Kalkadoon people
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| several hundred (less than 1% of the Australian population, about 1% of the Aboriginal population) |
|
| Regions with significant populations | |
 Australia(Queensland) |
|
| Languages | |
| English, formerly Kalkatungu language | |
| Religion | |
| Aboriginal mythology |
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 massacred at "Battle Mountain" by settlers and police.
Kalkatung belonged to the Kalkatungic branch of the Pama-Nyungan language family, the other being Yalarnnga which was spoken to its south in the area of Djarra, in Queensland. Kalkatungu was spoken around Mount Isa, Queensland. Nothing is known of a third language Wakabunga sometimes thought to have had a genetic relation to the other two.
Remnants of the language collected from the last native speakers by Barry Blake allowed the rudiments of the grammar and the language to be reconstructed. According to Robert M. W. Dixon there is a 43% overlap in vocabulary existed with Yalarnnga but with a different grammar and only 10% percent of verbs cognate. Both have bounded pronouns or traces of them unlike all other languages in the surrounding areas suggesting they represented, until their extinction, a larger block of distinctive languages.
Like many other Aboriginal societies, the Kalkatungu had a sign language. The idea of a large kangaroo, for example, was indicated by joining the tip of the forefinger to the thumb, with all other fingers remaining extended, while flicking the wrist forward (suggestive of the hopping motion). A land snake was indicated by pointing the forefinger, while rotating the wrist and extending one's arm outwards.
The Kalkatungu's traditional lands began at the heads of the Cloncurry river across the heads of the Leichhardt and Gregory Rivers, including the Barkly Tableland, the Selwyn ranges and extending south to the boundaries around Chatsworth, Mount Merlin and Buckingham Downs. To their east and north, were the Mayi-Thakurti (Mitakoodi) of the Cloncurry district, and next to the Maigudung tribe, according to Palmer.
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