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Kaurareg

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Coordinates:10°41′02″S142°11′06″E/ 10.684°S 142.185°E/-10.684; 142.185
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Kaurareg people
aka:Kauraraiga,Kaurarega,Kowrarega,Kauralaig,Kauraleg,Kororega,Korariga,Kauralaigna,Malulaig,Muralug(name of part ofPrince of Wales Island), andMuralag(AIATSIS),nd(SIL)[1]
A map of theTorres Strait Islands,with the Kaurareg traditional country located in the middle band of islands
Hierarchy
Language family:Pama–Nyungan
Language branch/group:Western and Central Torres Strait Language
Group dialect:Kauraraigau Ya
Area
Bioregion:Cape York Peninsula
Location:Torres Strait Islands,Far NorthQueensland,Australia
Coordinates:10°41′02″S142°11′06″E/ 10.684°S 142.185°E/-10.684; 142.185
Islands:

Kaurareg(alt.Kauraraiga,pluralKauraraigalai,Kauraregale) is the name for one of theIndigenous Australian groupscollectively known asTorres Strait Islander peoples,although many or most identify asAboriginal Australians.They are thetraditional ownersofThursday Island(Waiben) as well as a number ofTorres Strait Islands.

The Kaurareg are lower Western Islanders, based on theMuralaggroup. In common with the other peoples of the Torres Strait Island, they commanded impressive sailingoutrigger canoetechnology, traded throughout the Straits, fishing and trading with other Torres Strait Island groups. Similarly, they also regularly visited the Australian mainland ofCape York Peninsula,and retained ceremonial, marriage and trading alliances with several Aboriginal groups there. However they have been displaced many times sincecolonisationin the late 1800s. Subject to reprisals after being blamed for an incident in which a Westernschoonerand its crew were destroyed in 1869, their numbers rapidly diminished with the onset of white colonisation and administration. AfterWorld War II,descendants of the Kaurareg began to return to their traditional islands, and lay claim to native title over several of them.

Language

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The Kaurareg speak a dialect ofKalaw Lagaw Ya,an isolate in thePama–Nyunganfamily.[2]

Torres Island historical context

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The Kaurareg lie in the lower Western island group among the 5 basic ethno-culturally distinct groups that constituted the traditional world of the Torres Strait Islanders, the others being theSaibailgal,DœwanalgalandBœigulgal(Top West islanders), the Maluigal (Mid-West islanders), Kulkalgal (Central Islanders) andMeriam Le(Eastern Islanders).[3]Though internecine conflict was chronic in the region, it did not disrupt the dynamic interlocking family, clan and trading system that linked all in a far-flung exchange system, whose goods extended beyond the islands creating a flow of goods between New Guinea and Cape York Peninsula.[4]The Kaurareg and the Mua tradedbu(trumpet shells),alup(bailer shells)andwap(turtle and dugong harpoon shafts) for Papuan canoe hulls,cassowary bone-tippedarrows and bamboo for various purposes, such as carrying water and making knives for beheading enemies (upi).[5]

The Kaurareg had close links with the tribes of northern Cape York, which was home to a number of Aboriginal groups. These were theGudangwhose territory extended fromCape Yorkto Fly Point; theGumakudinwhose land was to the southwest of Cape York; theUnduyamowho were in the northern part ofNewcastle Bay,and theYadhaiganawhose country went fromJackey Jackey Creekto Escape River.[6]A.C.Haddon,surveying the field reports of the ethnography to date, esp. the narratives collected byGunnar Landtman,classified the Kaurareg as descendants of the ancient Hiamu people of the island ofDaruoff the southern Papuan coast. These Hiamu in turn, according to folk history, had come fromIamain theBourke Isles.The Hiamu, it was said, were repeatedly worsted in encounters with Kiwai invaders, and abandoned Daru and moved to Muralag.[7][8]

History of contact with westerners

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The Kaurareg people were extensively documented before their decimation and the destruction of their traditional life, byO. W. Brierly,an artist who took part in anAdmiraltysurvey of the York Peninsula byHMSRattlesnake.He estimated the number of Kaurareg onMuralag(Prince of Wales Island) alone as around 100, though they were also spread over another 10 islands and islets.[9]In particular he took many notes based on interviews withBarbara Thompson,a castaway who, the lone survivor of a shipwreck offNgurupai (Horn Island)in 1844, was cared for by the Kaurareg, who treated her as themarkai( "ancestral spirit" ) of an elder (Peaqui)'s deceased daughter (Giom) for 5 years untilOwen Stanley's expedition retrieved her at Evans Bay on 16 October 1849.[10][11]They were also the object of extensive research undertaken byAlfred Cort Haddonin 1888, and again in 1898 when he led the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Strait.

