What's in a name

Last week while waiting my turn at the doctors surgery I overheard the man in front of me trying to explain to the receptionist the correct pronunciation and spelling of the town he was from.
I had heard of this town and was aware that there is another town not too far away from where he lived with a similar sounding name and spelling.
The receptionist said something like'why did they give all these towns names that sound the same?,it is so confusing"
I did know that most of the places around here were derived from local Aboriginal dialect and that got me thinking just what the names meant and why they are named what they are.

I looked up the local shire records and found that yes, most are aboriginal names.

Here are a few......

•  NOOSA.  (Noothera or Gnuthura)     meaning  'Shady Place

 EUMUNDI.(Ngumundi or Huomundy)   Name of Aboriginal chieftan said to have adopted escaped convict Bracefield as his son in 1831 

   PEREGIAN.  Meaning Emu-because of the large numbers of the these animals in the the area back then.

• DOONAN.  It is thought that Doonan means 'leaf of a tree'.
• COOROIBAH.  Place of possoms.
•  COOROY.  The town of Cooroy gets its name from the mountain Mt Cooroy or( Coorooey, the aboriginal word Kurui-possom)
  

There are lots more and it is facinating reading .

There are also a few places in the area that were named by James Cook on his voyage of discovery in 1770.
Double Island Point was named by Cook on 18th May 1770 because from his ship it looked as though there were two small islands lying just below the land.
And of course he gave  the Glasshouse Mountains their name as they reminded him of the glass furnaces in his native Yorkshire.The aboriginal name was( daki comon) meaning stone standing up.
He also gave the name 1770 to a little inlet further up the coast and it is still called that today.