of the world of the Spirit amongst the young men and women.

In ‘Lands Edge’, the first book of the Spirit Children Series you walk with Jeremy, a young man of the Aboriginal community, which you came to know in the earlier series, The Dreaming. The tale will step you out of the community and into cosmopolitan Sydney where once more you will be confronted by the evidence of a more Ancient world. He is a young man who sees things through the teenage experience. It is in the second book, “Through Other Eyes’ that will show you a world which Jeremy didn’t fully understand. The more adult outlook of Tom, a man of the Kadaitcha or Featherfoot.

For 5 days only ‘Lands Edge’ will be available for free download on of the e-book and I hope you will enjoy the story. The continuing story, one that reveals the adult world revolving around the teenager, ‘Through Other Eyes’ is available through Amazon for the price of a cuppa’ and in this, I hope, you will enjoy the adventure.

The Dreaming Series, a series of much larger books is also available in e-book and print, through Amazon. If you are interested in the more expensive print versions, please visit my website for details on discounts available for my readers and followers to offset postal costs. The books of the first series, The Dreaming’ can be read, each independently, as each is a tale and story in its own right. The complete series of The Dreaming Series will build a world around you, one you never realised that you shared with the Dreamtime.

Enjoy.