Gawarrgay- Aboriginal Australian ConceptConcept"The Sky Emu"
Description
A great emu traced not by stars but by the dark spaces between them. The Coalsack Nebula forms its head, dark lanes of the Milky Way its neck and body. Known as Gawarrgay in Kamilaroi tradition, the celestial emu's shifting orientation through the year tells watchers when real emus run and when their eggs can be gathered.
Mythology & Lore
The Dark Emu
The Kamilaroi (Gamilaraay) call it Gawarrgay. It is not made of stars. It is made of the darkness between them. The Coalsack Nebula near the Southern Cross forms the head. Dark lanes extending through the Milky Way trace the neck, body, and legs. From the Southern Hemisphere, the figure of a running emu stretches across the bright band of the galaxy.
Gawarrgay moves through the year as the Milky Way shifts its position. In April and May, the celestial emu appears to run across the sky with its legs stretched out. This is when real emus are running, and their eggs can be gathered. Later in the year, the figure shifts orientation: the emu sits on its nest. The nesting season has begun. R.S. Fuller, R.P. Norris, and M. Trudgett documented how the sky emu served the Kamilaroi as a calendar written in darkness.
At Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park near Sydney, rock engravings show emus in different postures. Norris and Hamacher have noted that these may correspond to the celestial emu's seasonal orientations, suggesting the tradition of reading the sky for emu seasons runs deep into the archaeological past.