The traditional custodians of the land in the Koo Wee Rup area, belong to the Kulin Nation and now more specifically the Bunurong People.
On July 1st 2021, the Victorian Aboriginal Heritage Council has once again announced the reallocation of land, back to the Traditional Owners. The land which has been allocated is the land in the east of Melbourne, which is considered land of the Kulin Nation. After consultation with both the Bunurong and Wurundjeri peoples, two of the five clan groups of the Kulin nation, new boundaries have been decided.
The following map shows the distribution of land and its boundaries.
The Kulin Nation
The Kulin Nation consists of the five language groups who are the traditional custodians and are those that lived in the Port Phillip and Western Port regions:
Boonwurrung (Boon-wur-rung)
Dja Dja Wurrung (Jar-Jar-Wur-rung)
Taungurung (Tung-ger-rung)
Wathaurung (Wath-er-rung)
Woiwurrung (Woy-wur-rung), commonly known as Wurundjeri.
These groups have strong cultural connections with this land. Aboriginal culture holds an inherent ethic of land stewardship incorporating a belief system that places Traditional Owners as both custodians of and belonging to the land.
The collective traditional territory of the Kulin Nation extends around Port Phillip and Western Port. It extends up into the Great Dividing Range and the Loddon and Goulburn River valleys.
In the language groups of the Boon Wurrung and Woi Wurrung (Wurundjeri) peoples of the Kulin Nation, Womindjeka / Wominjeka means ‘welcome’.
More specifically, Bubup Womindjeka means ‘Welcome Children’ in the language of the Boon Wurrung People, and we here at St John the Baptist Catholic Primary School certainly reinstate those words and sentiment.
