The Ngarluma are an

Indigenous Australian people Indigenous Australians are people with familial heritage from, or recognised membership of, the various ethnic groups living within the territory of contemporary Australia prior to British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups, w ...

of the western

Pilbara The Pilbara () is a large, dry, sparsely populated regions of Western Australia, region in the north of Western Australia. It is known for its Indigenous Australians, Aboriginal people; wealth disparity; its ancient landscapes; the prevailing r ...

area of northwest Australia. They are coastal dwellers of the area around Roebourne and Karratha, excluding Millstream.

Language

The

Ngarluma language Ngarluma and Kariyarra are members of a dialect continuum, which is a part of the Ngayarda language group of Western Australia, in the Pama–Nyungan language family. Some sources suggest that an extinct dialect, Jaburara, was a third memb ...

belongs to the Ngayarda branch of the Pama-Nyungan family. It is a highly inflected suffixing language, with, unusually, a nominative-accusative case-marking system, with verbs inflected for tense, aspect and mood. The Ngarluma on contact with whites and distant tribes appeared to have reserved their grammatically complex language for conversations among themselves while adopting a simplified version when interacting with strangers. There are an estimated 20 full speakers, most of whom are elderly.

History

It would appear that the Ngarluma adapted quickly to the developing

pearling industry Cultured pearls are pearls which are formed within a cultured pearl sac with human intervention in the interior of productive living molluscs in a variety of conditions depending upon the mollusc and the goals. Having the same material as natur ...

along the northwest coast, perhaps travelling down to get work at

Cossack The Cossacks are a predominantly East Slavic Eastern Christian people originating in the Pontic–Caspian steppe of eastern Ukraine and southern Russia. Cossacks played an important role in defending the southern borders of Ukraine and Rus ...

300 miles south. This hypothesis is based on the fact that the vocabulary list provided to a priest in 1875 by two

Dalmatia Dalmatia (; ; ) is a historical region located in modern-day Croatia and Montenegro, on the eastern shore of the Adriatic Sea. Through time it formed part of several historical states, most notably the Roman Empire, the Kingdom of Croatia (925 ...

n Italian shipwreck survivors, Michele Bacich and Giovanni Iurich, after they returned to Italy, appears to be a creole with a strong but simplified component of Ngarluma. It is thought that they were extended hospitality for 3 months by the

Yinikutira Yinikutira, also recorded as the Jinigudira, are the traditional Aboriginal owners of the land along the Ningaloo Coast in the area of the Exmouth Peninsula in Western Australia now known as the Cape Range National Park. The area is within the G ...

people who had picked up the creole from

indenture An indenture is a legal contract that reflects an agreement between two parties. Although the term is most familiarly used to refer to a labor contract between an employer and a laborer with an indentured servant status, historically indentures we ...

d Ngarluma labourers in the pearling industry.

Kinship system

The Ngarluma people have a four group skin system.

Some words

* ''t(h)artaruga'' =

sea turtle Sea turtles (superfamily Chelonioidea), sometimes called marine turtles, are reptiles of the order Testudines and of the suborder Cryptodira. The seven existing species of sea turtles are the flatback, green, hawksbill, leatherback, loggerh ...

. This might be a

loanword A loanword (also a loan word, loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language (the recipient or target language), through the process of borrowing. Borrowing is a metaphorical term t ...

predating the Western discovery of the continent of Australia. In a number of Pilbara languages such as

Ngarluma The Ngarluma are an Indigenous Australian people of the western Pilbara area of northwest Australia. They are coastal dwellers of the area around Roebourne and Karratha, excluding Millstream. Language The Ngarluma language belongs to the Ngay ...

Ngarla The Ngarla are an Aboriginal Australian people of the Pilbara region of Western Australia. Country Norman Tindale estimated their territory, to the west of Port Hedland, at around , describing it as lying along the coast to the west of Solita ...

, Kariyarra Yinjibarndi and

Nyamal The Nyamal are an Indigenous Australian people of the Pilbara area of north-western Western Australia. Language A version of Nyamal became the basis of a pidgin used among workers on pearling luggers in the late 19th century, and was spoken sev ...

