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Dreamtime in Kakadu
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Dreamtime in Kakadu
AUSTRALIAN WELLBEING
No. 41
by Linda Lee Rathbun
(most) photos by Steven David Miller
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Dreamtime in Kakadu
text by Linda Lee Rathbun
photos by Steven David Miller
Kakadu is a place one can experience on many levels. On the surface, there is the beauty and danger. This breathtaking combination can be seen on an afternoon boat trip, waiting for the sun to set on the still lagoon of Yellow Waters. A white egret strikes a pose at the water's edge, its full attention focused on catching a fish. Water lilies create tiny island pads with blooms of pink and lavender. A saltwater crocodile rests on the bank; at will he can turn himself into the chilling predator of our nightmares. We like to think it is he that poses the threat.
There is a deeper level to Kakadu too, an embedded mystique that a white person can never fully fathom. It comes from the people who inhabited the area for as many as 40,000 years before Europeans 'discovered' it.
Throughout Aboriginal Australia there were 200 distinct languages. Fourteen language groups shared the Alligator Rivers region, with various clans within these groups owning clearly defined pieces of traditional land. An early anthropologist thought that only the Gagudju language group lived there, so the area was named Kakadu. If you had two or three fingers missing you could still count on one hand the remaining Aborigines who speak fluent Gagudju. So many of the people, and so much of the culture, have been lost. The genocidal fist of colonialism attempted to smash a way of life stretching back into pre-history….back into the Dreamtime.
All Aborigines believed in the Dreamtime when an empty land erupted into life with the arrival of the great spirit ancestors from beneath the earth and from the seas and the sky. These spirit ancestors took many forms and roamed through the vacuousness, creating all the landscape and everything living in and on it. When they finished their magical journeys they turned themselves into a part of the land, such as a rock or a billabong.
Each ancestor taught aspects of spiritual and physical survival to their children, and the laws that would govern their lives. This knowledge was passed on through all the generations. The ancestors entrusted the land and its fruits to the people and made them responsible for it, the irrevocable law being that they had to look after it. Just how they must do this was a large part of what the elders taught their children.
The Aborigines did not have a written language. Everything they needed to know was remembered through songs, ceremonies, art, and a complex kinship system. A clan's song described every part of the Dreaming path of their ancestors, and therefore their traditional land. It was like a vocal map of a region that told where food and water could be found, where the ancestors had turned themselves into the sacred sites, and any other important information.
The Gagudju and other language groups in Kakadu believed in many ancestral spirits. One was Indjuwanydjuwa. His dreaming path crisscrossed the flood plains where he created dramatic landmarks, hunted and fished, living a normal life much like that of his descendants. When he finished his journey he transformed himself into a rock surrounded by lilies in the middle of a billabong.
Warramurrungundji was a female ancestral spirit, an earth mother who emerged from across the sea with a womb full of children. As she wandered she planted the many bulbs and seeds she had brought with her. Her children were born along the way and she instructed them in the different languages that would form the language groups.
Some of the ancestral spirits of the Kakadu area were called the Birirrk or the Mimis. While other ancestors turned themselves into landmarks and their spirits continued to live there, the Mimis were able to always come and go. They conceived of many gifts for their children and taught them how to use them. These spirits were fragile and thin; in strong winds they had to hide in the protective cracks of rocks. Their shadows mark the places where they dissolved into the cracks and these can still be seen at many of the rock-art sites.
There are about 7,000 rock-art sites in Kakadu. These are usually in high rock formations that remain above the flood line in the wet season. Each site was owned by a clan and was a haven where they could shelter from the elements. They painted on the rock surface using ochre, minerals and clay pigments. Some paintings, like those of the Mimis, were painted by the spirits themselves. These could only be touched up during special ceremonies by initiated men who knew how to please the spirits. Other paintings illustrated ancestral beings; only those who knew the secrets of the spirit's Dreaming path could portray them. The act of drawing the ancestral spirit could give the artist the power of the spirit, or actually turn him into the spirit.
The daily activities of life were also depicted, along with the foods that people ate. These were often sketched to ensure a good hunt or plentiful harvest of food. Some pictures were used in sorcery, perhaps putting spells or curses on those who had broken the laws.
Today these paintings are no longer kept up in the traditional ways, though the equally rich art form of bark painting continues. Perhaps if we valued the artists as much as we value the art, they would still be here to share the secrets of the rock-art treasures. It is amazing that the traditional owners of the Kakadu area are still willing to share so many sites with the public. Considering the damage that has been done to some of the areas, they would be justified in reclaiming the shattered remnants of their culture and keeping it to themselves, as was once the law. There are a few sites that are too powerful for anyone to be allowed in. Some are so sacred they cn only be approached in a certain way, calling out the names of the ancestral spirits so as not to startle them.
