Warkawarka

The Warkawarka, also called Weki Weki, were an Australian Aboriginal group whose traditional lands are located in Victoria, Australia.^[1] Controversy exists as to whether they were an independent 'tribe' or rather consisted of a subgroup of the Wergaia, the latter view being shared by both Robert M. W. Dixon and Luise Hercus.^[2]

Victoria Aboriginal tribes

Name

The ethnonym seems to derive from their word for 'no' (warki=warka),^[1] though the name itself, warkawarka or wargawarga arguably may be a variant of the ethnonym for the Wergaia.^[3]

Country

The Warkawarka tribal lands extended over approximately 2,000 square miles (5,200 km²), from Tyrrell Creek and Lake Tyrrell, southwards to Warracknabeal and Birchip. Their western boundary lay along Hopetoun, and they also ranged over the Morton Plains.^[1]

Alternative names

• Booroung, Boorong^[1]
• Mirdiragoort
• Waikywaiky
• Weki-weki
• Wengenmarongeitch
• Werkawerka
• Wirtu, Wirtoo^[1]

Some words

• wirtu (man)^[1]

Notes

Citations

1. Tindale 1974, p. 208.
2. Clark 1998, p. 58.
3. Clark 1995, p. 177.

Sources

• Beveridge, Peter (1865) [First published 1861]. "A few notes on the dialects, habits, customs and mythology of the Lower Murray aborigines". Transactions of the Royal Society of Victoria. 6. Melbourne: 14–24.
• Beveridge, Peter (1883). "Of the aborigines inhabiting the great lacustrine and Riverine depression of the Lower Murray". Journal and Proceedings of the Royal Society of New South Wales. 17. Melbourne: 19–74.
• Clark, Ian (1995). Scars in the Landscape: A Register of Massacre Sites in Western Victoria, 1803-1859. Aboriginal Studies Press. ISBN 978-0-855-75595-9.
• Clark, Ian D. (1998). "That's My Country Belonging to Me": Aboriginal Land Tenure and Dispossession in Nineteenth Century Western Victoria. Melbourne: Heritage Matters. ISBN 978-1-876-40406-2.
• Howitt, Alfred William (1904). The native tribes of south-east Australia (PDF). Macmillan.
• Mathews, R. H. (January 1898). "Initiation ceremonies of Australian tribes.Appendix Nguttan initiation ceremony". Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society. 37 (157). Melbourne: 54–73. JSTOR 983694.
• Smyth, Robert Brough (1878). The Aborigines of Victoria: with notes relating to the habits of the natives of other parts of Australia and Tasmania (PDF). Vol. 1. Melbourne: J. Ferres, gov't printer.
• Stanbridge, William Edward (1858). "On the Astronomy and Mythology of the Aborigines of Victoria" (PDF). Transactions Philosophical Institute Victoria. 2: 137–140.
• Tindale, Norman Barnett (1974). "Warkawarka (VIC)". Aboriginal Tribes of Australia: Their Terrain, Environmental Controls, Distribution, Limits, and Proper Names. Australian National University Press.