The Dreamtime in Australian mythology: what is it?

The concept Dreamtime (that is, dream time) appeared for the first time in the work Report on the Work of the Horn Scientific Expedition to Central Australia, one of the first works devoted to Aboriginal mythology australian. The book, published in 1896, was the work of the anthropologist Baldwin Spencer, who in turn included the idea previously established by his colleague F. Gillen.

But what exactly is the Australian dreamtime? What does this sleep time inherent to the aboriginal culture of the island consist of? Join us on this interesting journey through one of the oldest living mythologies in the world.

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What is the dream time of Australian mythology?

Coined by Spencer, in the field of anthropology the term dreamtime refers to the ancestral time of the culture of the Australian aboriginal peoples. This primeval time is much more than a past time, since, and as the specialist in history of religions Mircea Eliade, constantly returns in the form of rituals of initiation.

Besides, Australian sleep time is the one that governs the rules by which Australian men and women must structure their existence. It is, therefore, a kind of sacred authority, comparable in religious importance to the New Testament for Christians or the Vedas for Hinduism.

The Creator and the spirits dream the world

In Australia there is the oldest living culture in the world, dating back about 50,000 years. However, despite the fact that all Australian Aboriginal peoples have aspects that link them to a common cultural background, there are considerable differences between the mythology of these peoples, more than 400 in total.

One of the common elements of the Aboriginal cultures of Australia is the concept of the creation of the world as a dream.. Thus, we find Alcheringa or Tjukurpa (the name varies depending on the town in question), the Great Primal Spirit who dreamed of creation. This dream existed long before life, it continued to exist afterwards, and it will always continue to exist, since it is a time that passes parallel to the time of the world.

However, despite the fact that Alcheringa dreamed of the creation, it was not his only work. One of the most beautiful ideas in Australian Aboriginal mythology is that all creatures are involved in the creative process, including humans. Following this, one of the legends tells that, after the dream of Alcheringa or Tjukurpa, he passed the secret of the creative dream to Barramundi, the Fish.

However, Barramundi only wanted to dream of the waters, his element. So, in order for creation to take its course, Alcheringa passed on the secret of the Dream to another Spirit, Currikee, the Tortoise. This spirit did not know what to do with the Dream either, since he was only capable of dreaming of rocks and warm sun.. So Alcheringa passed on the secret of the Dream again...

The Australian creative legend continues with several more spirits (Bogai the Lizard, Bunjil the Eagle, Kangaroo the Kangaroo...), until dreaming reaches the human being, the only creature that understands the secret. Since then, Alcheringa has lived withdrawn underground, because he understands that, with man and woman, the creative dream is well protected.

Sacred connection with nature

Since the human being is the only one who understands the secret of the Dream, he is in charge of watching over the rest of the creatures.. Men and women see that all of creation is connected to that primal Dream (the time of dream, Spencer's dreamtime), because his obligation is to respect nature as an entity sacred.

From there derives the enormous respect that aboriginal cultures have towards the world and towards all the beings that inhabit it. If everything created is in direct connection with that Great Spirit and with his sacred Dream, this means that everything on earth has the same value and deserves the same treatment. Australian aboriginal peoples, then, live in full connection with the world and nature, a connection that regularly renewed through rituals, very important to preserve the idea of ​​belonging to the same network of links.

However, despite being connected to the rest of creation, aboriginal culture gives human beings a place preponderant, since, as the only one capable of understanding the mystery of the Dream, he has the sacred mission of protecting the rest of creatures. But it is not a role of power, but rather paternal, caretaker, a protective role that emerges from wisdom.

The importance of sleep time in aboriginal culture

The time of sleep or dream time is not only important on a religious level, but it is also the basis of the system of rules and regulations of the aborigines. They distinguish two levels of time: on the one hand, real time, the objective, the one that marks the day-to-day activities; on the other, the spiritual time, the one that is marked by the time of the dream and that always existed and never ends.

It is precisely this time of infinite sleep that comes again and again into everyday life through rituals and celebrations, and is also the one that sets the guidelines of the community, as well as its ethics, beliefs and values. The elders transmit this teaching to the young, and thus perpetuate the connection with the dream time, source of all wisdom..

The time of sleep in aboriginal art

With the arrival of the western colonizers, a large part of the artistic representations that embodied the concepts was lost. essentials of the dream time, since the aborigines themselves destroyed them, possibly to protect their religion from the newly arrived. Fortunately, some of these paintings have come down to us, such as the magnificent samples of Ayers Rock, Uluru in the aboriginal language of the Pitjantjatjara.

Mount Uluru (which is actually a stone monolith) has been a World Heritage Site since 1987, and on its walls you can see some of the most interesting representations of the Australian dream time. But not only in caves and mountains can we find vestiges of this ancient aboriginal art; we also find it in other types of supports, such as tree bark. On the other hand, one of the most frequent motifs is the so-called aerial landscape painting, closely connected to the storytelling of the mythical dream era.