Djargurd Wurrung
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| Djargurd Wurrung, English | |
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Gulidjan, Girai wurrung, Djab wurrung and Wada wurrung see List of Indigenous Australian group names |
The Djargurd wurrung are Indigenous Australian people who traditionally occupied the territory between Mount Emu Creek and Lake Corangamite, extending to Mount Emu and Cressy in the North, and to Cobden and Swan Marsh in the South in central Victoria and are still represented in the region. The town of Camperdown is in the middle of their territory. The territory was bordered by the Wada wurrung in the north, the Girai wurrung in the west and south west, the Gadubanud in the south, and the Gulidjan in the east.
The Djargurd wurrung people had 12 clans under a matrilineal system with a descent system based on the Gabadj (black cockatoo) and Grugidj (white cockatoo) moieties. The clans intermarried with Gulidjan, Girai wurring, Djab wurrung and Wada wurrung peoples.
The Western District Lakes, now a Ramsar site, have been a focus for the Djargurd Wurrung and Gulidjan Aboriginal people for thousands of years. There are many archaeological sites registered that include fish traps, surface scatters, middens and burial sites.
At the time of European settlement in the 1830s and 1840s the Djargurd suffered from massacres from European settlers, and also from attacks by the neighbouring Wada wurrung tribe. Dispossession from their land led to starvation and their theft of sheep resulted in murderous reprisals. In 1839 one clan, the Tarnbeere gundidj, was massacred by Frederick Taylor and others in a site that came to be known as Murdering Gully.
When Framlingham Aboriginal Station was established in 1865 near Warnambool many of the surviving members of the Djargurd wurrung were forcibly relocated, however a number of elders refused to abandon their traditional country and stayed eking out a meagre living on the edge of towns like Camperdown. They were assisted by people like James Dawson, a Scotsman, who acted as guardian and supported them with his own money.
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Wikipedia