The Pitapita or Pitta Pitta are an Aboriginal Australian people of the state of Queensland .
6-570: They spoke Pitapita , one of the Karnic languages , which remains the best described dialect of an eastern group that comprised also Rangwa, Kunkalanya, Ngulupulu and Ringa-Ringa. It is otherwise closely related to the Western group consisting of Wangkajutjuru/Wangka-Yutjurru and Lhanima . The Pitapita's precise geographical borders are not known, since the earliest detailed account of them, by Walter Roth , included numerous subtribes and hordes in
12-411: A somewhat confusing presentation. Norman Tindale remarked that the precise tribal distribution was impossible to determine on the basis of Roth's data but that their area was in the present day Shire of Boulia , extending from Fort William in the north, through Boulia and some 50 miles south of the district, suggesting a territorial range of roughly 2,700 square miles (7,000 km). Their land
18-476: Is an extinct Australian Aboriginal language . It was spoken around Boulia, Queensland . The name pituri for the leaves chewed as a stimulant by traditional Aboriginal people has been claimed to be derived from the Pitta Pitta word pijiri . though Walter Roth pointed out in 1897 that the word 'pituri', thus pronounced, was the term used by the neighbouring Yurlayurlanya people, and added that
24-483: The Pitta Pitta people called it " tarembola ". In 1979, Barry J. Blake reported that Pitta Pitta was "virtually extinct", with only three speakers remaining – Ivy Nardoo of Boulia, Ted Marshall and Linda Craigie of Mount Isa . It is now considered unlikely that any speakers remain. Below is a basic vocabulary list from Blake (1981). The Pitta Pitta had well-developed a signed form of their language . This Australian Aboriginal languages -related article
30-557: The whole of the district. In 2012 a Federal Court awarded the Pitapita native title rights to 30,000 square kilometres (12,000 sq mi) of land in the Boulia region. The Pitapita practised both circumcision and subincision as part of their initiatory rites. Source: Tindale 1974 , p. 184 Source: Eglinton 1886 , p. 364 Pitta Pitta language Pitta Pitta (also known under several other spellings)
36-537: Was adjacent to the Wanggamala people. Opening up the country to white settlement led to the displacement of numerous tribes in the area from their traditional grounds, and "with privation, disease, alcohol and lead", whole communities were annihilated. By the time of his sojourn at Boulia, Roth goes on to estimate that, as with most tribes in the area, the Pitapita were suffering from a rapid demographic collapse, and he stated that no more than 200 probably remained in
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