The Names of South Australia

The Names of South Australia: Adeilde City Centre | Adelaide's Suburrbs | South Australia's Regional Cities and Towns

South Australia's Regional Cities and Towns

Adelaide
Named by royal command after Queen Adelaide , consort to King William IV. The city survey commenced 11th January 1837 and was completed 10th March 1837. Colonel Light intended to call the city Wellington but was overruled by Governor Hindmarsh. Queen Adelaide died in 1849. The native name of the area where Adelaide was surveyed by Light was recorded as Tarndanya, Tadanya or Tandarnya, meaning 'home of the red kangaroo'. Gov. Hindmarsh was never very optimistic about the suitability of the site, claiming, "it can never be a permanent capital by whatever means it may for a while be propped up. It can at best be nothing more than an inland market town of a fertile but limited district".


Aldinga
Of Aboriginal origin derived from 'aldinghi', meaning 'plenty of water'.


Andamooka
Of Aboriginal origin. Opals have been found at Andamooka since 1930, the largest being the famous 'Andamooka' opal which was presented to Queen Elizabeth II in 1954.


Angaston
Recalls George Fife Angas, a Scotsman who was involved in bringing a number of shiploads of German Lutherans to South Australia. It was originally known as German Pass because of the large number of German settlers there.


Ardrossan
Named by Governor Sir James Fergusson after a sea port in Ayrshire, Scotland which he had previously represented in Parliament.


Arkaroola
Of Aboriginal origin. The Adnajamathana Aborigines believed that Arkaroo, a mythical monster, drank Lake Frome dry and then crawled into the mountains. As Arkaroo moved through the land he created the Arkaroola Creek.


Arthurton
Named after Arthur Musgrave, a son of Sir Anthony Musgrave, who was Governor of South Australia from 1873 to 1877. The Aboriginal name for the locality was "Kalkabury" which meant "she-oak hill". In 1874, when the first post office opened, it was known as Kalkabury until 1876 when it was officially changed to Arthurton.


Auburn
Originally known as Tateham's Waterhole after a local settler, William 'Billy' Tateham. The name Auburn was coined by settler Thomas Henry Williams in 1856 when he subdivided his land to create the town. It is named after a town in Ireland.


Balaklava
Recalls a famous battle of the Crimean War. It was named in 1877.


Balgowan
Named by Governor Sir James Fergusson after a town in Perthshire, Scotland.


Barmera
The name is of Aboriginal origin but its exact meaning is the subject of conjecture. Some sources claim it is an Aboriginal word meaning or identifying a place of water, or that it refers to its original people, they being 'land dwellers'. Other sources say that it is derived from Barmeedjie, the name of an Aboriginal tribal group that lived on the northern banks of the Murray River before European settlement.


Beachport
Known as 'Wirmalngrang' to the local Booandik Aborigines, its original inhabitants. Its present name is descriptive.

Berri
Of Aboriginal origin, believed to mean or refer to a bend in the river.


Bethany
The Anglicised version of Bethanien, which is the name given to it by the first settlers, who were Lutheran Germans. The name refers to a town in the New Testament in the Bible, a place where Jesus performed miracles.


Birdwood
Recalls Sir William Birdwood who commanded the Anzacs at Gallipoli and the Fifth British Army in France. The town was originally called Blumberg after a small village in Prussia which is close to the river route used by the Silesian pioneers on their way from the likes of Züllichau and Klemzig. The town's name was changed during World War I because of anti-German sentiment. It is claimed that J. G. Bluemel laid out and named the town. It was given that name when being established as the new home for a group of German Lutherans escaping persecution in their homeland (see Lobethal). Unlike Lobethal and Hahndorf, its name has never been changed back to the original German name.


Bordertown
In the early days of European settlement, the are was known as 'tatiara', its local Ngarrindjeri Aboriginal name said to mean 'good country'. The name Bordertown was first given to a depot established near the state border on the western Victorian goldfields to Port Adelaide gold escort route when it was being established.


