23 Facts About Kaurna

Kaurna people are a group of Aboriginal people whose traditional lands include the Adelaide Plains of South Australia.

The name Kaurna was not recorded until 1879, used by Alfred William Howitt in 1904, but not widely used until popularised by Norman B Tindale in the 1920s.

Kaurna meyunna, meaning Kaurna people, is often used in greetings and Welcome to Country or Acknowledgement of Country ceremonies.

Kaurna'war:a belongs to the Thura-Yura branch of the Pama–Nyungan languages.

Gawler actively encouraged the settlers to learn Kaurna, and advocated using the Kaurna names for geographic landmarks.

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Kaurna territory extended from Cape Jervis at the bottom of the Fleurieu Peninsula to Port Wakefield on the eastern shore of Gulf St Vincent, and as far north as Crystal Brook in the Mid North.

Main Kaurna presence was in Tarndanyangga near the River Torrens and the creeks that flowed into it, an area that became the site of the Adelaide city centre.

Kaurna people resided in the suburb of Burnside, and an early settler of the village of Beaumont described the local people thus:.

Kaurna may have numbered several thousand before European contact, but were down to about 700 by the time of the formal establishment of the colony in 1836.

Wary of Europeans from their experience with sealers, the Kaurna generally stayed aloof when the first colonists arrived.

Summer was a period when the Kaurna traditionally moved from the plains to the foothills, so that the initial settlement of the Adelaide area took place without any conflict.

Kaurna reported in 1840 that many Kaurna were friendly and helpful, and that by 1840, about 150 spoke at least some English.

Many Kaurna people worked for the settlers and were well thought of, but the work was seasonal and the rewards inadequate, and their tribal obligations were not understood by their employers.

Kaurna people had to accept colonial domination more quickly than in other regions, and they mostly chose to co-exist peacefully with the settlers.

Some Kaurna people settled at Point McLeay and Point Pearce married into local families, and full-blood Kaurna still lived at the missions and scattered in the settled districts in the late 19th century, despite the wide belief that the "Adelaide tribe" was extinct by the 1870s.

In March 2018 the determination was made and the Kaurna were officially recognised as the traditional owners of the land from "Myponga to Lower Light".

Kaurna people were a hunter-gatherer society, who changed their dwellings according to climatic conditions: in summer they would camp near the coastal springs fishing for mulloway.

Interest in collecting and conserving Kaurna culture was not common until their display at the 1889 Paris Exhibition spurred an interest in Indigenous culture, by which time the Kaurna traditional culture was no longer practised.

Kaurna collection held by the South Australian Museum contains only 48 items.

Kaurna people lived in family groups called bands, who lived in defined territories called pangkarra which were "passed" from father to son upon his initiation.

Physically, the Kaurna practised chest scarification and performed circumcision as an initiatory rite and were the southernmost Indigenous language group to do so.

Many Kaurna people grew up in Bukkiyana and Raukkan and experienced some aspects of Narungga and Ngarrindjeri culture, and gradually started reclaiming Kaurna skills and Dreaming stories.

On 1 August 2019, the remains of 11 Kaurna people were laid to rest at a ceremony led by elder Jeffrey Newchurch at Kingston Park Coastal Reserve, south of Adelaide.