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• Aborigines
  Aborigines

  plural noun

  the plural form of Aborigine.
• aborigines
  aborigines

  The earliest known inhabitants of a region. The term is most often associated with the native hunting and gathering population of Australia, who preceded the arrival of white settlers. (See hunting and gathering societies.)

Aborigines

American  

[ab-uh-rij-uh-neez] / ˌæb əˈrɪdʒ ə niz /

plural noun

1. the plural form of Aborigine.

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aborigines Cultural  

1. The earliest known inhabitants of a region. The term is most often associated with the native hunting and gathering population of Australia, who preceded the arrival of white settlers. (See hunting and gathering societies.)

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Etymology

Origin of Aborigines

First recorded in 1540–50; Aborigine ( def. ) + -s ³ ( def. ); Aborigine ( def. )

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Aborigines aborigines

Wartilykirri is a hooked boomerang shaped like the number seven, used by Aborigines in southeastern Australia.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 24, 2024

The intersection of tourism and Australia’s Indigenous peoples, the Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders, hasn’t always been so promising.

From New York Times ● Jan. 15, 2024

When the Australian Aborigines arrived on the continent of Australia, they started changing the ecosystem in very dramatic ways, and a lot of species went extinct.

From Salon ● Aug. 5, 2023

For days, he’d hitchhiked across the country in 100-degree heat, bound for Uluru/Ayers Rock, a red sandstone mountain sacred to Australia’s Aborigines.

From Seattle Times ● Oct. 10, 2021

Despite their big advantage over the Aborigines in possessing guns with which to hunt, Burke and Wills starved, collapsed, and died within a month after the Aborigines’ departure.

From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond

Now the Japanese, the Chinese, the Mongolian, the Turks, the Indians, the Afghans, the Persians, the Arabs, the Malayans, the American aborigines, and the African peoples are all non-white.

From Textbooks ● Dec. 14, 2022

At the very least, this seems to mean that aborigines should have some formal involvement in the drafting of laws that affect them.

From Economist ● Jul. 6, 2017

Before the Dutch arrived, Taiwan’s aborigines, Austronesian peoples related to indigenous groups as far away as Polynesia and Madagascar, had lived basically undisturbed since as early as 10,000 B.C.

From Slate ● May 8, 2017

In Australia, however, aborigines did not depend on crops and lived as nomads in discrete regions.

From New York Times ● Mar. 8, 2017

After all, aborigines had reached Australia by boat tens of thousands of years ago.

From "1491" by Charles C. Mann