Nungali

The 'Yin and Yang' in advanced 'primitive' society .

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I have been recently reviewing Aboriginal Kinship systems .   

 

I encountered this recently and it seemed to me that the Aboriginals acknowledged , not just this polarity fundamentally , but its extension into everything .

 

" According to moiety, everything is split in half. This includes you and your environment. Each half of these entities are a mirror of each other. To understand the whole universe, the two halves must come together to form a whole.

 

You can share the same moiety as other people. If you do share the same moiety, you are considered siblings, and thus, are forbidden to marry. Having the same moiety also means having a duty to reciprocally support one another. "

 

This is the original system instigated at the forming of  'modern' Aboriginal social structure  ( started around 8000ya. ). It has since spread and in some places multiplied 'by itself'   , into 4 and 8 systems ('skin names' )  . . .  or sub systems of the essential two . These come from either of the parents ( depending if it is a matrilineal or patrilineal group - they have both , also as a reflection of this 'polarity') .

 

Fish, stone, river, sea etc., belongs to one or the other moiety as well.

 

I recently watched an Aboriginal mathematician  demonstrate  how it works on a black board ( which I had no hope of following !  maths ! :( )  , with just  a few simple 'nodes' of possible combinations ( marriages ) makes it possible, under their laws , for a group of less than 30 to expand and  develop continually , without  suffering genetic degradation ( 'cross breeding ' ) .

 

 

There are more 'practical considerations as well : 

 

" ... These include certain ‘avoidance relationships’, like that of the relationship between a mother-in-law and her son-in-law. This relationship requires a social distance, such that they may not be able to be in the same room or car together. "

 

:) 

 

But mostly , I have found those 'other considerations'  ( which are originally generated by the concepts behind all these systems ) seem to 'knit ' their relationships together in the more  tribal way .  My teacher told me he had a 'biological Mum, of course, '  but also 'a bunch of aunties that where my mum in all other respects , including breastfeeding me ' . Others include ;

 

  • father and mother include any relative of one's parents' generation, such as uncles, aunts, their own cousins and in-laws.
  • Grandfather and grandmother can refer to anyone of one's grandparents' generation. Grandfather can also refer to any respected elderly man, to whom the speaker may not be related.

 

So, one could announce themselves with their string of names , some of which are made up of certain permutations of the syllables  in both their parents name  ( and the parents names would also be likewise encoded ) , and their totem and from that a whole set of info would be understood ; lineage , marriage and hunting rights, land tenure and associated visiting rights , 'job'   ( which part of the ecology they have to manage according to totem ) .     ... and also , sometime there are just some people that are not a good match for you  -  'avoidence speech' , those people you can only talk to in a certain 'language modification'   speech .  Some, like the case with some tribes and the mother-in-law, they talk to then via another person . What if its urgent and important and no one else is around ?   Well, you can't  talk to mother-in-law, but you can talk to a rock and tree ( if she is within hearing range ) and ask the rock or the tree to tell her  .  :) 

 

 

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Interresting read, and in stark contrast to the indo european structure, where the PIE word for family consists of «to be born» and «house.» Father was also synonoumus with «head of the house,» and the children took the name of their fathers family. Free from the restrain of historium, we can finaly say that the forbidden science shows that indo-european males sometimes married outsiders, but women did not. And so they spread their hierarchial, patrichal and warring ways and semen. 

 

But enough about that. I am wondering what you can tell about how aboriginals deal with things like tribal and teretorial disputes, family structure, leadership, people who get exiled… stuff like that.

In general, hunter-gatherer societies are egalitarian, are they not? 


 

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 According to moiety, everything is split in half. This includes you and your environment. Each half of these entities are a mirror of each other. To understand the whole universe, the two halves must come together to form a whole.

Love it. Reminds me of the greeks take on soulmates. How Zeus spilt humanity in half, man and women, and ever since we have been searching reunite with our better half, become whole. 

 

Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.
Aristotle

 

https://greekerthanthegreeks.com/twin-flames-the-ancient-greek-story-of-one-soul-split-into-two/

https://european-origins.com/2020/05/10/indo-european-society/

 

edit, unrelated note:

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Just found it interresting that they could thrace this phrase so far back: 

Most interestingly some phrases used in these ancient poems can be reconstructed by looking at the oldest available sources of Indo-European poetry, such as Homer and the Vedas:

“imperishable fame,” *klewos dhgwhitom (kleu-, *dhgwhei-);  

____________

And lt is still burning ❤️‍🔥

 

Edited by NaturaNaturans
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