21 



The "Mirrn-yong" Heaps at the North- 

 West Bend of the River Murray. 



By R. Etheridge, jun., Paleontologist to the Australian 

 Museum, and Geological Survey of New South Wales. 



[Read March 7, 1893.] 



Sir T. L. Mitchell, Surveyor-General of New South Wales in 

 the early days, described* the aboriginal method of cooking food 

 in general " by digging a hole in the ground, making a fire in it, 

 and heating stones about." This may be accepted as a perfectly 

 accurate statement couched in very general terms, and is more or 

 less applicable to almost every pnvt of the Continent, for what- 

 ever modification may locally exist, stones, in one way or the 

 other, enter into the operation. 



For the purpose of more precise description, the cooking or 

 f easting-places of the al^origines may be arranged under four 

 sections : — 



1. Kitchen-middens, or shell-mounds of the coast line. 



2. Mirrn-yony heaps. 



3. Native, or Blackfellows' Ovens. 



■i. Cave-shelter, or Gihber-yunyah hearths. 



This classification, like so many others in different branches of 

 Natural Science, is but artificial and provisionary, for it is pos- 

 sible without much difficulty to select a case in which the condi- 

 tions partake of those of more than one of the above sections. 



The Mirrn-yony heaps of the Murray, of which it is intended 

 to give a short description in the present communication, are a 

 ■case in point. They are not strictly identical with similar heaps 

 to be met with in many parts of Victoria, or with the Black- 

 fellows' Ovens of the same colony, but in a greater or less degree 

 <3ombine the characters of both. 



It is hardly necessary to refer to the other section just now, 

 but perhaps it may be as well to explain the limit attached to the 

 use of the terms. The term Kitchen-midden is restricted to the 

 large shell-heaps occurring at intervals around the coast-line, 

 exhibiting a rough stratification, and composed of whatever 

 species of shells the natives of any particular neighbourhood may 

 have been in the habit of existing on. Native, or Blackfellows' 

 Ovens appear usually as stony irregularities of the surface, more 

 or less circular, often of large size, and grassed with great luxuri- 



* Three Expeditious Int. E. Australia, II., p. 343. 



