The Wakabunga 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 state of
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
, established_ ...
.
Language
Norman Tindale
Norman Barnett Tindale AO (12 October 1900 – 19 November 1993) was an Australian anthropologist, archaeologist, entomologist and ethnologist.
Life
Tindale was born in Perth, Western Australia in 1900. His family moved to Tokyo and lived ther ...
referred to material by two early correspondents, Urquhart and O'Reilley, in a publication by
E. M. Curr for details about the Wakabunga and
their language, but the word-list is not considered to contain elements of this tongue, about which the general belief is that no information survives regarding it. It has been suggested by
Barry Blake
Barry Blake, born 1937, is an Australian linguist, specializing in the description of Australian Aboriginal languages. He is a professor emeritus at La Trobe University Melbourne.
Career
Blake was born in the northern Melbourne suburb of Ascot V ...
however, that a word-list compiled in the Wakabunga domain by Curr's brother Montagu Curr, belong to a Mayi dialect. From this it has been inferred that Wakabunga may have belonged to the
Mayi language family.
Country
The Wakabunga traditional lands covered an estimated in the area of the
Upper Leichhardt River and
Gunpowder Creek.
People
According to Norman Tindale they were related to the
Kalkatungu
The Kalkadoon (properly Kalkatungu) are descendants of an Indigenous Australian tribe living in the Mount Isa region of Queensland. Their forefather tribe has been called "the elite of the Aboriginal warriors of Queensland". In 1884 they were ma ...
. They were crocodile hunters, stalking with spears
the Australian freshwater crocodile on the upper Leichhardt.
Alternative names
* ''Workabunga,''
* ''Workoboongo,''
* ''Wakobungo, Waukaboonia.''
* ''Waggabundi.''
* ''Waggaboonyah.''
* ''Kabikabi.''
Notes
Citations
Sources
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Aboriginal peoples of Queensland