- Collection type
- Object
- Description
- Rod spear-thrower with handled end having a large attachment of braided hair. [MJD DDF Body Arts Project 2010/2011 27/08/2010]
- Long description
- Rod spear-thrower with handled end having a large attachment of braided hair. There are traces of white paint in hair. The opposite end with hook set in resin and painted white. The entire length of wood is painted red with ?ochre. [MJD DDF Body Arts Project 2010/2011 27/08/2010]
- Cultural groups
- Wambaya
- Person
- Field collector Francis James Gillen
- Field collector Walter Baldwin Spencer
- PRM source Walter Baldwin Spencer
- Date / Period
- Date made: Before 1902
- Date collected
- 1901 - 1902
- Acquisition information
- Donated: 1903
- Materials and processes
- Material Wood Plant, Material Resin Plant, Material Animal Hair, Material Pigment, Material Ochre, Process Carved, Process Painted, Process Twisted, Process Bound
- Dimensions
- Length: max 885 mm
- Object numbers
- Accession number: 1903.39.44 Other numbers: Spencer number 24
- Research and responses
This object was collected during an expedition of Central Australia led by Walter Baldwin Spencer and Francis Gillen between 1901 and 1902. However, it should be noted that accompanying them was an Aboriginal man called Erlikilyika. He was 'hired' (receiving no monetary payment) to run their campsites, but actually undertook some of the ethnographic work himself. He could speak Arrernte (his native language), Kaytej (another Aboriginal language), and English. In their personal field-diaries, Spencer and Gillen note that they took days off work, leaving Erlikilyika with "entire charge of the ethnological branch", where he spoke with and recorded the complex beliefs and customs of Aboriginal communities that were not his own (the Kaytetye group in particular). Unfortunately, there is no way of knowing if Erlikilyika collected any of these objects himself but we know that he played a vital role in documenting their meaning and significance, and should therefore be credited for his valuable contributions to the expedition. This information was provided by Fionnuala Bradbury, a Master's student in Archaeology at Newcastle University, as part of her thesis entitled "Erlikilyika and Walter Baldwin Spencer: Indigenous Informants, Ethnographic Analogy, and Archaeological Interpretation". There is an abridged version of the thesis in RDF.
Search terms: Weapon, Spear-thrower