Photo discovery sparks investigation into mysterious overseas settlement 📸 | ABC Australia

The discovery of a trove of black and white photographs has sparked an international mystery involving a little-known settlement of Aboriginal Australians in Asia.
Over hundreds of years, First Nations people left to travel overseas with visiting Makassan fishermen.
And there’s growing evidence some stayed and had families in Indonesia.
The first known photographs of the community have been discovered in Italy, leading to speculation there could be a large number of descendants still living abroad.
Erin Parke travelled to Darwin to try to unravel the mystery.
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[@drpk6514]

Interestingly Indonesians were a lot more civilised than Europeans in dealing with aboriginese

[@19tet]

yeah cos they werent dicks lol

[@sylviatkac1992]

This is my grandfather father he was 15 years old when he boarded the ship from Makmanja on Groote Eylandt to work on a lugger to collect trepang and traveled to Thursday Island PNG then Makassar .One of the boys got sick on the journey and died on board the ship and was buried in PNG the PNG people attached the Makassans with arrows as they were paddling back to their ship after burying the deceased boy . The boys are from Groote Eylandt 1 Wurramarrba and 3 Wurramara this story was told by my uncle and his sons tell the same story my grandfather told this story because his father is the boy in the photo . The Makassan collected aboriginal people from Derby and North East Arnhem . They lived in Makassar over 6 years 3 of the Wurramara traveled back to Groote but the Wurramarrba boy lived with the Makassan eventually he also returned home after many years when he smiled he had two gold teeth . This is a very long story

[@shantelletolley6896]

Oiii… tell me more. I wanna know everything about this story. I’m from FNQ.

[@urbnctrl]

The Moluccans had a long and old historical connection with Australia too, consisting of trade, marriage and politics. Dating back 1000s of years.

[@TmbTmb-lr8xs]

We need to teach our people for real history Makassar people who first came to Australia our first visitors before British

[@SuartoSono]

Hello bro im peaople of makassar👋

[@jalbu8330]

How fascinating, we've always known that Aboriginal people had traded with other people's long before the British came and evidence like this proves it even further. It will be even more interesting when they find descendants. Looking forward to a follow up story. 😊

[@shantelletolley6896]

I’M SO KEEN IT MAKES ME WANNA CRY!!! Im so happy some white folk cared enough to recover whatever we can before time runs out. Im from fnq- we’re all pretty passionate about it up here.

[@TmbTmb-lr8xs]

I'm from Arnhem land place call Nyinyikay my people been taken away at place call dhaliwuy Makassar beach man's and women's one of my youngest great grandmother was married to royal family her yolngu name was Garngarr Gurruwiwi

[@banksiasong]

Fascinating this proof of early trading and social interaction between the people of Arnhem Land and the Kimberley, with the colonised people of Makassar.

[@pascalalick6107]

Very interesting to learn about this.

[@kilanspeaks]

Fascinating, if only we could trace the descendants of those who married the locals in South Sulawesi. We’re all related, after all. Cheers from Indonesia! 🍻 🇮🇩

[@QuestionThingsUseLogic]

Well the land was joined, so it's not surprising.

[@50centgotshot9times]

Someone told me that the Aboriginal language has elements of Indonesian and ancient Egyptian. Apparently there are also some pyramid like structures somewhere in Australia that aren't talked about. History has been anglicised greatly.

[@patrickgrant6389]

And we share DNA with sri Lankan and south Indian people which I find fascinating

[@Au_Hussar]

The book Beyond Capricorn by Paul Trickett mentions this situation and he references page 74 from a book called We Won the Victory - Aborigines and outsiders on the North West coast of the Kimberly. Hopefully this helps.

[@peterk2455]

There's an old term used for something that closely resembles this transportation of males from one island to another. Blackbirding. None of these fellas look particularly happy to be in those photos. Then again that's simply an interpretation. Much like any other interpretation of what transpired.

[@urbnctrl]

Moluccans and Australians have had 1000s years of trade and marriage as well so lets just finally agree that the Europeans didnt discover anything they merely infiltrated and hijacked the already existing world trade routes to monopolize it for Europe.

[@makassar0198]

Dan inilah salah satu bukti konkrit bahwa Bangsa Makassar (Wajo,Luwu,Mandar,Melayu) sangat mengedepankan kemanusiaan dalam menjalin/diplomasi dg bangsa lain sebab berbeza dg propaganda2 cerita karangan Yg dibuat oleh pihak2 sekutu lokal Belanda (eropah terlemah😅) bhw mereka dijajah oleh bangsa Makassar padahal singkat.y hanyalah "kedengkian" hingga tertinggal jauh oleh bangsa Makassar

[@shantelletolley6896]

Test them ALL! Are there any Aboriginal descendants in Makassar?

[@bluddyrowdy8757]

Mysterious ?

[@asecretcountry]

Which aboriginal groups did the ABC contact to show the images?...because during my dealing with the University of Adelaide..they told me repeatedly that no one can use an image of a "natural person" without permission of members of his family...but anyone else..no problem at all of course...sort of rascist but hey..thats how the game is played now days

[@jalbu8330]

It's actually about Aboriginal peoples beliefs in the spirit of a person and not about race. Have a good day. 😊

[@daveh322]

Well....that was boring.

[@19tet]

average tiktokker attention span