| ABORIGINAL SITES - Western Australia |
The Gwion (Bradshaw) Paintings, WA
The Gwion or Bradshaw Paintings are incredibly sophisticated examples of rock art found predominantly in the Mitchell Plateau and Gibb River sections of Kimberley region of Western Australia. This art form, known to the local Aborigines as Gwion Gwion or Allarwhro, was first recorded by Joseph Bradshaw in 1891, when he was lost on an expedition through the Kimberley with his brother.
Bradshaw published an illustrated account of his findings in 1892 ('Notes on a Recent Trip to Prince Regent River'). Of them, Bradshaw said, "The most remarkable fact in connection with these drawings is that wherever a profile face is shown, the features are of a most pronounced aquiline (eagle-like) type, quite different from those of any native we encountered." In 1938 Doctor Andreas Lommel, a member of the Frobenius Institute, lived for several months in the Outback of north-west Australia in the Kimberley, with the Unambal tribe, with the aim of copying Aboriginal rock paintings. On his second expedition to the Kimberley in 1955, he was joined by his wife Katharina. After that expedition, Dr. Lommel stated his belief that the rock art he referred to as and is now commonly identified as the Bradshaw Paintings may well predate the present Aborigines.
Since the initial find by the Bradshaw brothers, over 1,000 paintings have been discovered. The painting sites extend in an area of about 50,000 square kilometres. Based on aerial photography and field visits, an additional 10,000 to 50,000 vaults of Bradshaw Galleries are likely to exist in the Kimberley ranges. The figures are found in raised small caves at cliff faces of substantially horizontal bedding, and in the protection of overhanging rock ledges. Each painted site offers magnificent views of the rugged landscape. Many pictures were painted on the ceiling; the artist laying on the back, as Michelangelo did to paint his frescos. The Bradshaw Galleries cluster along and adjacent to the seven river systems of Kimberley Ranges, with concentrations around rocky river flats, which were certainly covered by large alluvial deposits during the glacial periods. The art is of such antiquity that no pigment remains on the rock surface, thus it is impossible to use carbon dating technology. The composition of the original paints cannot be determined, and whatever pigments were used have been amazingly locked into the rock itself as shades of Mulberry red, and have become impervious to the elements.
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| Bradshaw rock art figures |
Lybian rock art figures |
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Over the last two decades Grahame Walsh has explored the inhospitable environment of the Kimberley Region of Western Australia, mainly on foot, and has discovered thousands of these magnificent Bradshaw Paintings. The Bradshaw Art website presents a summary of the data Walsh has collected. Fortuitously, in 1996 Walsh discovered a Bradshaw Painting partly covered by a fossilised Mud Wasp nest, which scientists have removed and analysed using a new technique of dating, determining it to be 17,000 plus years old.
These small rock paintings are of human figures. Their location varies: sometimes they are to be found in the immediate vicinity of the larger Wandjina paintings, but sometimes they stand entirely on their own, as if they had been dropped at random into the landscape. Invariably painted in monochrome dark red, the part-human part-animal figures have agile, sinuous bodies, that are generally represented in profile, leaping, dancing, running, fighting, love-making, often carrying a barbed spear or a boomerang. Some are adorned with elaborate hair style and body ornamentation, presented in stunningly elegant, finely choreographed poses that seem to depict social events, or groups seemingly floating in space. Others, believed to be the most recent, are harsh, stick-like in character and contain none of the carefree imagery of the older figures.
Similar figures occur in the Upper Yule Valley and the Upper Shaw River as far as Nullagine in the east, and as far south as the Hamersley Range, but in a diminutive form, and near the coast around Dampier, on Depuch Island and as far north as the De Grey River. The origin of this style of painting is relatively obscure as it is unlike the rock art from another other region of Australia. A measure of outside influence is often assumed, as the depletion of movement is wholly uncharacteristic of indigenous Australian art, although the weapons - the multi barbed spear and boomerang - remain typical.
In his survey of the subject, Walsh examines the question of stylistic derivation and priority, pointing out that both types of painting unique to this area, the Bradshaw and the Wandjina, are often found at the same site. In such cases, the central picture is always the Wandjina, with the Bradshaws distributed round about in small niches and alcoves. Sometimes there is an element of continuity between the two styles.
