| ISBN |
9780522862591 |
| Author |
McKenna, Mark, 1959- (author) |
| Title |
From the edge : Australia's lost histories / Mark McKenna. |
| Portion of title |
Australia's lost histories |
| Publisher and/or associated date/s |
Carlton, Vic. : The Meigunyah Press an imprint Melbourne University Publishing, 2016. |
| Description |
xx, 251 pages : illustrations (some colour), maps ; 24 cm. |
| Series |
Second numbered series of the Miegunyah volumes no. 171 |
| Note |
Reprinted 2017. |
| "This is number one hundred and seventy-one in the second numbered series of the Miegunyah Volumes made possible by the Miegunyah Fund established by bequests under the wills of Sir Russell and Lady Grimwade". |
| "Prime Minister's literary award 2012 winner"-- Cover. |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliography and index. |
| Contents |
Eyeing the country -- Walking the edge: South-East Australia, 1797 -- 'World's End': Port Essington, Cobourg Peninsula, West Arnhem Land -- 'Hip bone sticking out': Murujuga and the legacy pf the Pilbara frontier -- On grassy hill: Gangaar (Cooktown), North Queensland. |
| Summary |
March 1797. Ninety Mile Beach, Victoria. Five British sailors and twelve Bengali seamen swim ashore after their longboat is ripped apart in a storm. The British penal colony at Port Jackson is 700 kilometres to the north, their fellow-survivors from the wreck of the Sydney Cove stranded far to the south on a tiny island in Bass Strait. To rescue them and save their own lives, they have no alternative. They set out to walk to Sydney. What follows is one of Australia's greatest survival stories and cross-cultural encounters. |
| In From the Edge, historian Mark McKenna uncovers the places and histories that Australians are so often ignorant of. Like the largely forgotten story of the sailors' walk in 1797, these remarkable histories, for example the founding of a 'new Singapore' in West Arnhem Land in the 1840s, the site of some extraordinary Indigenous rock art, or James Cook's meeting with Aboriginal people at Cooktown in 1770 - lie on the edge of the continent and the edge of national consciousness. Retracing their steps, McKenna explores the central drama of Australian history: the encounter between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal Australians, each altered irrevocably by the other - and offers a new understanding of the country and its people. |
| Subjects |
First contact of aboriginal peoples with Westerners -- Australia |
| Shipwreck survival -- Australia -- History |
| Aboriginal Australians -- First contact with Europeans |
| Aboriginal Australians -- History |
| First contact (Anthropology) -- Australia |
| Australia -- History |
| Call number |
2022.127 |
