WBS1914P133F36

Title: Photograph of pre-initiates at Gunbalanya (Oenpelli) carrying ceremonial wands

Description: This image appears in various publications of Baldwin Spencer including: Spencer, Baldwin. 1913. "Preliminary Report: On the Aboriginals of the Northern Territory." Bulletin of the Northern Territory 7:7-28. The caption is "Figure 3 — Boys carrying wands when sent out to summon members of distant tribes." Later it appears in: Spencer, Baldwin. 1914. Native tribes of the Northern Territory of Australia. London: Macmillan & Co. (The relevant description is on pages 35- 36). The caption here is: "Fig. 36.—Boys carrying the Wands called Uro-Ammi, when summoning Members of Distant Camps to the Initiation Ceremony. Kakadu tribe" Better contextualising information is given in Spencer, Baldwin. 1928. Wanderings in wild Australia. 2 vols. Vol. 2. London: Macmillan. "Two Mengerrdji youths singing at the Gaagudju camp at Oenpelli during their travels prior to initiation ceremonies. East Alligagor River, 2 July 1912. July 2nd Late yesterday evening we were sitting in our mosquito-proof tent … when we heard a special singing, coming from the direction of the native camp. It was repeated again in the morning, when we found that the singing came from two youths who were standing close together facing one another, each of them leaning on a wand, coloured red and white. The song they sang was: ‘Kadimanga, Da laian a. Da laian a. Kadimanga, Da laian a, Da laian a.’ It was repeated time after time, and always the women, sitting in camp, replied with the refrain, ‘Wait Ba! Wait Ba!’’ repeated as often as they could without drawing breath. They sometimes do this fourteen or fifteen times. I often heard it thirteen, and naturally it dies away towards the close when their breath is exhausted. It is sung on a high note; the Wait is short, the Ba emphasised and prolonged. For days after the boys have come to the men’s camp they stand up every now and then and chant their song and, time after time, from camps, some so far away that you can only just hear the sound, comes back the refrain ‘Wait Ba! Wait Ba!’ it is one of the most picturesque of their songs, especially when heard in the bush at night time."[fn:21:Spencer, Wanderings in wild Australia pp.765-6] The above information is reproduced in the 2008 Batty, Allen Morton volume, who include some editorial observations: [Eds wrote]: Every Gaagudju man has to go through five initiation ceremonial stages during his lifetime. The first ceremony marks the point where a youth leaves the company of women and children and is accepted as a man, the final when he is an old man. The two Mengerrdji youths photgraphed here were visiting the Gaagudju camp at Oenpelli during a tour prior to their beginning the second stage of initiation. The wands they carry were instruments of safe passage from one part of the country to another, made by themselves under the supervision of the elders. p151 The image also appears in Mulvaney, John, ed. 1982. The Aboriginal photographs of Baldwin Spencer. Melbourne: John Currey, O’Neil, with similar editorial commentary. From the SLSA: "Two Aboriginal men carrying message sticks after setting out to summon members of distant tribes to initiation ceremonies on Melville Island, Northern territory. photograph; 9 x 15 cm Magazine cutting." Part of Searcy Collection"

Date Created: 1912

Notes on date created: terminus ante quem

Item type: image of a message stick and messenger

Subtype: traditional

Linguistic area 1: Chirila: Mengerr Austlang: N53 - Mengerrdji Glottolog: mang1382

Cultural region: TopEnd_arnhem_west

Term for 'message stick' (or related) in language: Uro-Ammi

Institution/Holder file: State Library of South Australia object identifier: PRG 280/1/11/65

Coordinates: 12°19'31.800000"S,133°03'18.000000"E  (-12.3255, 133.055)

Media copyright: State Library of South Australia

Notes on coordinates: Absolute coordinates for Gunbalanya (Oenpelli)

URL institution: https://collections.slsa.sa.gov.au/resource/PRG+280/1/11/65/continue

URL source 1: https://nla.gov.au:443/tarkine/nla.obj-2717727188

URL source 2: https://archive.org/stream/b2993154x_0002#page/n475/mode/2up/search/Kadimanga

Notes: PK: I originally came across this image via the State Library of South Australia. It has been posted into Searcy's scrapbook and given the caption associating it with Melville Island in 1914. Then I found it in Batty, Philip, Lindy Allen, and John Morton, eds. 2005. The photographs of Baldwin Spencer. Melbourne: The Miegunyah Press and Museums Victoria, p150. It is also in Mulvaney, John, ed. 1982. The Aboriginal photographs of Baldwin Spencer. Melbourne: John Currey, O’Neil, p144. I have downloaded the SLSA image and scanned the other two from hard copies. PK: Note body paint and the message stick tucked into waist girdle. The 'wands' referred to by Spencer may or may not be distinct from a message stick. When Spencer describes the youths leaning on their wands, this is not what is happening in the photograph, where one man is leaning on a spear. Compare the wand in AMSD: SLSA_PRG280_1_11_60. Here it is certainly bigger than the object tucked into the wait girdle but perhaps not big enough to lean on while standing.

Media Files:

Data Entry: Piers Kelly