The traditional owners of the Lizard Island group are the Aboriginal Australian clan known as the Dingaal (or Dingiil) people.

[2] David Horton's 1996 representation of Norman Tindale's map shows the lands of the Guugu Yimithirr people extending from south of Hope Vale to an area which covers Lizard Island.

[3] The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority states on their website that the traditional lands of the "Guugu Yimidhirr Warra Nation" extend from Lizard Island to the Hope Vale region.

[5] According to the Cairns Institute[6] and Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service, the Dingaal people are the traditional owners of the Lizard Island group.

[9] Pottery found on the island has been dated at more than 1,800 years old,[10] showing that pots were most likely made by Aboriginal people using locally-sourced materials.

[9] The 2024 study showed that the people who lived there were involved in the ancient maritime networks in the vicinity, including the possession of sophisticated skills in building ocean-going vessels as well as navigation.

[citation needed] By the 1840s,[12] the island was being used by sea cucumber (trepang, or bêche-de-mer) fishermen who found that the waters contained substantial quantities of the creature which was a popular delicacy in Asia.

[13] Scottish naturalist John McGillivray visited the island in the Julia Percy in 1861, and wrote that there had been bêche-de-mer vessels operating there from Sydney, Singapore, and Hong Kong for 15 years prior.

A group of Guugu Yimmidir[15] or Dingaal[7] people travelled on a regular seasonal trip by canoe,[15] or went to investigate smoke at a sacred site on the island[7] The Watsons' home was close to the only source of fresh water, and Mary may have unknowingly trespassed on a ceremonial ground reserved for adult men.

[7] This devastated Aboriginal communities and their traditional economies in the region, which had already been affected by expanding agriculture and the discovery of gold, leading to the establishment of Cooktown in 1873.

[15] Lizard Island is located in the northern part of the Great Barrier Reef, 27 km (17 mi) directly off the mainland, north of Cooktown and Cape Flattery.

It was created mostly by an orogenic pluton of porphyritic biotite and muscovite, formed during the Permian age[12] around 300 million years ago.

In the 1990s, two Aboriginal rock art sites were observed in rockshelters formed by large granite boulders, in which red ochre was used.

It was observed through radiocarbon dating that the basal layer (6) produced a range of 3358-2929 cal BP on charcoal found at the 120–130 cm (47–51 in) depth.

[12] In 2006, New Zealand archaeologist Matthew Felgate found pottery in an intertidal zone by chance when he was on holiday on the island,[21] on Mangrove Beach.

[12] Later, Sean Ulm, distinguished professor at James Cook University, and Ian J. McNiven, professor at Monash University, both of whom were operating under the auspices of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Australian Biodiversity and Heritage (CABAH), co-led a team[22] including Kenneth McLean, chair of Walmbaar Aboriginal Corporation, and other members of the Dingaal and Ngurrumungu communities,[9] that excavated several more pieces of pottery from the site in 2009, 2010, and 2012.

Digging deeper, cultural material was found nearly 2 m (6 ft 7 in) metres below ground level, which was radiocarbon-dated to around 6,500 years ago; the earliest evidence of use of an island on the northern Great Barrier Reef.

The data showed that local raw materials were used and that the pottery was made on the island, which showed that the people who lived there were involved in the ancient maritime networks in the vicinity, including the possession of sophisticated canoe travel technology and skills in navigating on the ocean, which enabled them to connect with other peoples across the Coral Sea.

[10] There is conclusive evidence that the pottery is not of Lapita origin, and it is also proof of continuous seasonal occupation of the island by Aboriginal people.

[citation needed] Lizard Island has a number of heritage-listed sites, including Mrs Watson's Cottage[24] As the sea level rose in the early Holocene, resulting in the isolation of Lizard Island, mangrove forest gradually became established in place of the near-coastal palms and grasses.

The lowlands bar-lipped skink (Eremiascincus pardalis) and the sandy rainbow-skink (Carlia dogare) are endemic species of Queensland found on this island.

[26] The island is home to many land and sea birds including the bar-shouldered dove (Geopelia humeralis), pheasant coucal (Centropus phasianinus), yellow-bellied sunbird (Nectarinia jugularis), white-bellied sea-eagle (Haliaeetus leucogaster), and osprey (Pandion cristatus).