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Information about Australian Aboriginal Mythology

Indigenous Australians can be classified into about 400 separate language groups, each of which has a distinct culture. For this reason it is incorrect to classify any attribute as universal to them as a whole. However, almost all the belief systems found seem to be what can be considered a polytheistic, animistic religion. Instead of 'Gods', words like Creator Spirits, Culture Heroes, or Aboriginal Ancestral Spirit are more often used.

Many similarities between the groups may be seen:
  • The Australian Aboriginal cultures are based on nature in every aspect. Many of their mythological heroes are animals common in Australia, a prominent example being the Rainbow Serpent.
  • Humans are very much part of the land, and are associated with particular places.
  • Another similarity is the so-called "Dreamtime". It is often thought of as the time in which the world was created, but correctly describes the process of the world being called into being. Another general explanation can be seen in anthropologist Max Charlesworth's reference to the Indigenous Australian "Dreamtime" as the ability to 'see with eternal vision' [1]. However, the word Dreamtime is now generally discouraged, as it implies a time which has now passed, whereas many Indigenous Australians maintain that The Dreaming time is still with us for those with eyes to see, and so it is now more commonly referred to as the Dreaming. In the dreaming, there is no clear distinction between humans and animals, and several of the spirits are able to change from human form to animal form at will.
  • Dreaming paths or song lines describe the path taken by the Ancestral Spirits during the Dreaming. As they walked these paths, they sang the rocks, plants, and animals into existence. These paths are sacred, and there are songs and ceremonies that describe the journeys along these paths. Particular places along the path (e.g. Ubirr) are especially sacred, and sometimes dangerous.

Figures and elements

The following list mixes up many different cultures, and should not be regarded as definitive in any sense.
  • Alchera (myth)
  • Alcheringa - term used by the some Indigenous Australians for the Dreamtime
  • Altjira - the sky spirit of the Arrernte.
  • Anjea - a female fertility spirit
  • Bagadjimbiri - two brothers and creator spirits
  • Bahloo - the moon spirit
  • Baiame - the creator spirit of many language groups of South-East Australia, such as the Kamilaroi
  • Bamapana - a trickster hero who causes discord (Murngin people)
  • Banaitja - a creator spirit
  • Barnumbir - spirit for the Yolngu people
  • Baralku - island of the dead for the Yolngu people
  • Bobbi-Bobbi - a giant snake that lived in the sky, similar to the Rainbow Serpent.
  • Brolga
  • Bunbulama - rain spirit
  • Bunjil - creator spirit of the language groups in Victoria such as the Kulin, and sometimes identified as another name for Baiame.
  • Bunyip - a mythical creature said to lurk in billabongs in South-East Australia
  • Daramulum - a creator spirit, who may have been Baiame's son or borother, in South-Eastern Australia
  • Dhakhan - the ancestral spirit of the Kabi
  • Dilga - spirit of fertility and growth
  • Djanggawul - in Nortehrn Australia, three siblings, two female and one male, who created the landscape of Australia and covered it with flora.
  • Djunkgao - a group of sisters who are associated with floods and ocean currents
  • Dreamtime - central, unifying theme in Australian Aboriginal culture.
  • Eingana - a creator spirit and the mother of all water, animals, and humans
  • Erathipa - a boulder that has the shape of a pregnant woman
  • Galeru - a rainbow snake who swallowed the Djanggawul
  • Gidja - moon spirit, creator of women
  • Gnowee - a solar spirit who lived on Earth before there was a sun
  • Inapertwa - simple creatures with which the Numakulla formed created all life on Earth. (Arrernte)
  • I'wai - I'wai is the culture hero of the Koko Y'ao.
  • Jar'Edo Wens - a spirit of earthly knowledge and physical might
  • Julana - a lecherous spirit who surprises women by burrowing beneath the sand
  • Julunggul - a rainbow serpent and fertility spirit
  • Kalseru
  • Karora - a creator spirit
  • Kidili - an ancient moon-man who attempted to rape some of the first women on Earth (Mandjindja)
  • Kondole - a mean and rude man who became a whale
  • Kunapipi - mother spirit and the patron deity of many heroes
  • Kutjara
  • Makara - the seven sisters who eventually became the Pleiades
  • Mamaragan - a lightning god who speaks with thunder as his voice.
  • Mamu
  • Mangar-kunjer-kunja - a lizard spirit who created humans.
  • Mar'rallang - name shared by two twin sisters
  • Mimi - thin beings of Arnhem Land who live in rock crevices
  • Minawara - ancestors of the Nambutji
  • Minka Bird - a bird in for the Dreamtime narratives
  • Mokoi - an evil spirit who killed sorcerers who used black magic.
  • Mura-mura - another word for Dreamtime
  • Nargun - A female monster who abducts children
  • Ngariman - a cat-man who killed the Bagadjimbiri
  • Nogomain - a spirit who gives spirit children to mortal parents
  • Puckowe - Grandmother spirit who lives in the sky
  • Pundjel - a creator spirit who invented religious rites.
  • Rainbow serpent - the inhabitant of permanent waterholes and is in control of water; creator spirit.
  • Tjilpa - ancestor of the cat-people.
  • Tjinimin - ancestor of the Australian peoples
  • Ulanji - a snake-ancestor of the Binbinga.
  • Ungud - a snake spirit who is sometimes male and sometimes female
  • Wagyl - a snakelike creature who created the waterways in and around the south-west of Western Australia
  • Walo - the (female) Sun creator spirit in Northern Australia
  • Waramurungundi - the first woman (Gunwinggu)
  • Wati-kutjara - lizard men
  • Wawalag - pair of sisters who were daughters of Djanggawul
  • Wollunqua - a snake-spirit of rain and fertility
  • Wondjina - cloud and rain spirits
  • Wuluwaid - a rain spirit
  • Wuragag - first man (Gunwinggu)
  • Wuriupranili - female solar spirit who carries a torch that is the sun.
  • Wurrunna - A chief of a tribe
  • Yara-ma-yha-who - a small, vampiric man or humanoid monster,
  • Yowie - a giant beast resembling a cross between a lizard and an ant.
  • Yhi - a female spirit of light and creation, and a solar deity

