Summary: An Aboriginal engraving of a deity (probably Baiame) on a large rock platform below the Taber trig station

On a large rock platform below the Taber Trig is the figure of a man or deity, six metres in height. It was first described by R.H. Mathews in 1895 as a “colossal representation of a·man bearing a shield in his right hand” and a few years later by Campbell as “a man, eighteen feet long with a small shield close to the right hand, and three other shields a few feet distant”. (Campbell noted the additional shields which were missed by Mathews – but he also confused Mathews’ description of this site with the Smiths Creek Baiame figure located some distance away).

AWAT8658 LR Taber Trig (East) Baiame

Many years later, Fred McCarthy McCarthy described the figure as an anthropomorph or ancestral being: a “spiritual ancestor of the Baiame type”.

montage2 stitch LR 2 Taber Trig (East) Baiame

Next to the deity are four shields, one of them right next to Baiame’s hand: the shields are now very weathered and two of them are no longer visible.

Engraving PLATE XII Fig15 Taber Trig (East) Baiame
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Aboriginal Sites by National Park

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.
Over a hundred Aboriginal sites have been recorded in the Hornsby region, with many of these in the Berowra Valley National Park and around the suburb of Berowra.