Beeliar people

The Beeliar are a clan or group of Indigenous Australians belonging to the Noongar tribal people of the South West region of Western Australia. Robert Lyon referred to the Beeliar people as one of the five groups of the Perth metropolitan area, but it is now thought that they may have been a family subgroup of a larger group, which Daisy Bates refers to as "Beelgar". When British settlers arrived to establish the Swan River Colony in 1829, there were about 60 Beeliar people, including Midgegooroo and Yagan. The Beeliar group no longer exists, and although some present-day Noongars trace their ancestry to Yagan, they identify as Noongars rather than Beeliar.

The Beeliar people had customary land usage rights over the land from the Swan and Canning Rivers south to Mangles Bay. This area was sometimes also referred to as Beeliar.

See also

• Beeliar, Western Australia, a suburb of Perth

References

• Bourke, Michael (1987). "Chapter 3: Yagan 'The Patriot' and 'Governor' Weeip". On the Swan. Nedlands, Western Australia: University of Western Australia Press. ISBN 0-85564-258-0.