AUSTRALIA'S *VIOLENT PAST* AMPHITHEATER

MAP OF 250 indigenous massacres reveals most vividly Australia's violent past.

AN ONLINE MAP which has so far documented 250 massacres of indigenous peoples after Australia was colonised by the British is set to be expanded, researchers said  Friday, as they seek to uncover the country's dark past.

The native Aboriginal  population, who have occupied  Australia for 50,000  years, were dispossessed of their lands by the arrival of settlers two centuries ago.

As the colonisers pushed into the vast interior of the island continent, historians said they were resisted by the local population, and thousands of men, women and children were killed.

" It wasn't until I started to do this project that I realized how widespread frontier massacres were in Australia," indigenous  historian Lyandall Ryan of the University of Newcastle told AFP.

"It is beginning to overturn how we think about the past. There's been shift  in consciousness in Australians and they are ready now to know and understand what happened."

Since the government funded "Colonial Frontier Massacres Map" was launched a year ago focusing on eastern Australia from 1788 - 1872, Ryan said 'verified sites' where six or more undefended Aboriginal people "were killed had risen for more than 150 to 250 with the help of the public."

More than 6,200 people were killed during the 250 massacres, she said, adding that the final tally of sites could be closer to 500.

The sites are not catalogued on the map until there is sufficient collaborating evidence to show the killings took place.

The sadness of this honor and serving of this particular research and publishing, continues.