Burra
Believed by some to be of Hindustani origin, meaning "great". The word is said to have come from the early shepherds It is taken from the name of the region, Burra Burra. The mining area was so greatg it had to be divided into a number of separate communities based on the ethnic origins of the miners. These included Redruth for the Cornish miners; Aberdeen for the Scottish miners; Llychwr for the Welsh miners and Hampton for the English miners. All these remnant villages still exist. Other sources claim 'burra' is common in Aboriginal languages and is therefore of Aboriginal origin.


Cape Jervis
Named by Matthew Flinders in March 1802, it being the family name of Earl St Vincent, President of the Board of the Admiralty. John Jervis, Viscount St. Vincent (1735-1823) under whom Flinders sailed. French explorer Nicolas Baudin, who met Flinders at Encounter Bay to the south east two weeks later, named it Cap de La Secheresse (Cape Barren) whilst Freycinet called it Cap d'Alembert after Jean-le-Rond d'Alembert (1717-1783), French mathematician who was abandoned as a baby on the steps of the church of St. Jean Baptiste de Rond. Both French names were never used, but the name given by Baudin to the peninsula - Fleurieu Peninsula, has been retained. It honours Charles Pierre Claret, Comte de Fleurieu, French Minister for Marine in the 1790s. It was Fleurieu who lobbied emperor Napoleon to support Baudin's Australian voyage. The name Fleurieu remained unrecognised until a nephew of Fleurieu's, Compte Alphonse de Fleurieu visited Australia in 1905. In 1911 he encouraged the Surveyor General to adopt the names given by French explorers to places that did not have a name.


Ceduna
A corruption of the local Aboriginal word 'chedoona' which is said to mean 'a place to sit down and rest'. The town was surveyed in 1901 and became known as Murat Bay. The present name was adopted in 1921 when the name of the local local Post Office was changed to be the same as the railway siding.
Matthew Flinders named Denial Bay, not only because he was denied entry to the day - off its shore is St Peter Island, and it was St Peter who denied Christ three times! In his journal Flinders wrote: 'The bay to the northward, between the islands and the mainland I named Denial Bay, as well in allusion to St Peter as to the deceptive hope we had formed of penetrating by it some distance into the interior country.'


Clare
The area was variously known as The Twins (after the two gum trees where pioneer settler Edward 'Paddy' Burton Gleeson first pitched his tent), Inchiquin (the name of his property), Gleeson's Village and eventually Gleeson. To remove confusion, when the township was surveyed, it was named after County Clare, Gleeson's birth place in Ireland.


Cleve
Named after Cleve House, the country seat of the Snow family who were cousins of Governor Sir William Francis Drummond Jervois. Jervois was Governor of South Australia from 1877-83.


Coffin Bay
The bay was named by Matthew Flinders in March 1802 after his friend, naval officer Sir Isaac Coffin , who was to become a Vice Admiral of the British Navy. Coffin was the Royal Navy's Resident Commissioner at Sheerness, England, who supervised the fitting out of Investigator.


Coober Pedy
Of Aboriginal origin, it means 'white fellow's hole in the ground', a reference to the many opal mines and underground homes in the area - 'coober' means either boy, uninitiated man or white man; 'pedy' means hole or rock hole.


Cowell
Franklin Harbour was named by George Gawler, Governor of South Australia,1838-41 after Sir John Franklin (Governor of Tasmania and famous Arctic explorer) who was also a midshipman on the Investigator when Matthew Flinders unwittingly mistook the harbour for a lake in 1802. The township of Cowell was gazetted and named in 1880 by Governor Sir William Francis Drummond Jervois who, in keeping with his policy of naming towns after his friends and family, named the town after Sir John Clayton Cowell who was, at the time, the Lieutenant-Governor of Windsor Castle.


Crystal Brook
The name is taken from the watercourse which runs through the area. The name was given by explorer Edward John Eyre, though he misspelt it as 'Chrystal Brook'. The spelling was corrected when William Younghusband and Peter Ferguson established a pastoral property and named it 'Crystal Brook Run'.


Cummins
Named after William Patrick Cummins who was a member of the South Australian Legislative Council from 1896-1907.


Edithburgh
Recalls Lady Edith Fergusson, the daughter of the Governor-General of India and wife of the South Australian governor of the time, Sir James Fergusson (1869-73).


