Spellings of the name, pronounced [ɡ̊aˌmilaˈɻaːj] in the language itself, include Goomeroi; Kamilaroi; Gamilaraay and Gamilaroi.

[16] Southern Aboriginal guides led the surveyor John Howe to the upper Hunter River above present-day Singleton in 1819.

They told him that the country there was "Coomery Roy [=Gamilaraay] and more further a great way", meaning to the north-west, over the Liverpool Ranges.

A basic wordlist collected by Thomas Mitchell in 1832 is the earliest written record of Gamilaraay.

Gawambaraay Dialect Several loanwords have entered Australian English from Gamilaraay, including: