Powerline Trail Ghindarring

Summary: Next to a waterhole is a single Aboriginal engraving of a man, described as a Ghindarring or "hairy man" figure. Two kangaroos are nearby.

  • Site type: Rock engraving
  • Number of motifs: 1
  • Motif/s: Anthropomorph
  • Quality: 3/5
  • Year first recorded: 1975
  • Originally Recorded by: Ian Sim, Bob Pankhurst
  • Sim Reference: Sim Collection 2/15
  • Ian Sim, Archaelogical Sites in the Sydney Region – A Record of Field Surveys 1958-1973 (“Sim Collection”), Site 2/15 (Somersby)

Near the Powerline Trail in Brisbane Water National Park is a small Aboriginal engraving site, with small figure near a small waterhole. It’s potentially a Ghindarring or “hairy man” figure.

IMG 0323 LR Powerline Trail GhindarringIMG 0323 LR enhanced Powerline Trail Ghindarring

A detailed description by Bob Pankhurst explains the mythological Ghindarring (“hairy man”) figure:

This small man with a large head dress and a boomerang with a very large penis has dots all over the body which might represent hair covering the body. This could be a man known to the local people as Ghindarring or the hairy man. Hairy men were said to come out at night and take people away to eat them, young Aboriginal people were always warned that if they did not do what was expected of them the hairy man would get them. These types of legends of hairy men appear all over the world; some other Australian names for them were Yowie.

A method to keep the hairy men away at night was to light a fire and keep it going all night or to take a burning branch and wave it around vigorously and emit lots of sparks, thus frightening away the hairy man. It is also not advisable to whistle after dark or burn meat or fat on a fire after dark as this makes the hairy men extremely violent.

Bob Pankhurst, Culture Heroes of the Guringai and Darginung People
IMG 0309 LR Powerline Trail Ghindarring

Two kangaroos were also recorded by Sim on this rock platform; I could only find one of them, which is very weathered.

IMG 0300 LR Powerline Trail Ghindarring

Subscribe via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to Hiking the World, and receive notifications of new posts by email. (A hike is added every 1-2 weeks, on average.)

Join 637 other subscribers

0 Comments

Leave a Reply

Aboriginal Sites by National Park

Photographing Aboriginal rock art
A review of different techniques for photographing Aboriginal rock art. This includdes oblique flash, chain and planar mosaic imaging which combines hundreds of overlapping photos.
Aboriginal Rock Art – Hornsby Shire
Hornsby Shire - which is the largest LGA in the Greater Sydney Metropolitan region - contains approximately 600 recorded Aboriginal rock art sites (and over 1,200 Aboriginal heritage sites). These date back from thousands of years to post-European contact art.
Aboriginal Rock Art – Lane Cove
Over 40 sites have been recorded within the park; many were located along the river bank and were flooded by the building of the weir in 1938.
Aboriginal Rock Art – Blue Mountains National Park
Red Hands Cave, Glenbrook (Blue Mountains)
The Blue Mountains National Park (and surrounding areas along the Great Western Highway) is thought to have over a thousand indigenous heritage sites, although much of the park has not been comprehensively surveyed. The Aboriginal rock sites in the Blue Mountains include grinding grooves, stensils, drawing and rock carvings.
Aboriginal Rock Art – Maroota and Marramarra NP
Located to the north-west of Sydney, just south of the Dharug and Yengo National Parks, Maroota has a high concentration of (known) Aboriginal sites. Many more Aboriginal heritage sites are located in the Marramarra National Park. The original inhabitants of the area were the Darug people.