Description (Physical description)
A: churinga. Reddish brown in colour, with line decoration on one side. Churinga are inscribed with sacred designs, which represent a totemic ancestor.
Aboriginal women and uninitiated boys are forbidden to see them. Their meaning is only fully divulged to men who are initiated into that totem and who are of elder status. Those with a hole bored in one end (stone ones excepted), for the attachment of a cord, are called bullroarers. When whirled round, they produce a characteristic sound believed to be " spirit talk" .
Event Date 1937
Author: maa

Context (Acquisition Details)
Collected by Walter William Skeat (1866-1953), English anthropologist and colonial officer, serving in Malaysia 1891-1899 and then led the 1899-1900 expedition of north-east Malaya
Event Date 28/4/1993
Author: maa