Elliston
Ellie's Town it was named after the English born writer and teacher Ellen Liston who emigrated to South Australia in 1850. She became a governess working on the property near the present town. Governor Sir Sir William Francis Drummond Jervois named the town in her honour (1878) as she was a friend of his family who was widely respected and admired in the area. The settlement was originally known as Waterloo Bay, a coastal featured named along with Point Wellington and Point Wellesley in 1865 to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo. It was nearby at Escape Cliffs that white settlers, in a brutal act of reprisal, rounded up the local Aborigines and force them to jump to their deaths over the cliffs or be shop. It has been said the bay was named Waterloo as it was here that the natives 'met their Waterloo', but this is incorrect.


Eudunda
Derived from Eudundacowie springs, west of the town, which provided water for the men travelling through the area from the Murray River flats to the Adelaide markets and for drovers shifting cattle and horses between Kapunda in South Australia and Coopers Creek in western Queensland. The name, of Aboriginal origin, is said to mean 'water out of the ground'.


Gladstone
Honours William Gladstone, the British Prime Minister when the town was established in 1871.


Goolwa
Of Aboriginal origin, meaning 'elbow'. It is believed to have referred to the 'elbow' of Goolwa River as it passes Hindmarsh Island.


Gumeracha
Reputedly a corruption of the local Aboriginal word 'umeracha' which indicated a good water hole on the River Torrens. How it came to be chosen by officials of the South Australian Company in London in 1841 for the name of a new town in the Adelaide Hills is a mystery.

Hahndorf
Recalls Captain Dirk Hahn whose vessel, the 344 tonne Zebra, brought the first German Lutherans and pioneer settlers of Hahndorf to South Australia, arriving at Port Adelaide on 28th December 1838. The settlers named their settlement in the Adelaide Hills in honour of Captain Hahn, a Dane, who had helped them settle in their new land by arranging the rental of the land that would eventually become the townsite of Hahndorf. Hahn stayed on with the the new arrivals and eventually selected an area near Mt Barker to live himself.
Anti-German sentiment in Australia during World War I led to the town's name being changed to Ambleside, in spite of the fact it was of Danish origin and not German. It was not changed back until 1976.


Hallett
Recalls pastoralist brothers John and Alfred Hallett who ran Willogoleche Station in the area. Though decimated by a drought in the 1860s, the brothers clawed back from the brink of ruin to rebuilt their pastoral empire.


Hawker
Named after George Charles Hawker, Speaker of the House in the South Australian parliament when the town was established in 1880.


Innamincka
Of Aboriginal origin. It is a corruption of the word 'yidniminkani, which means 'you go into the hole there'. The name recalls a tribal totem hero who is said to have commanded a crocodile to disappear into a waterhole. The town was originally named Hopetoun, after a former Governor of Victoria who became Australia's first Governor General The name was changed in 1892.


Jamestown
Jamestown, as a town, came into existence around the Belalie Creek in 1870 as a service centre for the surrounding wheat properties. Though Belalie was used by the local Aborigines for the area, the town was named after the first name of Sir James Fergusson , who was the Governor of South Australia at the time.


Kadina
Of Aboriginal origin, it is dervied from 'caddy-yeena' or 'caddy-inna' which is believed to mean 'lizard plain'.

Kapunda
Of Aboriginal origin, derived from 'cappie oonda', which was either the name of a spring near the town site or words meaning "water jumping out".


Keith
Recalls Algernon Keith-Falconer (1852-1930), the 9th Earl of Kintore and eldest Son Of Sir Lancelot Stirling. He was Governor of South Australia from 1889 to 1895, in between terms in conservative British Governments in which he was a member of the Privy Council. Kintore's home in Aberdeenshire in Scotland was called Keith Hall and he was also known as Lord Keith.


Kimba
Of Aboriginal origin, is believed to mean 'bushfire'. The Kimba District Council's emblem incorporates a burning bush.


Kingston S.E.
Named after the government surveyor, George Strickland Kingston by the Governor of South Australia, Sir Richard Graves McDonnell, in 1858. It later became Kingston South East to distinguish it from Kingston-on-Murray.


