The Ochre Warriors

Price: $39.95

Author: Robin Coles, Richard Hunter
ISBN: 9781864765960
Binding: Hardcover with dust jacket
Pages: 228
Size: 260 mm x 254 mm


The Peramangk people existed in the Mount Lofty Ranges for at least 2,400 years. Their habitat ranged from the cool Eucalyptus forests of the Mount Lofty Summit region, often called the Tiers, to the warmer eastern ranges near the Murray Plains. The neighbouring Aboriginal groups feared them for their sorcery practices. Many often coloured their bodies with red-ochre hence, “The ochre daubed warriors” who were seen in the Adelaide region performing corroborees. Their territory extended from the south near Myponga, north towards Gawler, then east along the South Para River to the settlement called Towitta and southwards following the Bremer Escarpment to Strathalbyn.


The northern Peramangk lived close to Mount Crawford and were known as the “Tarrawata”. The Mount Barker Springs group were known as the “Ngurlinjeri”. A splinter group of the Peramangk nation the “Merrimayanna” lived in semi-permanent campsites in the eastern Barossa Region.The Merrimayanna were skilled artists who painted vivid motifs in mostly red-ochre and others in yellow, black and white. They utilised the many rock shelters in the eastern ranges to depict dreamtime stories, ceremonies and hunting scenes. Some of their images in the 72 art shelters discovered so far may have represented