Who created the Bradshaw Figures?
Right: A Bradshaw painting with an illustration of a classical Egyptian tassel dancer superimposed to illustrate the similarities. Photo: Robin Hutton
The early paintings are extremely old; 60,000 years or probably much more according to anthropologists, but their absolute age cannot be determined as the iron oxide pigments have lithified, mineralogically assimilated into the rock to become part of the rock itself, rather than a surface covering. If they are as old as they appear to be, chronologically they would predate the pyramids of Egypt and the Palaeolithic cave paintings of Europe, in fact they may well be the oldest art form of mankind in existence. The broad-shouldered, realistic representation of humans infers an origin of Egyptian culture in the Kimberley Ranges, while the slanted prolific features of the human face, reminiscent of Mayan pictures, suggest that the Kimberley Ranges may have been the cradle of all pyramidal cultures.
The Bradshaw Paintings differ in style from and, by archaeological evidence, appear to predate the art work of the ancestors of the Australian Aboriginal tribes of the Kimberley region, whose history goes back to about 40,000 years. Some scientists believe the figures were created by a race that populated the area long before the Aborigines migrated to Australia. They point out that the Aborigines' stature does not show even a remote match with the graceful homo-form of slender Bradshaw figures, and therefore they could not have possibly been the subject of Bradshaw figures. The Aborigines of Kimberley region at one time supported this notion. Since the late 19th Century until recent times, their elders stated that the Bradshaw images were "before their time" and referred to them as "rubbish paintings". According to Aboriginal legend, the Bradshaw images were painted by birds who pecked the rocks until their beaks bled, and then painted the images with their tail feathers. In recent years some Australian Aboriginal communities have had a change of heart, laying cultural claim to the Bradshaw Images in support of land claims involving the Kimberley region.
Anthropologist GL Seymour M.Sc has observed that the early Bradshaw images are depicted with representation of abundant plant material that suggests the Bradshaw People lived in a relatively lush environment in sharp contrast with the present hostile and desolate conditions of the region. "As the Bradshaw Paintings progressed in time they displayed a distinct trend of decline into barbarism. The decline is noticeable in artistic skills, composition, themes, motives and aesthetics. There is a noticeable increase in imperfect figures, and short stocky human forms appear together with the slender Bradshaw figures. Both homo-forms are clad in the Bradshaw tradition. The finely choreographed graceful postures gradually transit into wielding of weapons.
"The cause of multilateral decline is seen in the emergence of an external pressure, infiltration, inherent internal decay and eventual annexation by barbaric and warring new comers, probably the earliest wave of invasion (from the Indian sub-continent) by what is referred to as the Australian Aborigine. Such a quiet conquest infers the Bradshaw People were peaceful and hospitable, unaccustomed to deceit." Seymour surmises that the invaders eventually overtook the rule and overwrote the sophisticated culture, concluding that what the British did to the Aborigines, they themselves appear to have done to the Bradshaw People upon their arrival in Australia.
Right: an example of an image that appears to be from an early or classic period
Although the Bradshaw Pictures are timeless, the culture which created them was not, according to Seymour. "They had their beginning. The Bradshaw people displaced another culture of rock painting or philosophy as evidenced by abundant cupules (chipped pits), which cover large sections of rock surfaces. The cupules predate the Bradshaw pictures and served probably to obliterate previous rock paintings that the Bradshaw people may have perceived "pagan" or undesirable to their own spirituality and culture.
"Sensitivity to the old apparently diminished with time; Bradshaw figures were painted over the old. Interestingly enough, the Bradshaws displaced another advanced culture with sophisticated and realistic painting tradition. The giant figure in the background appears to be well clad in other than Bradshaw fashion, and seems to have no facial features. The figure's well developed muscular legs are represented in almost photographic precision."
According to Seymour, five major stages of the Bradshaw art have been identified.
- Early or Classic Period: Broad shouldered and realistic human representation of slender, ornamented and uniquely clad humans with hanging arms and "pony tail" hair style, reminiscence from the Egyptian Culture. Mainly floating images (above right).
