CPM1958P106F7D

Title: A message stick from Melville Island, reproduced by Mountford (1958)

Description: The message stick (Fig. 7D) refers to the Jaulama jungle, about a half a mile south of our camp. This stick was sent by the chief mourner of the Melville Island pukamuni group to the members of the ironwood, Mudungkala, totemic group of Buchanan Island, and adjacent Bathurst Islanders, notifying them of the oncoming burial rituals. The designs on the stick, however, have no relation­ship to either the ironwood tree group or the message they would receive. The short vertical lines at c, c, are living paper-bark trees, and the transverse lines, a, a, dead paper-bark trees in the Jaulama jungle. At h, are the roots of the trees, and at panels c, the vines of the edible roko yams on the branches of the paper-barks. The four panels, d, d, etc., are jungle trees, and e indicates their roots. (106)

Message: Death notification

Date Created: 1954

Notes on date created: Year of the National Geographic Expedition to Melville Island

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

Subtype: traditional

State/Territory: NT

Linguistic area 1: Chirila: Tiwi Austlang: N20 - Tiwi Glottolog: tiwi1244

Notes on linguistic areas: The message stick is associated with the Melville Island pukamuni group. The Jaulama site cannot be found on any map.

Cultural region: TopEnd_tiwi

Term for 'message stick' (or related) in language: purunkita

Sources:

Charles P. Mountford (1958). The Tiwi: their Art Myth and Ceremony. London Phoenix Melbourne: Georgian House.

Source types: book article

Coordinates: 11°40'43.784400"S,130°50'7.332000"E  (-11.678829, 130.83537)

Notes on coordinates: Chirila centroid coordinates for Tiwi

Media Files:

Data Entry: Julia Bespamyatnykh, Piers Kelly