Mirning

The Mirning, also known as the Ngandatha, are an Indigenous Australian people whose traditional lands lay on the coastal region of the Great Australian Bight extending from Western Australia into south-west South Australia.

Name

Mirniŋ was their name for 'man'.[1]

Language

Mirning was, properly speaking, a language known as Ngandatha, bearing the sense of "What is it?".[1]

Country

The Mirning's traditional lands covered, according to Norman Tindale, roughly 39,000 square miles (100,000 km2) of territory, reaching from Point Culver[lower-alpha 1] eastwards across to White Well in South Australia. Their northern limit was generally the ecological line separating them from the beginning of the karst plateau of the Nullarbor Plain, though good rains would see them penetrating further north. In Norman Tindale's estimation their tribal territory encompassed roughly 39,000 square miles (100,000 km2).[1]

Social organization

The Mirning were organized into hordes of which two at least are known.

For ceremonial rites, involving the tribe's adoption of circumcision and subincision, the Wonunda-mirnung and Jirkala-mirning would gather at Jadjuuna, just south of Cocklebiddy.[1]

Their kinship system has 4 classes:- Būdera (root), Būdū (digger), Kūra, (dingo) and Wenŭng (wombat).[3][lower-alpha 3]

Howitt describes the tribe's marriage system as "very peculiar", in which two classes (Būdera and Kūra) have a privileged position as follows:[3]

MaleMarriesChildren are
(M) Būdera(F) Kūra(M) Būdera, (F) Kūra
(F) Wenŭng(M) and (F) Būdera
(M) Kūra(F) Būdera(M) Kūra, (F) Būdera
(F) Būdū(M) and (F) Kūra
(M) Būdū(F) Wenŭng(M) Būdū, (F) Wenŭng
(M) Wenŭng(F) Būdū(M) Wenŭng, (F) Būdū

People and history of contact

The Mirning were, according to measurements made of old people from a remnant of the tribe in 1939, relatively short in stature and practice rites of circumcision and subincision.[1][lower-alpha 4] The Jirkala-mirning were first contacted by whites in 1872, when their numbers were estimated to be 30, consisting of 11 men, 8 women, 5 adolescents, and 6 children.[4] It was estimated by the first whites who settled in Wonunda-mirnung territory in 1877 that they numbered no more than 80 persons, 15 men, 15 women, 10 adolescents, and some 40 children.[5] Writing in 1931, A. P. Elkin stated: 'The Wanbiri-speaking tribe, referred to as the Yerkla-mining (that is, the men at Yerkla or Irgala) is now extinct.'[6]

Media

In April 1994 Julian Lennon proposed making a documentary, with the provisory title 'Eyes of the Soul -Legends of Whales, Dolphins and Tribes' which would have touched on the Mirnung's cultural relationship to whales.[7][8] A new documentary called Whaledreamers - the Gathering, which includes mention of the Mirning, was made in 2006.[9]

Alternative names
  • Mining, Meening, Minninng, Mininj
  • Ngandatha, Ngandada
  • Wanbiri (meaning 'sea coast')
  • Warnabirrie
  • Wonbil, Wonburi. (Kokata exonyms for the Jirkalamirning.)
  • Wonunda-meening. (wonunda meaning 'low land(ers)' of Eyre/ south of the Hampton cliff scarp clan)
  • Wonunda-minung
  • Warnabinnie
  • Wanmaraing
  • Yirkla, Yirkala-Mining, Yerkla-mining
  • East Meening/East Mining
  • Ikala, Ikula[3]
  • Ngadjudjara
  • Ngadjuwonga
  • Ngadjadjara
  • Julbari/Julbara. (meaning 'south')
  • Ba:duk. ( meaning 'circumcised/ignorant' (for lack of total absorption of rites)[1]

