Item 02: 'Aboriginal words and names - Lower Clarence River Dialect, compiled by Robert Leycester Dawson', September 1935 - Page 20

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[Page 20]

19

Clarence River Heads North side, (near a quarry) "Eerie-bunning". Place

where bats flit about at night.

Town of Maclean "Ee-why-ah-arrilay." Many white Cockatoos.

Lawrence or the Elbow. "Ill-boo-yah". "Illboo" means a cough but

the connection between a cough and a place name is unexplained.

Lismore "Dig-ah-rym-bah". "Digary" means sour and here again

Freeburn failed to explain any connections between "sour" and Lismore.

Tatham- "Char-gum-bah." Tatham is a village down river from Casino

and the native name probably means "place of children" chargum,

or "Charchum", meaning a child in the Casino-Lismore dialect.

Dyraaba, Cattle station 15m from Casino. "Tug-why-bin." The meaning

is not clear though "Tug-why-ah" means a messnger.

Wooroowoolgen, Cattle station near Casino. "Doom-gun." This wind

means "a wave", so called, perhaps, because of the wave like

appearance of some of the adjacent country. 

Years ago the Casino blacks denied that th original

names of these two stations belonged to their dialect.

One man thought that Wooroowoolgen might be a corruption

of "Wooroocooloom" a magpie. I think Freeburn got

the last four names (including those for Lismore and Tatham)

from his wife a native of Casino Lismore tribe.

  Both Cattle stations are on south side of the rivers.

"Beer-rin-bah" - general name of the Clarence river; Freeburn

could give no meaning for this word. 

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