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churinga

[choo-ring-guh]

noun

plural

churinga, churingas 
  1. an object carved from wood or stone by Aboriginal tribes in central Australia and held by them to be sacred.



churinga

/ tʃəˈrɪŋɡə /

noun

  1. a sacred amulet of the native Australians

“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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Word History and Origins

Origin of churinga1

First recorded in 1895–1900, churinga is from the Aranda word jwerreŋe
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Word History and Origins

Origin of churinga1

from a native Australian language
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Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

The artefacts range from traditional body ornaments and slippers to a churinga, a wood or stone item believed to embody the spiritual double of a relative or ancestor, and clapsticks, the musical instrument used in Aboriginal ceremonies.

Read more on The Guardian

The churinga nanja of its primal ancestor is sought for at the place of the child’s conception, and is put into the sacred repository of such objects.

Read more on Project Gutenberg

The whole system is impossible except where descent is reckoned in the male line, for there alone is local totemism possible, and the Arunta system is based on local totemism, plus the churinga nanja and reincarnation beliefs.

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Once more, it is clear that the Arunta system has but recently reached their neighbours, the Kaitish, for though they have the churinga nanja belief, and the haphazard method of acquiring totems by local accident, these things have not yet overcome the old traditional reluctance to marry within the totem name.

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The Arunta nation, however, cultivates an additional myth, namely that the primal ancestors, when they sank into the ground, left behind them certain oval stone slabs, with archaic markings, called churinga nanja, or “sacred things of the nanja.”

Read more on Project Gutenberg

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