CITY OF HOLDFAST BAY CULTURAL MAP KAURNA YARTA-ANA. Original watercolour by William Cawthorne, 1843. Mitchell Library, Sydney. A guide to sites of Kaurna significance and historical landscapes in the City of Holdfast Bay. HOLDFAST BAY – AS IT WAS The coastal plains of Pathawilyangga (Glenelg), Wituwartingga (Brighton), Tulukutangga (Kingston Park) and Witawartingga (Seacliff Park) provided an hospitable environment for the Kaurna people, whose country stretches from Crystal Brook in the north to Cape Jervis in the south. Today, there is little to remind us of the lives of the people who occupied the land for tens of thousands of years before European settlers “Marni naa putni claimed it for themselves, following their arrival Kaurna yarta-ana.” at Holdfast Bay in 1836. “Welcome to Kaurna country.” Old records, oral histories and memories of today’s Kaurna people provide us with some idea of the landscape before 1836. Camp sites lined the coastal area and plains in Some 200 years ago, this is how summer months, where food and water were you would have been greeted by the plentiful. When the cold south-westerly winds locals if you’d visited the area now and the flooding Warripari (Sturt River) that known as the City of Holdfast Bay. fed into the Pathawilyangga estuary made life difficult during the winter months, the Kaurna generally moved further inland to the foothills. This seasonal movement allowed important food sources to regenerate and was part of the careful management of their lands. Today, the rolling sand dunes, freshwater lagoons and natural springs that lined the coast have long been replaced by housing, commercial developments, roads and drainage systems. We are left to imagine the lifestyle of the Kaurna in the Holdfast Bay area before their lives were so dramatically interrupted by European settlement. Exploring the identified sites listed on the map can help us. THE KAURNA LANGUAGE “Marni niina pudni. Pulthunari payima, Kaurna English Location ngadlu yarta tampinthi.” “Welcome. When we understand the Pathawilyangga Swamp gums and foliage, Glenelg placenames,we recognise the land.” young branches, brushwood Wituwartingga In the midst of reeds Brighton Before European settlement, the Kaurna (witu ‘reed’) people named places using their own Tulukutangga Kaurna form of Ngarrindjeri Kingston Park language. Today, some places, such as name, ‘Tulukudangk’ Willunga, are still known by their Kaurna name. The Kaurna Naming Project, combining Witawartingga In the midst of peppermint Seacliff Park the work of the Kaurna Warra Pintyandi gums (wita ‘peppermint gums’) language group and the Land Services Group, is working to identify and map places Ngutinilla Place of Ngutinai Ngutinilla/ with Kaurna names, and to increase the (Kaurna man) Brian Nadillo Reserve knowledge and use of these names. Tarniwarra Voice of the waves Tarniwarra Reserve Below are some of the Kaurna placenames in Holdfast Bay. LOCAL NATIVE PLANTS Layers on the map show what kinds of landscape and vegetation were natural to the Holdfast Bay area prior to European settlement. The following local native plants are just some examples of what has grown in this area for centuries (and perfect for today’s gardens). Keep an eye out for interpretive signs in council areas to find out more. Tall Woodlands Mallee Woodlands Riparian Coastal Clasping Goodenia Mallee Box Knobby Club-rush Native Pigface Goodenia amplexans Eucalyptus porosa Ficinia nodosa Carpobrotus rossii Provides an important food After about 120 years, tree Knobby Club-rush provides The Kaurna people know source for pollinating insects hollows form for nesting valuable habitat for Pigface as ‘karrkala’ and (including the ‘kartlaparti’, birds, bats and possums. butterflies (some known as eat the reddish fruit (known a type of native bee) which In Kaurna language, our ‘pilyapilya’ by the Kaurna as ‘multyu’). Sleepy Lizards can often be seen flying local possums are known people). The Kaurna use this (known as ‘kalta’) also feed from flower to flower. as ‘madlurta’ (Ringtail) and plant for weaving baskets on the ‘multyu’ of ‘karrkala’. ‘pirlta’ (Brushtail). for fishing and various other practical purposes. KAURNA YARTA-ANA 3 TJILBRUKE’S JOURNEY Although not a powerful man, Tjilbruke was a great man, a master of fire making and a skilled hunter. One day his much loved nephew, Kulultuwi, and Kulultuwi’s two half- brothers decided to go hunting. Tjilbruke did not want to go with them; he decided to set up camp at Tulukutangga (now called Kingston Park by non-Kaurna people). Tjilbruke saw the old tracks of Kulultuwi’s hunting party and found fresh tracks of an emu. Tjilbruke tracked this emu but lost the track. Tjilbruke continued to walk in the direction he thought the emu would Later, on looking for Kulultuwi, Near Pariwarangga (Cape Jervis), have taken. While