Bunurong

The Bunurong were an Aboriginal tribe in the Kulin Alliance who lived in Victoria in central southern Australia . Before the European settlement, the Kulin were hunters and gatherers . They were referred to by the Europeans as the tribe of the Western Port or Port Philip tribe (German: Port Phillip tribe ) and had strong ties to the Wurundjeri in the Kulin Alliance .

The land of the Bunurong stretched along the north, east, and south coastlines from Port Phillip , the Mornington Peninsula , Western Port, and its two main islands to the land southeast of the Wilsons Promontory .

Surname

The name of the Bururong is also spelled Bunwurrung , Boonwerung , Bunurowrung , Boonoorong and Bururong . Bururong also occurs in other names such as Bunurong Marine Park , Bunurong Memorial Park and in the Bunurong Land Council founded by the Bururong in 2005 . Another octopus, Octopus bunurong , the southern white-spot octopus, bears its name.

history

First European contacts

The Bunurong clan met the Europeans early because, as coastal inhabitants, they had observed the explorers' sailing ships as they sailed past the coast and then landed at Port Phillip and Western Port . First contacts arose when Lieutenant Murray and his crew anchored in February 1801 on the Lady Nelson to take in fresh water at Sorrento , today's district of Melbourne . They suspiciously exchanged spears and stone axes for shirts, mirrors and steel axes until the British ended the trade in panic because of throwing spears and fired their muskets and fired their ship's cannons at fleeing bunurong.

The following month, Captain Milius of the Baudin expedition docked on the French ship Le Naturaliste on the beach of Western Port and a much more peaceful contact developed.

Only afterwards and during the period of British discovery and settlement did the Bunurong find themselves in a long-lasting dispute with the Gunai / Kurnai from Gippsland . The conflict arose, reported William Barak , because numerous Gunai ambushed them and kidnapped their wives. Because of such raids by the Gunai, the Yowengerra clan was completely destroyed in 1836. When the Bunurong camped at Carrum Swamp from 1833 to 1833, about 60 to 70 of them were killed by Gunai raids.

expropriation

The first British settlement was founded in October 1803 on Sullivan Bay under the command of David Collins near Sorrento. William Buckley , a British convict, fled this settlement and lived with the Wada worrung for more than 30 years before meeting other Elders with John Batman in 1835 . Buckley reported to George Langhorne in 1836:

"I frequently entertained them (the Wada wurrung), when sitting around the campfires, with accounts of the English People, Houses, Ships - great guns etc. to which accounts they would listen with great attention - and express much astonishment." (German : "I often talked to the Wada worrung when they were sitting around their campfires and told them about the British people, their houses and ships - big cannons etc. about which they listened with great attention and expressed great astonishment."

The Bunurong lived mainly along the coast of Port Phillip and Western Port , where they defended themselves against raids on their camps by seal hunters who forcibly entered their camps, killed men and abducted women from 1809 to 1833. Among them was Louisa Briggs , who was kidnapped to the European sealers' camps on the islands in Bass Strait and kept in their camps as a sex slave. The seal hunters' violence led to the decline of the economic and social life of the Wurundjeri and Bunurong.

James Fleming, one of Charles Grimes ' men who explored the Maryribynong River and Yarra River as well as the Dights Falls on the ship Cumberland in February 1803, reported of Aboriginal pockmarks he encountered. These were an indication that an epidemic of smallpox was decimating the Aboriginal tribes around Port Phillip before 1803. Author Richard Broome estimates that two smallpox epidemics may have reduced the population of the Kulin strains by half in the 1790s and 1830s. The Wurundjeri pass this disease on in their oral tradition as Mindye . This disease produced the rainbow serpent , which hissed white particles from the northwest and directed them against those who did evil deeds and made them sick if they inhaled them.

