Boonwurrung
Total population | |
---|---|
Pre contact – at least 500. Taungurong, Djadjawurrung |
The Boonwurrung,
The Registered Aboriginal Party representing the Boonwurrung people is the Bunurong Land Council Aboriginal Corporation.
Language
Country
The Boonwurrung people are predominantly
“Saw nothing but grassy country, open forest, plenty gum and wild cherry. Saw where the natives had encamped,
plenty of trees notched where they had climbed for opossums. …There are herds of forest kangaroo immensely large, a short distance from the settlement, also flocks of emus on the western plains fifty and sixty in a drove. …The country through which I travelled to the Salt Water (Maribyrnong) River had a park-like appearance, kangaroo grass being the
principal, the trees she-oak, wattle, honeysuckle. Saw a blue flower, thorny appearance. Numerous old native huts.”
— George Robinson 1836. The journals of George Augustus Robinson, chief protector, Port Phillip Aboriginal Protectorate.
In June 2021, the
In Boonwurrung belief, their territory was carved out by the creator
Clan structures
Communities consisted of six land-owning groups called clans that spoke the Boonwurrung language and were connected through cultural and mutual interests, totems, trading initiatives, and marriage ties. Each had an Arweet, or clan leader.[12]
The clans are:
- Yalukit-willam: East of Werribee River to St Kilda
- Mayone-bulluk: Carrum Carrum Swamp
- Ngaruk-Willam: Brighton, Mordialloc, Dandenong, and the area from Mount Martha to Mount Eliza.
- Yallock-Bullock: Bass River and Tooradin.
- Boonwurrung-Bulluk: Cape Schank.
- Yowenjerre: Tarwin River.[13]
Access by other clans to land and resources (such as the Birrarung, or Yarra River) was sometimes restricted depending on the state of the resource in question. For example; if a river or creek had been fished regularly throughout the fishing season and fish supplies were down, fishing was limited or stopped entirely by the clan who owned that resource until fish were given a chance to recover. During this time, other resources were utilised for food. This ensured the sustained use of the resources available to them. As with most other Kulin territories, penalties such as spearings were enforced upon trespassers.[citation needed]
Boonwurrung moieties classified people either as Bunjil, that is eaglehawk or Waang, namely raven.[14]
History and culture
Traditional life
Information on traditional life has been passed down by Boonwurrung people from one generation to the next, and was also recorded by European settlers and administrators.[6]
The Yalukit-willam clan of the Boonwurrung were semi-nomadic hunter gatherers who moved around to seasonal food sources in their territory to take advantage of seasonably available food resources. Their hunting equipment and techniques had been highly developed to the environment and they had a highly detailed knowledge of their Country. This knowledge was passed from one generation to the next. They had to work only about five hours a day.[6] Dogs were important and ceremonially buried.[15]
The Boonwurrung people have oral histories that recount in detail the flooding of Port Phillip Bay ten-thousand years ago. The boundaries of Boonwurrung territory are defined by further floods 5000 years ago. Prior to this time, the bay was scrub-filled and passable on foot, and the Boonwurrung people hunted kangaroo and possums on it.[6]
Food and hunting
The Yalukit-willam would spend up to a few weeks in one spot, depending on the water and food supply. Major camps were often set up close to permanent fresh water, leaving archaeological evidence of the places they lived. These archaeological sites include surface scatters, shell middens, isolated artefacts and burials.[6]
Men were the primary hunters. They hunted kangaroos, possums, kangaroo rats, bandicoots, wombats and lizards. They also caught fish and eels and collected shellfish. Some Boonwurrung people made seasonal trips in canoes to French Island, where they could gather swan eggs.[16] In coastal and swamp areas there was plenty of bird life to hunt, including ducks and swans. There were abundant eels, yabbies, and fish in Stony and Kororoit creeks, and the Yarra River. Men were experts at spearing eels and Robinson notes in his diary in 1841 two men catching 40lbs of eel 'in a very short time'. The coast provided saltwater fish, mussels, cockles and small crabs.[6]
Women were primarily gatherers. Murnong (or yam daisy) was a favourite food. Others were the black wattle gum, the pith of tree ferns, native cherries, kangaroo apples and various fungi. Murnong grew all year was best eaten in spring. Tubers were collected in vast amounts in string bags. Fresh murnong could be eaten raw, or if less fresh, murnong could be roasted or baked in earth ovens. Murnong used to grow in great amounts along the Kororoit Creek and other creeks in the area and covered the plain to the west.[6] These murnong fields were destroyed by the introduction of sheep. Scholar Bruce Pascoe attributes the widespread fields of murrnong in certain areas to active farming by Aboriginal peoples.[17] Women collected large quantities of tadpoles which were cooked beneath a bed of hot coals.[6]
Robinson's diary describes how the Yalukit-willam caught emus and restrained their dingos.
