io9 
board there shown is held tight by the waist belt, the central 
individual wears the “ wani ” or sacred head dress, which in form 
is like a radiating spider’s web, from which it may be copied, 
but which possibly is intended to represent a halo (see also the 
nearer individual in figure 21). When constructing the “ wani,” 
a ring about 1 \ inches thick is made of soft tops of scrub, and 
bound round with some bark or cloth, then seven or eight thin 
scraped and pointed sticks are stuck into it, in a radiating form, 
and the thread is wound in a spiral manner, a turn being taken 
round each stick crossing. The thread or web is made of the 
wool of opossums, kangaroos, or sheep, twisted between the 
fingers and rolled on the thigh by the palm of the hand. In the 
last-named figure the “ wani ” is surmounted by a rectangular 
shaped ornament of wool wound upon crossed sticks and placed 
upright in the hair of the head. The individual to the left-hand 
of the group holds a similar one in his mouth, and a tufted stick 
in both hands, and has other tufts above each ear and a smaller 
button-shaped one above the forehead. 
Mr. C. G. Gibson, Assistant Geologist, found a set of six 
boards in a granite rock shelter at a soak at the foot of a hill 
about 60 miles north-east of Laverton in October, 1905. The 
four larger boards are now in the Melbourne Museum, and the 
two smallest, about four feet long, are in the possession of Mr. 
Glasscock, chemist, at Laverton. 
In regard to the snake symbols, it may be useful to mention 
that in reply to an enquiry Mr. W. E. Roth, when Northern 
Protector of Aborigines of Queensland, informed the writer that 
“ they were met with in the initiation ceremony north of the 
Endeavour River, between it and Princess Charlotte Bay. The 
whole ceremony ends with a huge representation of a snake 
curled round the lower branches of a tree. Snake symbols are 
met with carved on the two-handed swords of West Queensland. 
In the western districts also the powers of the medicine-men, etc., 
are believed to be learned from a supernatural water-snake.” 
