"These family names are common over a great portion of the continent; for
instance, on the Western coast, in a tract of country extending between
four and five hundred miles in latitude, members of all these families
are found. In South Australia, I met a man who said that he belonged to
one of them, and Captain Flinders mentions Yungaree, as the name of a
native in the Gulf of Carpentaria.
"These family names are perpetuated, and spread through the country, by
the operation of two remarkable laws: -
"1st. That children of either sex, always take the family name of their
mother.
"2nd. That a man cannot marry a woman of his own family name."
From this it appears that the natives of that part of the country have in
addition to their other ordinary names a family or surname, which is
perpetuated through successive generations on the mother's side. This is
not the case as far as my observations and inquiries have enabled me to
ascertain among the numerous tribes frequenting the Murray river, and Mr.
Moorhouse assures me that he has been equally unable to detect any
coincidence of the kind among the tribes frequenting the district of
Adelaide.
The division, numbers, and names of the various tribes are also subjects
of difficulty and uncertainty. As far as my researches have yet extended
upon this point, it appears to me, first, that groups of natives have a
distinctive or a local appellation, derived from the particular place
they belong to, as Barmerara maru, the natives frequenting the lake
called Barmera: Moolyoolpero maru, the natives frequenting the lagoon
called Moolyoolko, and so on. Secondly, a general or tribal name, as
Narwijjerook, a native of the tribe so called, which includes the natives
of Barmera and various others in that neighbourhood. Karn-brickolenbola,
a native of the tribe so called, and which includes various groups around
Mooroonde. Thirdly, it appears that wherever a change occurs in the name
of the tribes to which contiguous groups of natives may belong, there is
a corresponding change in the dialect or language spoken; thus the
Narwij-jerook speak a dialect called Narwijjong, the Karn-brickolenbola
tribe the Aiawong dialect, and so on.
In many of these dialects there appears to be little more difference than
exists among the counties in England. Such is the case up the course of
the Murray from Lake Alexandrina to the Darling; and such Captain Grey
found to be the case throughout a great part of Western Australia. In
others the dialects are so totally unlike one another, that natives,
meeting upon opposite sides of a river, cannot speak to or understand a
word of what each other say, except through the medium of a third
language, namely that spoken by the natives of the river itself, and
which is totally unlike either of the other two.
This is the case at Moorunde, where three different dialects meet, the
Yakkumban, or dialect spoken by the Paritke tribe, or natives inhabiting
the scrub to the west and north-west of the Murray.