A particularly notable person during the time of the European settlement of Victoria was Derrimut , an elder who informed the early Europeans in October 1835 of a planned attack by the Voivurrung . The colonists armed themselves and fended off the attack. Benwod and Billibellary of the Wurundjeri also protected the colonists as part of their hospitality. Derrimut later became very disaffected and died in Benevolent Asylum at the age of 54 in 1864. Some colonists erected a tombstone in Melbourne General Cemetery in his honor .

In 1839 the Bunurong were reduced from more than 300 people before the British settlement to 83 people, of which only 4 out of 19 were children under four years of age. In 1850, the Protector of Aborigines William Thomas estimated the number of bunurong to be 28 people.

In 1852 Boonwurrung received 340  acres of land along Mordialloc Creek and Woiwurrung received 782 acres along the Yarra River at Warrandyte. These reserves were never entered by whites and did not form permanent camps, but they served as depots and for distributing food and blankets in order to keep the Aborigines away from the Melbourne settlement. The Aboriginal Protection Board lifted the two reservations from 1862 to 1863 on the grounds that they were too close to Melbourne.

In March, 1863, after three years, the surviving leaders of the Kulin, among them led Simon Wonga and William Barak , including forty Wurundjeri , taungurong from the Goulburn River and the Bunurong via the path Blackspur - present a road between Healesville and Marysville - to their traditional bin on Badger Creek near Healesville and claimed their property. The Coranderrk Aboriginal Mission Station was later built on this site , which was abandoned in 1924 and the nursing staff then went to Lake Tyers in Gippsland .

Structure, boundaries and land use

There were six Aboriginal communities who owned common land and are linked by cultural and common interests, totems , trade interests, and marriage rules. Linked to the land and resources , the Birrarung and other clans limited their resources in terms of sustainability . For example, if a river or stream had few fish outside of regular fishing times or due to heavy fishing, the clan limited fishing until the stock had recovered. During these times, other food resources were used. This ensured the substantial preservation of resources. In most of the Kuline areas, violations by travelers were punished with javelin throwing. Today these rules are no longer valid because the traditional clan areas, language groups and borders no longer exist and the descendants of the Wurundjeri live in modern Australian society.

Clans

It is generally accepted that before European settlement existed six tribes, each with an arweet , a kind of tribal leader.

• The Yalukit-Willam clan owned a stretch of coast from Werribee to Williamstown around Mordialloc Creek
• The Mayone-Bulluk clan owned an area from the tip of the Mornington Peninsula to the head of Western Port
• Ngaruk Willam Clan : Their land reached from Dandenong through the Mordialloc area.
• Yallock-Bullock Clan : Their land stretched from the Bass River to the east side of Western Port
• Burinyung Ballak Clan : Their area is unknown
• The Yowenjerre clan owned the easternmost side of the Bunurong land

Aboriginal land

The land of Bunurong was when it was part of the Kulin alliance, called marr ne bek or excellent country (German: excellent country ) is known and it provided food in abundance. As a descendant of the Lohan , the Kulin were administrators of this excellent land. The Kulin therefore assumed that this abundance was also available for other clans and therefore underwent a special ritual to allow others to access and use their land.

religion

The Bunurong had the same belief as the other Kulin, based on the creation story , which is known as the dream time and goes back to prehistoric times when the creation figures met the first people on their journeys in a creative and eponymous way. Their indigenous traditional and religious values ​​were based on worshiping the land and believing in dreamtime.

The dream time is one with the creation story and shows up in today's reality. There were many different indigenous groups in Australia, each with its own culture, belief structure and language. This culture overlapped to a greater or lesser extent and it evolved over time. The two related totems of the Wurundjeri are the bunjil , the wedge-tailed eagle and the waarn , the crow .

Dreamtime stories

• Bunjil & Pallian Creation Story : Bunjil is the creative spirit of Kulin.
• Birrarung Creation Story describes the formation on the Birrarung River.
• Waarn is the protector of the Bunurong waterways.

