Editing Nullarbor Plain (section)

== History ==

Historically, the Nullarbor was seasonally occupied by [[Indigenous Australian people]], the Mirning clans and Yinyila people.<ref>Marun, L. H. (1972) The Mirning and their predecessors on the coastal Nullarbor Plain, PhD thesis, Sydney University</ref> Traditionally, the area was called ''Oondiri'', which is said to mean 'the waterless'.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.abc.net.au/local/photos/2008/05/15/2245751.htm | title=The Road to Rawlinna | date=19 May 2008 | author=Rebecca McLaren | website=abc.net.au}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.laco.org/lines-southern-cross-part-three/|title=Lines of the Southern Cross (part three)|website=Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra|date=11 September 2014 }}</ref>

The first Europeans known to have sighted and mapped the Nullarbor coast were Captain [[François Thijssen]] and Councillor of the Indies, [[Pieter Nuyts]], on the Dutch [[East Indiaman]] ''[['t Gulden Zeepaert (ship, 1626)|'t Gulden Zeepaert]]'' (the Golden Seahorse). In 1626–1627, they charted a stretch of the southern Australian coast east of [[Cape Leeuwin]] and extending to longitude 133 30'E.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.samemory.sa.gov.au/site/page.cfm?u=197|title=Taking it to the edge: Coast: The Dutch|date=6 April 2006|publisher=SLSA|access-date=15 September 2019|via=www.samemory.sa.gov.au}}</ref> While the interior remained little known to Europeans over the next two centuries, the stretch of coast adjoining the Great Australian Bight was named for Nuyts, and maps subsequent to 1627 bore the legend "Landt van P. Nuyts" or "Terre de Nuyts".<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://museum.wa.gov.au/exhibitions/voyages/timeline/1600s.html|title=Voyages of Grand Discovery|first=Stuart|last=Sevastos|website=museum.wa.gov.au|access-date=15 September 2019}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.australiaonthemap.org.au/the-freycinet-map-of-1811-the-first-complete-map-of-australia-freycinet-map-1811/|title=The Freycinet map of 1811 – The first complete map of Australia? – Australia on the Map|access-date=15 September 2019}}</ref> That survives as two geographical names in West Australia: [[Nuytsland Nature Reserve]] and [[Nuyts Land District]], and in South Australia as Nuyts Reef, Cape Nuyts and the [[Nuyts Archipelago]].<ref name=CAPAD22 >{{cite web |url=https://www.dcceew.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/capad2022-terrestrial-wa.xlsx |title=Terrestrial CAPAD 2022 WA summary |author=<!--Not stated--> |website=www.dcceew.gov.au/ |publisher=[[Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water]] |access-date=9 September 2023}}</ref><ref name=Dashboard >{{cite web |url=https://www.dcceew.gov.au/environment/land/nrs/science/capad/dashboard |title=Australian Protected Areas Dashboard |author=<!--Not stated--> |website=www.dcceew.gov.au/ |publisher=[[Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water]] |access-date=9 September 2023}}</ref> 

[[Edward John Eyre]] became the first European to successfully cross the Nullarbor (from East to West) in 1841. In writing about Eyre's voyages in 1865, [[Henry Kingsley]] wrote that the area across the Nullarbor and Great Australian Bight was a "hideous anomaly, a blot on the face of Nature, the sort of place one gets into in bad dreams".<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Living Age, Volume 87|last=Littell|first=E|publisher=Littell, Son and Company|year=1865|location=Boston|pages=481}}</ref> Eyre departed westwards from [[Fowlers Bay, South Australia]] on 17 November 1840 with [[John Baxter (explorer)|John Baxter]] and a party of three Aboriginal men. When three of his horses died of [[dehydration]], he returned to Fowler's Bay. He departed with a second expedition on 25 February 1841. By 29 April, the party had reached [[Caiguna]]. Lack of supplies and water led to a [[mutiny]]. Two of the Aboriginal men killed Baxter and took the party's supplies. Eyre and the third Aboriginal man, [[Wylie (Australian explorer)|Wylie]], continued on their journey, surviving through [[bushcraft]] and some fortuitous circumstances such as receiving some supplies from a French [[whaling]] vessel anchored at [[Rossiter Bay]], Western Australia, some {{convert|36|km|mi}} east of [[Esperance, Western Australia|Esperance]]. They completed their journey in Albany in June 1841.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article37944867 |title=EYRE CENTENARY. |newspaper=[[Western Mail (Western Australia)|Western Mail]] |volume=56 |issue=2,872 |location=Western Australia |date=20 March 1941 |accessdate=29 April 2025 |page=43 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref>

