IDNO

LS.109149.TC1

Description

On Catalogue Card: "Australia. Arunta.
Initiation 4-16 phase of the Engwura.
Women throwing fire on the illpongwurra (initiates)." [first manuscript in ink]
"Nat. T.C.A. p.348-50." [second manuscript in ink]

On catalogue card: "Arunta initiation North. T.C.A. pp.348-350."

Group of Aranda (Arunta) men and women during the Engwura initiation ceremony. The men on the left are carrying shields and holding boughs of Eremophila over their heads. On the right, the women are throwing dry grass and boughs to which they set fire.
The landscape in the background consists of hills with shrubbery and small trees. [WV 4/2/2009, from record P.361.ACH1, JD 21/8/2012]

Place

Oceania Australasia; Australia; Central Australia

Cultural Affliation

Arunta

Named Person

Photographer

Baldwin Spencer, Walter; or Gillen, Francis James

Collector / Expedition

Baldwin Spencer, Walter [Spencer and Gillen 'Arunta' Fieldwork, Summer 1896 - 1897]

Date

?November 1896 - ?February 1897

Collection Name

Teaching Slide CollectionHaddon Unmounted Collection

Source

?Haddon, Alfred Cort (Dr)

Format

Lantern Slide Black & White

Primary Documentation

Other Information

Publication: Similar image published in Baldwin Spencer, W., and F.J. Gillen, 1899. The Native Tribes of Central Australia, (MacMillan and Co. Ltd., London), p. 349, fig. 76 with the following caption:
"The women throwing fire over the Illpongwura." [WV 17/2/2009]

Context: The involvement of women in the Engwura ceremony is described in Baldwin Spencer and Gillen as follows:
"Avoiding on this, the first morning of the new departure in the ceremonies, the women's camp, which lay out of sight of the Engwura ground on the other side of the river, the Illpongwurra were taken out through a defile amongst the ranges on the west side of the camp. As the day wore on it became evident that there was unusual excitement and stir in the women's camp. One of the older ones had been informed that the Illpongwurra would return in the evening, and that they must be ready to receive them. She had been through this part of the ceremony before, and knew what had to be done, but the great majority of the women required instructing. About five o'clock in the evening all the women and children gathered together on the flat stretch of ground on the east side of the river. The Panunga and Bulthara separated themselves from the Purula and Kumara. Each party collected grass and sticks with which to make a fire, the two being separated by a distance of about one hundred yards. A man was posted on the top of a hill overlooking the Engwura ground on the west, and just before sunset he gave the signal that the Illpongwurra were approaching. They stopped for a short time before coming into camp, at a spot at which they deposited the game secured, and where also they decorated themselves with fresh twigs and leaves of the Eremophila bush. These were placed under the head-bands, so that they drooped down over the forehead, under the arm-bands, and through the nasal septum. Then, forming a dense square, they came out from the defile amongst the ranges. Several of the Urliara who were carrying Churinga met them, some going to either side, and some going to the rear of the square. Then commenced the swinging of the bull-roarers- The women on the tip-toe of excitement lighted their fires, close to which were supplies of long grass stalks and dry boughs. The Illpongwurra were driven forwards into the bed of the river, pausing every now and then as if reluctant to come any further on. Climbing up the eastern bank, they halted about twenty yards from the first group of women; holding their shields and boughs, of Eremophila over their heads; swaying to and fro and shouting loudly "whirr! whrr!" The Panunga and Bulthara women to whom they came first stood in a body behind their fire, each woman, with her arms bent at the elbow and the open hand with the palm uppermost, moved up and down on the wrist as if inviting the men to come on, while she called out "kutta, kutta, kutta," keeping all the while one leg stifle while she bent the other and gently swayed her body. This is a very characteristic attitude and movement of the women during the performance of certain ceremonies in which they take a part. After a final pause the Illpongwurra came close up to the women, the foremost amongst whom then seized the dry grass and boughs, and setting fire to them, threw them on to the heads of the men, who had to shield themselves, as best they could, with their boughs. The men with the bull-roarers were meanwhile running round the Illpongwurra and the women, whirling them as rapidly as possible; and after this had gone on for a short time, the Illpongwurra suddenly turned and went to the second group of women, followed, as they did so, by those of the first, and here the same performance was again gone through. Suddenly once more the men wheeled round and, followed by both parties of women who were now throwing fire more vigorously than ever, they ran in a body towards the river. On the edge of the bank the women stopped, turned round and ran back, shouting as they did so, to their camp. The Illpongwurra crossed the river bed and then ran on to the Engwura ground where, sitting beside the Parra, was a man decorated for the performance of an Unjiamba ceremony."
(Baldwin Spencer, W., and F.J. Gillen, 1899. The Native Tribes of Central Australia, (MacMillan and Co. Ltd., London), p. 348-350) [WV 4/2/2009]