The Policeman's Eye: Foelsche's Frontier Photography

Article Index
The Policeman's Eye: Foelsche's Frontier Photography
I: The Life of Paul Foelsche, 1831-1914
II: Foelsche's Darwin
III: Policing the Frontier
IV: Industry and Progress: Promoting the Territory
V: Entering the Landscape: Foelsche as Pictorial Photographer
VI: Crocodiles and River Cruises: Kintore-Stirling Expedition of 1891
VII: Foelsche, The Naturalist
VIII: Foelsche, The Photographer
IX: Foelsche, The Anthropologist
X: Foelsche's Aboriginal Portraits
All Pages

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IX — Foelsche, The Anthropologist

Paul Foelsche arrived in Port Darwin just as the study of other peoples and cultures was being recognised as a new field of Western science, 'Anthropology'. Foelsche contributed to this study, by recording vocabularies and making observations on the culture of the Larrakia, Woolna and Iwaidja peoples. His portrait photographs became a crucial element in this anthropological record.

Foelsche's first anthropological records were his 1874 photographs of Larrakia camps. His portrait photography was initially made with a measuring scale, but his participation in the photography sections of International Exhibitions gave his photographs a broader appeal. He began carefully recording the names of his sitters, and their personal details. This was quite unusual for nineteenth-century anthropology.

During 1880 Foelsche responded to E.M. Curr's Australia-wide survey, supplying descriptions of the Larrakia and the Unalla (Iwaidja) peoples, together with samples of their vocabularies.

Encouraged by the South Australian Museum, Foelsche prepared a fuller account of the Larrakia, submitting this to the Adelaide branch of the Royal Society in 1881, together with a set of anthropometric photographs.

During 1889 Foelsche responded to a call from the South Australian Museum and made a carefully documented collection of artefacts, listing their Aboriginal names and uses. During this period Foelsche prepared several collections for other museums and collectors.

In his time, Foelsche was an acknowledged authority on anthropology. By today's standards, this reputation does not bear close examination. Although he was careful to record Aboriginal names correctly, he spoke only a form of Aboriginal pidgin English. He made one attempt to document Larrakia and Iwaidja origin myths, but he had little understanding of Aboriginal religion or social structure. Indeed, few Europeans did.

But Foelsche clearly appreciated that Aboriginal society had its own valid laws, and that European law was an alien imposition. He understood his own role in altering that balance. Writing to a friend in Germany after his retirement, Foelsche put it in these terms:

This is an Old Country with an Old People. The New People must remember the claims of the Old People. They were here first, and they have their established customs and institutions. So far as those customs and institutions can be related to our standards, they must be respected. For illegalities, there must be understanding.
— S. Downer, Patrol Indefinite, 1963

Photographs

Paul Foelsche's photography of Aboriginal people began as a response to the late 19th century interest in 'racial types', as a branch of the new 'science' of Anthropology. These first images often incorporated a measurement scale. But Foelsche saw these people as individuals, rather than as scientific specimens. He began recording the names of his subjects, their ages and language groups.

The Aboriginal people in Foelsche's portraits had to keep still for two or three seconds, in order to produce a clear, unblurred image. This fixed pose tended to make them appear serious, even concerned, but the same may be said of European portraits of the late 19th century. Despite Foelsche's role as a law-enforcer, the evidence suggests that Aboriginal people were willing participants in his photographic project.

58. Iwaidja people in camp, Port Essington, November 1877

Digital print from 600dpi scan of original wet-plate glass negative, State Library of South Australia.

This image might be regarded as one of Foelsche's early masterpieces. What appears to be an informal view of people in camp, relaxing, talking and attending to their business, has been well organised by the photographer. Most importantly, people have been alerted to be absolutely still, and only the blurred image of one or two children can be seen. No other nineteenth-century photographer, working with exposures of three or four seconds, achieved such success in photographing large groups of Aboriginal people. Foelsche's authority as a policeman may have had something to do with this, but there is little doubt also that he had the gift of communicating his intentions.

The central figure in this image is the Iwaidja woman known to Foelsche as Flash Poll, a key cultural broker between her people and the South Australians. She is indicated (perhaps intentionally) by the fan of spears pointing down in her direction.

Behind the seated group is the shed used by the trepang fisherman, E.O. Robinson. The station buildings for the Cobourg Cattle Company, which employed several of the Iwaidja men at this camp, are behind this shed, out of sight..

Several of the Iwaidja people in this image appear in Foelsche's portrait series, which was made in a tent on the other side of the shed, during these days in November 1877.

