**ELSTERNWICK KOORI HISTORY**

PLEASE NOTE: Knowledge of the original inhabitants is scarce. If you know of anyone that has more information that we could add to this page please forward our details to them. We would be pleased to expand on this section.

There is not much information about the Indigenous history of Elsternwick and it’s surrounding lands owing to it non existence prior to it’s English naming

The area is low lying and mainly swamp and wetland Point Ormond in Elwood was an Aboriginal campsite and traditional lands of the Clan Yalluik Willam. This clan is one of Five clan groups of the Boonerwrung language group which share a 97% Dialect match with the Woiwurrung (Wurundjeri Willam and Balluk). The traditional boundaries of this clan are Werribee river to the Nth West and Mordialloc Creek to the Sthn East.

Neerim is the Boonerwrung word for the Great Bay (Port Phillip Bay) and all the points along its coast are significant places.

Point Ormond formally known as Red Bluff was known by the Yalluik Willam as Bunjil Stones

This bluff prior to land reclamation works based around the draining of Elwood and was as large as the Sandringham Bluff. It is a place of quite indigenous significance with a midden containing sharpened stone tools located in the area. Most of the earth from here ended up as the grounds around the Elwood State Schools.

The area that Elsternwick now stands on was inhabited by the Wurundjeri, Bunurong and Woiwurung tribes

The information on this page is reproduced from N.B. Tindale’s Aboriginal Tribes of Australia (1974). Please be aware that much of the data relating to Aboriginal language group distribution and definition has undergone revision since 1974. Please note also that this catalogue represents Tindale’s attempt to depict Aboriginal tribal distribution at the time of European contact.

From Mordiallac near Melbourne southeast to Anderson Inlet; on Western Port Bay and on Mornington peninsula; a coastal tribe; inland to near Dandenong Range; east to about Warragul. In the 1940 map the area of two hordes of the Wurundjeri were incorrectly drawn as Bunurong territory, following Smyth. The Bunurong spoke a dialect very close to Woiwuru, the language of their northern neighbors.

145°30’E x 38°20’S

3,000 sq. m. (7,800 sq. km)

Boonurrong, Boonoorong, Boonoor-ong, Boon-oor-rong, Boongerong, Bunwurung, Bunwurru (language name [’bu:n] = no, [’wur:u] = lip or speech), Bunuron (man = [kulin]), Putnaroo, Putmaroo, Thurung (name applied by eastern neighbors = ‘tiger snakes,’ they came sneaking about to kill us), Toturin (general term applied to several tribes in west by the Kurnai = ‘black snake’), Gippsland dialect (of Thomas, 1862), Mordialloc tribe (corruption of a place name).

Page Resources

Robin Macpherson
Michael Simpson
Catholic Education University

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