Djerait
# Djerait

The Djerait were an indigenous Australian people of the Northern Territory

## Language

The Djerait language was said to have been mutually intelligible with that of the Mulluk-Mulluk who spoke a Daly river language, being as distant as ancient Greek dialects were to each other. And it was also said to be interchangeable with that spoken by the Pongaponga.

## Country

According to Norman Tindale, the Djerait occupied some 500 square miles (1,300 $km^2)$ of tribal land on the north shores of Anson Bay, extending north to Point Blaze. Neighbouring tribes were the Mulluk-Mulluk, the Madngella the Pongaponga and the Wogait.

## People

The Jesuit missionary Donald Mackillop stated that the Djerait were a "small but intelligent tribe".

## Some words

* yinnung delluk (bamboo nose stick)
* wennu. (conical helmet smeared with pipe clay and topped with a bone to which an emu plume is affixed)
* barang (dangerous night spirit, noseless and with blanks for facial eyes, with two organs on the back for seeing at great distances.'

## Alternative names

* Tjerait
* Cherait, Cherite
* Sherait
* Jeerite
* Scherits
* Tjiras
* Paperbark natives
