Jeannie Gunn's groundbreaking novel We of the Never Never painted a picture of Australian frontier life at Elsey Station in the North Territory outback.
Fast forward more than 100 years and a new history has been written, with the famous homestead handed back to traditional owners on Thursday.
"It's been a long journey, many of our old people have gone. We can feel their presence here today," elder Marjorie Roberts-Hall told AAP.
The Bobobingga clan of the Yangman and Mangarrayi nations have waited more than 20 years for the settlement of the area, known as Guyanggun.
The homestead is a significant tourist site near the Mataranka hot springs, 420km south of Darwin.
It will remain open to the thousands of visitors who come each year to swim and see the remote and hostile land depicted in Ms Gunn's novel.
Ms Roberts-Hall said the ceremony attended by Minister for Indigenous Australians Ken Wyatt was more than a symbolic act.
The deed to the land also represents certainty for future generations.
"It will help them understand their culture and where they come from," she said.
The Urapunga township in southern Arnhem Land was also handed back to the Budal Yutpundji-Milwarapara people.
Annette Miller-Murray echoed Ms Roberts-Hall's words about the long tough fight Aboriginal people had been through.
"I was very emotional. We are proud of getting our land back. Now we can make use of it and protect it," she said.
"It was always ours and now is totally given back to the people."
Ms Miller-Murray said families would now be able to build businesses and independence.
Mr Wyatt said it was a significant day, recognising the two groups continuing cultural and spiritual connection to their country.
"Today is your day in regaining ownership of land that was always yours and from now on, always will be," he said, addressing more than 100 traditional owners gathered in the heat at the local rodeo ground to hear him.
Senator Malarndirri McCarthy said although the day completed "unfinished business", it had taken way too long, and many Aboriginal people continued to struggle.
"We still need houses, we still need jobs and we still need a future for our children that gives them hope," she said.
"What does the future look like?"
Northern Land Council chair Samuel Bush-Blanasi said the struggle for land started in the 1800s when pastoralists moved in.
"The old people handed down stories about terrible days in the Urapunga area and right along the Roper River country," he said.
"There were many violent confrontations and our people were shot at with rifles, they were hunted.
"Today we honour the lives of the old people who kept our laws, our culture, our language."