When the natives want to kill emu they get up a cherry tree before daylight with a large spear, and having put a quantity of
cherries in a certain spot under the tree, conceal themselves above with a clear place for them to thrust the spear down. At day dawn the emu is heard coming by the noise it makes, and if this is a tree they have been at before they are sure
to come again, when they begin eating, and then the native thrusts the spear through them. …Saw several wild dogs on the settlement belonging to the country. …The aborigines tie up the fore foot of their dogs to prevent them going astray, instead of roping them round the neck as we do. At the native encampment, I saw two dogs thus tied.
— George Robinson 1840. The journals of George Augustus Robinson, chief protector, Port Phillip Aboriginal Protectorate.
Early European invasion
Initial contact was made in February 1801 when
Just before and overlapping the period of British exploration and settlement, the Boonwurrung were involved in a long-running dispute with the
Dispossession
The Boonwurrung people, living primarily along the Port Phillip and Western Port coast, may have had their livelihoods affected by European seal hunters. The sealers' abduction of Boonwurrung women and taken to Bass Strait Islands and Tasmania may have caused inter-tribal conflicts, and by analogy, this may also apply to the Boonwurrung, whose coastlands were visited by sealers.[21] A report by Jules Dumont d'Urville in 1830 attributed the absence of Boonwurrung on Phillip Island, which was a camp for sealers, as due to the latter's behavior.[22] As late as 1833, nine Woiwurrung and Boonwurrung women, and a boy, Yonki Yonka, were kidnapped and ferried across to the sealers' Bass Strait island bases.[23] Contact with sealers would have exposed the coastal tribes to European diseases, and this would have exercised a heavy impact on demographics, and the economic and social ties binding the Wurundjeri and Boonwurrung peoples, as would the possible effects of infectious diseases contracted from these sealers.[1]
James Fleming, one of the party of surveyor
One particularly notable person at the time of European settlement in Victoria was
By 1839, the Boonwurrung had been reduced to 80–90 people, with only 4 of 19 children under four years old, from a probable pre-contact population of greater than 500 people. By 1850
In 1852, the Boonwurrung were allocated 340 hectares (840 acres) at Mordialloc Creek while the Woiwurrung gained 782 hectares along the Yarra at Warrandyte. The
In March 1863, after three years of upheaval, the surviving Kulin leaders, among them
Law and war
Great enmity existed in particular between the Boonwurrung and the eastern Gunai, who were later deemed responsible for playing a role in the drastic reduction of the tribe's population.[31]
Injury or death to a tribal member usually resulted in a conference to assess the facts, and, where thought unlawful, revenge was taken.
Boonwurrung Dreaming
- Bunjil and Pallian Creation Story: Bunjil is the Creator spirit of the Kulin People.
- Birrarung Creation Story: formation of the Birrarung River.
Notable people
- Jack Charles (1943– 2022), actor.[35]
- Derrimut (c. 1810 – 28 May 1864), arweet – headman of the Boonwurrung.
- AM
- Louisa Briggs
- Maree Clarke (artist)
Alternative names
- Boonerwrung[36]
- Bunuron
- Bunurong, Bunwurrung, Boonwerung, Boonoorong and Bururong[37]
- Bunwurru
- Putnaroo, Putmaroo
- Thurung (an eastern tribal exonym for the Bunjurong, meaning tiger snakes, a metaphor indicating the sneaky way they set up ambushes against the eastern tribes.)
- Toturin (a Gunai term for 'black snake, used for several western Boonwurrung tribes.[5]
See also
Notes
- ^ It is attested that in some Victorian tribes, such of those found in the Loddon area the advent of the smallpox was associated with s serpent, Mindye, whose maleficence could be conjured by sorcerers to harm people. An early colonist wrote: "Any plague is supposed to be brought on by the Mindye or some of its little ones. I have no doubt that, in generations gone by, there has been an awful plague of cholera or black fever, and that the wind at the time, or some other appearance from the north-west has given rise to this strange being." (Thomas 1898, pp. 84–85, 89–90)
Citations
- ^ a b Gaughwin & Sullivan 1984, p. 88.
- ^ Blainey 2013, p. 8.
- ^ a b Howitt 2010, p. 338.
- ^ Dixon 2002, p. xxxv.
- ^ a b c Tindale 1974.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Clark & Briggs 2011.
- ^ Clark 1995, p. v, map.
- ^ Howitt 2010, p. 127.
- ^ Dunstan 2021.
- ^ Eddie, Rachel (1 July 2021). "Traditional owners formalised in new boundaries covering central Melbourne". The Age. Retrieved 29 August 2022.
- ^ Barwick 1984, p. 114.
- ^ Barwick 1984, p. 117.
- ^ Clark & Heydon 2004, p. 9.
- ^ Gunson 1968, p. 5.
- ^ "MS 204 - Samuel Rawson Diary & Papers 1831-1857 Pp. 10 & 11". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 29 August 2022.
