Ernest Ailred Worms

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Ernest Ailred Worms (1891-1963) was a German missionary who lived and worked among Indigenous Australians. He became an expert in Aboriginal languages, and an important contributor to the development of both Australian studies of native languages, and to the ethnography of the continent's Indigenous peoples.

Contents

Life

He was ordained a Pallotine father, and spent his first period of missionary work in Broome, where he served as parish priest for eight years. [1] His interest in ethnography led to particular studies among the Bardi people.

Stolen bones

In 1935 Worms came across the large body of an Aboriginal person wrapped for burial in bark and, as was a widespread custom, placed in the fork of a tree. He gathered the remains and dispatched them to Limburg. Worms was quite aware that he was violating the law against the unauthorised export of ethnological materials in doing so, and therefore requested anonymity. The remains, together with other skeletal material, was repatriated and restored to the Bardi Jawi, who laid them to rest in an offshore cave, in November 2015. [2]

Works

Notes

    Citations

    1. ↑ Burke 2011, p. 118.
    2. ↑ Parke 2015.

    Sources

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