Hundred of Yatala facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Yatala South Australia
The Dry Creek watercourse in the suburb of Walkley Heights
Yatala Location in South Australia
Established	29 October 1846
County	Adelaide
Lands administrative divisions around Yatala: Port Adelaide Munno Para Para Wirra Port Adelaide Yatala Talunga Gulf St Vincent Adelaide Onkaparinga

The Hundred of Yatala is a cadastral unit of hundred in South Australia covering much of the Adelaide metropolitan area north of the River Torrens. It is one of the eleven hundreds of the County of Adelaide stretching from the Torrens in the south to the Little Para River in the north; and spanning from the coast in the west to the Adelaide foothills in the east. It is roughly bisected from east to west by Dry Creek. It was named in 1846 by Governor Frederick Robe, Yatala being likely derived from yartala, a Kaurna word referring to the flooded state of the plain either side of Dry Creek after heavy rain.

Etymology

Contemporary Australian linguists believe the name "Yatala" is derived from "yartala", a Kaurna word which likely means "water running by the side of a river" or "inundation" or "cascade" or similar. South Australian historian Geoff Manning has implied that this refers to the swampy morass that occurred when heavy rain inundated the usually-dry plain either side of Dry Creek. The descriptive term "yartala" is thought to have been "co-opted by the colonists [as "Yatala"] in their endeavours to name [various] things including a government schooner," the Yatala, in 1865.

According to Rob Amery (2009), "Yatala" had been used as a place name by white settlers of the Adelaide Plains since 1836, referring initially to the River Torrens (called Yertala by the Kaurna people while in flood) and later to the land north of the Torrens, stretching from the coast at Port Adelaide to the foothills at Tea Tree Gully. Yatala was thus a natural choice for the land administration division in 1846.

Plan of the Hundred of Yatala, 1957