Swag (bedroll)

Swag (bedroll)

In Australia and New Zealand, a swag is a portable sleeping unit. It is normally a bundle of belongings rolled in a traditional fashion to be carried by a foot traveller in the bush. Before motor transport was common, foot travel over long distances was essential to agriculture in the Australian bush. It is sometimes referred to as a "backpack bed".

Swags have been carried by shearers, miners, the unemployed, and many others, some of whom would have been happy to have been called swagmen and some not. A swag was sometimes known as a bluey, for example see the lyrics to the 1959 song "I've Been Everywhere".