  Studies in Australian Indigenous astronomical knowledge reveal few accounts
of the visible planets in the sky. However, what information we do have tells
us that Aboriginal people were close observers of planets and their motions,
noting the relative brightness of the planets, their motions along the
ecliptic, retrograde motion, the relationship between Venus and its proximity
to the Sun, Venus' connection to the Sun through zodiacal light, and the
synodic cycle of Venus, particularly as it transitions from the Evening Star to
the Morning Star. The dearth of descriptions of planets in Aboriginal
traditions may be due to the gross incompleteness of recorded astronomical
traditions, and of ethnographic bias and misidentification in the
anthropological record. Ethnographic fieldwork with Aboriginal and Torres
Strait Islander communities is revealing new, previously unrecorded knowledge
about the planets and their related phenomena.