Famous bunurong

• Derrimut (1810–1864), was an elder of the Bunurong who was allied with the Wurundjeri

Web links

• City of Greater Dandenong the Bunurong
• A Boonerwrung Story

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Bunurong Marine Park ( Memento of the original from July 18, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed June 21, 2011  
2. ^ Bunurong Memorial Park: Creating Living Memories for the community since 1995 , accessed June 21, 2011
3. ^ ^{A b} Richard Broome, pp3-6, Aboriginal Victorians: A History Since 1800 , Allen & Unwin, 2005, ISBN 1-74114-569-4 , ISBN 978-1-74114-569-4
4. ↑ Dianne Barwick (1984): Mapping the Past: an Atlas of Victorian Clans , Aboriginal History, 8: 100-131, cited in David Rhodes, Terra Culture Heritage Consultants, Channel Deepening Existing Conditions Final Report - Aboriginal Heritage ( Memento des original from 1 October 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The  archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Prepared for Parsons Brinckerhoff & Port of Melbourne Corporation, August 2003. Retrieved November 3, 2008
5. ↑ Clark, Ian D. & Toby G. Heydon, 1998, The Confluence of the Merri Creek and Yarra River: A History of the Western Port Aboriginal Protectorate and the Merri Creek Aboriginal School , Report to the Heritage Services Branch, Aboriginal Affairs Victoria, quoted in David Rhodes, Terra Culture Heritage Consultants, Channel Deepening Existing Conditions Final Report - Aboriginal Heritage ( Memento of the original from October 1, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The  archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , Prepared for Parsons Brinckerhoff & Port of Melbourne Corporation, August 2003. Retrieved November 3, 2008
6. ↑ Langhorne 1836 in Tim Flannery (Ed.) (2002), Introduction to The Life and Adventures of William Buckley, by John Morgan, 1852. (2002) ISBN 978-1-877008-20-7
7. ↑ David Rhodes: Terra Culture Heritage Consultants , Channel Deepening Existing Conditions Final Report - Aboriginal Heritage ( Memento of the original from October 1, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , P. 23, Prepared for Parsons Brinckerhoff & Port of Melbourne Corporation, August 2003. Retrieved November 3, 2008 
8. ↑ James Fleming: A journal of Grimes' survey: the Cumberland in Port Phillip January-February 1803 , ed. John Currey, 2002, ISBN 0-949586-10-2 , quoted in David Rhodes: Terra Culture Heritage Consultants , Channel Deepening Existing Conditions Final Report - Aboriginal Heritage ( Memento of the original from October 1, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was used automatically and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , P. 24, Prepared for Parsons Brinckerhoff & Port of Melbourne Corporation, August 2003. Retrieved November 3, 2008 
9. ^ Richard Broome: Aboriginal Victorians: A History Since 1800 , p. 7-9, Allen & Unwin, 2005, ISBN 1-74114-569-4 , ISBN 978-1-74114-569-4
10. ↑ David Rhodes and Joanne Bell, pp50, Shire of Cardinia Urban Growth Corridor Aboriginal Heritage Study , Report to the Shire of Cardinia , April 2004. Retrieved November 10, 2008
11. ^ Richard Broome: Aboriginal Victorians: A History Since 1800 , pp. 106-107, Allen & Unwin, 2005, ISBN 1-74114-569-4 , ISBN 978-1-74114-569-4
12. ^ Richard Broome: Aboriginal Victorians: A History Since 1800 , p. 126, Allen & Unwin, 2005, ISBN 1-74114-569-4 , ISBN 978-1-74114-569-4
13. ^ Isabel Ellender, Peter Christiansen: People of the Merri Merri. The Wurundjeri in Colonial Days , p. 112-113, Merri Creek Management Committee, 2001 ISBN 0-9577728-0-7
14. ↑ Carolyn Briggs: Boon wurrung Arweets Carolyn Briggs  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as broken. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.   , Federation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Languages, in English, accessed November 9, 2008
15. ^ David Rhodes, Joanne Bell: Shire of Cardinia Urban Growth Corridor Aboriginal Heritage Study , Report to the Shire of Cardinia , April 2004. Retrieved November 10, 2008