[3] The town derives its name from an Aboriginal word meaning water hole,[citation needed] or 'wild fowl on creek.

[4] Prussian immigrants who arrived with Pastor Gotthard Fritzsche founded the village of Bethanien in 1842, the first settlement in the vicinity of today's Tanunda.

One year later, Prussians relocating from Klemzig on the Torrens River, where they had settled upon immigrating in 1838 with Pastor August Kavel, came to the Barossa Valley and founded the village of Langmeil.

Their new community bore the name of a Prussian town near Zullichau, from where the settlers had originated; it is now a Polish village known as Okunin.

91.6% of people spoke only English at home; the next most common languages were 0.9% German, 0.4% Mandarin, 0.2% Italian, 0.2% Latvian and 0.1% Gujarati.

[2] Tanunda and the Barossa Valley comprise one of Australia's premier wine-growing areas, and the town is surrounded by vineyards.

[9] Historically, Tanunda (and Adelaide) was the home to a number of the earliest South Australian newspapers that were printed primarily in German.

German newspapers were set up by early settlers, but many were forced to close or merge due to labour shortages caused by the Victorian gold rush of the 1850s-1860s.