Djul’djul Gurruwiwi

9.5 x 39 cm

ID: 7456-24

This work illustrates an important ancestral being for the Dha`waŋu clan. Wurraṉ the diver duck is on top of sacred waters of the Gulutji river. A sacred expanse of water behind the Gäṉgaṉ outstation is referred to as Gulutji. The initial activities of Barama, the great Ancestral Being for the Yirritja moiety, took place here. From travelling from the seaside at Blue Mud Bay he emerged from the waters of Gulutji. Council was held with ‘Disciple’ Ancestors and Yirritja Law was ‘written’. From this place the Yirritja (equal side or moiety of a duality) nation spread as it traversed its country establishing clan estates and governing policy including language, ceremonial ritual and miny’tji (signature of sacred design of event and place). The varying states and movement of sacred water is pivotal to Yolŋu philosophies. The journey of freshwater down river to meet the salt, the tidal ebb and flow, the rough and the calm are the basis or rhythm of sacred manikay (ritual song). In this painting the fields of diamond design represent the sacred qualities of the freshwater of Gäṉgaṉ. This design belongs only to the Dhalwaŋu clan. Barama came from the saltwater, coming up through the freshwater. The powers within the water has both entered the Diltji or bone and comes from it. This diamond design was imprinted at the moment the sanctified waters imbued with sacred silt streamed down the sunlit chest of Barama as he emerged.Minhala the long mecked Tortoise embodies Barama. Wurraṉ the diver duck or freshwater Darter is one of the ‘disciples’ of Barama. This ancestral totem for the Dha`waŋu clan travelled over Dha`waŋu estates following the sacred freshwaters affected by the original creators. A design such as this would mirror the spiritual journey of a deceased’s soul who had Dhalwaŋu freshwater kinship between Gäṉgaṉ and Gapuwiyak. Wurraṉ is seen as a metaphor for an agent in death therefore also of life. From the sacred waters of Gäṉgaṉ, Baypiṉŋa the saratoga are taken by Wurraṉ who picks the bones clean. In traditional Yolŋu society the last rites of mortuary that have the soul returned for rebirth can only be assumed when the bones have been cleansed of any tissue. This is an honored role for the child, mother or mother’s mother kinship relations of a deceased. The Baypiṉŋa are normally cooked in a termite mound ground oven (Gundirr) with sheets of paperbark to trap the heat. This is also a metaphor for the initial burial prior to bone cleansing that a deceased Yolŋu person undergoes prior to the placement of the bones in a Larrakitj, or hollow log.