The ipilja-ipilja, or ipilya, is a giant gecko in the mythology of the Anindilyakwa people of Australia. He is considered to be the creator of rain and thunder.
The ipilja-ipilja lives with his family, all giant geckos, in the Numarika swamp at the mouth of the Angoroko River of Groote Eylandt. The swamp is considered sacred, and it is believed that anyone who drinks water from the swamp will die. [1] Because of this, the ipilja-ipilja is greatly feared. [2] The wife of the ipilja-ipilja is called the guruina, and together they have a single child. [3]
The geckos are all "highly colored," with the ipilja-ipilja being about a hundred feet long and adorned with long hair and whiskers. [1] At the beginning of the monsoon season, the ipilja-ipilja eats the grasses on the edge of the swamp and drinks a large quantity of the swamp water. He then spews the mixture into the sky. The water turns into clouds, and the grass binds the clouds together. The ipilja-ipilja, pleased with his efforts, lets out a roar that becomes thunder. Thus, thunderstorms are created. [4] After the monsoon season, the ipilja-ipilja retires into the swamp. There, except to punishing intruders in his swamp, the ipilja-ipilja rests until the arrival of the next monsoon season. [5]
Similar stories can be found on Melville Island and Bathurst Island, where colorful lizards known as the maratji are said to guard their waterholes. Whenever they are being intruded upon, the annoyed maratji will cause floods and thunderstorms. [3] The stories of the ipilja-ipilja and maratji are similar with that of the Rainbow Serpent, a deity popular on the Australian mainland but are not found on Groote Eylandt or Melville Island. [6] It is thought that the myth of the ipilja-ipilja serves as a local replacement for the Rainbow Serpent. [7]
Guernea ipilya, an amphipod discovered in the Great Barrier Reef, is named after the ipilja-ipilja. [8]
Lizard is the common name used for all squamate reptiles other than snakes, encompassing over 7,000 species, ranging across all continents except Antarctica, as well as most oceanic island chains. The grouping is paraphyletic as some lizards are more closely related to snakes than they are to other lizards. Lizards range in size from chameleons and geckos a few centimeters long to the 3-meter-long Komodo dragon.
In Australian Aboriginal mythology, Mamaragan or Namarrkon is a lightning Ancestral Being who speaks with thunder as his voice. He rides a storm-cloud and throws lightning bolts to humans and trees. He lives in a puddle.
In the mythology of the Wunambal people of northwestern Australia, Ungud is a snake god who is sometimes male, sometimes female and sometimes androgynous. He is associated with rainbows by the fact Ungud may be an symbolic representation of rainbows and the fertility and erections of the tribe's shamans. In the beginning, when only the sky and the earth existed, Ungud lived underground as a giant python. Ungud is associated with earth and water and is credited with causing rain to fall and also has connections with monsoons. At night, Ungud and Wallanganda, the sky deity, created living beings through their dreams. The Mother Goddess Kunapipi who is also at times is called the Old Woman is connected to Ungud. The Rainbow Serpent made paths for her to walk around creation. Both The mother goddess and Rainbow serpent are the embodiment of creative powers that live within the earth. Through Ungud Dreaming itself into new forms natural species making it part of what life is based on becoming an archetype of life.
Lizard Island, also known as Jiigurru or Dyiigurra, is an island on the Great Barrier Reef in Queensland, Australia, 1,624-kilometre (1,009 mi) northwest of Brisbane. It is part of the Lizard Island Group that also includes Palfrey Island, and also part of the Lizard Island National Park. Lizard Island is within the locality of Lizard in the Cook Shire. The traditional owners of the Lizard Island group are the Aboriginal Australian clan known as the Dingaal people.
The common planigale, also known as the pygmy planigale or the coastal planigale, is one of many small marsupial carnivores known as "marsupial mice" found in Australia. There they fill a similar niche to the insectivores of other parts of the world.
Monitor lizards are lizards in the genus Varanus, the only extant genus in the family Varanidae. They are native to Africa, Asia, and Oceania, and one species is also found in the Americas as an invasive species. About 80 species are recognized.
The Rainbow Serpent or Rainbow Snake is a common deity often seen as the creator God, known by numerous names in different Australian Aboriginal languages by the many different Aboriginal peoples. It is a common motif in the art and religion of many Aboriginal Australian peoples. Much like the archetypal mother goddess, the Rainbow Serpent creates land and diversity for the Aboriginal people, but when disturbed can bring great chaos.
The Adnyamathanha are a contemporarily formed grouping of several distinct Aboriginal Australian peoples of the northern Flinders Ranges, South Australia. The ethnonym Adnyamathanha was an alternative name for the Wailpi but the contemporary grouping also includes the Guyani, Jadliaura, Pilatapa and sometimes the Barngarla peoples. The origin of the name is in the words "adnya" ("rock") and "matha".
The emerald tree monitor or green tree monitor, is a small to medium-sized arboreal monitor lizard. It is known for its unusual coloration, which consists of shades from green to turquoise, topped with dark, transversedorsal banding. This coloration helps camouflage it in its arboreal habitat. Its color also makes the emerald tree monitor highly prized in both the pet trade and zoos alike.
The spiny-tailed monitor, also known as the Australian spiny-tailed monitor, the ridge-tailed monitor the Ackie dwarf monitor, and colloquially simply ackie monitor, is an Australian species of lizard belonging to the genus of monitor lizards (Varanus).
The American-Australian Scientific Expedition to Arnhem Land remains one of the most significant, most ambitious and least understood expeditions. Commenced in February 1948, it was one of the largest scientific expeditions to have taken place in Australia and was conducted by a team of Australian and American researchers and support staff.
Sphaerodactylus macrolepis, also known as the big-scaled dwarf gecko or the big-scaled least gecko, is a lizard of the Sphaerodactylus genus. It was first documented in 1859 in the US Virgin Islands, specifically, St. Croix. This diurnal species has since been spotted in other locations such as Puerto Rico with major populations in Culebra.
Bila is the personification of the Sun among the Adnyamathanha people. She is a solar goddess, as befitting the general trends among Australian aboriginal peoples, which largely perceive the Sun as female.
The Worrorra, also written Worora, are an Aboriginal Australian people of the Kimberley area of north-western Australia.
The Anindilyakwa people (Warnumamalya) are Aboriginal Australian people living on Groote Eylandt, Bickerton Island, and Woodah Island in the Gulf of Carpentaria in the Northern Territory of Australia.
The Bininj are an Aboriginal Australian people of Western Arnhem land in the Northern Territory. The sub-groups of Bininj are sometimes referred to by the various language dialects spoken in the region, that is, the group of dialects known as Bininj Kunwok; so the people may be named the Kunwinjku, Kuninjku, Kundjeyhmi (Gundjeihmi), Manyallaluk Mayali, Kundedjnjenghmi and Kune groups.
Hydriastele wendlandiana, commonly known as Wendland's palm, cat o' nine tails, creek palm or kentia palm, is a tall, multi-stemmed tree in the palm family Arecaceae. It is native to New Guinea and the Australian states of Queensland and the Northern Territory.
Chasm Island is an island of the Groote archipelago in the Gulf of Carpentaria, located in the state of the Northern Territory, Australia, in the northernmost part of the continent.