The Boonwurrung, also spelt Bunurong or Bun wurrung, are an
Aboriginal people of the
Kulin nation, who are the
traditional owners of the land from the
Werribee River to
Wilsons Promontory
Wilsons Promontory is a peninsula that forms the southernmost part of the Australian mainland, located in the state of Victoria (Australia), Victoria.
South Point (Wilsons Promontory), South Point at is the southernmost tip of Wilsons Promon ...
in the Australian state of
Victoria. Their territory includes part of what is now the city and suburbs of
Melbourne
Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...
. They were called the Western Port or Port Philip tribe by the early settlers, and were in alliance with other tribes in the Kulin nation, having particularly strong ties to the
Wurundjeri people.
The
Registered Aboriginal Party representing the Boonwurrung people is the
Bunurong Land Council Aboriginal Corporation
The Bunurong Land Council Aboriginal Corporation is a Registered Aboriginal Party and incorporated association representing the Bunurong (Boon wurrung) community in the state of Victoria, Australia, Victoria, Australia, particularly in matters re ...
.
Language
Boonwurrung is one of the
Kulin languages, and belongs to the
Pama-Nyungan language family. The
ethnonym
An ethnonym () is a name applied to a given ethnic group. Ethnonyms can be divided into two categories: exonyms (whose name of the ethnic group has been created by another group of people) and autonyms, or endonyms (whose name is created and used ...
occasionally used in early writings to refer to the Bunwurrung, namely ''Bunwurru'', is derived from the word ''bu:n'', meaning "no" and ''wur:u'', signifying either "lip" or "speech". This indicates that the Boonwurrung language may not be spoken outside of their Country - their clan's territory.
Country

The Boonwurrung people are predominantly
saltwater people whose lands, waters, and cosmos encompassed some of territory around
Western Port Bay
Western Port, (Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung: ''Warn Marin'') commonly but unofficially known as Western Port Bay, is a large Tide, tidal bay in southern Victoria (state), Victoria, Australia, opening into Bass Strait. It is the second lar ...
and the
Mornington Peninsula
The Mornington Peninsula is a peninsula located in the south of Greater Melbourne, Victoria (state), Victoria, Australia. It is surrounded by Port Phillip to the west, Western Port to the east and Bass Strait to the south, and is connected to ...
. Its western boundary was set at
Werribee. To the southeast, it extended from
Mordialloc through to
Anderson Inlet, as far as
Wilson's Promontory. Inland its borders reached the
Dandenong Ranges, and ran eastwards as far as the vicinity of
Warragul.
In June 2021, the
Bunurong Land Council Aboriginal Corporation
The Bunurong Land Council Aboriginal Corporation is a Registered Aboriginal Party and incorporated association representing the Bunurong (Boon wurrung) community in the state of Victoria, Australia, Victoria, Australia, particularly in matters re ...
and the
Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung Cultural Heritage Aboriginal Corporation, both
registered Aboriginal Parties, agreed on a redrawing of their traditional boundaries developed by the
Victorian Aboriginal Heritage Council. The new borderline runs across the city from west to east, with the
CBD,
Richmond and
Hawthorn included in Wurundjeri land, and
Albert Park,
St Kilda and
Caulfield on Bunurong land. It was agreed that
Mount Cottrell, the site of a
massacre in 1836 with at least 10 Wathaurong victims, would be jointly managed above the line. However these new boundaries are disputed by some Wurundjeri and Boonwurrung people, including N'arweet
Carolyn Briggs of the Boonwurrung Land and Sea Council.
In Boonwurrung belief, their territory was carved out by the creator ''
Loo-errn'' as he moved from
Yarra Flats down to his final resting place at
''Wamoon'' and, as custodians of this ''marr-ne-beek'' country, they required outsiders to observe certain ritual prohibitions and to learn their language if the newcomers were to enter their land without harm.
Clan structures
Communities consisted of six land-owning groups called ''clans'' that spoke the Boonwurrung language and were connected through cultural and mutual interests, totems, trading initiatives, and marriage ties. Each had an
Arweet, or clan leader.