- Decline: The human shape deteriorates in the horizontal proportion, unnatural swells and bends distort the figures (pregnancy?), as if painted from remote memories with diminished aesthetics and talent.
- Ethnic Mixing: Stocky human clad in classic Bradshaw style appears together with slender humans. Are alien races (ancestors of Australian Aborigines?) being adopted into the Bradshaw society? (photo at top of page).
- Stick styles: Figures composed of equi-wide strips and primitive stick-style human representation with greatly diminishes artistic capacities. Warring activities replace choreographed action. The floating pleasure dance has become a war dance.
- Ethical Decay - The Aftermath: Over painting the old with primitive graphics, hand stencil and fat stocky homomorph with erect penis and Bradshaw style handbag - signs of disrespect and contempt.
Right: an example of an image that appears to be from a later, war-like period
According to Seymour, from the decay of old, the Aboriginal Culture was born. "The elite of the unsophisticated Aborigines, which had evolved within the Bradshaw society, acquired the simple boomerang from the Bradshaw People (opposed to the double boomerang displayed on many Bradshaw Images), the woomera (a spear throwing aid), basic graphics, paint making and painting. With the exception of introducing primitive rock carving (actually chipping and scratching into the decomposed rock surfaces), countless millennia passed without progressive modification of or addition to their learned skills.
"In fact, the skills of paint making and painting technique declined (Aboriginal painting of recent centuries have a life span of a few hundred years). Artistic choreography, composition and cohesive design diminished and never evolved again, simple and symbolic presentation dominated throughout their 40,000 year history in sharp contrast with the highly skilled realistic presentation by the Bradshaw Civilisation. The only unique tool which the Aborigines can perhaps claim as their own, is the throwing disk (erroneously described as "stone axe"); a circular basalt slab with chipped round edge. The disks measure 120 to 150 mm in diameter, and were used to throw. The way they are found indicates that the thrown disks were not meant to be retrieved. The early stage of human evolution is also reflected by the deterioration and eventual dissipation of Bradshaw culture, science and technology, which had fallen into the laps of Aborigines of the day."
Aside from being extremely old, the Bradshaw paintings are very significant to world history because instead of depicting animals, they depict highly decorated humans and relatively advanced technology. They show people with tassles, hair adornments, and possibly clothing. One depicts a boat with 29 people on board. Another depicts a boat with four people on board, and a rudder. The art is very different from that created by the hunter gatherers living in the area at the time of European colonisation. The hunter gatherer paintings are known as Wandjinas.
The Bradshaw "Sun Wheel"
With painstaking digital processing, art conservator Peter Paul Biro has recovered the details of a small painted object (right) found in the central attention of a finely choreographed group action. Biro's enhanced picture shows an oval rim of four semi-circular and parallel lines with a small ovoid in the off-centre. Five bands, with distinct boundaries radiating from the small ovoid in the fashion of a set of spokes, with blank (obliterated) room for two additional spokes. His reconstruction of missing components yields the perspective three dimensional picture of a disk bounded by four closely spaced circles. From an elevation above, seven bands, with dark linear edges, originate from a circular centre. The bands are spaced at an even radial angle, and descend to the edge of disk at a low angle giving a conical shape to the object.
Reconstruction of the object, using the rules of axonometric graphics, has also indicated that the Bradshaws' comprehension of representing a 3 dimensional object in a 2 dimensional plane coincides with ours. It means realistic representation as opposed to symbolic representation, which predominates prehistoric graphics.
In Seymour's opinion, the seven spokes radiating from an elevated origin define a gradient and inherent motion down the gradient (flow); the spokes symbolise the seven river systems of the Kimberley Ranges. "The importance of rivers are explained by the adjacent terrace formations and permanent water flow immediately before and during the Wurm and previous Glacial periods, in contrast with their present and previous interglacial status of terraces being totally washed away and water courses being intermittently active.
