Noongari

The Noongari, more commonly spelled Noongar, are the Aboriginal people of south-western Western Australia, a land they call Noongar boodja. Fourteen local groups speak mutually intelligible dialects of a Pama–Nyungan language; their name means man or person.

They ordered the year into six seasons, hunting kangaroos, possums and wallabies, taking fish in river traps, and gathering yams, wattle seeds and the carefully detoxified nuts of the zamia palm. When British ships first appeared the newcomers were taken for returning spirits and called djaanga, white spirits.

The Swan River settlement seized the best farmland, and clashes followed over controlled burning and livestock. In June 1832 the Whadjuk leader Yagan was declared an outlaw; he was later ambushed and killed and his head was sent to England for display. In 1834 the Pinjarra massacre broke the armed resistance of the Pindjarup.