Very little in Darnum search

by John Wells
This column has had some odd stories lately so I decided to do a 'straight history' column on Darnum. I know very little about that little town, so I went to the web, www, Wikipedia and so forth. That search has so far yielded very little.
What I did find was the whole of Daniel Bunce's 1851 book on Aboriginal languages. It was in the library of Columbia University in New York, of all places.
I'll be back to Bunce one day soon. There is more to his Australian story than I thought.
Right now, though, I am looking at a list of words that might be Gippsland place names and might not. The book has a rather long title, but at least I now have the whole book..
"Language of the Aborigines of the Colony of Victoria and other Australian Districts with parallel translations and familiar specimens in dialogue as a guide to Aboriginal protectors and others engaged in ameliorating their condition."
He wrote in the preface "It is trusted that the work in its present form will answer the end for which it was intended, namely – as an assistant to parties involved in civilising, Christianising, and otherwise ameliorating the condition of this most unfortunate race of human beings."
There were many things that were not understood about the Aborigines, including their languages. There was an assumption that there was one aboriginal nations, but there were hundreds, and while some words were widely used, others were not.
He is also using English spellings to list words that had never been written, and this would lead to many inaccuracies. ""The Melbourne, called the Doutta Galla, or, more properly speaking the N-Uther Galla tribe, worship the Pleiades, which they call Moonmoondick, a word that also means youth, past childhood." It is not hard to see how one person would hear and record N-uther Galla and someone else would gear Doutta Galla.
Anyway, here are the words in his vocabulary that might have relevance to Gippsland's place names (or might not).
Allambee recline, seated, sitting
Allambee blown by wind
Allambie weenth set ablaze
Bullarto, or Ballarto, is given dozens of meanings when various other words were attached. We have Ballarto and Ballarto Rd, and Ballarto is a name given to the native cherry in West Gippsland.
The main sense of the word appears to be 'abundance' but Bullarto jumbuck is said to mean brawling, Bullarto porkwadding means crabby or peevish and Bullarto jumbunna means to chat, talk noisily, talk fast, clamorous or noisy, meanings which are not so far apart.
Bullarto wonthaggi means to gather, to collect, get, bring, not so far from the meaning given for Wonthaggi, "borne. Bring, drag along, procure, fetch and obtain".
Burra burra means abrupt also bestir, busy, but burra as a suffix means something different. Currumburra refers to a fleshfly or blowfly, and Korumburra means maggot. To English ears there is no difference between the two words, so how did the white men arrive at two different spellings for the same sound?
Darnum was the name that got me into this and the meaning is simply parrot. Doomburrim means lizard and Nayook means cockatoo – but are these names from Gippsland tribes or somewhere else? We accept that Buln Buln was named for the lyrebird, but these are about the only Aboriginal names in Gippsland that refer to native fauna, which I find surprising.
Dumbalk labours under a name which means bleak, chilly, frosty, ice, freeze, frost or hail.
Ellinging, an East Gippsland and parish name is given as brow or forehead
Jeetho, like Bullarto, has its own meaning (detach, send away, exit, go, walk off, go forward, onward, withdraw) but Jeetho mornmoot means blow, or driven by the wind. There are several examples of words being added to Jeetho to give different meanings and there is another word given as Jeed'tho which has similar meanings and the different spelling is probably a matter of Aboriginal mouths talking to English ears.
Jeetho also means fly, go away, repulse, drive away, retire, send, to despatch. The general gist of the word stays the same but the subtle differences might well mean different sources in various languages.
Jindivick seems to mean burst, asunder, consume, destroy, devoid, empty, disappear, vanish, eaten, all gone, emptiness, escaped, exhaust, extinct, wither, lose, suffer, lose, none, all gone, out, not here, past, rid, clear away, to vanish, to disappear, fade away. That is a great many meanings for one word, so it again seems possible that Bunce's meanings are drawn from different aboriginal 'nations'. It could also mean that those languages relied on general meanings, meanings that were much the same over great distances., with local context giving them clarity. We just do not know.
Jumbuck's meanings are given as confer, declaim, harangue, oration, speech, speak, divulge, reveal, impart, communicate. Inquire, ask, interpret, explain. There is a clear connection between meanings that are apparently from various areas. Jumbunna has very similar meanings - colloquy, conference, discourse, language, mention, repeat, reply, say, to speak, speech and utter,
If these word s really are the source of the names of those two spots then they labour under a huge load, for two such tiny places.
Kongwak means catch, to stop, and Leongatha can mean cheek, tooth, dental or relating ton teeth. There is a native word 'monomeeth' (agree, perfect) but is seem clear that our Monomeath is a name from Ireland.
Mardan, too, has many meanings, and they are not very pleasing. Consider these - bewail, cry, weep, grief, groan, miserable, unhappy, regret, calamity, doleful, dolour, pain, lament, dejected, mourn, grieve, cry, sob, wail, lament, yet little Mardan seems to be a happy place.
Meeniyan somehow relates to the moon and the story about Minnie Anne is clearly apocryphal – an English word that also means things like untrue and nonsense. Our own tongue has many examples of there being many meanings for one word, often separated by very small differences.
Mirboo seems to mean kidneys but it is hard to see why unless some settler applied the word without really knowing what it meant.
Neerim means high, elevated or long, the leading to the other meanings - spear, long pointed weapon. Nerrena is given one meaning, 'name'.
Noojee has two spellings and two sets of meanings. Noojee with a J means complete, content, correct, done, enough, exactly, full, satisfied, complete, manifest, or clear, while Noogee, spelt with a G, means desist, leave off, mature, perfect, needless, that will do, quash, quell, crush, settled, confirmed, unnecessary, needless, valid, satisfactory
There being these two spellings suggests to me that the 'g' in Noogee would be a hard G, while the 'J' in Noojee would be soft. Remember that First Nations languages were never written down and the spellings of many place names are a little approximate.
Now, clearly enough and with no shades of meaning at all, I am out of space. I'll finish this next week and tell you a little more about Bunce.