Lameroo
The name was chosen by J. McL. Johnston, an inspector in the Post and Telegraph Service when the town was being established. Attending a large meeting of locals who could not settle on a name for their town, Johnston suggested Lameroo, which he had also given to a little bay in the Northern Territory between the Darwin Hospital and Gaol. As there was only one dissenter, the name was adopted. Johnston did not know where the name came from or what it meant, except that it was of Aboriginal origin.


Laura
Recalls Laura Hughes, the wife of Booyoolee Station's Herbert Bristow Hughes. Laura was the daughter of Samuel White, who migrated with his family from Dorset, England in 1843, and established White Park, one of South Australia's major pastoral stations


Leigh Creek
Recalls Henry Leigh, the head stockman of Alexander Glen, who took up a cattle run in the vicinity in 1856. The town was originally known as Copley, after W Copley MLC, Commissioner of Crown Lands, 1891. Unofficially known as Leigh Creek, the town waqs moved to its present site and renamed Leigh Creek after coalmining activities began nearby.


Lobethal
On the day of the division of the land by the new arrivals from Germany those in charge gave the settlement the name Lobethal, taken from the II Book of Chronicles, chapter 20, verse 26, which, according to Luther's translation, means 'Valley of praise'.


Loxton
Recalls William Charles Loxton, a boundary rider on Bookpurnong Station, who lived beside the river here in a pine and pug hut from 1878 to 1881.


Lyndoch
Thus named by surveyor Colonel Light on 13th December 1837 Light, who recorded, 'At length about 5 p.m. we came to a beautiful valley which I named Lynedoch Vale after my much esteemed friend, Thomas Graham, Lord Lynedoch.' The altered spelling has never been corrected.


McLaren Vale
Named after David McLaren, the Colonial Manager of the South Australian Land Company, who arrived in the colony in 1837 and departed three years later. Some sources claim it was named after John McLaren who surveyed the area in 1839 though this seems unlikely. Until the 1920s, the name applied to the whole district rather than just the town. The local Aboriginals called the McLaren Vale area Myallina Dooronga.


Maitland
Named in 1872 on its proclamation after Lady Jean Maitland, the wife of the First Lord of Kilkerran in Scotland, by the Governor of South Australia at the time, Sir James Fergusson. The Aboriginal name for the area was 'madu wltu which refers to the white flint common in the area.


Mannum
Of Aboriginal origin, the name originally applied to a subdivision. It was given to the town when it was surveyed in 1864. The meaning of the name is not known.




Marree
Of Aboriginal origin, meaning 'place of possums'. A water soak near the town was called Hergott Springs by explorer John McDouall Stuart, when he passed through here on his first expedition in 1859. The name honoured the Bavarian artist and naturalist in his party named Herrgott. Somewhere along the way a letter 'r' was dropped from the name. Though the town was officially named Marree, the residents referred to it as Hergott and it was not until 1918 that the Hergott Springs sign at the railway station was replaced with Marree in the wake of anti-German sentiments stirred up by World War I.


Melrose
Of unknown origin. Believed to recall a town in Scotland, it is possible the name originated for Scotsman Alexander Lang Elder who was involved in the original survey of the townsite.


Meningie
Of Aboriginal origin, said to mean 'mud'.


Milang
The Anglicised version of the Aboriginal word 'millangk', meaning 'place of millin (sorcery)'.


Minlaton
Originally called Gum Flat because of the giant eucalypts which once covered the area. This name was changed to Minlaton. There was an aboriginal well in the vicinity which the natives called "Minlacowie" and which meant "Sweet water." The name is said to be derived from Minla and the Anglo Saxon suffix, "Ton", which means "town".


Mintaro
Some sources claim it to be a corruption of an Aboriginal word 'mintadloo' or 'Minta - Ngadlu' meaning 'netted water' while others claim it is derived from a Spanish word meaning 'camp or resting place'. The latter argument is based on the fact that the Burra Mining Company imported Spanish-speaking mule drivers from Uruguay to transport copper from Burra to Port Wakefield. As many as 100 Spanish mule drivers would pass through the town each day.


Moonta
Named by Gov. Sir Dominick Daly when the town was laid out in 1863. Of Aboriginal origin, it is a corruption of the Aboriginal word 'moonteraa', meaning 'a place of impenetrable scrub'.


