THE STORY OF DJIRT.

In the Dream time, a small boy called Djirt found a dead fish on the beach and began to cook it on the fire. His father came along and asked for a piece of the fish, but Djirt was selfish and refused to give him any. The father therefore vowed that the next time he went fishing, he would not give his son any of the catch.

When the father returned from a day's fishing with a large catch, DJIRT asked for some, but the father refused.

DJIRT then cried so hard that he grew feathers and became a bird. His father looked up from where he was cooking the fish, saw what had happened, and decided also to become a bird to keep his son company.

Shown at bottom left are DJIRT's mother and aunt digging for yams with long digging-sticks. Around their foreheads they wear dilly-bags to carry the yams.

At bottom centre, DJIRT's father is seen walking towards his canoe carrying a fish spear.

At bottom right is Djirt's grandfather weaving a dilly bag from pandannis [sic] leaves.

At either side of the painting is shown a forked fishing spear above a woomera (spear-launcher).

The rest of the painting depicts events as related above: DJIRT following crab tracks in the sand until he finds the dead fish, his father spearing fish from a canoe, and father and son changed into birds shown sitting at the top of trees.

In the centre of the painting is shown the cooking place. This is actually represented three times, and yellow and white strokes denote maggots eating old fish ends (typed label on reverse of 1985.0246.0070; title added by hand).

A bark painting worked with ochres on bark and with a wooden restrainer at one end. At the top of painting there are three black birds. At the foot of the painting there are four crosshatched panels which depict from left to right, two women with dilly bags and digging sticks, a canoe, a man with a spear, a man weaving and another canoe. In the centre there are three pointed shapes in which there are depicted cooking fires and fish, with the centre one including three human figures. There are also two larger shapes, the left one contains two birds and a fish and two human figures, one in a canoe. The shape on the right contains two birds, a fish, a crab and its tracks and three humans figures, one of whom is a child.