18th century: Fresh water source

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Muralag had been noted as a source of fresh water since the days of early British expeditions. In 1791,Captain E. Edwardsand the crew ofHMSPandoraarrived in four boats on the island, seeking fresh water after thePandorawas wrecked on a reef.[12]

1869:Sperwerincident and reprisals

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In mid-April 1869 a schooner, theSperwer,while trading and trawling fortrepangoff Muralag, was attacked and its captain, James Gascoyne, and his crew of two whites and fiveMalayswere killed.[13]The incident occurred at WednesdaySpitbetween Wednesday Island andHammond Island,an area where, it was later reported, the Indigenous peoples "had constantly maintained friendly intercourse"[14]with Europeans.

Three Kaurareg men were captured, found guilty and executed by thenative policeled by police magistrate inSomersetat that time,Henry Chester.His successor, pastoralistFrank Jardine,set out on a punitive expedition seconded by a Captain McAusland of theMelanieand his crew ofkanakas(native police[a]). According to Jardine's son, the armed kanakas ran amok, and a great slaughter of Kaurareg on Muralag is thought to have taken place, though accounts differ.[9]Jardine, led additional attacks against the Kaurareg people on the island during the 1870s.[15][16]

Jardine soon afterwards went on leave, and Chester, who took over as the resident government administrator, took further measures against them. Misinformed that Gascoyne's wife and child were living with the Kaurareg, he had kidnapped a Kaurareg elder, Passiwapod, as a pawn to ransom in exchange for the Gascoynes. The elder was released when the information proved to be false; the Gascoynes were in Melbourne.[17]

In April 1870 Chester again set forth inHMSBlanchewith 25royal marinesand eightAustralian native police,five of whom were recently released fromSt Helena's prisonwhere they had served time for rape and armed robbery.[17]The site of the Muralag massacre was examined, 20 other islanders taken prisoners, one severely wounded, and all but two of their canoes burnt. This time the men turned out to beKulkalaigfromNagir.Cape YorkGudangaboriginals with Chester identified three Kulkalaig men as the culprits behind the Sperwer incident, and, on learning this, Chester had the three summarily executed. It is widely thought that the Kaurareg were indeed uninvolved, though the reprisal visited on them for it was responsible for their decimation.[18][19][20]

1880s–20th century: survival

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Kaurareg survivors were encountered in the 1880s at Yata (Port Lihou) and at Kiwain (Blue Fish Point) oppositeThursday Island,and at the close of the century their numbers were reduced to a hundred or so.[21]The remnants of the Kaurareg were then shifted toKiriri/Hammond Island,and later toMoa Island (Adam)in the 1920s,[22]andPuruma/Coconut Island.[23]

The Anglican Reverend Canon John Done, who had arrived as a missionary in 1915 and was much impressed by the Torres Islanders spirituality, noted in 1919 the 80 remaining Kauraregs' desperate situation – the worst of all the Islanders – and by 1920 they had been reduced to 67, afterinfluenza swept the area.[23]In March 1922[24]the Kaurareg were again moved at gunpoint toMoa Island,where they remained until 1947. In 1947 the elder Elikiam Tom insisted on returning to Kiriri, but, denied residence by the Catholic Mission because he refused to convert, he went over toHorn Island(Narupai) where, together with Kaurareg elders from Moa, the returnees built what became Wasaga village. The Department of Native Affairs tried to shift them to Red Island Point on the mainland, but they managed to resist further displacement.[25]

A large population of Kaurareg people still lives on Horn Island,[22]andEldershave continued to fight for connection to the remaining islands within what they consider as their homelands.[24]

Traditional lands

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After the enactment of theNative Title Act 1993,[22]in May 1996, the Kaurareg people lodged fivenative title claimswith theNational Native Title Tribunalover parts of the following islands:[26]

In 2001 afederal courtruled to return the seven islands to Kaurareg control.[22]

