Journals of Expeditions of Discovery into Central Australia and Overland from Adelaide to King George's Sound in the Years 1840-1: Sent By the Colonists of South Australia, with the Sanction and Support of the Government: Including an Account of the Manners and Customs of the Aborigines and the State of Their Relations with Europeans — Volume 02Eyre, Edward John
History
Journals of Expeditions of Discovery into Central Australia and Overland from Adelaide to King George's Sound in the Years 1840-1: Sent By the Colonists of South Australia, with the Sanction and Support of the Government: Including an Account of the Manners and Customs of the Aborigines and the State of Their Relations with Europeans — Volume 02
Eyre, Edward John
Australia -- Discovery and exploration; Ethnology -- Australia
There are many usages in force among the natives respecting the
particular kinds of food allowed to be eaten at different ages;
restrictions and limitations of many kinds are placed upon both sexes at
different stages of life. What is proper to be eaten at one period, is
disallowed at another, and vice versa. And although laws of this nature
appear to be in force throughout the whole continent, there appear to be
occasional differences of custom as to restriction in regard to both food
and age. It also appears that there are more restrictions placed upon the
females, until past the age of child-bearing, than upon the males.
Infants are not often weaned until between two and three years old; but
during this time any food is given to them which they can eat, except
those kind of vegetables which are likely to disagree with them. No
restrictions are placed upon very young children of either sex, a portion
being given to them of whatever food their parents may have. About nine
or ten years appears to be the age at which limitations commence. Boys
are now forbidden to eat the red kangaroo, or the female or the young
ones of the other kinds; the musk duck, the white crane, the bandicoot,
the native pheasant, (leipoa, meracco), the native companion, some kinds
of fungi, the old male and female opossum, a kind of wallabie (linkara),
three kinds of fish (toor-rue, toitchock, and boolye-a), the black duck,
widgeon, whistling duck, shag (yarrilla), eagle, female water-mole
(nee-witke), two kinds of turtles (rinka and tung-kanka), and some other
varieties of food.
When young men they are disallowed the black duck, the widgeon, the
whistling duck, the emu, the eggs of the emu, a fish called kalapko, the
red kangaroo, the young of other kinds of kangaroo, if taken from the
pouch; a kind of shag called yarrilla, the snake (yarl-dakko), the white
crane, the eagle, a kind of water-mole (nee-witke), two kinds of turtle
(rinka and tung-kanka), the musk-duck, the native dog, the large grub dug
out of the ground (ronk), a vegetable food called war-itch (being that
the emu feeds upon), the native companion, bandicoot, old male opossum,
wallabie (linkara), coote, two fishes (toor-rue and toit-chock), etc. etc.
Married men, until from thirty-five to forty years of age, are still
forbidden the red kangaroo, the young of any kangaroo from the pouch, the
fish kelapko, the shag yarrilla, the coote, the white crane, the turtle
rinka, the native companion, the eagle, etc.
Young females, before the breasts are fully developed, are disallowed the
young of any of the kangaroo species if taken from the pouch, the red
kangaroo, the white crane, the bandicoot, the native companion, the old
male opossum, the wallabie (linkara), the shag (yarrilla), the eagle, etc.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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