Morgan
Named after Sir William Morgan who was South Australia's Chief Secretary when the town was proclaimed in 1878. The area was called 'coerabko' by the original Aboriginal inhabitants, meaning 'meeting place of the tribe'.


Mt Barker
The mountain was named by Captain Charles Sturt who saw it from Lake Alexandrina in April 1831 and named it after Captain Collet Barker of the 39th Regiment who had recently been killed by Aborigines in the vicinity of the mouth of the Murray River. The peak (517 metres) was known to the local Aborigines as Wommu mu Kutra and was an ancient burial site.


Mt Pleasant
The reason for the name or details as to who gave it are unknown, however it would appear that it honours a Mrs Pleasant who was a relative of one of the early settlers.


Murray Bridge
Thus named because of the railway bridge built across the Murray River here in 1879. When laid out in 1883, the town was named Mobilong. It was later named Edwards Crossing and changed again in 1924, this time to Murray Bridge when a new railway bridge across the river was completed.


Nairne
Recalls Elizabeth Corse Nairne, the wife of the town's first settler, Matthew Smillie.


Nuriootpa
Of Aboriginal origin, meaning 'meeting place. It is believed that Nuriootpa was one of the major gathering points for the Aboriginal communities in South Australia.


Oodnadatta
Of Aboriginal origin, meaning 'flower of the mulga'. The locality was named by Sir Thomas Way.


Orroroo
The town was named by Surveyor General George Woodroffe Goyder in 1875 when he designed the town's simple grid system and named the streets by numbers (first to seventeenth). The name was suggested by early settler Charlie Easther whose land was subdivided to create the town. It is of Aboriginal origin, but its meaning and correct pronunciation are still subject to conjecture. It is variously said to mean 'place of the magpie'; a rapid motion; the name of a local Aboriginal girl; or 'place of departure'.


Penong
Of Aboriginal origin, believed to be the Anglicised spelling and pronunciation of a local Aboriginal word meaning 'rock hole'.


Peterborough
Originally named Petersburg after Peter Doecke, a landowner who subdivided his land and sold it by auction. The name was Anglicised during World War I when anti-German sentiments were running so high, the Nomenclature Act demanded that all German-sounding names be changed.


Pinnaroo
Of Aboriginal origin, believed to mean 'big men', 'great men' or 'old men' in a number of Aboriginal languages.


Port Augusta
Recalls Augusta Sophia Fox nee Marryat , the wife of Sir Henry Fox Young, the Governor of South Australia at the time of the town's inception. She was the daughter of Charles Marryat and neice of the Bishop of Adelaide who married the incoming Governor of South Australia, Sir Henry Young, in 1848.


Port Clinton
Named by Governor Sir Dominck Daly after the town of Clinton in Canada where he had held the office of Chief Secretary.


Port Julia
Named after Mrs. Julia Wurm, wife of Louis Frederick Wurm who arrived on Yorke Peninsula about 1875.


Port Lincoln
Takes its name from Lincoln Cove which was named by Matthew Flinders in March 1802. It is named after the English county of his birth. Flinders was born at Donington in Lincolnshire on 16th March 1774. He named the bay, island and point after his home town of Boston and Cape Donington was named after his birthplace. Many of the coastal features in the area recall other localities in Lincolnshire. The names of Taylor, Thistle, Little, Hopkins, Warterhouse, Smith, and Lewis, found in coastal features to the south on Jussieu Peninsula, are the names of crew members lost by Flinders in a boating accident. Memory Cove and Cape Catastrophe also recall the event. He rarely named features after places he had a personal connection to, but perhaps did so on this occasion because the deaths of his crew disturbed him greatly.


Port Pirie
Taken from the Port Pirie River which was named after the schooner John Pirie. It brought the first white settlers to the area in 1845. The vessel navigated the creek from Gulf St Vincent to the present townsite.


Port Vincent
Named by Government Auctioneer Robert Cock, in 1839 when the town was being surveyed, presumably because it is on the shores of Gulf St. Vincent.


Port Victoria
Named after the schooner Victoria which took the surveyor James H. Hughes along the coast in 1839. It was originally named Wauraltree by G.E. Stangways, but was changed in 1940 following confusion over the name.


