This book reveals the significant role Aboriginal men, and some women, played in Australias early maritime history. Theirs was a canoe culture and they called the foreign ships 'mari nawi', meaning large canoes. With remarkable resilience, they became guides, go-betweens, boatmen, sailors, sealers, steersmen, whalers, pilots and trackers, valued for their skills and knowledge, while some, like Musquito, Bulldog and Dual, were exiled as Aboriginal convicts. They sailed the Australian coast, to sealing and whaling
grounds in Bass Strait, the icy sub-Antarctic and New Zealand and to international destinations like Timor, Mauritius, Bengal, Britain, Canada, Hawaii, Tahiti, San Francisco and Rio de Janeiro.
View this short video about the MARI NAWI exhibition on show at the NSW State Library