59. Public ceremony by Larrakia men, 1891

Digital print from 600dpi scan of original dry-plate glass negative, Noye Collection, Art Gallery of South Australia.

This photograph is of a public ceremony performed by Larrakia men at Palmerston, probably during the visit of the South Australian Governor in April 1891. Known as the 'Warrangin' ceremony, the performance was open and could be viewed by all, including Aboriginal women. Larrakia people also hosted ceremonies in Palmerston from other groups, such as the Djerimanga, Wagait and Alligator Rivers people, and it is possible that some of these individuals are included in this group. One of the performers can be identified with certainty – the Larrakia man known as Elbow Davy, fourth from the right (see portrait no. 3).

In ceremonies of this kind, both the pole and the hats would ordinarily have been abandoned at the end. Instead, Paul Foelsche collected them: ten of the ceremonial hats are preserved in the South Australian Museum. One of the hats is displayed here, made of grass stems wrapped with hair-string and decorated, like the performers, with native cotton and down. The remainder of the hats were presented to the Governor, the Earl of Kintore, and are now in Scotland.

60. Demonstrating the Larrakia spearthrower grip, ca.1891

Digital print from 600dpi scan of original dry-plate glass negative, Noye Collection, Art Gallery of South Australia.

An unnamed Larrakia man demonstrating the spearthrower grip in Paul Foelsche's studio. Foelsche may have been asked by Edward Stirling, Director of the South Australian Museum, to document the way in which Larrakia men launched their spears using the spearthrower. Methods and the spearthrower-grip varied across the continent and anthropologists were interested in mapping these variations. Edward Stirling had commented on this during his 1891 visit to Palmerston, and had noted in his journal that: 'womerah held by 3, 4 & 5 finger. Index [finger] between womerah & spear. Thumb round spear' (Stirling 1891 journal, South Australian Museum Archives).

In his attempt to show as much of the spear as possible, Foelsche has revealed more of his studio than appears in many of his other portrait photographs. This makeshift studio, which relied upon natural light regulated by a canvas awning, was built onto the side of Foelsche's house.

61. Larrakia camp in Cavenagh Square, Palmerston, 1874

Digital print from 600dpi scan of original albumen print, South Australian Museum Archives.

George Goyder's 1869 survey of Palmerston took little account of traditional Larrakia camping places. It is unclear whether these people had already been displaced to Cavenagh Square by the time of Foelsche's photograph in 1874. As if to mark the fact that this camp was absorbed within Palmerston, and that its warriors no longer represented a threat to settlement, Foelsche placed two Europeans in the background. Within another year or two, townspeople were agitating to have the camp moved away from the town centre, and for a curfew to be imposed on Aboriginal people.

The young man wearing trousers in the right foreground is probably Biliamuk Gapal, who had become a key figure in relations between the Larrakia and Europeans. In 1874 he was also working as a police tracker for Paul Foelsche.

62. Larrakia people in camp, Palmerston, 1890

Digital print from 600dpi scan of original dry-plate glass negative, Noye Collection, Art Gallery of South Australia.

Foelsche's 1890 photograph of one of the main camps of the Larrakia. This camp, constructed partly from European materials, was situated at the edge of town, near the Chinese quarter. By 1890 several Larrakia men and women were employed in the town, returning to this camp each evening.

The linguist T.A. Parkhouse gave this contemporary description:

The camp is arranged in two divisions at the head of Cavendish and Smith streets, and in the larger of these there are several circles of wurleys. About 150 yards distant, on the north, is the second division, with two circles of wurleys, in this division resides Wulnars, brothers to Larrakiyas by alliance or descent [...]. On the Lammeroo Beach there is another distinct camp of Larrakiyas. These camps are all in permanent occupation […] during the rainy season; then upon a given day there is a migration of the majority […] the main body return in various parties […] at the beginning of the wet season.
— PRG300, A35, State Library of South Australia

Foelsche undoubtedly knew all the Larrakia people in this photograph. Perhaps that accounts for his success in its composition and its clarity, which required perfect stillness for several seconds.

63. Iwaidja ceremony at Port Essington ruins, November 1877

Digital print from 600dpi scan of original albumen print, South Australian Museum Archives.

This is the earliest known image of Aboriginal ceremony in the Northern Territory. It shows a group of Iwaidja men performing for a mixed group of men, women and children, at the site of the old British settlement of Port Essington, which was abandoned in 1848. Foelsche noted that several of the older Iwaidja people remembered the British and could even sing marching songs and sea shanties learnt from them. Two didjeridu players can be seen just to the right of the standing performers, who are standing motionless for the camera.