Port Wakefield
The name is taken from the River Wakefield. It was first located in 1838 by William Hill who named it after Edward Wakefield, the person whose vision of colonisation had been largely responsible for the establishment of South Australia.


Price
Takes its name from Florence Anne Price who married a son of Major-General Sir Wm. Francis Jervious. Price Island and the Hundred of Price were named after Thomas Price, MP (1893-1909) and Premier (1905-1909).


Quorn
Named after Quorndon in Leicestershire, England. The name was given by the Governor William Francis Drummond Jervois whose private secretary came from near Quorndon.


Renmark
Derived from the Aboriginal word for 'red mud'. The town was established in 1887 as the administrative centre for the irrigation scheme in the area upon its founding.


Robe
Named after Governor Frederick Holt Robe who sailed into Guichen Bay in 1846 aboard the Government cutter, Lapwing. He chose the site for the town and later in 1846 it was surveyed by Thomas Burr. Governor Robe was one of South Australia's most unpopular governors. The bay had been named after Admiral De Guichen in 1802 by the French explorer, Nicholas Baudin, as he sailed the South Australian coast.


Roxby Downs
Taken from the Roxby Downs station on which the town has been built.


Snowtown
Named by Governor William Francis Drummond Jervois in 1878, possibly after Thomas Snow who was Jervois's aide de camp, although Sebastian Snow was the Governor's Private Secretary.


South Kilkerran
Takes its name from the Hundred of Kilkerran which in turn was named after Governor Sir James Fergusson's family home in Scotland.


Stansbury
Originally known as Oyster Bay as it once had the most productive oyster beds in South Australia. The Governor Sir Anthony Musgrave renamed the town Stansbury after a Mr Stansbury, a friend of his about whom very little is known.


Stenhouse Bay
Named after Andrew Stenhouse, who in the 1920's operated the Permascite Manufacturing Company. He helped start the gypsum industry here.


Strathalbyn
Originally called Strath Albyn, the name is of Gaelic origin, derived from two words - 'Strath' meaning 'broad valley' and 'Albion' meaning 'hilly land'. Some sources suggest that 'Albion', which was also a term used to describe Great Britain, was the name of a steel mill which Dr Rankine had a large shareholding in.


Streaky Bay
Derives its name from the bay on which it stands, which was named by Matthew Flinders in 1802. Flinders observed the streaky effect of the water caused by the seaweed in the bay. When the town was proclaimed in 1872, it was given the name of Flinders. Consistent use of the original name by locals led to it being retained.


Swan Reach
A section of the river where swans were plenteous.


Tailem Bend
The origin of the name is unsure. There are a number of theories. One source states it is a corruption of the local Aboriginal word 'thelim' meaning 'bend' (the town is located near a major bend in the river). Other sources claim the name originated with Donald Gollan, one of the early European settlers, who called his property 'Taleam' (this and the former suggestion could well be one and the same). Another source states it refers to cutting tails off sheep while another equally dubious suggestion says the name arose from advice given by the Aboriginals on how to get cattle to swim across the Murray 'bendem tail, boss'.


Tanunda
Of Aboriginal origin, said to mean either 'watering hole' or 'many birds on a creek'. It is erroneously believed by many that the name is of German origin.


Terowie
Of Aboriginal origin. The name was originally used by white settlers for a pastoral run.


Truro
Said to have been named by Angas' son, John Howard Angas, after Truro in Cornwall although this is questionable as Cornish miners moved into the area in 1842 to work the Whealbarton Mine. It is more likely the miners named the town Truro.


Tumby Bay
The town's name is taken from the coastal feature on which it stands. The bay and nearby island was named by Matthew Flinders when he sailed the coast in March 1802. At this stage of his circumnavigatory voyage around Australia, Flinders was naming the coastal features he charted after localities in Lincolnshire, England, the county in which he was born. Tumby is a village in Lincolnshire.


