Historical information

Abstract: ‘Dingo’ is today the name given to Australia’s wolf-like native dog Canis dingo, however it was originally the Dharuk word for a ‘domesticated dog’ - the Dharuk word for a wild dog was ‘warrigul’ (Dixon, Ramson, and Thomas 1992, pp. 65, 87). In its populist usage today this distinction has fallen away and dingo now refers to both wild and domesticated native dogs. Anthropological discussions about the role and significance of dingoes and dogs in northern Australian Aboriginal society have been extensive (Meehan, Jones and Vincent 1999; Smith and Litchfield 2009). Archaeological (McCoy 1882; Barker 1979), ecological (Nowak 2006) and taxonomic debates (Corbett 1995; Coman and Jones 2007) have existed for almost two centuries about the dingo’s origins (Jardine 1839; Gill 1951; Barker 1979; Savolainen et al 2004), and an intense sociological discussion has focused on what has been termed the ‘economic-utilitarian perspective’ that attributes to dingoes a decisive usefulness in Aboriginal people’s food quest (Kolig 1978). Contributors to this lively debate have been almost exclusively northern Australia-centric in their conversations, with the notable exception of Jones (1970), which is understandable given the rich vein of accessible Aboriginal informants in this region and observational data neither of which is possible or available in much of southern Australia.
In this paper the authors shall build upon the northern Australian research of Meggitt (1965), Rose (1992), Meehan, Jones and Vincent (1999), and Parker (2006) and demonstrate that there exists a concomitant range of ethno-historical and archeological sources from south-eastern Australia which adds a considerable body of knowledge to our understanding of the utilitarian and symbolic significance of dingoes for Aboriginal communities. Furthermore, the authors shall examine the impact of British colonizers upon Aboriginal peoples’ associations with dingoes in Victoria. The word dingo shall be used throughout this paper to connote dogs as well as dingoes.

Physical description

Unpublished typed manuscript.

This item is part of the 'Australian Mythical Animals Collection'.