The Nyoongar Legacy Online

The Nyoongar Legacy is the result of decades of research into Nyoongar language by the Rt. Rev. Bernard Rooney OSB, Emeritus Abbot of New Norcia. It is a study of the Indigenous place-names of the south-west of Western Australia, including over 300 Indigenous place names from the region.

Each entry offers an interpretation of the source for a particular place and the possible or probable meanings.

The book includes a comprehensive dictionary of the Nyoongar language focusing on what is now known as the northern dialect.

Divided into two sections, Nyoongar­English and English­Nyoongar, the dictionary is the result of the author’s own grass­roots experience of Nyoongar as a spoken language and offers the fruits of his extensive research into the available written sources.

These sources include published dictionaries as well as unpublished word­lists dating back to the foundation of the colony of Western Australia.