- ^ Grayden, Christine (2010). "The Bunurong People". pidhs.org.au. Phillip Island & District Historical Society. Retrieved 29 August 2022.
- ^ Pascoe 2018, p. [page needed].
- ^ a b Broome 2005, pp. 3–6.
- ^ Barwick 1984, p. 119.
- ^ Clark & Heydon 2004, p. 32.
- ^ Presland 1994, p. 40.
- ^ Gaughwin & Sullivan 1984, p. 82.
- ^ Broome 2005, pp. 5–6.
- ^ Shillinglaw 1879, p. 28.
- ^ Broome 2005, pp. 7–9.
- ^ Barwick 1984, p. 116, n.17.
- ^ Broome 2005, pp. 106–107.
- ^ Broome 2005, pp. 126–127.
- ^ Clark 2015, p. 19.
- ^ Clark 2015, p. 3.
- ^ Gaughwin & Sullivan 1984, p. 83.
- ^ Howitt 2010, pp. 336ff..
- ^ Clark 2015, p. 163, n.101.
- ^ Howitt 2010, pp. 338–340.
- ^ Munro 2014.
- ^ Boon Wurrung Foundation 2013.
- ^ Clark 1990.
Sources
- "About Us". Boon Wurrung Foundation. 6 August 2013. Retrieved 20 August 2022.
- Barwick, Diane E. (1984). McBryde, Isabel (ed.). "Mapping the past: an atlas of Victorian clans 1835–1904". JSTOR 24045800.
- Barwick, Laura (2005). "Briggs, Louisa (1836–1925)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. Melbourne University Press.
- ISBN 978-1-107-29277-2.
- Broome, Richard (2005). Aboriginal Victorians: A History Since 1800. ISBN 978-1-74114-569-4.
- Canning, Shaun; Thiele, Frances (February 2010). Indigenous Cultural Heritage and History within the Metropolitan Melbourne Investigation Area: A report to the Victorian Environmental Assessment Council (PDF). Australian Cultural Heritage Management. pp. 1–48.
- Chadwick, Vince (28 January 2013). "Action plan to support Victoria's indigenous barristers". The Age. Retrieved 3 January 2019.
- Clark, Ian; Briggs, Carolyn (2011). The Yalukit-Willam: The First People of Hobsons Bay (PDF). Hobsons Bay City Council.
- Clark, Ian D (1990). Aboriginal languages and clans: an historical atlas of western and central Victoria, 1800–1900. Dept. of Geography and Environmental Science, Monash University. ISBN 978-0-909685-41-6.
- ISBN 0-85575-281-5.
- ISBN 978-3-110-46824-3.
- ISBN 978-0-855-75469-3.
- "Conversations with Richard Fidler". ABC Radio. 1 February 2016.
- "The Coranderrk Aboriginal Station". The Argus. No. 9, 428. Melbourne. 1 September 1876. p. 7. Retrieved 28 August 2017 – via National Library of Australia.
- ISBN 978-0-521-47378-1.
- Dunstan, Joseph (26 June 2021). "Melbourne's birth destroyed Bunurong and Wurundjeri boundaries. 185 years on, they've been redrawn". ABC News. Retrieved 1 July 2021.
- Fels, Marie Hansen (2011). 'I Succeeded Once': The Aboriginal Protectorate on the Mornington Peninsula,1839–1840 (PDF). ISBN 978-1-921-86212-0.
- Gaughwin, Denise; Sullivan, Hilary (1984). McBryde, Isabel (ed.). "Aboriginal boundaries and movement in Western Port, Victoria" (PDF). ISSN 0314-8769.
- Gunson, Niel (1968). The Good Country: Cranbourne Shire. F. W. Cheshire.
- ISBN 978-1-108-00632-3.
- McGaw, Janet; Pieris, Anoma (2014). Assembling the Centre: Architecture for Indigenous Cultures: Australia and Beyond. ISBN 978-1-317-59894-7.
- Munro, Kate (14 August 2014). "Actor Jack Charles: the tumultuous life of a stolen child". The Guardian.
- Pascoe, Bruce (2018). Dark Emu: Aboriginal Australia and the birth of agriculture (New ed.). Broome, Western Australia. OCLC 1038067363.)
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link - ISBN 978-0-869-14346-9.
- ISBN 978-064633150-8.
- ISBN 978-0-522-85064-2.
- Shillinglaw, John Joseph (1879). Historical records of Port Phillip: the first annals of the colony of Victoria (PDF). Melbourne: J. Ferres. pp. 15–30 – via Internet Archive.
- Thomas, William (1898). "Letter 14. Account of the Aborigines" (PDF). In Bride, Thomas Francis (ed.). Letters from Victorian Pioneers. Melbourne: Robert S Brain Government Printer. pp. 84–100 – via Internet Archive.
- ISBN 978-0-708-10741-6.