[3] The Gandangara lived throughout an area covering an estimated 11,000 square kilometres (4,100 sq mi) in the south-east region of New South Wales.

[4] The Gandangara were formed into a variety of groups, among which were: In 1802, the explorer Francis Barrallier met the Gundungara people as his party moved through "The Cowpastures" southwest of Sydney, crossing the Nattai to the Wollondilly River and up to the heights above where Yerranderie now stands.

"[8] Most of their land was initially not appetizing for early settlers, given the poor quality of the Nepean sandstone soils, and in a bid to stop encroachments they are said to have petitioned Governor King successfully in order to secure protected access to their riverine yam beds.

[9] In 1811 Governor Macquarie started handing out numerous "land grants" to settlers in the Darawal area around Appin, one as large as 400 hectares (1,000 acres) given to William Broughton.

Gandangara raiding bands, harvesting crops on settlers' properties,[11] also attacked the Thurrawal and Dharug, so that the latter two began to collaborate against them, by helping the British authorities, and seeking refuge in squatters' settlements.

[13] Wallis often found settlers unwilling to hand over the Darawal people who lived on their stations but, eventually, executing what he later recalled was a "melancholy but necessary duty",[14] he tracked down a group camping under the Cataract River[15] near Appin.

[14] Their skulls, together with that of another beheaded woman, were exchanged for 30 shillings and a gallon of rum each in Sydney, according to the recollections of William Byrne in 1903,[14] and were sent to England where they were lodged for study at Edinburgh University, and were only returned in 1991 and 2000.

[citation needed] Notwithstanding the attempts to disperse, round them up, or kill them under Macquarie's direction, the Gandangara population, able to take refuge in the tough hinterlands like the Burragorong, have sustained itself as an organised social group somewhat better than other neighbouring peoples like the Dharug, for in the 1860s they returned to demand restitution of their lands.

It was here, while he basked in the sun, that the redoubtable fish-hunter, Mirragañ the quoll, glimpsed the light reflected from Gurangatch's eyes and endeavoured, unsuccessfully, to spear him.

The quoll tried to force his prey back from the depths of the waterhole, where Gurangatch had sought refuge, by planting ever more bundles of nauseating slabs of millewa hickory bark here and there in the various soaks and pools.

Gurangatch, wise to the plan, burrowed his way out, tunneling through the landscape, drawing the lagoon waters in his train, till he emerged on a high rocky ridge called thereafter Birrimbunnungalai, since it is rich in birrimbunnung (sprats)[c][22] The features of the landscape were etched as Gurangatch wriggled and slipped across and under the terrain, in flight from his predator, or sometimes while directly fighting with him.