Barngarla place names and regions in South Australia

Abstract

ABSTRACT Barngarla is a Thura-Yura Pama-Nyungan language originally spoken on the Eyre Peninsula, South Australia and adjacent northern hinterlands. This paper proposes various etymologies and supports the Barngarla language reclamation. Reflecting Barngarla epistemology and traditional ecological knowledge, toponyms are intimately connected to place name reclamation and language reclamation. Delineating hunting, foraging and fishing places, geographical features, and sites embedded in oral history, toponyms also provide windows into broader diachronic processes within grammar and phonology. Oral history recorded by the German missionary Clamor Wilhelm Schürmann indicates naming practices dating back to the late-Pleistocene showing some similarities to other, non-Barngarla groups. Several named band areas seem focused on floristic regions. Barngarla toponyms exhibit signs of diachronic processes both regarding phonology and grammar. We explore the extent to which post-invasion Barngarla names are identifiable, propose evidence for Thura-Yura lenition of an original gabi ‘water’ form, and discuss a locative form -la unrecorded by Schürmann.