The clans are:
*
Yalukit-willam: East of
Werribee River to
St Kilda
* Mayone-bulluk:
Carrum Carrum Swamp
* Ngaruk-Willam:
Brighton
Brighton ( ) is a seaside resort in the city status in the United Kingdom, city of Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, England, south of London.
Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze Age Britain, Bronze Age, R ...
,
Mordialloc,
Dandenong, and the area from
Mount Martha to
Mount Eliza
* Yallock-Bullock:
Bass River and
Tooradin
* Boonwurrung-Bulluk:
Point Nepean to
Cape Schank
* Yowenjerre:
Tarwin River
Access by other clans to land and resources (such as the
Birrarung, or Yarra River) was sometimes restricted depending on the state of the resource in question. For example; if a river or creek had been fished regularly throughout the fishing season and fish supplies were down, fishing was limited or stopped entirely by the clan who owned that resource until fish were given a chance to recover. During this time, other resources were utilised for food. This ensured the sustained use of the resources available to them. As with most other Kulin territories, penalties such as spearings were enforced upon trespassers.
Boonwurrung
moieties classified people either as ''
Bunjil'', that is
eaglehawk or ''
Waang'', namely
raven.
History and culture
Traditional life
Information on traditional life has been passed down by Boonwurrung people from one generation to the next, and was also recorded by European settlers and administrators.
The Yalukit-willam clan of the Boonwurrung were semi-nomadic hunter gatherers who moved around to seasonal food sources in their territory to take advantage of seasonably available food resources. Their hunting equipment and techniques had been highly developed to the environment and they had a highly detailed knowledge of their Country. This knowledge was passed from one generation to the next. They had to work only about five hours a day. Dogs were important and ceremonially buried.
The Boonwurrung people have oral histories that recount in detail the flooding of Port Phillip Bay ten-thousand years ago. The boundaries of Boonwurrung territory are defined by further floods 5000 years ago. Prior to this time, the bay was scrub-filled and passable on foot, and the Boonwurrung people hunted kangaroo and possums on it.
Food and hunting
The Yalukit-willam would spend up to a few weeks in one spot, depending on the water and food supply. Major camps were often set up close to permanent fresh water, leaving archaeological evidence of the places they lived. These archaeological sites include surface scatters,
shell middens, isolated artefacts and burials.

Men were the primary hunters. They hunted kangaroos, possums, kangaroo rats, bandicoots, wombats and lizards. They also caught fish and eels and collected shellfish. Some Boonwurrung people made seasonal trips in canoes to
French Island, where they could gather swan eggs.
In coastal and swamp areas there was plenty of bird life to hunt, including ducks and swans. There were abundant eels, yabbies, and fish in Stony and Kororoit creeks, and the Yarra River. Men were experts at spearing eels and Robinson notes in his diary in 1841 two men catching 40lbs of eel 'in a very short time'. The coast provided saltwater fish, mussels, cockles and small crabs.
Women were primarily gatherers.
Murnong (or yam daisy) was a favourite food. Others were the
black wattle gum, the pith of tree ferns,
native cherries,
kangaroo apples and various fungi. Murnong grew all year was best eaten in spring. Tubers were collected in vast amounts in string bags. Fresh murnong could be eaten raw, or if less fresh, murnong could be roasted or baked in earth ovens. Murnong used to grow in great amounts along the
Kororoit Creek and other creeks in the area and covered the plain to the west. These murnong fields were destroyed by the introduction of sheep. Scholar
Bruce Pascoe attributes the widespread fields of murrnong in certain areas to active farming by Aboriginal peoples. Women collected large quantities of tadpoles which were cooked beneath a bed of hot coals.
Robinson's diary describes how the Yalukit-willam caught emus and restrained their dingos.
Early European arrival
Initial contact was made in February 1801 when
Lieutenant Murray and his crew from the
''Lady Nelson'' came ashore for fresh water near present-day
Sorrento
Sorrento ( , ; ; ) is a City status in Italy, city and overlooking the Gulf of Naples, Bay of Naples in Southern Italy. A popular tourist destination, Sorrento is located on the Sorrentine Peninsula at the southern terminus of a main branch o ...
