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Nyirti Jukurrpa
“When we was little kids, used to tell us this story. It was told by many generations – repeated. We still tell it today. One place to another, they keep on going. This one only we know – kids form the 80’s or 90’s. We grew up on the story, I’m bringing it back. White people have three little pigs, we have this one. They had a big fight. The echidna (minguwa) had no spikes. The lizard (kata puta) had no crown. The lizard had thousands of spears (kurlata). Echidna had a baton (jurna). He hit him really hard and that is why he got a big lump on him. So he threw all the spears really quickly and he got all the spikes on him”
– Owen John Biljabu
The term Jukurrpa is often translated in English as the ‘dreaming’, or ‘dreamtime’. In this case, Nyirti Jukurrpa can be understood in English as children’s stories, nyirti meaning ‘the littlest one’ in Martu language. Jukurrpa refers generally to the period in which the world was created by ancestral beings, who assumed both human and nonhuman forms. These beings shaped what had been a formless landscape; creating waters, plants, animals, and people. At the same time they provided cultural protocols for the people they created, as well as rules for interacting with the natural environment. At their journey’s end, the ancestral beings transformed themselves into important waters, hills, rocks, and even constellations.
