Riverland

The Riverland is a region of South Australia. It covers an area of along the River Murray from where it flows into South Australia from New South Wales and Victoria downstream to Blanchetown. The major town centres are Renmark, Berri, Loxton, Waikerie, Barmera and Monash, and many minor townships. The population is approximately 35,000 people. The Riverland is located about 1.75 to 3 hours (or ) north-east of Adelaide, and 90 minutes west (or ) from Mildura, Victoria via the Sturt Highway. The region has a Mediterranean climate with warm, dry summers and relatively mild winters, and temperatures a few degrees above those of the state capital, Adelaide. The average summer temperature is , with a winter average of and an average rainfall of . At the time of British colonisation of South Australia in the 1830s, and for tens of thousands of years before then, the area today known as the Riverland was inhabited by Aboriginal Australian people, whose name for it is Moorundie Ruwe. At the time of colonisation, these were (from west to east) the Ngaiawang, Ngawait, and Erawirung, sometimes collectively referred to as the Meru people. Based on available data, the pre-European population along the River Murray within South Australia is estimated to have been several thousand people, with a density of up to 0.3 to per person. Ceremonial exchanges were major events, with people travelling from far and wide to participate. At this time, the people of the central River Murray area were "engaged in a broad-based economy embedded in a diverse and highly productive mosaic of riverine habitats". The oldest known River Murray Indigenous site, a midden of ancient river mussel shells, confirmed the occupation of the site by Aboriginal people for at least 29,000 years. The find has expanded the scarce knowledge of the area's ancient history. A study reporting the find and describing the dating as "based on 31 radiocarbon age determinations" was published on 14 July 2020, saying that this pushes back the previously known occupation of the area by 22,000 years, into the last ice age.