Context (References)
Ref. Plate: Fig. 18; Fig. 341
Event Date
Author: rachel hand

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Description (Physical description)
Catalogue card for 1922.264 A-B reads, 'Two beaked, non returning boomerang. Used for fighting.'
Event Date 1922
Author: rachel hand

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Context (Amendments / updates)
Register notes the source as 'Prof T. G. Bonney'

The Bonney collection, noted variously as from Prof Bonney or T.G Bonney, had been recorded with T.G. Bonney as the collector and donor based on the catalogue cards and registers. However, the objects were collected by Frederic Bonney and given or passed on his death, to his brother, Thomas George Bonney, (1833- 1923), a tutor at St John's College, Cambridge and lecturer in geology from 1868, and Professor of Geology in University College London, 1877- 1901.

Archival research by Ian Coates at MAA in 2015 highlighted letters from T. G Bonny in the 1922 uncatalogued correspondence files regarding the gift of his late brother Frederic's collections confirming that Frederic was the initial field collector and source of much of his collection.

Some objects have cards or labels that note other collectors and suggest that T. G Bonney's collection had multiple sources, e.g. W. H. Watson or R. E. Guise, etc. Guise may be the Mr Guise who accompanied T.H Bonney and Poondary, one of Bonney’s major informants during night photography, noted without a reference in the draft ms version of Hope and Lindsay’s book.


The records have subsequently been updated to reflect the multiple collectors and give T. G. Bonney as a subsequent rather than the primary collector of the material.
Event Date 6/3/2018
Author: rachel hand

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Context (References)
State Library of New South Wales, PXA 562. Photographs of Australian Aborigines at Momba
sheep and cattle station, New South Wales, c.1865-1880s.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (References)
State Library of Victoria, ‘Possum’ by Frederic Bonney, 1873415.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (References)
Hope, Jeannette and Robert Lindsay. The people of the Paroo River: Frederic Bonney's
photographs Sydney, N.S.W. Dept. of Environment, Climate Change and Water.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (References)
Lindsey, Robert The Bonney Photographs Dubbo: Western Region Country Area Program,
Western Readers, 1983.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (References)
National Library of Australia, Views of the Colonies of Victoria, New South Wales, South
Australia and Queensland including Momba Station and the township of Bourke,
PIC/8131/1-91 LOC Album 1026.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (Acquisition Details)
Following Frederic Bonney’s death in 1921, 47 objects were donated to the MAA by his brother, the Reverend Professor T.G Bonney (see letter dated Feb 11 1922 in MAA Archives). Thomas George Bonney (1833- 1923) was a tutor at St John's College, Cambridge and lecturer in geology from 1868, and Professor of Geology at University College London from 1877-1901.
Further objects collected by Frederic Bonney were later donated in 1920 by Bonney’s brother-in-law, Major Wetherall, in 1929 (see letter dated Feb 11 1922 in MAA Archives 25 April 1929).
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (Display)
Upon Bonney’s return to Britain in 1881, he displayed his collection at Colton House, his home in Rugeley, Staffordshire. The objects remained in Bonney’s possession throughout his lifetime.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (Related Documents)
Frederic Bonney was an enthusiastic recorder Paakantyi social life and there are many extant sources that illuminate his experiences on Momba Station. His writings, held at the State Library of New South Wales, attest to the close relationships he formed with Paakantyi people, and his photographs, held at the National Library of Australia, State Library of Victoria, and MAA Cambridge, form an important record of cross-cultural interaction on pastoral properties.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (Field collection)
This ‘beaked’ boomerang is part of the collection of Frederic Bonney (1842-1921), a British-born pastoralist, photographer and early ethnographer, during his management of Momba Station, a sheep and cattle farm in north-western New South Wales, between 1865 and 1881.

It was given in a set of four to Bonney by the Queensland pastoralist, W. H. Watson, who managed Currawulla Station at Farrer’s Creek in Queensland.

Momba Station was located on Paakantyi (also spelt Barkindji or Barkandji) Country and Frederic Bonney was an enthusiastic recorder Paakantyi social life. Objects collected by Bonney on or around Momba Station now held in the MAA number over fifty objects and stone tools.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (References)
Bonney, Frederic. “On Some Customs of the Aborigines of the River Darling, New South
Wales.” The Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland 13,
no. 2, (1884): 122-37.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (References)
National Museum of Australia, Album of drawings by Panga with loose leaf letters, photograph
and booklet, 2015.0012.0001.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster

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Context (References)
State Library of New South Wales, Frederic Bonneys’ papers, circa. 1866-1915, ML MSS 259.
Event Date 26/2/2024
Author: Eleanor Foster