entitled to eat emu, by some of the fat being rubbed unexpectedly by some old man on his naked back.
The Wirrarap (medicine-man) also in this tribe exercised supervision over the youth who had been made Jibauk. He could dream of his actions. But the novice was also under supernatural penalties if he broke the food laws or rules of conduct laid upon him. Thus the Kulin of the Goulburn River, who were the neighbours of the Wurunjerri, and nearly allied to them, believed that if the novice ate the spiny anteater or the black duck, he would be killed by the thunder. If he ate of the female of the opossum or native bear, he was liable to fall when climbing trees.
Protector Thomas speaks of this ceremony in a report to Governor La Trobe[1] on the "Ceremony of Tobbut," and his remarks probably apply not only to the Wurunjerri, but also to other tribes within his immediate knowledge. He says "that there are strips of old rags, string, strips of opossum skin and old rope, and all the variety of stripes with which a fringed apron girdles him round" (sic). He is not allowed to have a blanket to cover him, or anything else, night or day, and it is generally the winter season which is selected for this purpose. He goes through the encampment calling out "Tib-bo-bo-but." He has a basket under his arm, which contains all the filth he can pick up, not even omitting soil. He frightens and bedaubs all he meets with some of the beastly commodities contained in his basket, but must not touch any who are in their mia-mias, or lubras on their way getting water, but in any other case he is at liberty to annoy and frighten all he meets.
The Talangun Ceremonies
In the Bunurong tribe the equivalent of the Jibauk was called Talangun. All that was done was that the boy was taken by some of the men, who dressed him in full male attire, and he was made free of the forbidden food animals as soon as the men could catch them. According to Berak, who knew that tribe well, there were no other ceremonies of
- ↑ Letters from Victorian Pioneers, p. 99.
