Lightning Brothers: Nimji Art Site
Yidumduma teaches the meaning behind the rock art at this famous site on Willeroo Station, Northern Territory. Here the Lightning Man Jabirringgi sings the clouds, brings the sheet lightning, heavy rain and works together with his older brother Yagjagula to make the fork lightning and brings the bushfires to clean the land and keep the rivers clean.
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Transcript
Now, these two have a name, this one here called Jabirringi.
Jabirringi is the one that make the very big rain.
The rain he makes, we call barrawunda.
The barrawunda mean a tornado or cyclone and Jabirringi makes it. The wind was given by the Little Grasshopper to the Lightning to make that big wind called barrawunda.
He makes the big rains with that big black stroke in the middle.
We call that yarrindi.
The yarrindi mean, 'the song with the power',
and that's what the Jabirringi uses.
Jabirringi doesn't strike any tree at all.
He puts up the big flash lightning and the big wind and it blows the trees or house or anything down.
He has electricity down the bottom, this is the white one.
We call that jirri...is the electricity.
He digs that into the ground and reverberates the whole earth and pushes the tree over...
That's what the Jabirringi does.
When Jabirringi make the very big rain, then this bloke,Yagjagula, he takes the lead.
He takes the lead to strike many trees in the country, light fires in the grass...
That's why he's all red.
He strikes the trees, and has two stone axes, one in each hand.
He flicks those two together and he makes a big forked lightning go out, hit the tree,
you can hear the big loud sound and the chips fly everywhere.
That's what the Yagjagbula does.
Yagjagula, because he's dressed all in red, he's full of electricity.
Jabirringi, he's black and yellow and white.
The white represents the clouds that are flowing across the country.
That's represented in all those lines.
When the Jabirringi make the very big strong rain, the Yagjagula take the lead all the way and strikes many trees.
When the rain come right over the grass, in his mouth, with his power, he has spit.
He spit that out on the grass while it's raining because he has wax in there.
When he hits that with the electricity, with the two stone axes and the fork lightning, he can still set a fire, while it's raining, because there's a wax all over the spinifex (grass).
We call that benegin.
This is the two brothers, that's Yagjagula, and this is Jabirringi.
That's the two, the Lightning Brothers.