Victor Harbour
Recalls HMS Victor, the ship of Captain R. Crozier, which surveyed the harbour in 1838. Crozier later died on an expedition in search of the North West Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Prior to European settlement the local Aborigines called the area around Victor Harbour, 'wirramulla'. Encounter Bay was named by British navigator Matthew Flinders as it was here, on 8th April 1802, during his circumnavigation of Australia, that he had a chance encounter with his French counterpart, Nicolas Baudin, who was also surveying the southern Australian coast.


Waikerie
Of Aboriginal origin, said to mean 'many wings' or 'anything that flies', referring to the birdlife on the river.


Wallaroo
The Aborginal name for the area. It was first recorded as the name of a large pastoral station of the 1850s operated by Welsh pastoralist, Walter W. Hughes.


Warooka
The locality was originally known as Mt Hardwicke after the bay which lies to the north. Its present name is the Aboriginal name of the locality, which means "muddy water hole".


Whyalla
Originally known as Hummock Hill, with the arrival of the first policeman in 1911 the town's name was changed to Whyalla, an Aboriginal word believed to mean 'place of deep water'. It was still known locally as Hummocky until the 1920s.


Whyte Yarcowie
Originally called Yarcowie after Yarcowie Pastoral Station. The name 'Whyte', being that of the Hundred in which it is situated, was added in 1929 to avoid confusion with similar sounding names across Australia. Yarcowie is of Aboriginal origin.


Wilmington
Formerly known as Beautiful Valley. The town was officially named Wilmington by the Governor Sir Anthony Musgrave in 1876, perhaps after Wilmington in Delaware or Wilmington in North Carolina, in the United States. No one knows why he chose the name, though it could have something to do with the fact that his wife was an American and perhaps she came from one of those places. The locals preferred Beautiful Valley and continued to use if for a number of decades, though it was never officially adopted.


Wilpena
Of Aboriginal origin, derived from 'Warlpunha', it is said to mean 'Kangaroo Bones'. It was the named use by the local Adyanmathanha people for the Elder range and is said to be associated with the Dreamtime story about its creation.


Willunga
Of Aboriginal origin derived from 'willangga' possibly meaning ' locality of green trees' although some source record its meaning as 'black duck'. The first settlers named the town's streets after saints which reflect the town's quaint European village feel.


Woomera
Of Aboriginal origin, it is the name of a short stick used to launch spears.


Wudinna
A word of Aboriginal origin, believed to mean 'granite hill'. It refers to the many granite outcrops in the area.


Yalata
Of Aboriginal origin, it is said to mean 'shellfish' or 'oyster'. Though the name has been in use for the area for many years, the actual Yalata community only came into existence in 1952. It is of interest and perhaps no coincidence that there is a Yatala Reef (the letters 'l' and 't' are transposed) on the Gt. Australian Bight, to the south of Fowlers Bay not far from the original Yalata Homestead. It is named after the schooner Yatala which delivered supplies to the west coast of South Australia in the late 1830's & early 1840's. In 1858, Capt. Bloomfield Douglas, Port Adelaide's Harbour Master, made a detailed survey of the West Coast of South Australia, naming the reef after the survey vessel.


Yankalilla
Believed to be of Aboriginal origin, but this has yet to be confirmed. The argument to support this states that there are many similar names locally - Tunkalilla, Yattagolinga and Carrickalinga - all of which would seem to come from the same language. Others, noting that the founder of Adelaide, Colonel Light , referred to it as Yanky-lilly and Yanky Point deduct that there may have been an American, possibly a whaler, who had a daughter called Lilly and that it is named after her. Yankalilla itself began in 1842 when wheat and barley farmers Henry Kemmis, Septimane Herbert and George Worthington took up land and built houses here, forming the beginnings of the village. It was for many years one of the five major towns in the colony of South Australia.


Yorketown
Thus named as it was the main stttlement on the Yorke Peninsula. The peninsula was named by Matthew Flinders after Philip Yorke , 3rd Earl of Hardwicke (1757-1834), Member of the British Parliament for Cambridgeshire, later for Liskenard. He became secretary of state of war in Addington's ministry in 1802. He opposed concessions to Roman Catholics and caused exclusion of strangers, including press reporters, from the House of Commons. Yorke became First Lord of the Admiralty in 1810. The number of salt lakes in the area led a local to lobby for the town to be renamed Salt Lake City but the bid failed.