Several of the old buildings were dismantled and the stone reused in the Cobourg Cattle Company buildings, which were erected nearby during the early 1870s. Paul Foelsche acted as an agent for one of the Company's owners, John Lewis, whose son Essington later founded the B.H.P. iron and steel company.

During this November 1877 visit, Foelsche's primary aim was to obtain photographs of the Iwaidja to submit to the 1878 Paris Exhibition. It is likely that this image was among those submitted.

64. Iwaidja people at the old mango tree, Port Essington, April 1875

Digital print from 600dpi scan of original albumen print, South Australian Museum Archives.

A group of Iwaidja people photographed at Port Essington, in front of the old mango tree, a survivor of the gardens planted by the British garrisoned there from 1839 to 1848. The photograph is dated to April, 1875, and if correct, it is the earliest known image of Iwaidja people. Apart from the two Europeans, who may be associated with the Cobourg Cattle Company which was based at Port Essington, the photograph shows a Malay man in traditional dress. He is possibly one of the crew from a fishing proa, visiting the Arnhem Land coast to catch and smoke-dry the trepang or sea-slug, which were found in these waters in great numbers. The annual visits of these fishing fleets had resulted in close relationships with Iwaidja people, and Foelsche observed that all the Iwaidja whom he met could communicate easily in the language of the Malay trepangers.

Foelsche's tribal map

Part of Foelsche's tribal mapPaul Foelsche's tribal map was prepared at the request of the South Australian Museum Director, Edward Stirling, in 1891. It shows Paul Foelsche's understanding of the territories occupied by the various Aboriginal groups in the vicinity of Darwin. Subsequent research has resulted in a different picture of these boundaries, but Foelsche's map represents an important stage in European understanding of these complex issue.

Foelsche's 'Notes on the Aborigines of North Australia'

Foelsche was a member of the Royal Society of South Australia, and in 1881 he sent a paper to Adelaide to be read at one of the Society's meetings. Titled 'Notes on the Aborigines of North Australia', it summarised his observations on the various Aboriginal groups, gathered during the previous decade.

Foelsche's 'Notes on the Aborigines of North Australia'

Foelsche's article 'On the Manners, Customs, etc. of Some Tribes of the Aborigines in the Neighbourhood of Port Darwin and the West Coast of the Gulf of Carpentaria, North Australia' appeared in the Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland (J.A.I.), vol.XXIV in 1895.

'On the Manners, Customs, etc. of Some Tribes of the Aborigines in the Neighbourhood of Port Darwin and the West Coast of the Gulf of Carpentaria, North Australia'

Foelsche's descriptions of the Larrakia and Iwaidja (Unalla) peoples were published in Curr's Australian Race, vol.1, 1886.

'The Larrakia tribe'

'The Unalla tribe'

Paul Foelsche's vocabularies of Larrakia and Iwaidja

Paul Foelsche did not claim to be a linguist, but he spoke and wrote fluently in German and English, and his policing work brought him into close contact with Chinese, Malay and several Aboriginal languages. During the early 1880s he compiled vocabularies of the Larrakia language of Darwin, and the 'Unalla' language of the eastern Cobourg Peninsula. These were published in Edward Curr's comprehensive volume, The Australian Race, in 1886-87.

Foelsche's vocabularies for download:

Larrakia vocabulary

Iwaidja vocabulary

Foelsche's Ethnographic Collections

The Aboriginal people of the Top End began trading artefacts for European commodities as soon as first contact occurred with explorers. Coastal people had already developed trading relations with the Macassan fishing fleets which visited Arnhem Land annually. Paul Foelsche assembled several collections of Aboriginal artefacts. Encouraged by the South Australian Museum, he prepared an especially well documented collection in 1890 and 1891. His original list contains the language names for individual objects, and descriptions of their precise use. This collection provides a unique insight into the 'material culture' of the Larrakia and Iwaidja peoples, as their way of life was quickly transformed through European contact. Many of the decorative items in this collection, such as headbands, neckbands, armlets and belts, can be seen in Foelsche's portraits of the Larrakia and Iwaidja people

Foelsche's 1889 Artefact Collection

A selection of Larrakia artefacts, from a larger collection which Paul Foelsche sent to the South Australian Museum in 1889. Foelsche's handwritten list below records the Larrakia terms for these objects and their precise function, matching the attention to detail which he applied to his photographic documentation.

Foelsche's list of Larrakia artefacts

The Larrakia bartered their artefacts with Europeans since the South Australians arrived 1869 and Foelsche had no difficulty in making collections for museums and collectors until the 1890s.

South Australian Museum Archives.

The following images are not to scale: