Wallungunder
Ngarinyin · deity · Ngarinyin traditional religion; continuing · Recorded classification
Wallungunder is the great creator Wandjina of the Ngarinyin and their Wanjina Wunggurr neighbours. Travelling across a formless country, he cut the rivers and gorges, opened the waterholes and imbued each with wunggud, the generative essence, before making the first people, the Gwion. Sources differ on his exact place in the sky pantheon: some accounts name him the first son of Idjair, while others identify him directly with Walanganda, the Milky Way whose dark pools are the origin of all fresh water. Having laid down the beginnings of the Law, he withdrew upward, leaving his image and those of the later Wandjina fixed upon the rock as clouds heavy with rain.
Parentage
- parent: IdjairFirst son of the sky-dwelling first Wandjina Idjair.Blundell, V. & Woolagoodja, D. (2005) Keeping the Wanjinas Fresh. Fremantle Press (secondary)
Domains
- creation
- milky way sky
Powers
- create the earth and its waters
- make the first human beings
Epithets
- the first WandjinaMowaljarlai, D. & Malnic, J. (1993) Yorro Yorro. Magabala Books (secondary)
Relations
- parent: IdjairFirst son of the sky-dwelling first Wandjina Idjair.Blundell, V. & Woolagoodja, D. (2005) Keeping the Wanjinas Fresh. Fremantle Press (secondary)
- companion: UngudSky-being and earth-serpent whose paired dreaming brings living forms into being.Encyclopedia.com, 'Ungarinyin Religion' (drawing on Petri 1954 and Lommel 1952) (secondary)
Sources
- Wallungunder is the creator Wandjina who formed the land, its waters and the first people, and is identified with the Milky Way.: Mowaljarlai, D. & Malnic, J. (1993) Yorro Yorro: Everything Standing Up Alive. Magabala Books (secondary); Blundell, V. & Woolagoodja, D. (2005) Keeping the Wanjinas Fresh. Fremantle Press (secondary)