, the turtle is called ''tartaruga/thartaruga''. This happens to be identical to the Portuguese word for that creature, and there is a grounded suspicion that the common term must reflect some otherwise unattested interception of Portuguese sailors prior to the advent of the Dutch on the northwestern coast. The data, and theorization of some such contact, was gathered and advanced by

Carl Georg von Brandenstein Carl-Georg Christoph Freiherr von Brandenstein (10 October 1909 – 8 January 2005) was a German linguist who took up the study of Australian Aboriginal languages. Life Born in 1909 in Hannover to , Carl-Georg finished high school in Weimar, an ...

, who hypothesized that there must have been a secret Portuguese colony established in the area around the 1520s, which lasted for 60 years. The need for secrecy stemmed, in this hypothesis, from the consequences of the

Treaty of Tordesillas The Treaty of Tordesillas, signed in Tordesillas, Spain, on 7 June 1494, and ratified in Setúbal, Portugal, divided the newly discovered lands outside Europe between the Kingdom of Portugal and the Crown of Castile, along a meridian (geography) ...

which divided the

New World The term "New World" is used to describe the majority of lands of Earth's Western Hemisphere, particularly the Americas, and sometimes Oceania."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: ...

into

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many countries in the Americas **Spanish cuisine **Spanish history **Spanish culture ...

and Portuguese imperial zones. Von Brandenstein thought that, given the quarrels between the two nations over the boundaries and extension of these lines of demarcation, the Portuguese might have kept their discovery of Australia and colonization of the coastal area of the Pilbara, secret until the

Portuguese succession crisis of 1580 The Portuguese succession crisis of 1580 () emerged as a result of the disappearance of young King Sebastian I of Portugal in the Battle of Alcácer Quibir in 1578 and the death without issue of his successor and great-uncle Henry I in 1580. A ...

led to the regency of the Spanish king Philip II, after which the colony ended. This etymology has strong claims, unlike the rest of the hypothesis.

Native title

In 2015, the Ngarluma people's

native title Aboriginal title is a common law doctrine that the land rights of indigenous peoples to customary tenure persist after the assumption of sovereignty to that land by another colonising state. The requirements of proof for the recognition of ab ...

rights were recognised by the

Federal Court of Australia The Federal Court of Australia is an Australian superior court which has jurisdiction to deal with most civil disputes governed by federal law (with the exception of family law matters), along with some summary (less serious) and indictable (mo ...

. Ngarluma Aboriginal Corporation, based in Karratha, administer the Ngarluma's native title rights and interests. Since 1998, the Ngarluma people, alongside the

Yindjibarndi people The Yindjibarndi are an Aboriginal Australian people of the Pilbara region of Western Australia. They form the majority of Aboriginal people around Roebourne (the Millstream area). Their traditional lands lie around the Fortescue River. Languag ...

, have been a party to the land access agreement for the Woodside-operated

North West Shelf Project The North West Shelf Project (NWS), also known as the North West Shelf Venture, is an Australian resource development project, extracting natural gas from under the ocean from the North West Shelf off the coast of Western Australia. Running sinc ...

. Under the agreement, Ngarluma people remain the

traditional owner Native title is the set of rights, recognised by Australian law, held by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander groups or individuals to land that derive from their maintenance of their traditional laws and customs. These Aboriginal title right ...

representatives for the North West Shelf Project area, which includes the Karratha Gas Plant. In 1998, the Ngarluma and Yindjibarndi elders established the

Ngarluma Yindjibarndi Foundation Ltd The Ngarluma are an Indigenous Australian people of the western Pilbara area of northwest Australia. They are coastal dwellers of the area around Roebourne and Karratha, excluding Millstream. Language The Ngarluma language belongs to the Ngay ...

(NYFL) as the traditional owner representative body for the North West Shelf land and waters. NYFL continues to operate out of Roebourne, the contemporary heartland of the Ngarluma people. NYFL delivers social, cultural and economic benefits for the Ngarluma and Yindjibarndi people, and the broader Aboriginal community. NYFL does not receive royalties from the Woodside-operated North West Shelf project. NYFL is led by a board of directors made up by Ngarluma and Yindjibarndi people, including Michael Woodley and Josephine Samson as chair and deputy, and former ASX top 20 corporate leader and social impact practitioner, Sean-Paul Stephens as CEO.

Notes

Citations

Sources

* * * * * * * * * {{Authority control Aboriginal peoples of Western Australia Broome, Western Australia