The townsite of Wonnerup is located south of

Perth Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth is ...

and east of

Busselton Busselton is a city in the South West region of the state of Western Australia approximately south-west of Perth. Busselton has a long history as a popular holiday destination for Western Australians; however, the closure of the Busselton ...

. It was gazetted a townsite in 1856, deriving its name from the nearby

Wonnerup Inlet The Vasse-Wonnerup Estuary is an estuary in the South West region of Western Australia close to the town of Busselton. The estuary is listed with DIWA. It was also recognised as a wetland of international importance under the Ramsar Conventi ...

. The name is Aboriginal, and has been shown on maps of the region since 1839. The meaning of the name is "place of the woman's digging or fighting stick"; the

Noongar The Noongar (, also spelt Noongah, Nyungar , Nyoongar, Nyoongah, Nyungah, Nyugah, and Yunga ) are Aboriginal Australian peoples who live in the south-west corner of Western Australia, from Geraldton on the west coast to Esperance on the so ...

word for fighting stick is ''wonna'', while the suffix ''

-up -up is a suffix commonly found in place names in south western Western Australia. The suffix originated in a dialect of Noongar, an Australian Aboriginal language, in which "-up" means "place of". The suffix "-in" or "-ing" has a simila ...

'' denotes ''place of''. The wonna was made from the peppermint tree, ''

Agonis flexuosa ''Agonis flexuosa'' is a species of tree that grows in the south west of Western Australia. It is easily the most common of the ''Agonis'' species, and is one of the most recognisable trees of Western Australia, being commonly grown in parks an ...

'', a coastal native found only in the south-west, and was a common trade item of the Noongar people. The

Wonnerup massacre The Wonnerup massacre, also known as the Wonnerup "Minninup" massacre , was the killing of dozens of Waadandi Noongar people by European settlers in the vicinity of Wonnerup, Western Australia in February 1841. The massacre on Waadandi-Doonan lan ...

of Wardandi Noongar people by European settlers occurred in the vicinity of the area in 1841. The

Ballaarat Tramline The Ballaarat Tramline, also known as the Lockville - Yoganup Railway, was the first railway in Western Australia, constructed in 1871 by the Western Australian Timber Company. The railway was used to transport timber from forests in the South ...

, Western Australia's first railway and railway bridge, was constructed in 1871 in the locality of Lockville, within Wonnerup. Wonnerup was later the junction of the Bunbury to

railway line and the

Nannup Branch Railway The Nannup Branch Railway, also known as the Wonnerup to Nannup Railway, was a branch line of the Western Australian Government Railways (WAGR) between Wonnerup and Nannup. History In 1897 the Jarrah Wood and Saw Mills Company leased the ...

. In 1998, part of Wonnerup was subsumed into the Busselton suburb of

Geographe Geographe is a suburb of the Western Australian city of Busselton. At the 2021 Australian census, 2021 census, it had a population of 3,622. ''Sandylands'', one of the first houses built in Busselton, was constructed in the area beginning in ...

Landgate The Western Australian Land Information Authority operates under the business name of Landgate. Formerly known as the Department of Land Information (DLI), the Department of Land Administration (DOLA) and the Department of Lands and Surveys ( ...

Geonoma database, entry for Geographe BallaratLocomotive WEFretwellCollection

Bridge at Wonnerup, Western Australia,1921

References

External links

Towns in Western Australia South West (Western Australia) {{WesternAustralia-geo-stub

See also

References

External links