Most pages about the Stirling Ridge use English names. This page sits as an appendix in order to acknowledge the lives of the Noongar indigenous people who lived in this area for thousands of years before first contact with non-indigenous people.
The whole range was known as Koikyennuruff (also written Koi Kyenunu-ruff, and recorded in 1832 as Koikyeuneruff), usually translated as “mist moving around the mountains” — a fitting name for peaks that make their own weather and are wrapped in cloud most mornings. To the Noongar this is a place of deep significance: a place where, in their tradition, the spirits of the dead return, and where ancestral beings are bound to the summits. For that reason it is treated with respect, not conquered.
The first non-indigenous person to describe the range in any detail was Ensign (later Lieutenant) Robert Dale, who explored it in 1832 looking for grazing land. The country was then occupied by people Dale recorded as the “white cockatoo” clan — almost certainly Minang or Goreng. From his account and a few later records, only a handful of the original names survive, and that is where care is needed: there is good reason to think that some surviving names were later attached by surveyors to different peaks than the ones they first described. So the tidy list on a modern map may not match the older naming underneath it.
iThe names ending in “-up”
You will notice many peaks here end in -up, -erup or -oorup: Coyanerup, Isongerup, Pyungoorup, Moongoongoonderup. In Noongar, the suffix -up means “place of”. These were working names — a spoken map — that told people where to find water, food and shelter as they moved through the ranges.
What the first part of each name means is, honestly, harder to know — and in some cases so is which peak a name first belonged to. Many of these names were written down by surveyors a century or more ago. Over time the original meanings and pronunciations of a great number of them have been lost, and a few seem to have drifted from one summit to another. So below, we name what we can, mark plainly what is well recorded and what is uncertain, note where the old name may sit on a different peak than the map suggests, and leave room to be corrected.
iiThe peaks, west to east
Travelling the eastern massif from Coyanerup and Bluff Knoll out towards Ellen Peak:
A Noongar “place of” name on the western shoulder of the eastern ridge. The recorded meaning of the first part has not been found in public sources.
The highest peak in the south-west. Known to the Minang and Goreng as Pualaar Miial (also Boola Miyel), often translated “great many-faced hill” or “many eyes” — the rock formations near the summit were seen as eyes looking out across the valley. Its mists were understood as the visible form of a spirit. The English name comes from the range itself, named in 1835 after Governor James Stirling; it has also appeared on maps as Mount James. There is also a historical suggestion, traceable to the early records, that the name Isongerup may originally have belonged to this peak rather than the mid-ridge peak that now carries it.
Bluff Knoll’s near neighbour and “false summit”. We have not found a recorded Noongar name.
Another Noongar “place of” name along the ridge. Meaning of the first part not recorded in sources we could find.
A Noongar “place of” name, today mapped to a peak in the middle of the ridge (with North and South summits). But the early record suggests the name may first have described Bluff Knoll itself — so its modern placement may be a later surveyor’s reassignment. First element undocumented in public sources.
The three jagged peaks (First, Second and Third Arrow) at the heart of the ridge — the most technical ground on the walk, named in English for their resemblance to arrows. Mirlpunda is very widely used as if it were the Noongar name for this section, and there is even a “Mirlpunda Track” on the northern side. But research turns up no documented connection to Noongar usage or meaning. The likeliest explanation is that the word has circulated so long in the bushwalking and photographic community — it was already in print by the late 1990s — that it has acquired the appearance of an Indigenous name but may or may not be one. We flag it here rather than repeat it as fact.
A small rise between the Arrows and Pyungoorup. No recorded Noongar name found.
One of the highest and most dramatic peaks on the ridge; a Noongar “place of” name. The early record gives its meaning as something like “a lump on one’s backside” — and suggests the name may originally have referred to Ellen Peak rather than the peak that carries it on today’s maps.
The eastern-most peak of the ridge and, for most walkers, the start or the end of the traverse. It carries an English name today; the early record hints that the Noongar name Pyungoorup may originally have belonged to this peak.
iiiA note about stories
There are Creation stories tied to these mountains — including the story behind the name Koikyennuruff. Those stories belong to the Noongar, and are best heard from the community in their own words rather than retold second-hand. Where you would like to know more, the sources below point to Noongar-led accounts.
Nomenclature in this website
For convenience, to avoid confusion as well as aiming for cohesion with other published sources, we have used commonly accepted names found on other maps and in current usage throughout this website. This is really for convenience only. The aim of this section of the website is to point out the uncertainty in the naming, and also the unfortunate fact that so much from our indigenous history has been lost.
Where this came from
- Robert Dale, journal of his 1832 expedition into the range, and Descriptive Account of the Panoramic View &c. of King George’s Sound and the Adjacent Country (1834) — the earliest detailed non-indigenous record, and the source for several of the older names and the “white cockatoo” clan
- Kaartdijin Noongar — South West Aboriginal Land and Sea Council: noongarculture.org.au
- Boodjar Nyungar Placenames project: derbalnara.org.au
- Landgate — Western Australian geographic names and their histories
- Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions (Explore Parks WA) — Stirling Range National Park
- C. G. von Brandenstein, Nyungar Anew (Noongar wordlist), for the “-up = place of” suffix and Noongar vocabulary