painting
- Museum number
- Oc1986,07.14
- Title
- Object: Baru ga Rangga Baltjawuma (Crocodile and Sacred Fire Dreaming)
- Description
-
Painting made of bark, wood, paint (mid-brown, red-brown, black, white). Depicts two ancestral crocodiles, and four fish. The diamond pattern is a freshwater, Madarrpa clan design for the Baykurrtji (Koolatong River) area. Wood supports at either end, lashed with string and painted red.
- Production date
- 20thC (before 1986)
- Dimensions
-
Length: 108 centimetres (appx)
-
Width: 60 centimetres (appx)
- Curator's comments
-
Buku Larrngay Arts label: 'Artist: Wakuthi Marawili (clan leader). Clan: Madarrpa. Moiety: Yirritja. Homeland centre: Baniyala. Cat no. 4590.
Description: Baru, Ancestral crocodile at Baykurrtji (Koolatong River), the background design [drawing] is the Madarrpa freshwater design and it also represents fire which is associated with Baru."
-
Typed text pasted to back: "Language: Madarrpa. Clan: Yithuwa. Moiety: Yirritja
Baru ga Rangga Baltjawuma (Crocodile and sacred fire dreaming).
In the dream days, there was a woman called Dhamilingu (blue tongue lizard) and a man named Baru (crocodile) living together at Ditjpalwuy, Dhamilingu went away to collect mendung, snails, and while she was away, Baru made fire for the first time during a ceremony. Baru knew that the site and that fire belonged to him, and he said to himself 'This is my fire and my sacred site.' Baru placed big logs of stringy bark on the fire, and then went to sleep while waiting for Dhalmilingu to return. When she returned to cook the mendung she and Baru quarelled. She spat at Baru and he threw fire at her and burnt her on the arms and legs. Dhamilingu turned into a blue tongued lizard, and Baru, who had burnt his hands and arms, turned into a crocodile.
Baru then went away to Baygurrdji. As he was going, he said that the fire would be for Madarrpa. The fire dreaming design is one of the sacred designs of Madarrpa people and in ceremony, fire dreaming songs and dances are performed."
Handwritten: "Baru in the Koolatong River at Baykurdji. The design on his back is where he got burnt."
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition date
- 1986
- Department
- Africa, Oceania and the Americas
- Registration number
- Oc1986,07.14
