Pindjarup
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The Bindjareb, Binjareb, Pindjarup or Pinjareb are an Indigenous
Noongar The Noongar (, also spelt Noongah, Nyungar , Nyoongar, Nyoongah, Nyungah, Nyugah, and Yunga ) are Aboriginal Australian people who live in the South West, Western Australia, south-west corner of Western Australia, from Geraldton, Western Aus ...
people that occupy part of the South West of
Western Australia Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...
.


Name

It is not clear if ''Pindjarup'' is the historically correct
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 ...
for the tribe. After their disappearance, the only sources for them came from Kaneang informants. The word itself may reflect a
lexeme A lexeme () is a unit of lexical meaning that underlies a set of words that are related through inflection. It is a basic abstract unit of meaning, a unit of morphological analysis in linguistics that roughly corresponds to a set of forms ta ...
''pinjar''/''benjar'' meaning ''wetlands'' or ''swamps'', which would yield the idea that the Pindjarup were "people of the wetlands".


Country

Pindjarup tribal estates extended over an estimated , taking in Pinjarra, Harvey and the Leschenault Estuary. They were also present on Murray River's lower reaches.


Social organization and lifestyle

As a people of the wetlands, the Pindjarup were famed for their fish-traps, and a seasonal cycle of six seasons, making full use of the environmental resources from the coastal estuaries and sand-dunes, through the interior lakes and wetlands to the more fertile soils of the Darling Scarp foothills and ridgelines. Western long-necked tortoises,
black swan The black swan (''Cygnus atratus'') is a large Anatidae, waterbird, a species of swan which breeds mainly in the southeast and southwest regions of Australia. Within Australia, the black swan is nomadic, with erratic migration patterns dependent ...
s,
ducks Duck is the common name for numerous species of waterfowl in the family (biology), family Anatidae. Ducks are generally smaller and shorter-necked than swans and goose, geese, which are members of the same family. Divided among several subfam ...
, and
migratory birds Bird migration is a seasonal movement of birds between breeding and wintering grounds that occurs twice a year. It is typically from north to south or from south to north. Migration is inherently risky, due to predation and mortality. The ...
formed an important part of their diet.


History of European settlement

The lands of the Pindjarup were first explored by Europeans in 1829, when Lieutenant P. N. Preston and Dr.
Alexander Collie Dr Alexander Collie (2 June 1793 – 8 November 1835) was a Scottish surgeon and botanist who journeyed to Western Australia in 1829, where he was an explorer and Colonial Surgeon. Early life Collie was born in Insch in Aberdeenshire, Scotland on ...
took the
Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the naval warfare force of the United Kingdom. It is a component of His Majesty's Naval Service, and its officers hold their commissions from the King of the United Kingdom, King. Although warships were used by Kingdom ...
vessel HMS ''Sulphur'' to explore the mouths of the Peel Inlet, the Serpentine and Murray Rivers, and the Leschenault Inlet. The Pindjarup killed one of the exploration party, George MacKenzie, a 19-year-old, in 1830. Two years later, after a soldier was wounded on the Murray River,
Frederick Irwin Lieutenant-Colonel Frederick Chidley Irwin, KH (22 March 1794 – 31 March 1860) was acting Governor of Western Australia from 1847 to 1848. Born in 1794 in Drogheda, Ireland, Frederick Chidley Irwin was the son of Reverend James Irwin. Som ...
sent a
punitive expedition A punitive expedition is a military journey undertaken to punish a political entity or any group of people outside the borders of the punishing state or union. It is usually undertaken in response to perceived disobedient or morally wrong beha ...
which killed five Pindjarup and wounded several others. Thomas Peel, a second cousin of the future British Prime Minister,
Sir Robert Peel Sir Robert Peel, 2nd Baronet (5 February 1788 – 2 July 1850), was a British Conservative statesman who twice was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1834–1835, 1841–1846), and simultaneously was Chancellor of the Exchequer (1834–183 ...
, was granted some of land, part of it covering Pindjarup territory, as his personal domain. The Pindjarup were in dispute also with the
Whadjuk Whadjuk or Wadjak, alternatively Witjari, are Noongar (Aboriginal Australian) people of the Western Australian region of the Perth bioregion of the Swan Coastal Plain. Name The ethnonym appears to derive from , the Whadjuk word for "no". Count ...
of the Swan River. In December 1833 the former's claim to have rights to perform their ceremonies and make kinship visits to the northern area were recognised at a
corroboree A corroboree is a generic word for a meeting of Australian Aboriginal peoples. It may be a sacred ceremony, a festive celebration, or of a warlike character. A word coined by the first British settlers in the Sydney area from a word in the ...
and the Pindjarup resumed their visits to kin. The Whadjuk themselves had had numerous conflicts with encroaching white settlers, who had occupied land on which one of their basic foods, yams, grew. The colonial authorities themselves were drawn into taking sides when intertribal conflicts arose. Around February of the following year clashes took place with settlers after their clan dingoes attacked livestock near Perth. In a standoff, the Pindjarup leader Calyute distinguished himself by keeping his spear pressed to a soldier who had, in turn, held his musket at Calyute's chest. The Whadjuk, who had come to some terms of agreement over co-existence with the intruders, and the Pindjarup fell out with regard to the way to handle the settlers, especially after a duel between Calyte and a Whadjuk man, Yaloo, in which both suffered wounds. In April 1834 Calyute raided George Shenton's windmill, pinned its owner down after luring him out with an offer of baked damper, and hauled off a substantial quantity, , of flour. His identity and that of many others in the raiding band, was passed on to the settler authorities by Whadjuk people. A detachment managed to capture Calyute, who was bayoneted, together with two other men, Yedong and Monang, some days later, and he was flogged with 60 lashes in Perth's main street, and then imprisoned for a year, being released on 10 June 1834. On Yedong's release he organised an ambush on the 24 July on what Peel regarded as his property, killing a private, Hugh Nesbit and wounding a former soldier, having lured them into a trap after promising them help in retrieving a lost horse. Nesbit's death was attributed to a man called ''Noonar''. The wounded man managed, though speared three times, to make his way back to safety. The military unit at Governor Stirling's disposition had received reinforcements that doubled their numbers by September 1833 and he also created a Mounted Police unit, mainly from discharged soldiers. On 25 October, Stirling led troops, and accompanied by Peel, down into Pindjarup lands, not only to exact retribution for Nesbit's death, but also to enable Peel to resume developing, unthreatened, the Pindjarup lands the Crown had bestowed on him.


