One of our favorite readers, Sharon Lynne, asked "Okay...what's a Brumbie?" I am glad you asked, because I learned a lot just researching the definition of "Brumbie"!
According to the Wikipedia Encyclopedia a brumbie is a wild horse of Australia. Spelled brumbie, brumby and brumbee, "It is similar to the American mustang." The following is a quote from the Origin of the term section over at Wikipedia Encyclopedia:
The name brumby comes from the horses left behind by Sergeant James Brumby from his property at Mulgrave Place in New South Wales, when he left for Tasmania in 1804. The name may also have come from an Aboriginal word "baroomby" meaning wild in the language of the Pitjara people on the Warrego and Nogoa Rivers in southern Queensland. Banjo Paterson said in the introduction for his poem Brumby's Run published in the Bulletin in 1894 that Brumby was the word for free-roaming horses. A letter in 1896 to the Sydney Morning Herald also says that baroombie is the word for horse among the Aboriginal people of the Balonne, Nebine, Warrego and Bulloo rivers.
Another explanation is that the name comes from Baramba, which was the name of a creek and station in the Queensland district of Burnett, which had been established in the 1840s, and later abandoned, leaving many of the horses to escape into the wild. It has also been suggested that the name comes from the Irish word bromach or bromaigh.
The first recorded use of the term was from the Australasian magazine from Melbourne in 1880, which said that brumbies were the bush name in Queensland for 'wild' horses. In 1885 the Once a Month magazine suggested that brumbies was a New South Wales term.
A couple of our favorite movies include "The Man from Snowy River" and "The Man from Snowy River II". I didn't know that the movie was based on a poem by Banjo Paterson*, until I did the research on the term "Brumby"! The poem is of substantial length being 13 stanzas long with eight lines in each stanza. Tony likes to memorize poems, so I will try to get him to record this one so that I can add it to the left column of this blog!!* Interesting Note: Banjo Paterson appears on the Australian $10 bill and composed the famous ballad "Waltzing Matilda"! This animated image is taken from TnT's collection of Australian money.
So, technically TnT did not ride "brumbies" when they rode the train out to Glenworth Valley to ride Australian horses, unless the stock had "Brumbie Blood" in their lineage...
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MnC's Disclaimer: At no time is excessive force, cruelty or brutality used when training the horses pictured in this blog. Reinforcing pats and firm gentleness, along with calmness from the trainers, encourage the horses to do as they are asked.
9 comments:
That was really interesting !! Thanks!
You are most welcome Marvel! I found some really neat information while researching!!
I love soundtracks to motion pictures...now I have to add the one for "The Man From Snowy River" to my collection!!!
Interesting info! I'd like to think it came from the Aboriginal tribes. Well...thanks for helping me add a new word to my vocab!
Hi Sharon Lynne! I found this research most interesting myself!! Thanks for asking the question!!!
Very interesting indeed. I used to groom horses for a trainer who used the term pretty regularly for horses that weren't in show condition. If it looked like it had been living in a pasture somewhere all winter, then it was a brumby to her. My guess is she's not the only horse people out there to do that.
Great post Janey. I heard this term before and didn't know what it meant. Very interesting. I love the flashing photo of the Oz money too. How did you do that? It's so clever!
Interesting info Rising Rainbow! You always are a wealth of information, yourself!
I really enjoyed doing this post, Naomi. First, I love to research and second, I found out how to add the animated gif's that I created in Adobe Photoshop Elements. I found the html over on "Tips for New Bloggers". If you would like me to send you how, just let me know.
G'day from the Great Divide in Victoria, Australia,
Home to the Man from Snowy River, Brumbies and Banjo himself.
We have the last man from Snowy River on our team.
He's the real Mckoy! Until this year he had a run in the high country, chased cattle, ran brumbies and enjoyed the freedom of his beloved mountains.
Until our government outlawed him and the rest of the remaining famillies who have been there since the 1840's. Phil Maguire is a proud battler who has fought the the powers to the bitter end.
He lives it, breathes it, he is the last man standing!
Our blog seeks to celebrate this dying culture.
Watch our space over the next few months while we build something to do justice.
Call in on us. Your welcome at our campfire anytime!
I get so frustrated that there are so many people who refer to feral horses as "wild horses".
The only TRUE wild horse left is Equus ferus przewalskii,also known as Przewalskii's horse or the Mongolina Wild Horse.
Please people, I can understand the romance and fascination with feral horses, but don't demean the true wild horses by mudding the nomenclature.
By the way, I regularly see feral horses in the area I hunt in the foot hills of Alberta, and they are majestic. But feral, OK?
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