The Kaurna (pronounced "Gaa-nah") people are a group of original peoples whose traditional Yerta (lands) lie in and around the Adelaide Plains of South Australia. Kaurna language is the spoken language of Kaurna.

[edit] Lands

Traditional Kaurna Yerta covers regions of South Australia from Cape Jervis at the bottom of the Fleurieu Peninsula to Port Wakefield on the eastern shore of Gulf Saint Vincent and as far north as Crystal Brook in the Mid North. Bordered by those of the Peramangk and Ngadjuri to the East, Nukunu to the North and the Narungga to the West.^[1]

Yerta (Clans) were also found at Snowtown, Blyth, Hoyleton, Hamley Bridge, Clarendon, Gawler and Myponga, where they were sometimes known as Nantuwara. The Jultiwira (stringy bark forests) of the Mount Lofty Ranges is a traditional boundary. Between Hamley Bridge and Crystal Brook, they were known as Padnaindi.^[2]

[edit] People and culture

The Kaurna people were a hunter-gatherer society who inhabit the "Adelaide Plains" and surrounding regions. Among their customs was the practice of fire-stick farming (controlled bushfires) in the Adelaide Hills, which the early European settlers spotted before Kaurna were displaced. These fires were part of Kaurna scrub clearing to encourage grass growth for Emu and Kangaroo.^[1]

A main Kaurna presence was in Tarndanyangga (red kangaroo rock place) near the River Torrens and the creeks that flowed into it, an area which became the site of the "Adelaide" settlement. The Kaurna also resided in the Burnside Suburb area: an early settler of the village of Beaumont described the local Kaurna: "At every creek and gully you would see their wurlies [simple Aboriginal homes made out of twigs and grass] and their fires at night ... often as many as 500 to 600 would be camped in various places ... some behind the Botanic Gardens on the banks of the river; some toward the Ranges; some on the Waterfall Gully."^[3][4]

The original population may have been several thousand prior to a 1829—1830 smallpox epidemic originating from the Eastern states. At the establishment of South Australia in 1836 it was nearer 700 and a report in 1841 notes a population of 650.^[5] The Kaurna population had been seriously depleted prior to 1836, with the spread of smallpox from the eastern states thought to have come along the Murray River.^[6] The population again severely declined upon the arrival of Anglo-European colonial settlers with South Australia Governor Capt John Hindmarsh as Commander in chief Proclamation December 1836 at Holdfast Bay (now Glenelg), from about 1000 members before settlement to 180 in 1856.^[2] An outbreak of typhoid, due to pollution by Europeans of the River Torrens, lead to many deaths and a rapid population decline though accurate figures were not recorded.^[5] The land was considered to be terra nullius by the enactment of the South Australia Act on 14 August 1834 by the British Parliament.^[7] despite King William IV South Australia Letters Patent and Governor Hindmarsh Proclamation 1836 (In Australian law this was finally annulled in 1992 by the Mabo decision.) The last surviving full-blood Kaurna woman, called Ivaritji, died in 1931.^[6]

[edit] Pangkarra and Yerta

The Kaurna people lived in independent family structures in defined territories called pangkarra. Pangkarra always had access to the coastline and ran extensively inland. The coastline was essential for seafood hunting and the inland territories provided protection to the people during bad weather. The pangkarra were then grouped into subgroups called yerta. All the members in the yerta and different pangkarra were intimately linked. Marriage between a man and a woman within the same yerta was forbidden. The Kaurna performed circumcision as an initiatory right and were the southernmost indigenous language group to do so. ^[2]

[edit] Other names

Some of the names by which the Kaurna people are also known include: Kaura (misprint), Coorna, Koornawarra, Nantuwara (in relation to the Northern yerta "Kanagaroo Speakers"), Nantuwaru, Nganawara, Meljurna or Meyukattanna (in relation to the Northern yerta 'quarrelsome men', as named by the Southern yerta).

[edit] See also

• Indigenous Australians
• Kaurna language
• History of Adelaide
• Tjilbruke
  • Tjilbruke's Trail

Other Sovereign Original ethnic groups in South Australia:

• Adynyamathanha
• Arabunna
• Kokatha
• Mirning
• Narungga
• Ngadjuri
• Ngarrindjeri
• Nukunu
• Peramangk
• Pitjantjatjara
• Yankunytjatjara

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Concise History of the Kaurna People
• Kaurna Warra
• Kaurna Culture
• Bibliography of articles
• Kaurna Yerta
• Kaurna Place Names