Australian “Black-Fellow”

Number 2 in a set of 25 cigarette cards entitled 'Picturesque People of the Empire' issued by Ogden's branch of the Imperial Tobacco Co. Ltd. There is a picture on one side with an inscription reading 'Australian "Black-Fellow"', and a description on the other side. The text on the reverse reads: 'The aboriginal inhabitants of Australia - commonly but inaccurately termed black-fellows, for they are dark chocolate in colour - number to-day about 60,000. Wandering tribes with no knowledge of pottery, metal-work or agriculture, and feeding upon kangaroos, emus, snakes, lizards, grubs, birds, shell-fish and vegetable food - they may be described as Stone Age men living in the 20th century! They are extremely highly-skilled huntsmen, extremely dexterous in the use of spear, club, shield and boomerang, the remarkable hunting and fighting weapon invented by the Australian natives themselves.'

Collection Information

These objects are only a part of our collections, of which there are more than 350,000 objects. This information comes from our collections database. Some of this is incomplete and there may be errors. This part of the website is also still under construction, so there may be some fields repeated or incorrectly formatted information.

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