Gadjari

Gadjari, in modern Warlpiri Kajirri, is the ancestral Mother, the Old Woman for whom the great second-stage male initiation cult is named. Meggitt's monograph documents the Gadjari as the presiding fertility being of the northern and central-desert cult, associated across the wider region with the Rainbow Serpent and the Kunapipi Mother of Arnhem Land. Among the Warlpiri her presence is oblique: the secret episodes performed in her cult belong to the male Mamandabari pair, and the Mother herself stands some distance from the action, treated almost as a presiding deity rather than a character within the songs. Her cult is understood to have travelled south from Arnhem Land through Wave Hill and Lajamanu into the Tanami.

Domains

• fertility
• initiation law

Powers

• presides over the male initiation cult that bears her name
• transforms initiands into ritual adults

Epithets

• Kajirri — the Old WomanMeggitt, M.J. (1966), Gadjari among the Walbiri Aborigines (primary)

Sources

• Gadjari (Kajirri) is the ancestral Mother who presides over the great Warlpiri male-initiation cult named for her, documented in detail by Meggitt.: Meggitt, M.J. (1966), Gadjari among the Walbiri Aborigines of Central Australia, Oceania Monographs, Sydney (primary)
• Among the Warlpiri she is a distant presiding figure, standing apart from the Mamandabari ritual performance rather than acting within it.: Meggitt, M.J. (1966), Gadjari among the Walbiri Aborigines (primary)