BY FRITZ NOETLING, M.A., PH.D , ETC. 67 



sacred stones. It is not only probable, but pretty cer- 

 tain, that the water-worn, rounded-off pebbles, which 

 were turned into sacred stones, were distinguished by a 

 different word from the ordinary tronatta, and Mr. 

 Ritz's hypotihesis comes probably very near the truth. 



The result of these somewhat lengthy considerations 

 may be condensed as follows : — 



The words 



1. Loine, loine, loinah, louna, longa, larnar, 



noeenar mean a stone (of any kind). 



2. Loan-tennina, lenn-parenna, leni-carpeny, 



noan-yale probably represent special kinds 

 of rocks, such as granite or Diabas. 



3. Peurar, peora probably means a pebble, per- 



haps a sacred stone. 



4. Trona, teroona is the word for the rock from 



which an implement i^ made. 



5. Mora trona means a peculiar variety of trona, 



distinguished by a bluis'h black colour and a 

 fine conchoidal fracture. 



6. Tronatta, trowutta, trawootta, teewartear is 



the name for the implements which were 

 manufactured from trona or mora trona. 



7. Mungara, meaning unknown ; perhaps cor- 



rupted from mora trona. 



The main and most important result of this investi- 

 gation is the establishment of the fact that the Tas- 

 manian language knew perihaps two, but most probably 

 only one, word for the implements which were produced 

 by working certain classes of siliceous rocks. 



I particularly wish to point out that the fact is fully 

 corroborated by the results of the morphological exami- 

 nation of the tronattas. These examinations proved 

 that the tronatta is a kind of universal implement whidh 

 was indiscriminately used for chopping, cutting, scrap- 

 ing, boring, and hammering. The Aborigines did not 

 manufacture an implement which, for instance, solely 

 and exclusively served the purposes of a knife, or a 

 chopper, or a scraper. Any suitable fragment of rock 

 could be used for any of these actions above-mentioned, 

 and we must take it as granted that the Aborigines 

 never manufactured special implements to serve special 

 purposes only. 



