Gringai otherwise known as ''Guringay'', is the name for one of the
Australian Aboriginal people
Aboriginal Australians are the various Indigenous peoples of the Australian mainland and many of its islands, such as Tasmania, Fraser Island, Hinchinbrook Island, the Tiwi Islands, and Groote Eylandt, but excluding the Torres Strait Islands ...
who were recorded as inhabiting an area of the
Hunter Valley
The Hunter Region, also commonly known as the Hunter Valley, is a region of New South Wales, Australia, extending from approximately to north of Sydney. It contains the Hunter River and its tributaries with highland areas to the north and ...
in eastern
New South Wales
)
, nickname =
, image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates:
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = Australia
, established_title = Before federation
, es ...
, north of Sydney. They were united by a common language, strong ties of kinship and survived as skilled hunter–fisher–gatherers in family groups as a clan of the
Worimi
The Worimi (also spelt Warrimay) people are Aboriginal Australians from the eastern Port Stephens and Great Lakes regions of coastal New South Wales, Australia. Before contact with settlers, their people extended from Port Stephens in the sout ...
people.
Country
The Gringai lived round the
Williams River, Barrington tops,
Dungog
Dungog is a country town on the Williams River in the Hunter Region of New South Wales, Australia. Located in the middle of dairy and timber country, it is the centre of the Dungog Shire local government area and at the 2016 census it had a ...
, Barrington and
Gloucester
Gloucester ( ) is a cathedral city and the county town of Gloucestershire in the South West of England. Gloucester lies on the River Severn, between the Cotswolds to the east and the Forest of Dean to the west, east of Monmouth and east o ...
area and traded with the
Paterson River
Paterson River, a perennial river that is part of the Hunter River catchment, is located in the Hunter and Mid North Coast regions of New South Wales, Australia.
Course and features
Paterson River rises in the Barrington Tops National Park, w ...
Aboriginals The centre of their territory is on the land where the modern town of
Dungog
Dungog is a country town on the Williams River in the Hunter Region of New South Wales, Australia. Located in the middle of dairy and timber country, it is the centre of the Dungog Shire local government area and at the 2016 census it had a ...
(perhaps "clear hills" in the Gringai dialect) lies.
History
Two people of the Gringai are known by that name as a result of their arrest and subsequent trials. ''Wong-ko-bi-kan'' (Jackey) and Charley were both arrested within a year or so of each other in the 1830s. He was judged guilty and sentenced to be transported to
Tasmania
)
, nickname =
, image_map = Tasmania in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of Tasmania in AustraliaCoordinates:
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdi ...
for manslaughter after spearing John Flynn on 3 April 1834. Flynn died soon after. Flynn had been a member of an armed troop of nine settlers who went to the aborigines' camp at the Williams River at dawn to arrest some of them for culling sheep on their land. From another perspective, Wong-ko-bi-kan could be said to have been defending the native camp from armed intruders. Wong-ko-bi-kan's case elicited some sympathy from the presiding judge and several observers, because of the way the settlers had provocatively approached the native camp. Wong-ko-bi-kan died in his Tasmanian prison soon after, in October of that year.
Another Gringai, known only as Charley, was arrested in May 1835, soon after the incident with Wong-ko-bi-kan. In August of that year, he was deemed responsible for the death of five convict shepherds working for
Robert Mackenzie, later premier of Queensland, at Rawden Vale, 26 miles west of Gloucester. Though generally understood by Europeans as an act of warfare, the trial interpreter,
Lancelot Threlkeld
Lancelot Edward Threlkeld (20 October 1788 – 10 October 1859) was an English missionary, primarily based in Australia. He was married twice and survived by sons and daughters from both marriages. Thelkeld is known for his work with Biraban i ...
, stated that Charley had acted after an Englishman had stolen a tribal talisman, called a ''muramai'', and that the victims cohabited with a native woman, to whom the sacred object was shown. For this reason he implemented
tribal law after a decision had been taken to that end by the elders. After his sentence he was brought back to Dungog and hung publicly as a warning to other Gringai. Local historian Michael Williams comments that, "Charley, ... was both an enforcer of one law and the victim of the enforcement of another set of laws." One later story, recounted in 1922 in the
Wingham Chronicle, suggests that a raiding party set out to enforce the verdict by hunting other Gringai, managing to round some up and push them all over a cliff at
Barrington.
Syphilis contracted from convicts, and other introduced diseases, took their toll. In 1847 alone, 30 Gringai children died of measles.
Ceremonial life
Key rites in the ceremonial life of the Gringai and related tribes, such as the ''keeparra'', were described by Walter John Enright and R.H. Mathews in the late 19th century who managed to obtain permission to view and record them from the last remnants of the tribe.
One of the Gringai
Bora rings used in the initiation is reported to have been at
Gresford
Gresford (; cy, Gresffordd ) is a village and community in Wrexham County Borough, Wales.
According to the 2001 Census, the population of the community, which also includes the village of Marford, was 5,334, reducing to 5,010 at the 2011 cens ...
A ''karabari'' was reported as having been performed on the occasion of the
appearance of a comet in the sky in
1845/1846.
Some words
* ''wilhurgulla'' (place of little sticks)
* ''erringi'' ( black duck)
* ''monduk'' (fertility)
Alternative names
* ''Goreenggai''
Notable people
*
Arabanoo
Arabanoo (b.circa 1758 – d.1789) was an Indigenous Australian man of the Eora forcibly abducted by the European settlers of the First Fleet at Port Jackson on New Year's Eve, 1788, in order to facilitate communication and relations between the A ...
.
Notes
Citations
Sources
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
Further reading
*
{{authority control
Aboriginal peoples of New South Wales
Hunter Region