Wyungare

A man who lives in the Milky Way. He was a hunter. The salt lagoons are the places where Wyungare used to peg out the skins of the giant kangaroos he killed, and thus denuded them of grass.

According to one legend, Wyungare took the two wives of Nepelle, which greatly angered the latter. He intended the burn the hut in which they slept, but they awoke and ran away, with the fire in pursuit. Wyngare sought to escape and decided to effect this by going up to Wyirrewarre to live there. So he tied a line to a barbed spear, and hurled it at the heavens. It stuck in and he proceeded to pull himself up, and afterwards the two women. Three starts are still pointed out as Wyungare and his two wives. He is said to sit up there and fish for men with a fishing-spear, and when people start in their sleep it is thought to be because he touches them with the point of his spear.

Another version¹ relates how Wyungare fell in love with two sisters called Mar-rallang (Two-in-one) and married them. Nepelle called Nurunderri to him and asked him why Wyungare had married the daughters of earth, for spirits of heaven may not be joined with the daughters of men. He ordered them to be separated at once. Nurunderri returned to earth and set fire to their encampment. The three fled into a lagoon but there was no hope for them. Wyangare told his wives to climb the shaft of his spear, and then hurled it with all his strength into the sky. It sped as quickly as a meteor in the night sky and was soon lost to sight. Wyangare sank back into the water, content to face death now that his wives were safe. But the heart of Nepelle had been softened by the love of Wyangare for his wives and gently lifted his spirit from the lagoon and placed it in the sky besides his wives. He granted them eternal life and love together in his heavenly home, where they shine steadily as three stars.

Before his ascent he is related that he took a giant kangaroo and tore it in pieces, and scattered the fragments through the scrub, and they became the kangaroos which exist today.

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