Irukandji people
| Yirrganydji people | |
|---|---|
| Aka: Irukandji | |
Wet Tropics BioRegion
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| Language | |
| Language Family: | Pama–Nyungan |
| Language Branch: | Yidinic |
| Language Group: | Djabugay |
| Group Dialect: | Yirrgay |
| Area (approx. 500 km²) | |
| BioRegion: | Wet Tropics |
| Location: | Far North Queensland |
| Coordinates: | 16°45′S 145°40′E / 16.750°S 145.667°ECoordinates: 16°45′S 145°40′E / 16.750°S 145.667°E |
| Rivers | |
| Other Geological: |
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The Yirrganydji people, are an indigenous Australian people of Queensland, who trace their descent from the Irukandji, and, as such, are the original custodians of a narrow coastal strip within Djabugay country that runs northwards from Cairns, Queensland to Port Douglas. Their traditional lifestyle was that of fishers along this coastal strip and around the river mouths, islands, and seas between the Cairns Trinity Inlet and Port Douglas
The Irukandji spoke Yirrgay, one of the five dialects of the language group generally known as Djabugay. These dialects indicate that Djabugay was genetically related to Yidiny, with a lexical overlap of 53%.
Irukandji country, according to Norman Tindale, extended over some 200 square miles (520 km2), running along the narrow coastal strip from Cairns to the Mowbray River at Port Douglas. Their inland extension went some 7 miles northwest of Cairns, around the tidal waters of the Barron River around Redlynch. Dialects defined tribal distinctions, and the Irukandji dialect Yirrgay, was the southernmost of the group, with the Yidinji people to their immediate south, while, northwards, one encountered, in geographic order, Guluy, Ngakali and finally Djabugay. The Bulway-speakers lay to their west, from Woree to Mareeba.
The Irukandji as a distinct tribal identity were close to extinction by the end of the 19th-century. William Parry-Okeden, in a short report on Queensland aborigines written in his capacity as Police Commissioner, wrote in 1897 that he counted 6 Yettkie, a name now thought to refer to a remnant of the Irukandji. The following year Billy Jagar, leader of the Irukandji, received a King plate, designating him as 'King of Barron', a gesture repeated in 1906 with a second plate bearing the same inscription. Jagar died at the age of 60 in 1930 in his traditional payu hut at the northern end of the Cairns Esplanade.
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Wikipedia