Waa- Aboriginal Australian SpiritSpirit · Beast"The Crow"
Also known as: Waang
Description
The Crow — one of two ancestral powers that divide all of Kulin existence. Every person, animal, plant, and phenomenon belongs to either Waa or Bunjil the Eaglehawk, and the rivalry and partnership between them shapes marriage, ceremony, and the structure of the world.
Mythology & Lore
The Quarrel
In the Dreamtime, Waa the Crow and Bunjil the Eaglehawk competed and quarreled. Bunjil shaped the land and climbed the sky. Waa stayed close to the ground, dark-feathered and sharp, eating what Bunjil left behind. They were rivals and could not be separated. Their conflicts, recorded in Kulin tradition, set the rules that bind the two halves of Kulin society together: who can marry whom, who performs which ceremony, what each side owes the other.
Born Waa
Every Kulin person belongs to either Waa or Bunjil. A Waa person must marry a Bunjil person. Marriage within one's own moiety is forbidden. Certain ceremonies need Waa people, others need Bunjil people, and neither side holds all the knowledge required to maintain the sacred order alone.
The division runs through everything. Animals, plants, and weather belong to one moiety or the other, and a person of the Crow moiety has kinship with every creature classified under Waa. Howitt documented this system across the Kulin groups of central Victoria, where the two halves together account for everything in the world.
Relationships
- Enemy of