Administered by theAboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission(ATSIC) and theTorres Strait Regional Authority(TSRA), the Kaurareg declared their independence from Australia in 2002,[27]after regaining native title over their ancestral land. They call their lands the United Isles of Kaiwalagal.[22]

Historical records indicate that the Kaurareg Aboriginal people are the Traditional Owners for Thursday island; however there are (as of 2018) no active Native Title claims over this area. The Kaurareg people refer to Thursday Island as "Waibene". For thousands of years the Kaurareg followed traditional patterns of hunting, fishing and agriculture and maintained close cultural and trading ties with the Aboriginal groups of the Northern Peninsula Area ofCape York.[28]

Identity and recognition

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The Karuareg and Torres Strait communities have always lived alongside each other, and have close inter-familial and cultural ties.[24]However, Kaurareg people reported feeling neglected by ATSIC and TSRA, and "caught in the middle of a power struggle". This led to questions of identity among the people, who mostly do not view themselves as Torres Strait Islanders but as Aboriginal Australians.[22]

A 2012 community forum identified that

Kaurareg Aboriginal people have suffered cultural prejudice from the wider community but also within the local community. Historically they are a nation of people dispossessed of their traditional lands, culture and language. There has been little acknowledgement of the Kaurareg Aboriginal people from the people who settled on their traditional lands. This has caused immense tension, anger and hurt and people feel they are still fighting for the appropriate recognition.

The forum found that community fragmentation, followed by loss of culture and identity, disempowerment and government systems, were the things affecting the Kaurareg people negatively the most.[24]

Traditional practices

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The Kaurareg distinguish at least six kinds oftide.Knowing where to hunt and fish, and in which kinds of currents, allows the Kaurareg access to a wide range of seafood. A strong ethic of sustainability means that over-hunting is punished. Kaurareg marine lore teaches "one can fish successfully only when one is hungry".[29]

The story of these people was featured in theSBStelevisionprogramLiving Black.[30]Kaurareg men were long-haired and went naked, save for as belt, while the women, apart from periods of mourning when it was removed, and replaced by asoger(long fringed skirt)[31]wore a leaf petticoat (zazi), and had closely cropped hair. Bothseptum piercingand wooden lobe plugs were customary.[32]

Death rites among the Kaurareg were apparently the same as those prevailing among the Mua and other Islanders. Once the deceased'smari(spirit) left the body, the latter was laid on asara(mortuary bier raised on four legs) and left until decomposition stripped the flesh from the bones, and the latter were rubbed with red, gathered within a bark sheath and buried in a sand mound surrounded by shells, skulls and dugong bones.[31]

Notable people

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See also

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Notes

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  1. ^Note: Needs checking – Aboriginal or Islander people?

Citations

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  1. ^Dousset 2005.
  2. ^AUSLANG 2012.
  3. ^Shnukal 2001,pp. 23–24.
  4. ^Shnukal 2008,p. 24.
  5. ^Shnukal 2008,pp. 24–25.
  6. ^Greer, McIntyre-Tamwoy & Henry 2011,p. 2.
  7. ^Haddon 2011,pp. 50–51.
  8. ^Shnukal 2008,p. 8.
  9. ^abSharp 1992,p. 29.
  10. ^Moore 1979,pp. 8–9.
  11. ^Wallace 2011,pp. 4–7.
  12. ^Sharp 1992,pp. 105, 109.
  13. ^Carroll 1969,p. 40 n21.
  14. ^Carroll 1969,p. 37.
  15. ^Queensland Govt: Hammond 2014.
  16. ^Queensland Govt: Thursday Is. 2014.
  17. ^abSharp 1992,pp. 71–72.
  18. ^Bowen & Bowen 2002,p. 149.
  19. ^Osborne 2009,p. 11.
  20. ^Moore 1979,pp. 12–13.
  21. ^Sharp 1992,p. 109.
  22. ^abcdefCultural Survival 2002.
  23. ^abSharp 1992,pp. 109–110.
  24. ^abcdHealing Foundation 2012.
  25. ^Southon & Elders 2014,p. 352.
  26. ^NNTT 2001.
  27. ^ABC 2012.
  28. ^GoQ 2018.
  29. ^MESA 2013.
  30. ^Clarke 2012.
  31. ^abShnukal 2008,p. 23.
  32. ^Shnukal 2008,p. 9.

Sources

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Further reading

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