blackfellow

[ blak-fel-oh ]

noun

, Older Use: Usually Offensive.

1. a term used to refer to an Aboriginal inhabitant of Australia.

Word History and Origins

Origin of blackfellow¹

First recorded in 1730–40; black + fellow

Example Sentences

As a further protection against lurking blackfellow or prowling dingo, a man slept in a small wooden portable cabin, called a watch-box, close by the sheep.

From Project Gutenberg

When they were mustering these cattle before starting, the boss, Mr. A. Scott Holmes, riding along with a stockman, met a blackfellow whose gin had two half-caste children with her, aged about nine and seven years; the blackfellow evidently wanted them to see the children, as he kept pointing to them.

From Project Gutenberg

The blackfellow generally wears his hair long, and usually caked into thick matted rope-like coils, with a band of red above the forehead, or else a native dog’s tail.

From Project Gutenberg

There is a superstition about abstracting the kidney fat of a blackfellow for promoting luck in fishing, and this is said to be done in various ways.

From Project Gutenberg

In some places they skin the dead blackfellow, and twist the skin round a bundle of spears with the hair sticking up on top, and they carry this to different camps, sticking it in the ground by the points of the spears; children are sometimes eaten when they die.

From Project Gutenberg