Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 17, 1906.djvu/196

184 How would Mr. Lang like it if we used the terms noa or nupa without indicating what English term they include. I have no doubt that he might ask at once, "Why is not the meaning of this term given?"

If Mr. Lang will look at the Dieri and Urabunna terms he may see their present meaning and that they are applied by those tribes to individuals who are living under the pirrauru or piraiungaru marriage. If he will then examine the terms in use by the tribes I have quoted, he will see the same terms, in different languages, which do not denote the conditions of individual marriage but of pirrauru marriage.

I again assert that the aboriginal terms include relationships as understood by us, and at the same time include persons who under the universal conditions of the Australian tribes are considered, for instance, to be "fathers" or "sons," etc., as the case may be. An example of this will make my position clear. In the Kurnai tribe the term mungajn, that is "father," includes not only the husband of the individual wife and the father of her children, but also his brothers own and tribal. For instance Tulaba, whom I have mentioned in Native Tribes, was the son as we should see it of Bembinkel and his individual wife. Thus Bembinkel was his mungan. But the brother of Bembinkel named Bruthen-mungi was also his muingan. It was only when especial inquiry was made that Tulaba said, "Bembinkel is my mungan, but Bruthen-munji is my breppa munngan." The former was his father, the actual husband of his mother, but the latter was his "other father," and the nominal husband of his mother.

Had he been a Dieri, the actual tippa-malku husband of his mother would be his ngaperi, but her pirrauru husband would be his ngaperi-waka or "little father."

In the Dieri case we have the actual group-marriage with appropriate terms, while with the Kurnai there are