CAPELL1950-001 - ethnographic attestation
Djäbulju's galiguru from the south
Roebuck Bay - Roebuck Plains, south of Broome, West Kimberley, Western Australia
Sacred / spirit
galiguru
Source term: bull-roarer
galiguru: the bullroarer, the same word as Karadjeri; Nyul-Nyul and Bardi galigur. Djäbulju: "grey-haired", the old man of the Dreaming.
In the dream time an old man made the bull-roarer, and he came from the south. The Yawuru called him Djäbulju, Grey-hair. He made the larar, the small pointed stick of the corroboree, and the shield and the boomerang of old. Another old man, Naldja, made a boomerang and the club and gave them to men; an old man set out the four sections, Garimba, Baldjeri, Banaga and Burong, complete for all time; and it was Djäbulju who gave the people their increase sites, the totem centres. The Yawuru tongue stood apart from that of the Karadjeri to their south, but in custom they took much from their southern neighbours, and the roarer's name came north with it: galiguru, as in Karadjeri, while up the coast the Nyul-Nyul and the Bardi say galigur.
Djäbulju made the bull-roarer in the dream time. He came from the south.
A. Capell, "Some Myths of the Garadjeri Tribe," Mankind 4(4) (1950), p. 159
- Object
- The bull-roarer, galiguru, known from a Yawuru Dreaming text.
- Function
- Made in the Dreaming by the culture hero Djäbulju, who also gave the people their increase sites; its ritual use is not recorded.
- Source
- A. Capell, "Some Myths of the Garadjeri Tribe, Western Australia," Mankind 4(4) (1950): 148-162, at pp. 158-161
- Source location
Page references
pp. 158-161 (Text B, p. 159)
- Source confidence
- medium to high
- Location note
- Yawuru country east of Roebuck Bay (Roebuck Plains); Capell places the Jauor immediately north of the Garadjeri, bounded by the Djugan at Broome and the Njigina to the east. The narration site, Beagle Bay Mission, lies outside Yawuru country.