People
The first inhabitants of the Australian continent were the Aboriginal. At about 50.000 before Christ they supposably took a land bridge from Asia onto the Australian continent and thus they are the oldest still living human race. They lived in small seminomadic groups as hunter-gatherer in their tribal areas.The colonisation by the Caucasians occurred only about 200 years ago. More precisely the first ship full of immigrants entered port 1788 in present Sydney. First most colonialists were convicts and/or supporters of interdicted persuasions. In the middle of the 19th century there was a gold rush in Australia and more and more free settlers came.
For the Aboriginal this colonisation meant dissipation, assassination and death because of imported diseases.
Today Australia counts about 19,7 million inhabitants (in 2003), approximately 2,5 times as much as Austria. However, the Australian population density is only approx. 2,56 inhabitants/km² while in Austria it is about 97 inhabitants/km². About 90 % of the Australians derive from Europe, the majority from Great Britain. Most of the rest of the population is originally from the Asiatic area. Only 1 % are Aboriginal!!
Many Aboriginal live in "our white" world.
Nowadays the number of Aboriginals and Mongrels is probably as high again as before the settlement through white people, however, their way of life has changed completely, strongly influenced by the white ones. Only few succeeded in living in this new world. 1967 they got the same rights as the white population, however, discrimination is still a big problem. Most Aboriginal are on welfare, and in addition many of them have alcohol problems. A 15 years shorter expectation of life and a higher infant mortality are evidence of the worse life circumstances.
The number of those living the old way is below 500! Much of the customs, myths and languages of the initially more than 500 different tribes is buried in oblivion, irrecoverably lost.
Old rock paintings of the Aboriginal