Pinjarra massacre

What ensued was almost immediately referred to as the "Battle of Pinjarra", a name retained by historical memory in Western Australia until recently. Historians now consider it to have been a massacre of the Indigenous people. Stirling's military contingent consisted of 25 men who came across a Pindjarup camp of from 70 to 80 people. Tactics had some positioned on either side of the river and others advancing on an front, with a forward party pressing on horseback into the camp. At least five Pindjarup were shot dead immediately, and the rest fled riverwards as they were continuously fired upon by Stirling's party. One soldier was speared in the arm, and Captain Ellis, the Superintendent of the Mounted Police, was mortally wounded during the massacre. Stirling's official report stated that 14 Pindjarup had been killed, though modern estimates run as high as 50.


Events after 1834

By 1836 a permanent military settlement was established in Pinjarra, and further land grants to settlers occurred with little overt resistance from Aboriginal people, who sought employment in the pastoral industry which was established in the area. By 1838 a road through Pindjarup lands connected Pinjarra to Bunbury. Pindjarup people survived the conflict, but their cultural identity was weakened through policies of successive Protectors of Aborigines in Western Australia, particularly Henry Prinsep and A. O. Neville, who sought to "breed out" the Aboriginal race through
miscegenation Miscegenation ( ) is marriage or admixture between people who are members of different races or ethnicities. It has occurred many times throughout history, in many places. It has occasionally been controversial or illegal. Adjectives describin ...
with whites. Successive outbreaks of measles and other illnesses also took their toll on the successive demoralisation of these people. Nevertheless, since the 1930s the number of Aboriginal people in Pindjarup lands has increased, though most now identify themselves by the language group
Noongar The Noongar (, also spelt Noongah, Nyungar , Nyoongar, Nyoongah, Nyungah, Nyugah, and Yunga ) are Aboriginal Australian people who live in the South West, Western Australia, south-west corner of Western Australia, from Geraldton, Western Aus ...
, rather than Pindjarup. From the 1940s to the 1970s up to 500 Aboriginal people, including many of Pindjarup heritage, were incarcerated at the Roelands Aboriginal Mission, most of whom were taken from their families as a part of the
Stolen Generations The Stolen Generations (also known as Stolen Children) were the children of Aboriginal Australians, Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, Torres Strait Islander descent who were removed from their families by the Australian Gover ...
policies of that era.


Alternative names

* Pinjarra (
toponym Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of ''wikt:toponym, toponyms'' (proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage, and types. ''Toponym'' is the general term for ...
) * Penjarra * Pidjain * Peejine * Murray tribe * South West tribe * Banyowla * Bangoula (personal name) * Banyoula * Kuriwongi (language name) * Yaberoo ("northerners" applied to people around Wonnerup)


See also

*
List of massacres of Indigenous Australians Colonial settlers frequently clashed with Indigenous people (on continental Australia) during and after the History of Australia (1788–1850), wave of mass immigration of Europeans into the continent, which began in the late 18th century and la ...
*
List of Indigenous Australian group names This list of Australian Aboriginal group names includes names and collective designations which have been applied, either currently or in the past, to groups of Aboriginal Australians. The list does not include Torres Strait Islander peoples, wh ...


Notes


Citations


Sources

* * * * * * * * {{Aboriginal peoples of Western Australia Noongar Swan Coastal Plain