BERNDT1946_0003_3

Title: A message stick from Arnhem Bay held in the Berndt Museum (three of five in a series)

Description: For Australia in General: Sticks can be divided generally in 2 kinds. Those used in ceremony, and more general purpose secular message sticks. Generally the secular sticks serve only as a memory aid or a passport though foreign or hostile territory. The designs themselves have meaning but they cannot be read by anyone except the messenger who has been told the meaning by the sender of the stick. ie. There is no sign language the marks being given arbitary meaning by the sender. The messenger in in all cases an adult man, never a woman, and usually a trusted close relative of the sender. In some regions namely Queensland and S.E. Australia and southern edge of the Nullabor, and Melville and Bathurst Islands designs sometimes refer to topographical features which the messenger must pass before his destination is reached. Sometimes also there were notches representing the length of the journey in days. N.E. Arnhem Land sticks (like these) do not have such topographical features represented hosever. message sticks from Arnhem Land are usually small flat slabs of wood, or a cylinder tapering at both ends. patterns are mainly vertical diagonal lines, diamonds, and human figures. NB: A variety of such sticks are shown in Ref. 1. to 5. The designs on ceremonial message sticks have mythological significance. They refer to approaching rituals or ceremonial trade relations. N.B. Those on Bathurst and Melville Islands are more elaborately carved and usually constitute an invitaiton to a ceremony (e.g. mortuary rite) or are informative e.g. notification of an event such as a death. According to both Howitt and Roth who collected in 1897 and 1904 respectively, message sticks were used for several purposes, to call participants of a ceremony together, to invite fellow tribesman to a hunt or fight, and to convey a personal request from one aboriginal through a messenger to another asking him for food or goods, or to inform of a dead (the latter two being more secular usages.) … Small flat incised wooden tablets Made from blonde wood rectangular with incised meaningful designs. Some have fur or wool attachments. Two have been coated with red ochre before incising. 2” to 3” in length. Manufacture: Specific: Made of soft ‘milk-

Message: (c) Sent by Bindjalbuma (Slippery) camped at Arnhem Bay to the collector, R.M. Berndt, who was at Yirrkala at the time. The stick represents a request for plugs of tobacco, the strokes on he reverse (back) side representing the number wanted, and the curved shape (on the front side) representing the billabong at Marabi where Bindjalbuma was camped, the notches along its sides being the number of men he has around him there.

Creator of Object: Bindjalbuma

Item type: message stick in a private collection

Subtype: traditional

State/Territory: NT

Linguistic area 1: Chirila: Djapu Austlang: N145 - Djapu Glottolog: djap1238

Linguistic area 2: Chirila: Dhangu Austlang: N192 - Dhangu Glottolog: dhan1270

Notes on linguistic areas: The origin of the message stick is Arnhem Bay Marabi billabong in Arnhem Bay, where Bindjalbuma was camped cannot be located. Best guess for the whole bay area is the Djapu linguistic area. It is possible that the representation of the billabong on the message stick could be superimposed on a map of Arnhem Bay to indicate where the billabong is relative to other landmarks

Cultural region: TopEnd_arnhem_east

Motifs: purpose_request sd_item_tobacco sd_person_group

Institution/Holder file: Berndt Museum object identifier: 1946/0003.1-5

Collector: Berndt, RM & CH

Place collected: Yirrkala

Coordinates: 12°37'3.428400"S,136°15'23.677200"E  (-12.617619, 136.256577)

Media copyright: Berndt Museum

Notes on coordinates: Chirila centroid coordinates for Djapu

Media Files:

Data Entry: Piers Kelly