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	STEP 4 - Contents > Examples of heritage values > Who assesses heritage significance? > Assessing the significance of a place > What is a statement of significance? > Examples of statements of significance   > Have a go - Step 4
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	Holsworthy Area, Sydney Basin Holsworthy/Cubbitch Barta, New South Wales Holsworthy is an outstanding heritage region close to Sydney, Australia's largest metropolitan area, set aside as a Commonwealth military training area. It is bordered by Royal National Park and Heathcote National Park. It contains a diverse range of Indigenous, natural and historic heritage values:   Indigenous heritage The area is highly valued by members of the Tharawal Local Aboriginal Land Council and the Dharawal people for its symbolic, cultural, educational and social associations. Its relatively intact suite of Aboriginal sites provides a unique record of Aboriginal use of landscape in the Sydney Basin. The area contains a large and diverse range of more than 530 known Aboriginal sites. These include rock shelters containing paintings, drawings and archaeological deposits, engraving sites on rock platforms, scarred trees, grinding grooves and artefact scatters. Together these represent a complex Aboriginal cultural landscape. Holsworthy's Indigenous cultural landscape, and especially its particular art style, is representative of the southern social unit of the Sydney Basin. The area's rich collection of rock art sites depicts kangaroos, wallabies, fish, birds and snakes and human and human-like figures. The significance of the art sites has been recognised as aesthetically important to the broader community through its long history of recording by volunteer groups and individuals. Holsworthy illustrates the changes in the relationship between Aboriginal people and the early settlers and was associated with Governor Macquarie's war against the Aboriginal people of the Liverpool, Campbelltown and Appin areas in the early 1800s.   Natural heritage Holsworthy contains a diversity of relatively undisturbed and scenic natural landscapes and vegetation types including deeply dissected valleys, rocky waterholes and waterfalls. It is the site of more than 400 plant species including at least nine vulnerable or rare species. The area's diverse vegetation types include a substantial remnant of Cumberland Plain woodland, of which only 6% of the original area is thought to survive. Other vegetation types include plateau and gully forests, sedgeland, heath/swamp and melaleuca thickets. It includes populations of rare, vulnerable or endangered animals, including the koala, spotted-tailed quoll (a cat-sized carnivorous marsupial), New Holland mouse, broad-headed snake, giant burrowing frog, red-crowned toadlet and powerful owl. The creek corridors provide 'highways' for koalas which may have been used for thousands of years. The koala population is one of the few remaining viable populations in southern NSW.   Historic heritage Holsworthy has a number of historic roads, the earliest of which is the Old Illawarra Road (c1850s) which connects Sydney to southern settlements. It contains remnants of the early 'Grodno' vineyard, including dry stone walls, terraces and wells dating back to 1890s. The important military links of the place date back to World War I, when the Remount Depot was used to prepare troops and 47 000 horses for overseas service in war theatres such as Gallipoli. It was subsequently used by the Australian Army for post-World War II training. The area contains what was Australia's largest World War I internment camp which was used to intern Germans and other Europeans as well as migrants. It also housed German prisoners of war, some of whom survived the sinking of the German ship 'Emden' by HMAS Sydney off the Cocos Islands in 1914.   .....