Some words
  • mobung (magic)[10]
  • doodoo/judoo (wild dog)
  • mumma. (father) (In the Jirkala-mirning dialect = mummaloo'.)
  • yarkle. (mother).(In the Jirkala-mirning dialect = yakaloo'.)
  • wandy-murna (children) (In the Jirkala-mirning dialect = wonderong'.).[11])[12]

Notes
  1. Tindale states 'Port Culver' which appears to be an error or misprint, otherwise unattested, for Matthew Flinders's Point Culver. Tindale's coordinates for the area coincide with those of Point Culver according to the ('Point Culver (32°54'S., 124°42'E.'), and secondly Point Culver is given by W. Graham[2] (NGIA 2004, p. 158)
  2. Williams however writes:'Euclsa, I learn, is a corruption of the aboriginal name of a favorite camping-place called Yircla or Yirgella, a term which signifies morning star, the morning star as it rises over the sandhills being a noticeable object, at the spot, as the Blacks say'. (Williams 1886, p. 400)
  3. D. E. Roe of Euclas in Fison and Howitt, 1880 (Fison & Howitt 1880, p. 345)
  4. "The Wonunda speak of the tribes to the north of them as Katabungata and Mooroon, which last word means fat or stout, and of those to the west as Kooraradee, or tall. The reason of this, no doubt, is that the country of the Wonunda Meening is little better than a waterless desert, and its inhabitants, in comparison with their neighbours, half-starved, spare in person, low in stature, who use weapons and implements of an inferior sort". (Graham 1886, p. 394)

Citations
  1. Tindale 1974, p. 248.
  2. Graham 1886, p. 394.
  3. Howitt 1883, pp. 508–509.
  4. Williams 1886, p. 401.
  5. Graham 1886, p. 395.
  6. Elkin 1931, p. 62.
  7. Maddox 2007.
  8. HJC.
  9. Seiler 2012, p. 56.
  10. Fison & Howitt 1880, p. 345.
  11. Graham 1886, p. 398.
  12. Williams 1886, p. 404.

Sources
  • "AIATSIS map of Indigenous Australia". AIATSIS.
  • Elkin, A. P. (September 1931). "The Social Organization of South Australian Tribes". Oceania. 2 (1): 44–73. JSTOR 40327353.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • "Eyes of the Soul". heyjules.com.
  • Fison, Lorimer; Howitt, Alfred William (1880). Kamilaroi and Kurnai (PDF). Melbourne: G Robinson.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Graham, W. (1886). "Eyre's Sand Patch: Wonunda Meening Tribe" (PDF). In Curr, Edward Micklethwaite (ed.). The Australian race: its origin, languages, customs, place of landing in Australia and the routes by which it spread itself over the continent. Volume 1. Melbourne: J. Ferres. pp. 394–299.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Howitt, Alfred William (1883). "Notes on the Australian Class Systems". Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland. 12: 496–512. JSTOR 2841688.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Maddox, Lauren (17 April 2007). "Julian Lennon sells stake in Beatles' music". The Houstonian.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • North, West and South Coasts of Australia. ProStar Publications. 2004. ISBN 978-1-577-85655-9.
  • Seiler, Elaine (2012). Multi-Dimensional You: Exploring Energetic Evolution. Dog Ear Publishing. ISBN 978-1-457-50629-1.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • "Tindale Tribal Boundaries" (PDF). Department of Aboriginal Affairs, Western Australia. September 2016.
  • Tindale, Norman Barnett (1974). "Mirning (WA)". Aboriginal Tribes of Australia: Their Terrain, Environmental Controls, Distribution, Limits, and Proper Names. Australian National University Press. ISBN 978-0-708-10741-6.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Williams, W. (1886). "Eucla: Yircla Meening Tribe" (PDF). In Curr, Edward Micklethwaite (ed.). The Australian race: its origin, languages, customs, place of landing in Australia and the routes by which it spread itself over the continent. Volume 1. Melbourne: J. Ferres. pp. 400–407.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Wright, Tony (15 October 2015). "The whale song man, the oil giant and the Great Australian Bight". The Sydney Morning Herald.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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