M3 - Learner Manual

9. Creation Periods

The Creation period, in many stories begins in darkness and the bare earth. Out of these Dreaming stories came great ancestral spiritual beings, who then travelled across a land without form and created sacred sites and other significant places, giving language to people, creating other living beings and shaping the earth. Many different creation stories exist among the different Aboriginal groups. This period of creation is often referred to as Alcheringa, Creation time, the ‘Dreaming” or the ‘Dreamtime’.  The Dreaming was the time before time existed.

Click on the following link for Jacinta Koolmatrie  TEDx Talk: The myth of Aboriginal stories being myths:

Different characters and beings, in Creation stories, created the land and the lore in ways particular to different peoples and landscapes.

The Dreaming refers not to historical past but a fusion of identity and spiritual connection with the timeless present.