. A wary exchange of
spears and
stone axes for shirts, mirrors and a steel axe, ended when the crew of the ''Lady Nelson'' panicked, resulting in spears flying,
musket
A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating plate armour. By the mid-16th century, this type of musket gradually dis ...
shots and the use of the
ship's cannon, wounding several fleeing Boonwurrung people. The following month, Captain Milius from the
French ship ''Naturaliste'', in the
Baudin expedition, danced alone on a beach at Western Port for the natives, in a much more peaceful contact.
Just before and overlapping the period of British exploration and settlement, the Boonwurrung were involved in a long-running dispute with the
Gunai/Kurnai people from
Gippsland. According to
William Barak, the last traditional elder of the
Wurundjeri people, the conflict was a dispute over resources, which resulted in heavy casualties being suffered by the Boonwurrung. Many Gunnai raids occurred to abduct Boonwurrung women. The Yowengerra had almost been completely annihilated by 1836, largely as a result of attacks from the Gunai. During 1833–34, around 60–70 Bunurong people, if a report has been correctly interpreted,
may have been killed in a raid by Gunai when they were camped to the north of
Carrum Carrum Swamp.
Dispossession

The Boonwurrung people, living primarily along the Port Phillip and Western Port coast, may have had their livelihoods affected by
European seal hunters. The sealers' abduction of Boonwurrung women and taken to Bass Strait Islands and Tasmania may have caused inter-tribal conflicts, and by analogy, this may also apply to the Boonwurrung, whose coastlands were visited by sealers. A report by
Jules Dumont d'Urville
Jules Sébastien César Dumont d'Urville (; 23 May 1790 – 8 May 1842) was a French List of explorers, explorer and French Navy, naval officer who explored the south and western Pacific, Australia, New Zealand and Antarctica. As a botanist an ...
in 1830 attributed the absence of Boonwurrung on
Phillip Island, which was a camp for sealers, as due to the latter's behavior. As late as 1833, nine Woiwurrung and Boonwurrung women, and a boy, Yonki Yonka, were kidnapped and ferried across to the sealers' Bass Strait island bases. Contact with sealers would have exposed the coastal tribes to European diseases, and this would have exercised a heavy impact on demographics, and the economic and social ties binding the Wurundjeri and Boonwurrung peoples, as would the possible effects of infectious diseases contracted from these sealers.
James Fleming, one of the party of surveyor
Charles Grimes in
HMS ''Cumberland'' who explored the
Maribyrnong River and the
Yarra River as far as
Dights Falls in February 1803, reported smallpox scars on several aboriginal people he met, suggesting that a
smallpox
Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by Variola virus (often called Smallpox virus), which belongs to the genus '' Orthopoxvirus''. The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (W ...
epidemic might have swept through the tribes around Port Philip before 1803, reducing the population. Broome puts forward that two epidemics of smallpox decimated the population of the Kulin tribes by perhaps killing half each time in the 1790s and again around 1830. This theory has been challenged, however, by modern historical diagnosticians, who argue that the observed symptoms in the early ethnographical literature are compatible with
impetigo and
ringworm
Dermatophytosis, also known as tinea and ringworm, is a mycosis, fungal infection of the skin (a dermatomycosis), that may affect skin, hair, and nails. Typically it results in a red, itchy, scaly, circular rash. Hair loss may occur in the a ...
.
One particularly notable person at the time of European settlement in Victoria was
Derrimut, a Boonwurrung Elder, who informed early European settlers in October 1835 of an impending attack by clans from the
Woiwurrung group. The colonists armed themselves, and the attack was averted. Benbow and
Billibellary, from the
Wurundjeri, also acted to protect the colonists as part of their duty of hospitality. Derrimut later became very disillusioned and died in the Benevolent Asylum at the age of about 54 years in 1864. A few colonists erected a
tombstone to Derrimut in
Melbourne General Cemetery in his honour.
By 1839, the Boonwurrung had been reduced to 80–90 people, with only 4 of 19 children under four years old, from a probable pre-contact population of greater than 500 people. By 1850
Protector William Thomas estimated just 28 Bunurong people living on Boonwurrung land.
