The Diyari (), alternatively transcribed as Dieri (), is an Indigenous Australian group of the South Australian desert originating in and around the delta of Cooper Creek to the east of Lake Eyre. Language Diyari is classified as one of the Karnic languages. Though earlier described in Ethnologue as extinct, and later "nearly extinct", Peter Austin has attested that the language still has fluent native speakers and hundreds of Diyari who retain some knowledge of it. Lutheran missionaries developed an orthography to transcribe the language, together with a German-Diyari dictionary, as early as 1893 and, as later modified by Johann Flierl, this was taught to many Diyari-speakers, who corresponded in the language from the 1880s down to the 1960s. Diyari was the first Aboriginal language for which a complete translation of the New Testament was made. The Diyari also had a highly developed sign language, which was first noticed by Alfred William Howitt in 1891, who first mistook them for defiant or command gestures until he realised that they formed part of an integral system of hand signs, of which he registered 65. One of their functions was to allow women to communicate during mourning, when a speech taboo prevailed. Country The traditional lands of the Diyari were estimated by Norman Tindale to have encompassed roughly , and lay in the delta of the Barcoo River (Cooper Creek) to the east of Lake Eyre. The southern boundary was marked by Mount Freeling, its most northern reach by the Pirigundi Lake, on the Cooper Creek. The most easterly edge was constituted by Lake Hope, and the western limits lay some 80 miles west of Lake Hope. Their neighbouring tribes were the Yandruwandha and Yawarrawarrka, respectively to their east and north-east and, to the north, the Ngameni. To their north-west were the Wangganguru, to their west the Thirrari and Arabana, while on the southern fringes were the Kuyani and Adnyamathanha. The environment was harsh, and foraging for vegetables was a staple since the kangaroo was absent from their terrain and the emu, their favourite food, quite rare. Native rats, snakes and lizards were, however, abundant. Mythology Lorimer Fison (1880): After the creation, brothers, sisters, and others of the closest kin, intermarried promiscuously, until — the evil effects of these alliances becoming manifest — a council of the chiefs was assembled to consider in what way they might be averted, the result of