The drawings made by Watling, Raper and others have taken on a
significance that their creators could not have realised when
they set about making them. The drawings of individuals, family
groups, their tools, customs and activities found in this
section are a key record of Aboriginal people and their culture,
developed over thousands of years, which suddenly met with
enormous change. The accurately observed and dispassionate
portraits give a unique record of some of the key individuals to
interact with the settlers. Within a year of the arrival of the
First Fleet, the Aboriginal people of the Sydney area began to
die of diseases, mainly smallpox, introduced by the colonists.
It is estimated that within two years of the start of the
European settlement the Aboriginal population of the Port
Jackson (Sydney) area had been halved and that this rapid
decline continued throughout the 19th and into the 19th century.
Similarly, few of the artifacts that these people made and used
have survived.