In August 1865, while travelling across the Nullarbor Plain, [[E. A. Delisser|E.A. Delisser]] in his journal named both Nullarbor and [[Eucla]] for the first time.<ref>''Journal of the Great Australian Bight Expedition'', May–October 1865, recording the exploration and naming of the Nullarbor Plain. The journal covers the dates 1 May to 5 October. Both volumes include mounted and identified botanical specimens, with some since lost or deteriorated. Book II includes a sketch plan entitled "Bight Country - the two catacombs near Kuelna [Colona?] July 16 Sunday −1865". This volume appears to contain the first written use of the name Nullarbor Plain under the date Friday 18 August 1865. – see http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/34692051</ref>

A proposed new state of [[Auralia]] (meaning "land of gold") would have comprised the Goldfields, the western portion of the Nullarbor Plain and the port town of [[Esperance, Western Australia|Esperance]]. Its capital would have been [[Kalgoorlie, Western Australia|Kalgoorlie]].<ref>{{cite news |url=http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article88401466 |title=The Separation Movement. |newspaper=[[Kalgoorlie Miner]] |volume=5 |issue=1294 |location=Western Australia |date=3 February 1900 |accessdate=15 July 2016 |page=2 |via=National Library of Australia}}</ref>

During the [[British nuclear tests at Maralinga]] in the 1950s, the [[Australian Government]] removed the [[Wangai]] people from their homeland. Since then, they have been awarded compensation, and many have returned to the general area. Others never left.{{Citation needed|date=November 2023|reason=specifics on alleged compensation and return of Wainga peoples}}

Some agricultural interests are on the fringe of the plain including the {{Convert|2.5|e6acre|e6ha|0|abbr=off|adj=on}} [[Rawlinna Station]], the largest [[sheep station]] in the world, on the Western Australian side of the plain. The property has a short history compared to other properties of its type around Australia, having been established in 1962 by Hugh G. MacLachlan, of the South Australian pastoral family.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.jumbuckpastoral.com/pages/stations/rawlinna.html|title=Rawlinna|publisher=Jumbuck Pastoral|year=2012|access-date=22 January 2013|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130409182204/http://www.jumbuckpastoral.com/pages/stations/rawlinna.html|archive-date=9 April 2013}}</ref> An older property is [[Madura Station]], situated closer to the coast; it has a size of {{Convert|1.7|e6acre|ha}} and is also stocked with sheep.<ref name="Jumbuck">{{cite web|url=http://www.jumbuckpastoral.com/pages/stations/Madura.html|title=Madura|publisher=Jumbuck Pastoral|year=2012|access-date=21 February 2013|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130409182057/http://www.jumbuckpastoral.com/pages/stations/madura.html|archive-date=9 April 2013}}</ref> Madura was established prior to 1927; the extent of the property at that time was reported as {{Convert|2|e6acre|ha|spell=in|abbr=off}}.<ref name="The Sydney Mail – 20Jul1927 – Madura Station – 2,000,000 Acres">{{cite news|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=d45VAAAAIBAJ&pg=4995,932345&dq=madura-station&hl=en|title=Madura Station – 2,000,000 Acres|date=20 July 1927|work=[[The Sydney Mail]]|access-date=22 February 2013}}</ref>

In 2013, a huge area of the Nullarbor Plain, stretching almost {{Cvt|200|km}} from the Western Australian border to the Great Australian Bight, was proclaimed as the [[Nullarbor Wilderness Protection Area]] under the ''Wilderness Protection Act 1992'' (SA), doubling the area of land in South Australia under environmental protection to {{Convert|1.8|e6ha|e6acre|abbr=off}}. The area contains 390 species of plants and a large number of habitats for rare species of animals and birds.<ref>ABC News, 25 March 2011</ref>