"In the rugged rocky environment the permanent water flow and adjoining river terraces provided the place of habitation and opportunity for practising agriculture. In this context, the life supporting role of rivers were paramount to warrant the symbolisation of rivers. The specific and exclusive nature of symbolism expressed in the object indicates the geographic knowledge of land boundaries and the effective control and ownership of land. The "Spoked Object" defines the land holding of Bradshaw People as "All lands from the catchments of seven rivers to the sea", a contemporary equivalent of the map of state boundaries in our time. It implies statehood, a much higher level of social organization than the dispersed tribal system."
Who Were The Bradshaw people?
Seymour believes the answer to that question may lay in the fact that the investigation of river terraces and wind borne terrestrial sediments (loess) has established the existence and climatic details of four long glacial periods of catastrophic magnitudes during the past 600,000 years. Interleaved with the Ice Ages were short warm periods, which commenced with the marine inundation of coastal and low-laying land masses. The last regression of the ice cap inundated large tracts of land, which lie now down to 90 to 120 metre depths below the current sea level. "Since the temperate to warm coastal strips were the preferred human habitats, the civilisations were eradicated and displaced with regularity by pre-glacial deluge, the transgress of ice caps, immense glaciers, and swallowed up by raising seas," argues Seymour. Such disasters are manifest in loose historical records such as The Bible (Noah's flood) - there are 200 locations around the world with variations by a great number of ethnic branches - and folklore (Plato's story of Atlantis).
"The handful of survivors were bound to resettle in the new temperate zones at the shores of retreated seas, or seek shelter in caves, and rebuilt their life without the benefit of resources and technology that they used to have. Hence is the emergence of advanced Stone Age civilisations without a prior evolutionary chain." Historical patterns also show residual civilisations regressing into tool making barbarism over the time, as in their memories, their former science and technology becomes reduced to lores of magic and might, which could explain the vagueness of the 'dreamtime" stories of the Australian aborigines.
In addition to showing ancestry to the Egyptian and American pyramidal cultures, states Seymour, one of the Bradshaw images (above) depicts a keeled canoe with an ethnic mix of crew. "The one sided submersion of driving implements implies steering action," explains Seymour, "Which renders a mobile rudder superfluous. The keel offers stability, its positioning at the tail end renders steering easy and efficient by paddle action." Seymour notes the shape of head gear / hair styles of the crew - No 1 is American Indian, and No 3 is Melanesian style, No 2 has Bradshaw hair style, and No 4 is unknown. What Seymour and others of the scientific community can't answer is what relationship, if any, was there between the Bradshaw figures and their near neighbours, the Wandjina? They are not only distinctly different to each other, they both also have little in common with other Australian rock art. Interestingly, the local Aborigines claim that it was the Wandjinas who created the Bradshaw art.
Iconography of a Lost Civilisation?
The Bradshaw art seems to indicate that the artists were from a settled society, and the modern environment of Australia makes this seem impossible. Although the modern environment is not conducive to civilisation forming, the Australian environment 50,000 years ago was more like South America. A civilisation could have commenced and subsequently fallen into ruins.
Admittedly, aside from the Bradshaw art, there is no sign of civilisation developing in Australia. This is not unexpected as the civilisation would have to be around 40,000 years old and it would be unreasonable to expect anything to exist after this time. In Australia, small towns created by Europeans 100 years ago have almost been completely reclaimed by the bush. After 5,000 years, only something as large as a Pyramid could survive. After 20,000 years, even a pyramid would be difficult to differentiate from a pile of dirt. After 40,000 years, everything would be gone, except perhaps rock art in protective rock overhangs whose iron oxide pigments have lithified to become part of the rock itself, as is the case with the Bradshaw figures.
Aside from the remnants of a civilisation being destroyed by nature, they would also be destroyed by subsequent generations of hunter gatherers picking up anything different. After 60,000 years of nomadic life, every inch of Australia would have been crossed countless times. Perhaps for this reason, not even a single stone tool of the Bradshaw people has ever been found. The only reason why the paintings still exist is that a cave cannot be carried away and is out of the danger from the elements.
If the Bradshaw art was created by hunter gatherers, the Bradshaw art would be ceremonial or religious. If it were created by a settled society, then it could have all the complex ideas that writing allows. While it is not essential to understand the meaning of the symbols to appreciate the Bradshaw art, making judgements about the type of culture that created them is essential in trying to contemplate their meaning.
