Barada people

The Barada were an Indigenous Australian people of Central Queensland.

Country

Barada lands, according to Norman Tindale's estimation, stretched over some 2,500 square miles (6,500 km2). They inhabited the area of the Connors River from Killarney north to Nebo. Their westward extension stopped around Bombandy.[1] They were wedged between the coastal Koinjmal and the Barna to their west. Their northern borders met with those of the Wiri.[2]

Social organization

The Barada, like the other Mackay area tribes, are said to have had two main social divisions, or phratries[3] namely the Yungaroo and Wootaroo.[4] These classificatory terms are applied not only to the constituent groups, but to all natural phenomena, which are ascribed to either one or the other of the two basic classes.[lower-alpha 1]

  • Yungaroo are subdivided further into Gurgela and Gurgelan (male and female) and Bunbai and Bunnbaian.
  • The Wootaroo are subdivided into Koobaroo and Koobarooan, masculine and feminine, and Woongo and Woongoan.[7]

At least two distinct sub-branches or bands are known to have formed part of the Barada.

  • Thararburra, centered around Cardowan.
  • Toolginburra, (the horde name is related to their word for "hill", namely tulkun.)[1]

History of contact

The area around Mackay began to be colonized in 1860, and, according to George Bridgeman,

During the eight or ten years which followed, about one-half of the aboriginal population was either shot down by the Native Mounted Police and their officers, or perished from introduced loathsome diseases before unknown.'[8]

Bridgeman named the Barada (Toolginburra) as one of the 4 Mackay tribes that suffered from this decimation.[8] Though the "dispersal" shootings are thought to have accounted for the majority of deaths, a measles epidemic struck the survivors in 1876, drastically reducing their numbers, and, according to one estimating, the remnants of the original tribe in 1880 amounted to no more than a hundred people, 80 evenly divided between men and women, and the remainder their children.[7]

Alternative names
  • Thar-ar-ra-burra/Tha-ra-ra-burra. (horde at Cardowan)
  • Toolginburra[1]

Notes
  1. "When an Australian of the Port Mackay tribe says that the sun, snakes, etc., are of the Yungaroo phratry, he does not mean merely to apply a common, but none the less a purely conventional, nomenclature to these different things; the word has an objective signification for him. He believes that alligators really are Yungaroo and that kangaroos are Wootaroo. The sun is Yungaroo, the moon Wootaroo, and so on for the constellations, trees, plants, etc."[5][6]

Citations
  1. Tindale 1974, p. 165.
  2. QGAG, p. iv.
  3. Durkheim 2012, p. 142.
  4. Bridgeman 1887, pp. 45–46.
  5. Durkheim 2012, pp. 148–149.
  6. Smyth 1878, p. 91.
  7. Bridgeman 1887, p. 45.
  8. Bridgeman 1887, p. 44.

Sources
  • Bridgeman, George F. (1887). "Port Mackay and its Neighbourhood" (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 3. Melbourne: J. Ferres. pp. 44–51.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Durkheim, Émile (2012) [First published 1915]. The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life. Translated by Swain, Joseph Ward. Dover Publications. ISBN 978-0-486-45456-6.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Fox, M (1974a). "Legend of the Tha-ra-ra-burra tribe as to how the Sea was Made". Science of Man. 3 (4): 64.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Fox, M (1974b). "Legend of the Tha-ra-ra-burra tribe as to how the Sea was Made". Science of Man. 3 (8): 136.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Robertson, William (1928). Basedow, Herbert (ed.). Coo-ee talks: a collection of lecturettes upon early experiences among the Aborigines of Australia delivered from a wireless broadcasting station. Sydney: Angus & Robertson.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Smyth, Robert Brough (1878). The Aborigines of Victoria: with notes relating to the habits of the natives of other parts of Australia and Tasmania (PDF). Volume 1. Melbourne: J. Ferres, gov't printer.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Tindale, Norman Barnett (1974). "Barada (QLD)". Aboriginal Tribes of Australia: Their Terrain, Environmental Controls, Distribution, Limits, and Proper Names. Australian National University. ISBN 978-0-708-10741-6.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • "Working Together on Country" (PDF). Queensland Government, Australian Government. Retrieved 26 January 2016.
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