About Kaurna
Kaurna
Miyurna
Kaurna
Yarta
Kaurna
Warra
Kaurna Peoples Native Title Claim
The people of the Kaurna Nation are the mathanya (owner/custodians) and culture bearers of the lands of what is now called the Adelaide Plains. At the time of the establishment of the British colony of South Australia in 1836, their ancestors had lived on and from this land and its coastline for innumerable generations. Their land and waters reaches from the southern tip of Cape Jervis to near Crystal Brook at the northern end of Gulf St Vincent and West of the Mount Lofty Ranges to the coast and adjacent waters of the Gulf St Vincent.
By the mid-1800s, the Kaurna people were driven out of their land and settled in “Mission” stations at Poonindie (Eyre Peninsula), Burgiyana/Point Pearce (York Peninsula) and Raukkan/Point Mcleay (Lake Alexandrina), where they were forbidden to speak and transmit their own languages. Most likely, the Kaurna language was last spoken in a day-to-day context in the 1860s and was considered extinct even as early as 1850.
Map: Kaurna Native Title Claim, Courtesy of Land Services Group, Government of South Australia