Yangman

The Yangman were an indigenous Australian people of the Northern Territory.

Language

The Yangman language was closely related to Wardaman and Dalabon, and survives fragmentarily as passive knowledge among a few Mangarrayi people, descendants through intermarriage of Yangman who once worked at Elsey Station and around Mataranka.^[1] Jimmy Daniels (d.1986) was the last known fluent native speaker, though rather reluctant to think back in his mother-tongue, and left a record of some 500 words in interviews with the linguist Francesca Merlan.^[1]

Country

Traditional lands of the Aboriginal tribes in the Roper River area of the Northern Territory

In Tindale's estimation the Yangman's territory extended over some 5,600 square miles (15,000 km²) covering basically the plateau terrain lying between the Roper and Victoria river systems. Its southern reaches extended to Elsey Creek, south of Mataranka, especially around Warlock Ponds,^[2] as far as Daly Waters.^[3] The Wardaman people lay to their west.^[2]