Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

Five Versions of a Dyirbal Legend

Five Versions of a Dyirbal Legend The Dyirbal peoples of North Queensland believe that at one time the spirit of a departed person could return to visit their relatives. Then one returning spirit saw his own rotting head, which his mother had retained when burying his body. This meant that he must now return permanently to the land of spirits and everyone would follow him when their turn came. This was the origin of death as we know it today. Five versions of this legend were recorded, from three narrators; no one version includes every detail. A similar story was told by the neighboring Yidiñ people. The versions are analyzed, compared, and assessed. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Anthropological Linguistics University of Nebraska Press

Five Versions of a Dyirbal Legend

Dixon, Robert M. W.
Anthropological Linguistics , Volume 55 (4) – Oct 1, 2014
Download PDF
53 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/university-of-nebraska-press/five-versions-of-a-dyirbal-legend-EL7W6thvZi

References

References for this paper are not available at this time. We will be adding them shortly, thank you for your patience.

Publisher
University of Nebraska Press
ISSN
1944-6527

Abstract

The Dyirbal peoples of North Queensland believe that at one time the spirit of a departed person could return to visit their relatives. Then one returning spirit saw his own rotting head, which his mother had retained when burying his body. This meant that he must now return permanently to the land of spirits and everyone would follow him when their turn came. This was the origin of death as we know it today. Five versions of this legend were recorded, from three narrators; no one version includes every detail. A similar story was told by the neighboring Yidiñ people. The versions are analyzed, compared, and assessed.

Journal

Anthropological Linguistics – University of Nebraska Press

Published: Oct 1, 2014

There are no references for this article.