In 1852, the Boonwurrung were allocated at Mordialloc Creek while the Woiwurrung gained 782 hectares along the Yarra at Warrandyte. The
Aboriginal reserves were never staffed by whites and were not permanent camps, but acted as distribution depots where rations and blankets were distributed, with the intention being to keep the tribes away from the growing settlement of Melbourne. The
Aboriginal Protection Board revoked these two reserves in 1862–1863, considering them now too close to Melbourne.
In March 1863, after three years of upheaval, the surviving Kulin leaders, among them
Simon Wonga and
William Barak, led forty Wurundjeri,
Taungurung (Goulburn River) and Boonwurrung people over the
Black Spur and squatted on a traditional camping site on
Badger Creek near
Healesville and requested ownership of the site. This became
Coranderrk Station, named after the Woiwurrung word for the
Victorian Christmas bush. Coranderrk was closed in 1924 and its occupants were moved to
Lake Tyers in
Gippsland.
Law and war
Great enmity existed in particular between the Boonwurrung and the eastern Gunai, who were later deemed responsible for playing a role in the drastic reduction of the tribe's population.
Injury or death to a tribal member usually resulted in a conference to assess the facts, and, where thought unlawful, revenge was taken. In 1839, after one or two Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung were killed, a party of 15 men left for
Geelong
Geelong ( ) (Wathawurrung language, Wathawurrung: ''Djilang''/''Djalang'') is a port city in Victoria, Australia, located at the eastern end of Corio Bay (the smaller western portion of Port Phillip Bay) and the left bank of Barwon River (Victo ...
in order to retaliate against the malefactors, the
Wathaurong.
In 1840, the Boonwurrung became convinced that a man from
a tribe in
Echuca
Echuca ( ) is a town on the banks of the Murray River and Campaspe River in Victoria (state), Victoria, Australia. The border town of Moama is adjacent on the northern side of the Murray River in New South Wales. Echuca is the administrative cen ...
had
used sorcery to ordain the death of one of their warriors, whose name had been sung while a possum bone discarded after a Boonwurrung meal, and encased in a kangaroo's leg bone, was roasted. Shortly afterward the named Boonwurrung man died, and the tribe revenged itself on the first Echuca tribesman who then came to visit their territory. It was arranged by word of mouth, passing from Echuca through the
Nirababaluk and
Wurundjeri, for a meeting to have justice done at
Merri Creek. Nine or ten of the killed Echuca tribesman's kinsmen threw spears and boomerangs at the Boonwurrung warrior, armed with a shield, until he was wounded in the flank by a reed-spear. An elder of another, observing tribe, the
Barababaraba, called it a day, the ordeal ended, and all celebrated a grand corroboree.
Boonwurrung Dreaming
*
Bunjil and Pallian Creation Story: Bunjil is the Creator spirit of the Kulin People.
*
Birrarung Creation Story: formation of the Birrarung River.
Notable people

*
Jack Charles (1943– 2022), actor.
*
Derrimut (c. 1810 – 28 May 1864),
arweet – headman of the Boonwurrung
*
Carolyn Briggs
*
Louisa Briggs
*
Maree Clarke (artist)
Alternative names
* ''Boonerwrung''
* ''Bunuron''
* ''Bunurong, Bunwurrung, Boonwerung, Boonoorong'' and ''Bururong''
* ''Bunwurru''
* ''Putnaroo, Putmaroo''
* ''Thurung'' (an eastern tribal
exonym
An endonym (also known as autonym ) is a common, name for a group of people, individual person, geographical place, language, or dialect, meaning that it is used inside a particular group or linguistic community to identify or designate them ...
for the Bunjurong, meaning
tiger snakes, a metaphor indicating the sneaky way they set up ambushes against the eastern tribes)
* ''Toturin'' (a
Gunai term for '
black snake, used for several western Boonwurrung tribes
See also
*
Australian Aboriginal enumeration
*
Possum-skin cloak
Notes
Citations
Sources
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
External links
Bunurong Land Council Aboriginal Corporation
{{Authority control
Aboriginal peoples of Victoria (state)
History of Victoria (state)
Kulin nation
Port Phillip