WI Australian Aboriginies had gold?

Apparently the Aboriginies had no world for gold, they didn`t use it. But what if they did? Nothing fancy of course, maybe crude ornamental jewelry. But enough for the Dutch etc to notice way back in the early 1600s.
 
Apparently the Aboriginies had no world for gold, they didn`t use it. But what if they did? Nothing fancy of course, maybe crude ornamental jewelry. But enough for the Dutch etc to notice way back in the early 1600s.
That is a very interesting idea. OTL the Dutch did not care for the desert, if they have the idea some profit could be made, they might pay attention to it. I wonder if the VOC could or would keep it a secret. You might see a small Dutch colony in Australia of prospectors, growing into a larger colony, growing into a (partialy) Dutch Australia.
 
Well, the Aborigines suffered quite a lot IOTL from the Europeans. Having gold wouldn't help them, I guess.

On the other side, working and mining gold and distributing it through the continent likely requires ubstantial changes in Aboriginal culture, I guess. these changes will likely outmatch the effects of gold significantly.
 
To my understanding of Aboriginal culture it would not have allowed them to mine gold (or gems etc.) so the would only harvest the free gold found in rivers etc.

Not sure that there would be enough gold (certainly not smelted) to excite even the most mercenry European.
 
To my understanding of Aboriginal culture it would not have allowed them to mine gold (or gems etc.) so the would only harvest the free gold found in rivers etc.

Not sure that there would be enough gold (certainly not smelted) to excite even the most mercenry European.
cf. Jared's excellent Lands of Red and Gold

There's lots of gold in Australia, in various places. And to say 'Aboriginal culture' implies that such a (single) thing exists. You had hundreds of local nations with their own languages and cultures. Saying that 'they didn't have a word for gold' (which someone else said) means we know enough about dozens of languages to know what words they had - before they went extinct, perhaps. And we simply don't.

Even if the culture said "Don't do X", if X becomes useful, people will do it.

Then there's the other danger. The anecdote about the tribe that 'was so peaceful they didn't have a word for war', which was apparently true. They DID have words for 'raid', 'battle', 'fight'....
 
Can you say 'reservations?'

Whenever there's gold involved the natives get pushed out of the way... hard.
 
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