Aboriginal corroborees on Sunday night in 1840s become paid shows and part of early Adelaide's social life

From Corroboree (around 1864, Adelaide), painting by John Michael Skipper. 
Image courtesy Art Gallery of South Australia, on loan from the South Australian Museum

A distinct part of Adelaide social life in the 1840s were the Aboriginal-organised Sunday corroborees. The corroborees became so popular with settlers that Aboriginals used it as a source of cash and advertised performances through newspapers such as the Adelaide Observer.

More regular corroborees in Adelaide in the 1840s originated from the Kaurna tribe hosting visits by Murray Lakes and Murray River Aboriginals to see the European settlement.

The corroborees persisted despite complaints about noise from North Adelaide residents. The colonial secretary told Aboriginals protector Matthew Moorhouse to tell “Natives encamped near Adelaide” that “this is now a Christian country” and the Sabbath must be kept holy without noise.

Despite being generally disapproved by the government, the corroborees became adopted as peace, command or gala performances for the well-to-do colonists and visitors, as a must-see artistic attraction fitting European notions of the picturesque.

Painter W. A. Cawthorne, who had a deep interest in Aboriginal culture, took part in a 1848 Mechanics’ Institute public debate with crown solicitor Charles Mann, arguing that nurture rather than nature made the differences between the civilised and the uncivilised. To promote the debate, a subscription corroboree in the parklands was widely promoted, attracting a large crowd and raising £4.

This was the first of more entrepreneurial and commercial corroborees that lost authenticity. Aboriginals began organising corroborees to raise cash and advertised through the newspapers.

Corroboree performances raised an average of £2, a valuable alternative after the Aboriginals lost another source of revenue when cutting and sale of tree timber was banned.

These commercial corroborees stopped with the 1850s Victorian gold rushes. The loss of the South Australian European labour force to the goldfields stimulated the rural demand for Aboriginal workers. The government closed the Native school in the parklands and discouraged Aboriginal visitors to the city.

But the fascination with corroborees wasn’t lost. One of the biggest spectator attractions at Adelaide Oval during the 1880s were two Aboriginal corroborees, attracting an estimated 20,000 on the first night.