Aboriginal people often cooked their food underground in earth ovens. Heat retainers (either clay balls or stones) were placed in a pit and a fire lit over them. Food was then placed over the heat retainers and the pit was filled in. Over time, debris from cooking and other domestic activities combined with natural sediments to form a mound. Mounds often contain charcoal, burnt clay, stone/clay heat retainers, food remains such as animal bones, stone tools and human skeletal remains. Mounds were also used as camping locations during floods, and were often used as burial sites. They are frequently found in close proximity to rivers, lakes and swamps.

BURIALS

Burials can be found in mounds, middens, as single grave sites or mass burial grounds (cemeteries). Burial and cremation were the two most customary forms of disposal of the deceased. Sand dunes or large sandhills were frequently used for burials in areas where regular flooding occurred (eg Murray Valley Floodplain), because they presented easy digging and provided higher ground during flood.

SCARRED TREES

Scarred trees are those which show signs of scarring caused as a result of bark removal by Aboriginal people for making a variety of artefacts such as canoes, shields, containers and temporary shelters. Scars may also be the result of bark having been removed to make toe notches for climbing. These trees provide important clues about the perishable resources used by Aboriginal peoples.

STONE ARTEFACT SCATTERS

An artifact scatter is a site where there is flaked material left over from the manufacture of stone tools. These sites are often the only physical remains of where Aboriginal people camped, prepared and ate meals. The material used for stone tool making is rich in silica, and is hard and brittle for example: quartzite, chert, flint, silcrete and quartz. In Victoria an artefact scatter is defined as having more than five artefacts within a 10 metre square area; fewer than five is defined as an 'isolated artefact site' rather than a scatter.

ROCK ART SITES

These sites were predominantly used for shelter and vary from shallow cramped overhangs to deep spacious chambers. In contrast to some other areas of Australia, rock art sites are not numerous in Victoria. Most of the galleries recently discovered in Victoria have been found in the Grampians National Park where there are approximately 39 such sites. The first recorded discovery in the Grampians, the Glenisla rock art site, was in 1859. The type of motifs contained in these shelters comprise: lines, emu and kangaroo tracks, human figures and hand stencils. This type of site often contains archaeological deposits in the form of: stone tools, shellfish remains, animal remains and charcoal.

SHELL MIDDENS

A shell midden is a surface scatter and/or deposit that consists mainly of edible shellfish remains, although it can often include other occupational refuse, such as fish, animal bones, hearths, stone tools and charcoal. Marine shell middens are present along much of the Victorian coastline. Freshwater shell middens are far less common and are usually found near rivers, lakes and swamps in the northern half of Victoria only, particularly the north west and along the Murray River and its tributaries.

ROCK WELLS

Rock wells are formed by natural processes and in some situations enlarged by humans through chipping or by fire heating. They vary from slight undulating depressions to large underground cavities. Forty-two rock wells have been registered with Aboriginal Affairs Victoria.

FISH TRAPS/WEIRS

Coastal
Fish traps are walled cages with a high and low opening which could be opened or closed by removing and adding rocks. In coastal areas fish traps were occasionally constructed by taking advantage of natural reefs and rock pools- fish entering the enclosures during high tide were trapped as the tide fell several hours later.

Inland
In some areas stone pens were built using river rocks to form an elaborate maze of weirs and pens of varying size and shape, some stretching 500m in length. Stone walls were kept in good functioning order, particularly just prior to spawning season when substantial numbers of fish would journey upstream. As soon as an adequate amount of fish entered the trap, the openings were blocked.

In areas were very little rock occurs naturally, traps were constructed using earthen banks and wooden stakes. Wooden grills were constructed at the mouth of drainage channels during flood times and fish were trapped on receding floodwaters, then harvested over subsequent weeks.

Known and undetected Aboriginal sites are protected by State and Commonwealth legislation. Anyone who willfully disturbs or destroys Aboriginal sites can be fined AUD$ 10,000 and / or imprisoned for up to 5 years.