See also

Notes

1. ^ Max Charlesworth, 'Introduction' in Religion In Aboriginal Australia: An Anthology, ed. by Max Charlesworth, Howard Morphy, Diane Bell and Kenneth Maddock, University of Queensland Press, Queensland, Australia, 1984.

References

Hiatt, L.R. (1974) Australian Aboriginal Mythology. (AIAS, Canberra)
  • Lawlor, Robert (1991). Voices Of The First Day: Awakening in the Aboriginal dreamtime. Rochester, Vermont: Inner Traditions International, Ltd. ISBN 0-89281-355-5
Indigenous Australians are descendants of the first known human inhabitants of the Australian continent and its nearby islands. The term includes both the Torres Strait Islanders and the Aboriginal People, who together make up about 2.5% of Australia's population.
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God

General approaches
Agnosticism Atheism
Deism Dystheism
Henotheism Ignosticism
Monism Monotheism
Natural theology Nontheism
Pandeism Panentheism
Pantheism Polytheism
Theism Theology
Transtheism
Specific conceptions
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The term Animism is derived from the Latin anima, meaning "soul".[1][2] In its most general sense, animism is simply the belief in souls. In this general sense, animism is present in nearly all religions.
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religion is a set of common beliefs and practices generally held by a group of people, often codified as prayer, ritual, and religious law. Religion also encompasses ancestral or cultural traditions, writings, history, and mythology, as well as personal faith and mystic experience.
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Rainbow Serpent (also known as the Rainbow Snake) is a major mythological being for Aboriginal people across Australia, although the creation stories associated with it are best known from northern Australia.
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The Dreaming or Altjeringa (also called the Dreamtime), a sacred 'once upon a time' [1] time out of time in which ancestral Totemic Spirit Beings formed The Creation.
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Indigenous Australians are descendants of the first known human inhabitants of the Australian continent and its nearby islands. The term includes both the Torres Strait Islanders and the Aboriginal People, who together make up about 2.5% of Australia's population.
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Dreaming may refer to:
  • Dreaming (story), an Indigenous Australian creation story
  • Dream, the experience of envisioned images, sounds, or other sensations during sleep
In music:

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Songlines are also called Dreaming tracks by Indigenous Australians.

