Dhudhuroa people

The Dhudhuroa people (or Duduroa) are an Indigenous Australian people of North-eastern Victoria, in the state of Victoria, Australia. About 2,000 descendants exist in Australia in the early 21st century.

Name

The endonym Dhudhuroa has been analysed as being composed of the initial syllable dhu- of their word for "no" (dhubalga) and a form of the word for "mouth" (wurru).[1][2]

Language
Main article: Dhudhuroa language

Dhudhuroa has been classified as belonging to the Gippsland branch of the Pama-Nyungan language family.[3] Robert M. W. Dixon classifies it, with Pallanganmiddang, as one of the 2 languages comprising an Upper Murray Group.[4] Lexicostatistical analysis however shows that it something of a language isolate within neighbouring languages, with which it shares no more than 11-16% of common vocabulary.[3] It has various dialects, one being Ba Barwidgee.[2]

The language is currently undergoing a revival, and is being taught at Bright Secondary College and Wooragee Primary School.[5]

Country

The Dhudhuroa language was a language of north-eastern Victoria, before European settlement.[6] According to Norman Tindale, the people inhabited a stretch of territory that encompasses around 1,800 square miles (4,700 km2), embracing the areas defined by the Mitta Mitta and Kiewa rivers. It included Tallangatta and the Murray River Valley land from Jingellic and Tintaldra to Albury.[7] Tindale's reconstruction of the scanty source evidence to arrive at this conclusion has been judged "poor" due to its over-reliance on a single source, that of A. W. Howitt, by R.M. Dixon.[8]

As of 2015 it is estimated that there are about 2000 descendants of Dhudhuroa, and there is a Dhudhuroa Native Title Group.[5]

Social organization

The early Australian ethnographer Alfred Howitt categorized the Dhudhuroa as a horde of the Jaitmathang,[7] an opinion shared by Aldo Massola in 1962.[9] Linguistically however the vocabulary they used differed from that noted down from tribal informants of various hordes of the Jaitmattang.[10]

Alternative names

Tindale
  • Tharamirttong, Tharamittong
  • Tharomattay
  • Jeenong-metong (strong-footed ones)
  • Dyinning-middhang
  • Ginning-matong
  • Dhooroomba.( ?)
  • Theddora mittung. (hordal term)[11]

AIATSIS
  • Djiningmiddang tribe
  • Yaithmathang
  • Jaitmatang
  • Duduroa
  • Djilamatang
  • Kandangora
  • Omeo tribe
  • Theddora
  • Yaitmathang
  • Dhudhruwa
  • Dhuduroa
  • Do
  • dor
  • dee
  • Dodora
  • Dodoro
  • Toutourrite
  • Theddora mittung
  • Duduruwa
  • Tharamirttong
  • Tharamittong
  • Tharo mattay
  • Jeenong metong
  • Dyinning middhang
  • Ginning matong[12]

Some words
  • ngiyambanba (fire)
  • geberri (bad)
  • gundja (good)
  • yambo (fish)
  • bandjina (child)
  • mema (father)
  • baba (mother)
  • wingga (dog)
  • dalga (mountain)
  • gumbarro (gum tree)[10]

Notes

    Citations
    1. Blake & Reid 2002, p. 179.
    2. Clark 2009, p. 201.
    3. Blake & Reid 1999, p. 23.
    4. Dixon 2002, p. xxxv.
    5. Revival 2015.
    6. Blake & Reid 2002, pp. 177–210.
    7. Tindale 1974, p. 204.
    8. Clark 2009, p. 213.
    9. Massola 1962, pp. 319–325.
    10. Clark 2009, pp. 208–209.
    11. Tindale 1974.
    12. Austlang.

    Sources
    • "Austlang: S44: Dhudhuroa". Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies. Retrieved 18 March 2019.
    • Blake, Barry; Reid, Julie (2002). "The Dhudhuroa language of northeastern Victoria: a description based on historical sources" (PDF). Aboriginal History. 26 (Annual 2002): 177–210.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
    • Blake, Barry J.; Reid, Julie (1999). "Pallanganmiddang: a language of the Upper Murray". Aboriginal History. 23: 15–31. JSTOR 24046758.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
    • Clark, Ian D. (2009). "Dhudhuroa and Yaithmathang languages and social groups in north-east Victoria – a reconstruction". Aboriginal History. 33: 201–229. JSTOR 24046829.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
    • Dixon, R. M. W. (2002). Australian Languages: Their Nature and Development. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-47378-1.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
    • Howitt, Alfred William (1904). The native tribes of south-east Australia (PDF). Macmillan.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
    • Jacks, Timna (10 October 2015). "VCE Indigenous language students awaken 'sleeping' Dhudhuroa tongue". The Age. Retrieved 21 June 2019.
    • Massola, Aldo (1962). "Aborigines of the Victorian high plains". Proceedings of the Royal Society of Victoria. 75 (2): 319–325.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
    • Tindale, Norman Barnett (1974). "Duduroa (VIC)". 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)
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