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For the state electoral district in South Australia, see Electoral district of Kaurna.

The Kaurna (pronounced "Garner" or "Gowna") people are a group of Indigenous Australians whose traditional lands lie in and around the Adelaide Plains of South Australia. Kaurna language is the spoken language of the Kaurna people.

Contents 1 Lands 2 People and culture 2.1 Pangkarra and yerta 3 Other names 4 See also 5 References 6 External links

The traditional Kaurna cover the regions of South Australia from Cape Jervis at the bottom of the Fleurieu Peninsula to Port Wakefield on the eastern shore of Gulf Saint Vincent and as far north as Crystal Brook in the Mid North. Their lands were bordered by those of the Peramangk and Ngadjuri to the East, Nukunu to the North and the Narangga to the West.^[1]

Tribes were also found at Snowtown, Blyth, Hoyleton, Hamley Bridge, Clarendon, Gawler and Myponga, where they were sometimes known as Nantuwara. The Jultiwira (stringy bark forests) of the Mount Lofty Ranges was a boundary. Between Hamley Bridge and Crystal Brook, they were known as Padnaindi.^[2] Little is known of the usage of the Adelaide Plains by the Kaurna but it naturally serves as a hunting and gathering route. In 1836, at the first arrival of european settlers, fires were observed burning along the coast. These fires were part of the Kaurna's scrub clearing to encourage the growth of grass for Emu and Kangaroo.^[1]

The traditional way of life of the Kaurna people was destroyed within twenty years of European settlement with the last surviving Kaurna, a woman called Ivaritji, dying in 1931. The Kaurna population had been seriously depleted prior to 1836, with the spread of smallpox from the eastern states.^[3] The population again severely declined upon the arrival of European settlers in 1836 at Holdfast Bay (now Glenelg), from about 1000 members before settlement to 180 in 1856.^[2] The land was considered to be terra nullius by the enactment of the South Australia Act on 14 August 1834 by the British Parliament.

The Kaurna people lived in independent family structures in defined territories called pangkarra. Pangkarra access always had to the coastline and ran extensively inland. The coastline was essential for seafood hunting and the inland territories provided protection to the people during bad weather. The pangkarra were then grouped into subgroups called yerta. All the members in the yerta and different pangkarra were intimately linked. Marriage between a man and a woman within the same yerta was forbidden. The Kaurna performed circumcision as an initiatory right and were the southernmost indigenous tribe to do so. ^[2]

Some of the names by which the Kaurna people are also known include: Kaura (misprint), Coorna, Koornawarra, Nantuwara (in relation to the Northern yerta "Kanagaroo Speakers"), Nantuwaru, Nganawara, Meljurna or Meyukattanna (in relation to the Northern yerta 'quarrelsome men', as named by the Southern yerta).

• Indigenous Australians
• Kaurna language
• History of Adelaide
• Tjilbruke
  • Tjilbruke's Trail

Other indigenous ethnic groups in South Australia:

• Adynyamathanha
• Arabunna
• Kokatha
• Mirning
• Ngarrindjeri
• Narungga
• Pitjantjatjara
• Yankuntjara

1. ^ ^{a b} Fitzpartick, Phil (1991). Kaurna'Warra, A selected wordlist form the language of the Karuna People of the Adelaide Plains. Adelaide: Department of Environment and Planning, Aboriginal Heritage Branch. 
2. ^ ^{a b c} Woerlee, Bill (2000-01-27). Kudnarto, In loving memory of my mother-in-law Anaseini Didrua Barrack. Retrieved on 2006-07-14.
3. ^ (1985) in A City of Salisbury Publication: Settlers on the Hill, A Local History of Para Hills. City of Salisbury, South Australia, p5. 

• Concise History of the Kaurna People
• The Kaurna People
• Kaurna Warra
• Kaurna Culture
• Bibliography of articles
• Kaurna Yerta