Aborigines are believed to have lived in Australia for between 60,000 and 40,000 years, their early ancestors coming from South-East Asia.
Europeans came to Australia in 1788. The process of colonisation by Europeans has had a radical effect on Aboriginal culture. The settlers viewed the natives as barbarians, seizing tribal land and, in many cases, following a policy of pacification by force. Many others died of disease, starvation, cultural dislocation and neglect. Today, there are fewer than 230,000 Aborigines in Australia, less than 2% of the population.
A didgeridoo is a wind instrument developed by Aboriginals of northern Australia at least 1.500 years ago and it is still in widespread usage today both in Australia and around the world.
Another example of Australian Aboriginal Art is boomerang. The oldest Australian Aboriginal boomerangs are ten thousand years old, but older hunting sticks have been discovered in Europe, where they seem to have formed part of the Stone Age arsenal of weapons.
In Catalonia there are at least 60 sites with paintings of communities that lived approximately between 6000 and 1000 BC.