The area between the Lighthouse and
Information Centre on Commercial Road Port
Adelaide was one of the summer camps of the
Kaurna people. Here lived Ityamiitpinna, his wife
Tangkaira and their daughter Ivaritji and other
members of their family group. Ityamiitpinna,
also known as King Rodney, was reported to
have been the first Kaurna man encountered
by Europeans when they arrived at the Port in
1836. For thousands of years Kaurna people
had summer camps along the Port waterways
and beaches and fed on fish, crabs and oysters.
Ityamaiitpinna means ‘father of mushrooms’.
It was common to be called ‘father of...’
Ityamaiitpinna’s summer camp was at Port
Adelaide. He used to live in the Botanic
Gardens in the winter.
“We didn’t roam around, we only went west
to east. We lived in the west by the sea in the
summer and in the foothills for the winter. We
were managers of country. It was a magical
system because everyone looked after the land -
the Sturt River (Warriparinga) was blue when the
first settlers came, they were shocked, but then
they used the rivers as sewers, tanners, washing
wool in them and wrecked them. You shouldn’t
put anything in the river. We always lived well
back from the river so it stayed pure and so
the animals can drink the water and it’s useful
all round.
Port Adelaide has always been an important
place for Aboriginal people. The Kaurna people
gave the Port Adelaide area the name Yertabulti,
Yerta is land; bulti a place to sleep. Mudla is the
place of the nose, a natural corral where you can
round up the emus.
Traditional people were educated people, we ran
conferences, we had a word for ‘conference’ and
a word for ‘ambassador’. Some of our people
knew 20 languages. We had an edict that you
speak the language of the person you speak to.
We had to have a lot of knowledge and were
interested in learning a lot of subjects. We’re
thinking as we go, we’re not relying on tools.
It’s magical thinking, you’re training your brain
on all different levels, language, orientation,
a lot of different factors.
We always know, our eyes will tell us. We can
see much more detail. We can discriminate
between the bush and the animal. We lived
outside and looked long distances in clear light,
we didn’t weaken our eyes with reading inside.”
Lewis O’Brien
Ityamiitpinna
Ngadluko, Kaurna Meyunnu,
Kaurna yerta tampendi
Let’s recognise Kaurna People
and Kaurna Land
Uncle Lewis O’Brien
