| One of the most common comments we hear from customers is "You have spelt Ballaarat wrong" or "Why do you spell Ballaarat with an extra A?" |
| The answer is rather simple so please read on; |
| It is generally accepted that the origin of the name came from two aboriginal words signifying a camping or resting place - "Balla" meaning elbow or reclining on the elbow and "Arat" meaning place. |
| The first white settler (1837), Scotsman Archibald Yuille, called his property "Ballarat". We cannot know how a Scotsman pronounced an aboriginal word, but in 1851 another Scot arrived to officially survey the area and he recorded the towns name as Ballaarat. When the first local paper arrived in 1854, three years later, it was called the "Ballarat Times" (perhaps the typesetter ran out of "a's"). |
| Official government documents used the double "a" spelling and successive local councils varied the number of "a's" according to the prevailing fashion of the time. Prior to amalgamation of the councils in 1994, the municipality of the City of Ballaarat was the official spelling for the corporation that was the Council, though the official spelling for place name purposes of the area (then comprised of several municipalities) was Ballarat. |
| When the new amalgamated Ballaarat City Council was gazetted in 1994 the single "a" version was adopted for the corporation, to align it to the area's place-name. |
| Therefore both spellings were legitimate at different times in the city's history and can still be seen on buildings and in historical literature. |
| It should be noted that the only thing to alter the policy of Kittelty's Auction Rooms using the double AA will be a change in the surname of the owner. While it is Kittelty expect the double AA to remain set in stone. |
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All text, images, script and code remain the intellectual property of Dean Kittelty and Kittelty IT
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