Bunjil vs Pallian

The creator ancestor of the Kulin nations of central Victoria, a wedge-tailed eagle who shaped the land, made people, gave them law, and rose into the sky, where the Wurundjeri and Boon Wurrung see him as the star Altair.

Bunjil is the creator ancestor of the Kulin nations of central Victoria, among them the Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung, Boon Wurrung, Wadawurrung, Taungurung, and Dja Dja Wurrung peoples. He takes the form of the wedge-tailed eagle, and he is one of the two moiety ancestors of the Kulin, the other being Waa (Waang), the crow; every Kulin person belongs to Bunjil's moiety or Waa's, which governs marriage and relationships. The Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung Cultural Heritage Aboriginal Corporation and other Kulin organisations share Bunjil's story publicly today.

In Kulin tellings, Bunjil's brother, who had charge of the waters and who, beating the water with his hands, brought forth the first women.

Pallian appears in Kulin creation stories as Bunjil's brother, who was given charge of the rivers, creeks, and billabongs. In a telling shared publicly by a Wadawurrung Elder, after Bunjil had made the first men, Pallian began to thump the water with his hands until the water took the shape of two women, who became the first women. Similar accounts were recorded in the nineteenth century in colonial Victoria.