The Ngajanji, also written ''Ngadyan,'' and Ngadjon-Jii
are an
Indigenous Australian
Indigenous Australians or Australian First Nations are people with familial heritage from, and membership in, the ethnic groups that lived in Australia before British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups: the Aboriginal peoples ...
people of the rainforest region south of
Cairns, in northern
Queensland
)
, nickname = Sunshine State
, image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = Australia
, established_title = Before federation
, establishe ...
. They form one of 8 groups, the others being
Yidin,
Mamu,
Dyirbal,
Girramay
The Girramay are an Australian Aboriginal tribe of northern Queensland.
Name
The Girramay ethnonym is formed from ''jir:a'', meaning "man".
Language
The Girramay spoke the most southerly dialect of Dyirbal.
Country
The Girramay people's trad ...
,
Warrgamay
The Warrgamay people, also spelt Warakamai, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the state of Queensland.
Language
Their language, Warrgamay, is now extinct. It was a variety of Dyirbalic, and appears to be composed of three distinct dialec ...
,
Waruŋu and
Mbabaram, of the Dyirbal tribes.
Ethnonym
Ngajanji/Ngadyan was according to
Robert M. W. Dixon, the name for the language spoken by a people whose proper tribal name was Ngadyandyi.
Language
The Ngajanji spoke ''Ngadyan'', a dialect of
Dyirbal, and one showing the greatest differences with the others, particularly in phonology, where it displays vowel lengthening. A vowel followed by ''l'', ''r'' or ''y'' and a successive consonant would result in the lengthening of the vowel in question: thus ''gibar'' (large fig tree) in the other dialects became , and (meat) became . It also had a
mother-in-law
A parent-in-law is a person who has a legal affinity with another by being the parent of the other's spouse. Many cultures and legal systems impose duties and responsibilities on persons connected by this relationship. A person is a child-in-la ...
language (''Jalnay'') in which, when one's mother-in-law or her kin were around, one substituted standard words with a special lexicon. Thus ''guda'' (dog) would be replaced by ''nyimbaa'', having the same meaning.
By the time Robert Dixon started studying the language in the mid 1960s, the number of speakers was down to 6. The last informants concerning Ngajan lived in
Malanda.
Country
The traditional lands of the Ngajan, covering , lay north and west of
Innisfail, and extended from the
Atherton Tableland plateau rainforest east to the upper
Russell River, encompassing
Yungaburra
Yungaburra is a rural town and locality in the Tablelands Region, Queensland, Australia. In the , the locality of Yungaburra had a population of 1,239 people.
Geography
Yungaburra is on the Atherton Tableland in Far North Queensland.
The lan ...
,
Malanda, and the mountain range north of
Millaa Millaa. They were bounded on the northern side by the
Yidinji and, to the east, between them and the coast were the
Yidinji-Wanyurr. The
Waribarra Mamu lay to their south.
Hypothesis about the people
Joseph Birdsell and Norman Tindale once argued that the Ngatjan were one of the tribes demonstrating their
Barrinean hypothesis, according to which the Ngatjan, together with 11 other tribes of this area, -
Mamu,
Wanjiru,
Tjapukai,
Mbabaram,
Yidinji,
Gungganyji
The Guŋgañji, also transcribed Gungganyji, Gunggandji, Kongkandji, and other variations, are an Aboriginal Australian
Aboriginal Australians are the various Indigenous peoples of the Australian mainland and many of its islands, such as ...
,
Buluwai,
Djiru,
Dyirbal,
Gulngai and
Girramay
The Girramay are an Australian Aboriginal tribe of northern Queensland.
Name
The Girramay ethnonym is formed from ''jir:a'', meaning "man".
Language
The Girramay spoke the most southerly dialect of Dyirbal.
Country
The Girramay people's trad ...
, - were remnants of a
Tasmanoid type retaining the small
negrito
The term Negrito () refers to several diverse ethnic groups who inhabit isolated parts of Southeast Asia and the Andaman Islands. Populations often described as Negrito include: the Andamanese peoples (including the Great Andamanese, the O ...
stature attributed to the original first wave of Aboriginal peoples in Australia. One late informant appears to have believed that the Ngatjan were closely related to the
Madjandji.
Mythology
The origin of the 3 volcanic lakes in the area, ''Yidyam'' (
Lake Eacham), ''Barany'' (
Lake Barrine
Lake Barrine is a freshwater lake on the eastern parts of Atherton Tableland in the locality of Lake Barrine, in the Tablelands Region of Far North Queensland, Australia, close to Lake Eacham. The lake and surrounds are protected within th ...
) and ''Ngimun'' (
Lake Euramoo) is related in Ngajanji myth as the result of the infraction of a taboo by 2 men who had just being initiated into the tribe. At the time of the event, the terrain of the Ngajanji was open scrubland. Their transgression roused the ire of the
Rainbow serpent
The Rainbow Serpent or Rainbow Snake is a common deity often seen as the creator God, known by numerous names in different Australian Aboriginal languages by the many different Aboriginal peoples. It is a common motif in the art and religion ...
, who set the land under their camping site trembling, as cyclonic winds also blew in, and a strange red hue coloured the sky. As a result of the fissures in the earth, the panicking people were swallowed up and disappeared into the bowels of the earth. Dixon considers this legend, which he recorded in 1964, to accurately reflect the historic formation of the volcanic lakes some 10,000 years ago, an event retained by virtue of the tenacious transmission of memories of the eruption among this people and another Dyirbal tribe, the
Mamu.
History
The Ngajanji around Yungaburra and
Lake Eacham were affected by the rush of settlement that followed
John Atherton
John Atherton (1598 – 5 December 1640) was the Anglican Bishop of Waterford and Lismore in the Church of Ireland. He and John Childe (his steward and tithe proctor) were both tried and executed for buggery in 1640.
Life and death
Early l ...
's discovery of tin in 1878 at
Tinaroo, and development of Robson's track linking the district to the coast.
Descendants
A Russian adventurer Leandro Ilin (1882–1946) settled in the area in 1910, together with several other Russian émigrés, to establish a settlement they called 'Little Siberia'. A widowed Ngajanji woman, Kittie Clarke, was befriended by him, and after she fell pregnant with his child, he proposed marriage. He failed to obtain permission from the ''soi-disant''
Protector of Aborigines
The role of Protector of Aborigines was first established in South Australia in 1836.
The role became established in other parts of Australia pursuant to a recommendation contained in the ''Report of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Abori ...
at
Atherton, and had to struggle to legalize their relationship. They had five children. A documentary film of the story was produced in 2005 by Julie Nimmo.
Last speakers
The last speakers of the dialect were Tommy Land, Jimmy Brown, Mollie Raymond and Ginnie Daniels.
Alternative names
* ''Eacham''
* ''Eashim''
* ''Eaton''
* ''Hucheon''
* ''Jitjam.'' (lacustrine
toponym
Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of '' toponyms'' (proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage and types. Toponym is the general term for a proper name of ...
)
* ''Narcha''
* ''Natchin''
* ''Nga:tja.'' (name of distinguished tribal elder who died in 1904)
* ''Ngachanji''
* ''Ngadjen''
* ''Ngadyan''
* ''Ngadyan''
* ''Ngadyandyi''
* ''Ngaitjandji''
* ''Ngatjai''
Source:
Some words
* ''yibi'' (woman). In
Dyirbal this was , and in Girramay.
Notes
Citations
Sources
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
{{authority control
Aboriginal peoples of Queensland
Far North Queensland