Editing Southwest National Park (section)

===South West Tasmanian Aboriginal Nation and Black War===
South West Tasmania has been inhabited for approximately 40,000 years, and isolated from mainland Australia since the [[Bassian Plain]] flooded 8,000 years ago.<ref>{{cite journal | title = Isolation and Evolution in Tasmania
 | last = Pardoe | first = Colin
 | journal = [[Current Anthropology]]
 | date = February 1991 | volume = 32 | issue = 1 | pages = 1–21
 | jstor = 2743891
| doi = 10.1086/203909 | s2cid = 146785882 }}</ref> 

Tools, bones and fireplaces found in caves in what is now the Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park date aboriginal occupation in south-west Tasmania back to at least 34,000 BP.<ref>{{Cite journal | title = Hunter-Gatherer Cultural Dynamics: Long- and Short-Term Trends in Australian Prehistory
 | last = Lourandos | first = Harry
 | author-link = Harry Lourandos
 | journal = Journal of Archaeological Research
 | date = March 1993 | volume = 1 | issue = 1 | pages = 67–88
 | jstor = 41053069
| doi = 10.1007/BF01327162 | s2cid = 144195012 }}</ref> The [[Aboriginal Tasmanians|South West nation]] was one of nine across the state, and contained four known clans the Mimegin, [[Toogee people|Lowreenne]], Ninene and Needwonne. They were nomadic hunter gatherers, with staple foods including shellfish, crayfish, seals, penguins along the coast, and wallabies, wombats and birds along the buttongrass plains.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.parks.tas.gov.au/file.aspx?id=6357 |title=Aboriginal people of Macquarie Harbour |publisher = Tasmania Parks}}</ref>

There is some evidence to suggest that repeated [[Fire-stick farming|burning]] of buttongrass moorlands by the South West Nation has caused it to propagate more widely than is natural. This was done to increase areas where wallabies and wombats can forage for hunting purposes.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p18701/pdf/ch174.pdf |title=The burning question: Claims and counterclaims on the origin and extent of buttongrass moorland (blanket moor) in southwest Tasmania during the present glacial-interglacial |author=Mike Macphail |publisher=Australian National University}}</ref>

European sealers hunted in Tasmania from 1798, shortly followed by settlements around the Derwent River, to the east. Conflict between the aboriginals and Europeans soon followed, cumulating in the [[Black War]] and the near-destruction of Aboriginal Tasmanians.