Ubirr is a rock monolith that looks out over the flood plains of the East Alligator River. It is here that the Rainbow Serpent, Kuringali, paused in her travels, and she placed an image of herself in the rock so the people would remember she had been there. Below is the vast landscape that she and other ancestral spirits gave rise to. They were generous, conferring on their descendants a staggering array of foods that varied through the six seasons of the area. The Bunitj and other clans camped in the protected escarpment. There are many dazzling examples of the art they created to appease the spirits and to express their way of life. The thin, stick-like figures are now referred to as Mimi art, and the elaborate crisscrossed designs of animals and spirits are called X-ray art. Both styles were highly developed in the Kakadu and Arnhem Land areas.
Most of the rock surfaces that were used as canvases at Ubirr are layered with artwork. Each artist painted over another's work as though the work itself did not matter, as though only the act of creating was significant. A colossal wedge of rock that hangs overhead like a roof is covered with X-ray paintings overlapping each other in an impressive stone fresco that is like a visual guide to food, particularly fish. Further on a 15 metre long surface is another display of creatures: goanna, wallaby, turtle, mullet, barramundi and catfish. High above a path on a seemingly inaccessible ledge is a thylacine, extinct in Kakadu for about 3,000 years. Other rock faces represent more recent times: a man, probably a buffalo hunter, carrying a gun. One impressive mural shows a multitude of white Mimi spirits, dashing across the rock in a frenzy of activity. Some carry spears and woomeras, others have fans and dilly bags. Painted over the Mimis are the Namarrkan sisters, each pulling a string between her hands. The sisters could transform themselves into crocodiles so that they could eat anything they wanted.
They now live in the heavens from where they can cast their strings and pull themselves down into the bodies of people, making them sick. The Mimis and Ubirr engaged in all sorts of activities. If they want to they can come out of the rocks to inflict mischief at night. However, no one has seen or spoken to a Mimi for many years.
Nourlangie was another location that provided a rock shelter with fresh water and a wide range of food very close by. The Warramal clan lived in the area, as did their ancestors stretching back for 20,000 years. One shelter called Anbangbang was a popular camp for 6,000 years. Generations had used the rock surfaces to express the religion that linked them to closely to the land. As outside influences began to erode the traditional ways, the rock paintings were not kept up. At the turn of the century the flood plains to the north of Nourlangie were used by the Aborigines and whites to hunt buffalo, but along with the killing of the animals came swift changes to deep and complex traditions. One man, Nayombolmi of the Badmardi clan, despaired at what was happening to the culture of his people. He was able to express his deep nostalgia for the art of rock painting by re-painting and adding to the stone surfaces at Anbangbang to leave a masterpiece in the traditional X-ray style. Nayombolmi died four years later…..thankfully he left behind a stirring tribute to his heritage.
The top figures of Nayombolmi's huge design were his own. To the right is Namarrgon, the lightning man. Namarrgon is encircled with an arched bolt of lightning; at his knees, head and elbows are the stone axes which he hurls at the clouds to create the bolts that light up the skies during electrical storms. Perhaps he has his Teutonic twin in Thor, the God who hurled his stone hammer to create thunder. To the left is Namondjok, the dangerous spirit. Namondjok committed incest with his cousin, but because in Aboriginal clan kinship a cousin is considered a sister, he broke an important law. Beneath him is Namarrgon's wife, Barrginj. The rest of the mural was re-painted by Nayombolmi. The figures are families on their way to a ceremony.
Nourlangie contains more works of art. One is another illustration of Namarrgon. The actual resting place of Namarrgon is in Arnhem Land, and the incredible power of this landmark makes it forbidden except to only a very few who know how to appease Namarrgon. One of the most impressive figures is of a solitary spirit, Nabulwinjbulwinj. He uses yams to beat women to death….and then eats his victims. Anyone who sees this king size image won't doubt that the spirit must have been menacing indeed.
For me, there is a sense of loss in the paintings of Kakadu….a reminder of how we so ruthlessly attempt to destroy things before we take the time to understand them. Dismissing the Aboriginal ways made whites illiterate to the subtle language of the land they stole - with consequences that will continue for many years to come. For the Aborigines, the balance of nature and ways of the earth were easy to comprehend, everything they needed to know was written in the land. They could read their environment through an alphabet that had been handed down through 400 generations. Perhaps it is time for Aboriginal Australians to read aloud the language of the land, and time for European Australians to listen. The time has passed to return completely to the ways of the Dreamtime, but it is not too late to appreciate the knowledge and spiritual gifts which sprang from that tradition. Kakadu is giving Aborginal Australians the chance to teach, and giving European Australians the chance to learn and appreciate.
It is a place where an old culture and a young culture can meet. It is a way to return to the most sacred law of all: the law that says we must look after the land.
THE END