Lyndall Ryan’s impact on Australian history research will be felt for many years to come

‘As young adults, we began our careers in an era that saw major changes in Australian political, intellectual, and cultural history.’ Photograph: Jessica Hromas/The Guardian

Lyndall Ryan was one of Australia’s foremost historians, changing the way we do and understand Australian history. She died on Tuesday, aged 81.

Her work on Aboriginal Tasmanian history and on the massacres of Aboriginal people that occurred in the course of colonisation across the country has been hugely influential. The online Massacre Map, based at the University of Newcastle, which she conceived and created with a team of scholars, continues to attract national and international attention. It was the basis for Guardian Australia’s series The Killing Times. The Victorian premier, Jacinta Allan, referred to the Massacre Map recently when speaking at the Yoorrook Justice Commission, the state’s current truth-telling process into injustice experienced by Indigenous people, and the map is likely to remain an important source of information and understanding for years to come.