Where did they come from?

The Yolgnu live in the Miwatj or Arnhem region. They started off as intermarrying clans that were closely related and spoke similar tongues. They are divided into clans, the mains one being Rirratjingu, Djapu, Marrakulu, Ngaymil and Galpu.

Their first encounter of the outside world was with the Macassan fisherman who came to North Australia in the 18^th century. They continued to visit until fishing trade was banned in 1907. They developed trading and working relationships with the Yolgnu people who would trade them pearl shells, turtle shells and timber. They were also given goods such as tobacco, cloth, axes, steel knives, and canoes.

In the late nineteenth century, white Australians began to open up Arnhem Land for cattle grazing. A series of battles between Yolŋu and Balanda started. Yolngu were more warrior-like than other Indigenous Australians because they had had to defend their northern shoreline for many years. There were also many massacres.

An incident where Yolngu were fed poisoned horse meat after they killed and ate some cattle. Many people died as a result of that incident.

A massacre ten years later occurred after some Yolngu took a small amount of barbed wire from a huge roll to build fishing spears. Men, women and children were chased by mounted police and men from the Eastern and African Cold Storage Company and shot.

In 1932 some Japanese soldiers were speared by Yolngu men after their mothers had been allegedly raped by the Japanese.This came to be known as the Caledon Bay crisis. Several Yolngu were imprisoned.

Donald Thomson, a young anthropologist went to live with the Yolŋu and collected the facts of the case.

Thomson lived with the Yolngu for several years and made some photographic and written records of their way of life at that time. These have become important historical documents for both Yolngu and European Australians.