As far as I’m aware the sling wasn’t used in Australia, this is the first information I’ve ever seen that shows different.
As for bows they were used. But only by certain groups.

As far as I know the knowledge of braiding and weaving was not used extensively and definitely not used by all indigenous Australians.

Gotta remember Australia is a large place.

By the 1940s it’s wuite possible that the sling had been shown to them by an early settler. There’s no real way to tell. Darwin had many indigenous Australians from all over Australia. This is sad but many of the early settlers enslaved indigenous Australians and moved them all around the country. So it’s possible that if the sling was used in north eastern communities  and some of these people were moved to Darwin.

Honestly though in my opinion the sling and bow were used in the islands north of Australia and could be that there’s some combination of technologies. But it’s also possible the sling was brought in by settlers.

The woomera(Australians version of an atlatl.) and the boomerang are very sufficient tools for hunting Australian native animals. Majority of larger game would be kangaroos and there’s plenty of evidence that these weapons are very effective against these animals.

An interesting find nonetheless.

I think unless they find true historical cave paintings or artefacts it’s all speculation.

I’m wondering why you doubt it being a technique brought in by settlers?

I say seeing as the only evidence is post colonisation it’s more likely than less.

The British came on boats with limited resources.
They were making do with what they had .
I don’t think it’s unreasonable that one or some of the settlers were proficient in use of the sling .
1940s is pretty late and for sure the photo is a staged photo.
As it states. That the show is an accurate representation of aboriginal culture is definitely not true. The indigenous Australians were mistreated and used as an attraction. It was genocide, most of the cultural significance had been lost or combined with other parts of Australia.  I don’t think you can rule out either hypothesis. It’s possible in my eyes that it could be from contact with other sling users wherever they’re from Britain or PNG.  By the 1940s a lot of tradition was already lost as was language and culture. Australia was changed forever after European colonisation, especially for indigenous communities.

I’m not sure there’s ever going to be enough information on the use of slings in Australia pre colonisation. It’s possible that they were but the majority of evidence points to them not being used. And especially not on a large scale.

Most of the knowledge was passed down generation to generation in songs and stories, practical teaching and hands on. I know at least in my region of Australia the indigenous communities definitely did not sling , braiding was first taught to them by early settlers. And the weapon of choice is a woomera and darts.

I’m not sure either way but drawing conclusions from a single photo from the 40s when aboriginal culture had already been destroyed and they were treated like slaves or pets is kinda wrong. I think the best place to really ask is going the elders from the region you think has the most potential to be using slings.

I could show you a whole load of different photos post colonisation of technology that was adapted or adopted by native people after the British arrived.

A cool find anyway but not a solid enough bit of evidence for me personally and probably not for any scientific journal.

I think you guys need to use Occam's razor.

I also think you guys have absurd standards for proof that can't be met. If you guys were looking at North America, you would probably conclude that slings were barely used, when in reality they were spread across the continent. The evidence for Iroquois slinging, for example, seems to all come from the late 1800s and early 1900s. The archeological record often does not do slings any favors.

Morphy, just... what? The scientific consensus is that slings were introduced by the British? Are you sure about that? I thought the consensus was that slings were never present, hence why I thought the picture and the blog briefly mentioning it were significant.

And yes, I know about the Lovelock Cave sling, it's one of two ancient slings that I know of that have survived to the modern times. Not the point I was making. Lovelock Cave is in Nevada and is rather old, which is a little bit far removed from the Iroquois that I was making the point with. You could swap out Iroquois with any other Native American group, most of which we have no precolonial evidence of use of the sling. Does that mean they didn't use them? Of course not, as we have evidence around it that has survived to today.

You're asking for something that is probably impossible. You're asking for evidence of a weapon that as far as we know would have only been used in the far North, in environments that probably wouldn't preserve slings too well. Any slings that ever survive are pretty much a miracle.

Speaking of miracles, the fact that we have a picture with a good amount of context should also be considered one. How often does that happen with slinging? Coupled with the fact that this (along with use of bows) wasn't thought to have existed in Australia, then there probably hasn't been anyone looking into this subject. There is the book which has pictures taken from it in the blog, but there is no way to find out the title of that book and who wrote it. We don't even know if the culture depicted still slings or if the practice died out like with other cultures. Unfortunately, this is the best information we have on this topic, so we have to draw the best conclusion we can. When guessing whether this was a pre-colonial or colonial introduction, you would be making a lot of assumptions to assume that it was introduced during the colonial period.

Sorry if I was being a bit harsh. I think we'll have to agree to disagree. I don't think the research you're discussing is as thorough as you think it is. There are even artifacts like these in Australian museums:

https://australian.museum/learn/cultures/atsi-collection/aboriginal-toys/toy-boo
merangs/

Regardless of pre or post colonization, these weapons haven't even been acknowledged. Clearly there is a gap in our understanding. From what I've seen, these cases haven't been explored yet. I think that the idea that bows or slings weren't present among indigenous Australians is because that's the case in almost all of the continent, but they probably missed a spot or two.

While I agree there are certainly gaps in knowledge and the possibility that you could be right I must reiterate that lack of evidence is not sufficient to prove the existence or even potential existence of something. On a hypothetical basis Im not opposed to the idea that the sling may have made it to Australia at some point in time even if but briefly but that same hypothetical streak of mine gives credence to the remote possibility that Bigfoot is real. So take all of it with a hefty grain of salt.

I would like to check the link out but its not working for me. Says page not found.