'Dark Emu' challenges modern re-tellings of early Aboriginal history

Radio National Breakfast with Fran Kelly

The centuries-old notion that pre-European Aboriginal people were hunter-gatherers who did not farm the land they occupied is under further challenge.

A new book by award winning indigenous author Bruce Pascoe draws on the diaries of early explorers to provide evidence that Aboriginal people across the continent were sowing, harvesting, irrigating and storing.

He argues that systems of food production and land management have been blatantly understated in modern re-tellings of early Aboriginal history.