ABSTRACT
The first historic site in Australia to be declared as such by law was Captain Cook’s landing place at Kurnell, south of Sydney in 1899, and two years later the Royal Australian Historical Society was founded. During the 1970s the efforts of the National Trust to preserve Australia’s cultural heritage were joined by what is probably the first unique feature of the conservation movement in Australia: the development of ‘green bans’ by the trade unions. Since the 1960s Australia has developed reasonably comprehensive legislation to protect both the Aboriginal and the European heritage. Legislation to protect Aboriginal sites came before that aimed at conserving the European heritage. The Western Australian legislation of 1972 partially recognized these differences, by including special provisions for Aboriginal custodians and traditional use of sites and artefacts, and for the protection of sacred sites, including those lacking visible traces of Aboriginal culture.
