Page:Native Tribes of South-East Australia.djvu/148

122 The class names, totems, and sub-totems are called mir.

This system seems to be a peculiar development of the class systems of the Darling River tribes. But in this case some of the totems have advanced almost to the grade of sub-classes, and they have a markedly independent existence.

The new features are the numerous groups of sub-totems attached to the classes Gamutch and Krokitch respectively. It seems as if some of the totems of a two-class system had grown in importance, leaving the remaining totems behind in obscurity; and probably this has arisen through this tribe dividing the whole universe between the two classes, as, for instance, the Wiraduri do. Another peculiarity is that some of the totems have synonyms. Thus Ngaui has a second name, Ngaui-na-guli, or men of the sun. Moreover, it is said to be closely attached to Garchuka, which one of my informants claimed as a "second name of his mir," in fact, that both Ngaui and Garchuka were his names, but he said that Ngaui was specially his name, because "Garchuka came a little behind it." On the other hand, another informant, who also claimed to be both Ngaui and Garchuka, said that he was specially Garchuka, and that "Ngaui came a little behind." Wherein the difference lay I was quite unable to ascertain, but it seemed that Ngaui and Garchuka were in fact slightly divergent appendages of the class Krokitch, under new names. This view is strengthened by the fact that the mortuary totems which will be referred to later are the same for both Ngaui and Garchuka. Gamutch-batchangal has also a second name, which is said to be only a name and not a mir. Its members are called "darau-yau-ngau-uing," "we are warming ourselves," because Wanyip, "fire," is one of their sub-totems.

The system as tabulated is not complete. The old men who were my informants knew their own mir and the various objects which they respectively claimed as belonging to the mir, and therefore to themselves, but they were not so clear as to the other totems, excepting Batya-ngal, as to which they knew a number of objects it claimed. They said that it was formerly a very strong mir. Regarding the totems Barewun, "a cave"; Ngungul, "the sea"; and