{"id":"MATHEWS1905-001","label":"Dhülpaka at the tooth-striking","people_or_site":"Campaspe, Loddon and lower Goulburn River tribes (Wonggumuk initiation)","country_current":"Australia","historic_region":"Campaspe, Loddon and lower Goulburn rivers, northern Victoria, crossing the Murray a little way into New South Wales","macroregion":"Australia / Southeast","local_name":"dhülpaka","source_term":"bullroarer, dhülpaka","source_language":"English","object_description":"A bullroarer called dhülpaka.","function_summary":"Sounded in the bush, out of the boys' sight, while each novice's upper front tooth was knocked out; after the performances in the bush it was shown to the novices, who were warned never to reveal any part of the rites to the uninitiated or to women, on pain of death.","attestation_type":"ethnographic_attestation","source_key":"mathews1905_wonggumuk","source_type":"primary_ethnography","source_url":"https://archive.org/details/zeitschriftfuret3719unse","page_or_plate":"p. 872 (Wonggumuk; Campaspe, Loddon and lower Goulburn); p. 874 (tooth removal, dhülpaka sounded out of sight); p. 877 (dhülpaka shown; secrecy on pain of death)","map_confidence":"low_medium","plot_status":"plot_with_caveat","coordinate_basis":"Regional anchor between the lower Loddon and lower Campaspe, south of the Murray, within the three-river country Mathews names (p. 872); no ceremonial ground located.","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"On the Campaspe, Loddon and lower Goulburn rivers, a boy lost a front tooth to the sound of the dhülpaka. A man of a stranger tribe held him from behind while another set a wooden punch against an upper incisor and struck it with a mallet. When the tooth came out the men shouted \"Wir-r-r!\", and the boy had to swallow the blood. All the while the bullroarer hummed in the nearby bush, out of sight. Then came days of performances in the bush, many of them absurd or obscene, at which the boys were forbidden to laugh or speak. Only at the end was the dhülpaka itself shown to them, with a warning that telling women or the uninitiated anything of the rites meant death. An uncle kept the tooth, and in time gave it back.","pull_quote":"During these proceedings, a bullroarer, dhülpaka, is sounded in the adjacent bush, but out of sight of the boys.","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"R. H. Mathews, “Some Initiation Ceremonies of the Aborigines of Victoria,” Zeitschrift für Ethnologie 37 (1905), p. 874","term_gloss":"dhülpaka: the bullroarer of the Wonggumuk. Wonggumuk: the initiation ceremony of the Campaspe, Loddon and lower Goulburn tribes. dhirra: the wooden punch used to knock out the tooth; lillena: the mallet.","cls":"restricted","class_label":"Restricted","color":"#A43C2F","is_candidate":false,"flags":["initiation","women_taboo"],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":true,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":false,"sources":[{"citation":"R. H. Mathews, “Some Initiation Ceremonies of the Aborigines of Victoria,” Zeitschrift für Ethnologie 37 (1905): 872–879","url":"https://archive.org/details/zeitschriftfuret3719unse"}],"source_citations":"R. H. Mathews, “Some Initiation Ceremonies of the Aborigines of Victoria,” Zeitschrift für Ethnologie 37 (1905): 872–879","source_display":"R. H. Mathews, “Some Initiation Ceremonies of the Aborigines of Victoria,” Zeitschrift für Ethnologie 37 (1905): 872–879","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"A bullroarer called dhülpaka.","function_display":"Sounded in the bush, out of the boys' sight, while each novice's upper front tooth was knocked out; after the performances in the bush it was shown to the novices, who were warned never to reveal any part of the rites to the uninitiated or to women, on pain of death.","confidence_display":"low to medium","attestation_label":"ethnographic attestation","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"campaspe","display_name":"Dhülpaka at the tooth-striking","image":{"full":"assets/objects/hunt_2026_10_08/TORRES-002_haddon1904_v5_fig52_bigu_wanes.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/hunt_2026_10_08/thumbs/TORRES-002_haddon1904_v5_fig52_bigu_wanes_thumb.jpg","alt":"Haddon’s plate of five Mabuiag bull-roarer models—four large bigu and one small wanes—with their cords.","credit":"A. C. Haddon (ed.), Reports of the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to Torres Straits, vol. V (1904), fig. 52, p. 332","license":"Public domain","source_page":"https://archive.org/details/reportsofcambrid05hadd","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Mabuiag models of large bigu and small wanes roarers","pool_id":"auto-hunt_2026_10_08--TORRES-002_haddon1904_v5_fig52_bigu_wanes","auto_assigned":true,"last_modified":"2026-10-19"},"slug":"mathews1905-001-campaspe-loddon-and-lower-goulburn-river-tribes-wonggumuk-initiation"}