Ntjikantja brothers

The Ntjikantja brothers are a pair of serpent-ancestors of Southern Aranda (Arrernte) tradition documented by T. G. H. Strehlow. In the Dreaming the two brothers, after their earthly wanderings and the events at Uralterinja, hurled a spear into the vault of heaven and climbed up it, casting away their human kin below. As they departed they pronounced a grim curse upon the assembled host, an act to which Southern Aranda tradition traces the origin of human mortality and the Central Australian custom of ritual wailing for the dead. In the night sky the two brothers are identified with the Magellanic Clouds, and their story belongs to the substantial body of Aranda celestial mythology recorded by Strehlow and discussed in later studies of Aboriginal astronomy.

Domains

• sky and stars
• death and mourning

Powers

• to climb into the sky upon a hurled spear and remain there as the Magellanic Clouds
• to pronounce the curse that brought death and the wailing for the dead upon humankind

Sources

• T. G. H. Strehlow, Aranda Traditions, Melbourne University Press, 1947
• T. G. H. Strehlow, Songs of Central Australia, Angus and Robertson, 1971
• Dianne Johnson, Night Skies of Aboriginal Australia: A Noctuary, Sydney University Press, 1998