CPM1938P125F8

Title: Sketch of a message stick from C. Mountford's "Aboriginal message sticks" (1938)

Description: Sketch of message stick on p. 125 of “Aboriginal message sticks” by C. Mountford

Message: In figure 8 the cuts above F (fig. 9) are the aborigines at Ooldea. The long incision F is the Oooldea soak, while those below this symbol indicate unspecified individuals, as do the marks above symbol G. The latter refers to the Mission Station at Ooldea, and the symbols below that point are a message to the recipient of the stick that the missionary at Ooldea only gives one meal a day and that only of wheat porridge. (p. 124)

Creator of Object: Sender: "the aborigines at Ooldea" (p. 124)

Date Created: 1938

Notes on date created: terminus ante quem

Item type: image of a message stick (artefact missing)

Subtype: traditional

State/Territory: SA

Linguistic area 1: Chirila: Mirniny Austlang: A9 - Mirning

Notes on linguistic areas: Language is uncertain and inferred from geography. Could also be Wirangu or any number of languages that met at the Ooldea Mission station The "Ooldea tribe" is nonetheless analysed as Mirniny. (Note, however, that Mirniny turns up twice in Chirila. One is over on the western edge of the Nullabor near Caiguna. The other is further east near Eucla. The Eucla Mirniny is the one referred to here.) We have assumed that "Ooldea tribe" is (eastern) Mirniny on the basis of the fact that the Ooldea soak is in this area at 30°24'29.0"S 131°49'42.0"E and the mission settlement is here: 30° 27′ 32.9″ S, 131° 50′ 8.21″ E. Tindale also refers to "Miming man of Ooldea who went to Esperance by train and found friendly southern people there". Note that the Ooldea settlement was used as a base for constructing the railroad. Harald wrote: "For doculects that that referred to as Mirning or the like the corresponding Glottolog variety can be either Kalarko [kala1379] kba Ngadjunmaya [ngad1258] nju It's debatable whether there should be a separate variety with that name. Mirning is also the name of a subgroup" Claire wrote: "So it looks like Glottolog includes 2 western Mirning languages but not the eastern-most one around Eucla, since the term Ngatjumaya is specifically for Western Mirning? I see in my tree I used "Mirniny", "Ngatjumaya" and "Eucla", and a number of Noongar varieties; I didn't have data for inland varieties."

Semantic domains: sd_food_wheatporridge, sd_number_1, sd_person_group, sd_place_mission

Sources:

Mountford, C. P. 1938. “Aboriginal message sticks from the Nullabor Plains.”

Transactions of the Royal Society of South Australia 62 (1):122-126.

Coordinates: 30°27'32.900400"S,131°50'8.210400"E  (-30.459139, 131.835614)

Notes on coordinates: Absolute coordinates for Ooldea mission station

URL source 1: https://archive.org/stream/TransactionsRoy62Roya#page/123/

Media Files:

Data Entry: Olena Tykhostup, Piers Kelly