Smythe, writing in the 1940s in the Casino area, noted that some of his informants stated "Beigal" (Man or People) was the tribal name, others though stated there never was a shared named in use. In traditional culture, there was no general name for this "language", this being noted as early as 1892. The Aboriginal dialects spoken from Beenleigh/Beaudesert south to the Clarence River are said by linguists to be a single language or linguistic group. Yugambeh descendants state that the name Bundjalung, applied by Europeans and adjacent peoples, is a misnomer. The Yugambeh use the word Miban/Mibanj / Mibin meaning wedge-tailed eagle to denote an indigenous person of the group, and is the preferred endonym for the people Gurgun Mibinyah (Language of Mibin ) being used to describe their dialects Yugambeh, Nganduwal, and Ngarangwal. Tindale listed a number of alternative names and spellings for the Jukambe including: Yugambir, Yugumbir, Yoocumbah, Yoocum, Jukam, Yukum, Yögum, Yuggum, Jugambeir, Chepara, Tjapera, Tjipara, Chipara. Yugambeh refers to people descended from speakers of a range of dialects spoken in the Albert and Logan River basins of South Queensland, stretching over the area from the Gold Coast west to Beaudesert, while also including the coastal area just over the border into New South Wales along the coast down to the Tweed Valley. Their ethnonym derives from the Yugambeh word for "no", namely yugam/yugam(beh), reflecting a widespread practice in Aboriginal languages to identify a tribe by the word they used for a negative, this is typical of the area, as Kabi, Wakka, Jandai, Guwar all mean "no" as well. Yugambeh is the traditional language term for the Aboriginal people that inhabit the territory between the Logan river and the Tweed river. Watson's map of South-east Queensland tribes, circa 1944 The 2016 Australian census records 12,315 Aboriginal people in the four local government areas, a portion of these are non-Yugambeh Aboriginal peoples who have moved into the area for work, or as a result of forced removals. It is estimated there were between 1,500 and 2,000 Aboriginal people in the watersheds of the Logan, Albert, Coomera and Nerang before the 1850s. Throughout the 70s-90s, the Yugambeh founded organisations and businesses in culture/language, housing and community care, wildlife and land preservation, and tourism. The last of the missions/reserves in the area closed in 19, though people continued to occupy them. Other Yugambeh people found refuge in the mountains or gained employment among the Europeans. Their arrival displaced Yugambeh groups, and conflict between both sides soon followed throughout the 1850/60s By the 20th century, they were being forced onto missions and reserves despite local resistance. Įuropeans arrived within their proximity in the 1820s, before formally entering Yugambeh territory c.1842. The Yugambeh territory is subdivided among clan groups with each occupying a designated locality, each clan having certain rights and responsibilities in relation to their respective areas. By the time European colonisation began, the Yugambeh had a complex network of groups, and kinship. Archaeological evidence indicates Aboriginal people have occupied the area for tens of thousands of years. Historically, some anthropologists have erroneously referred to them as the Chepara (also written as Chipara, Tjapera ), the term for a first-degree initiate. A term for an Aboriginal of the Yugambeh tribe is Mibunn (also written as Miban/Mibanj, Mibin, Mibiny, Mebbon, Meebin ), which is derived from the word for the Wedge-tailed Eagle. They are alternatively known as the Minyungbal. The Yugambeh (s ee alternative spellings) are an Aboriginal Australian people of south-east Queensland and the Northern Rivers of New South Wales, their territory lies between the Logan and Tweed rivers. Ancestor exhibition at the Yugambeh Museum Language and Heritage Research Centre