R. M. & C. H. Berndt 24 concluded that the practice of
killing the very young seemed to have been carried out
occasionally over almost all Aboriginal AustraUa, but that
infanticide was not invariably followed by eating the flesh.
Howitt 25 found instances where young children were eaten by
members of the Kaura tribe near Adelaide during hard
summers; and where the flesh of young children of the
Wotjobaluk tribe was eaten by their elder brothers and sisters
to make them strong.26 He reported also 2? that all the tribes
of the Wotjo nation and on the Murray River frontage used
at times, when an older child was weak and sickly, to kill its
infant brother or sister and feed it on the flesh. Bates 2«
also recorded examples of the practice of infant cannibalism
by the desert tribes of South and Western AustraUa.
Thomas 2^ recorded a case on the Gascoigne River in Western
Australia where an Aboriginal girl was killed and eaten by
a native who decoyed her away. "She was very plump; the
object of killing her was to acquire this desirable quality".
Bleakle> ^^ also referred to "rare cases .. . of the killing and
eating of a young girl on a special ritual occasion"; but his
information is not documented. Bates ^"^ wrote of the
Kaalurwonga east of the Boundary Dam who killed and ate
fat men, women, and girls.
Elsewhere she stated ^°^ that
"wanton women in any camp" (i.e., among the West Australian
desert tribes) could be lawfully killed and eaten, and this
may be a key to the motivation for some cannibalistic practices
of this nature.
Instances of the eating of human flesh by Australian
Aborigines solely for food were much rarer than those of
endo-cannibalism or revenge cannibalism. Thomas ^' stated
that "some blacks kUl only to eat" but did not provide any
documentation for this observation. Bates ^2 reported the
hunting and sharing of kangaroo and human meat by the
Koogurda on the South Australian-West Australian border.
Elsewhere ^^ she wrote of the terrible Dowie, who when a boy
was given the flesh of four baby sisters to eat, after which
"he developed a taste for human food that grew and strengthened
with his years". He "brought home many human bodies, for
he would stalk game in murderer's slippers, and he loved the
flesh of man, woman, and chUd". After reading of some of
Dowie's actions, however, one feels that this human monster
was not typical of the Aborigines of the area: but there is
no gainsaying that the cannibalistic acts ^'^ described hereunder
by Bates contain elements of compulsive cannibalism and differ
from typical acts of simple revenge cannibalism.
I use the word cannibal advisedly. Everyone of these
natives was a cannibal. Cannibalism had its local name
from Kimberley to Eucla, and through all the unoccupied
country east of it, and there were many grisly rites attached
thereto. Human meat had always been their favourite food,
and there were killing vendettas from time immemorial.
In order that the killing should be safe, murderers' slippers
or pads were made, emu-feathers twisted and twined
together, bound to the foot with human hair, on which
the natives walk and run as easily as a white man in
running shoes, their feet leaving no track. Dusk and
dawn were the customary hours for raiding a camp.
Victims were shared according to the law.
https://espace.library.uq.edu.au/data/UQ_242712/Qld_heritage_v1_no7_1967_p25_29....
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