he was walking, Tjilbruke discovered evidence of Tjilbruke went into a cave, where he he came across Kulultuwi starting a his nephew’s death. He went to left Kulultuwi’s body. He travelled fire to cook an emu that he had killed. Warriparinga where he found further in and emerged covered Being new at hunting, Kulultuwi had Kulultuwi’s partially smoked, dried in yellow ochre. Feeling old and accidentally killed the emu that Tjilbruke body. He picked up the body and saddened by the death of his was hunting (it was against tribal law carried it to the freshwater spring at nephew, Tjilbruke decided that he to kill an animal that was rightfully Tulukutangga (Kingston Park). no longer wanted to live as a man. someone else’s). Tjilbruke forgave He found a swampy lagoon and At Tulukutangga, Tjilbruke completed Kulultuwi’s mistake and returned to his killed a grey currawong. He plucked the smoking of Kulultuwi’s body. camp. Kulultuwi placed green herbs its feathers, rubbed its fat over his An inquest was held and Tjilbruke on the bird, laid it on a bed of hot body and tied the feathers onto his discovered how his nephew had stones and poured water on it to make arms. As he flapped his arms, he died. Tjilbruke carried Kulultuwi’s it steam. As Kulultuwi leaned over the started to fly and became an ibis. body to Murrkangga (Hallett Cove) bird to see if it was nearly ready, a Today you can see Tjilbruke’s spirit where he rested. As he thought burst of steam blinded him. in the ibis that live around springs about his nephew, he cried. His and swamps. His two half-brothers, who were tears formed a freshwater spring. jealous of Kulultuwi’s popularity, He continued along the coast to thought he should face tribal justice Witawali (Sellicks Beach), crying as for killing the emu. They speared him he carried Kulultuwi’s body. He cried to death, then took Kulultuwi’s body as he travelled along the coast and to Warriparinga, where they started more freshwater springs were created to smoke it. by his tears. Springs were created at Tayinparingga (Port Noarlunga), Karrkungga (Red Ochre Cove), Wirruwarungga (Port Willunga) and Kungkaratingga (near Wirrina Cove). 4 CITY OF HOLDFAST BAY MULLAWIRRABURKA When Europeans first arrived at Holdfast Bay in 1836, they discovered the indigenous people had a clearly defined system of land ownership. German missionaries, Schurmann and He was keen to keep the peace Mullawirraburka died in Adelaide Teichelmann wrote that local groups between his people and the eight years after the arrival of were associated with a pangkarra, newcomers, at times assisting in settlers at Glenelg. He had seen ‘the district or tract of country disputes. But when orders were given his traditional hunting grounds, belonging to an individual, which he to suspend rations to the Kaurna camping places and ceremonial inherits from his father’, along with the people in Adelaide, following the and sacred sites overrun by people totemic rites and songs associated killing of two shepherds by Aborigines who had no idea of the culture they with it. The position of burka, the from northern tribes, it may well were destroying. He watched as his ‘owner’ of a pangkarra, passed from have been Mullawirraburka, often people became victims to poor living the father to the first-born son. the spokesman for his people, who conditions, alcohol and introduced expressed these sentiments reported diseases. Deaths among the Adelaide Mullawirraburka (his name means, in the local newspaper: Aborigines consistently outnumbered literally: ‘dry gum forest old man’) births by at least two to one. was the ‘owner’ of Mullawirra, the pangkarra on the eastern side of the Aldinga Plains. Today he would be regarded as the senior custodian of “You white men have taken away our land and you have the Willunga area. There is some driven away our kangaroo and emus. We have no food evidence that before 1840 he had been the custodian of the areas now but what you please to give us. We are few and covering Adelaide, Glenelg, Sturt weak; you are many and strong. You say black man have River and Hurtle Vale (Reynella) but killed white man. We say take and kill bad black man but had ‘exchanged’ these lands for do not kill and starve good black man, your friends, and those further south, perhaps as a their women and children.” result of the lands formerly in his care being taken over by settlers. He is known to have spent much time in the Onkaparinga River region. Mullawirraburka was in his late twenties when his way of life was disturbed by the arrival of Europeans. He became a regular visitor to the new settlement of Adelaide. He learned to speak English, and helped the German missionaries compile their extensive Kaurna language dictionary. Adapted from: Tom Gara – The life and times of Mullawirraburka (‘King John’) of the Adelaide tribe.