Songlines in the culture of Indigenous Australians

Australian's indigenous peoples conceive of all things beginning with the Dreaming or (in some Indigenous languages) Altjeringa
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Ubirr is located in the East Alligator region of Kakadu National Park, and is famous for its rock art. It consists of a group of rock outcrops on the edge of the Nadab floodplain where there are several natural shelters that have a collection of Aboriginal rock paintings, some of
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Alcheringa can be:
  • an annual cultural festival held once a year at the Indian Institute of Technology, Guwahati, India: see Alcheringa (Indian festival)
  • a term used by the Indigenous Australians for the Dreamtime, also known as Alchera.

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Indigenous Australians are descendants of the first known human inhabitants of the Australian continent and its nearby islands. The term includes both the Torres Strait Islanders and the Aboriginal People, who together make up about 2.5% of Australia's population.
..... Click the link for more information.
The Dreaming or Altjeringa (also called the Dreamtime), a sacred 'once upon a time' [1] time out of time in which ancestral Totemic Spirit Beings formed The Creation.
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In Australian Aboriginal mythology, Altjira is the sky god of the Arrernte. He was the central god of the Dream time (called Alchera by the Aranda) who created the Earth, then retired to the sky.

In art, he is depicted as having an emu's feet. His wives and daughters have dog's feet.
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Arrernte or Arrarnta may refer to:
  • Arrernte people
  • Arrernte language
  • Arrernte (area)

See also

  • Aranda, an older spelling

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In Australian Aboriginal mythology, Anjea is a fertility goddess or spirit. People's souls reside within her in between their incarnations. She picks them up at their resting places in the sand, which are marked with twigs.
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In Aboriginal mythology (specifically: Karadjeri), the Bagadjimbiri are two brothers and creator gods. They arose from the ground as dingos and made water-holes, sex organs (from a mushroom and another fungus) for the androgynous first people, and invented circumcision.
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In Australian aboriginal mythology, Bahloo is moon man. He keeps three deadly snakes as pets.

Myths Concerning Bahloo

One aboriginal legend tells of how Yhi, the sun, courted Bahloo, but he refused her advances.
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Baiame (Baayami or Baayama) is a creational ancestral hero in the dreaming of several language groups (e.g. Kamilaroi, Eora, Darkinjung, and Wiradjuri), of Indigenous Australians of South-East Australia.
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General

The Kamilaroi or Gamilaraay are an Indigenous Australian people who are from the area between Tamworth and Goondiwindi, and west to Narrabri, Walgett and Lightning Ridge, in northern New South Wales.
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In Australian Aboriginal mythology (specifically: Murngin), Bamapana is a trickster god who causes discord. He is obscene and profane and once committed incest, thus breaking a strict taboo.
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In Australian aboriginal mythology, Banaitja is a creator god.
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Yolngu (or Yolŋu) IPA: [ˈjolŋʊ] are an Indigenous Australian people inhabiting north-eastern Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory of Australia.
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In Yolngu culture, Baralku is the island of the dead and the place where the Djanggawul originated. The Barnumbir goddesses are said to live on the island.
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In myths of the Binbinga people of northern Australia, Bobbi-Bobbi was a supernatural being who lived in the heavens in the Dreamtime. He was a huge snake, similar to the Rainbow Snake, and was originally benevolent towards humans.
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G. rubicunda

Binomial name
Grus rubicunda
(Perry, 1810)

The Brolga (Grus rubicunda), formerly known as the "Native Companion", is a bird in the crane family.
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In Aboriginal mythology, the Djanggawul are three siblings, two female and one male, who created the landscape of Australia and covered it with flora. They came from the underworld, Beralku, and were eventually eaten by Galeru.
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Bunjil is the supreme god, represented as an eagle. The Kulin claim he is a culture-hero who taught them all the important skills of life, but the Wurundjeri claims he created mankind. He now lives in the sky. Binbeal, the rainbow spirit, is his son.
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Kulin alliance is one of the Indigenous Australian nations of Australia who lived in central Victoria, Australia, around Port Phillip and Western Port, up into the Great Dividing Range and the Loddon and Goulburn River valleys.
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Baiame (Baayami or Baayama) is a creational ancestral hero in the dreaming of several language groups (e.g. Kamilaroi, Eora, Darkinjung, and Wiradjuri), of Indigenous Australians of South-East Australia.
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