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Overview
The seven Meamei receive the hungry traveller Wurrunnah and let him camp with them. They explain that they are visiting from a distant country. After appearing to leave, he secretly watches them gather flying ants and steals two yam sticks. The five girls who recover their sticks depart, while the remaining two search. He then exposes the missing sticks as a lure, seizes their owners and compels them to travel with him as wives, threatening violence if they resist. Their outward adjustment is explicitly contrasted with their continuing hope of reunion with their sisters.
When Wurrunnah later orders them to cut pine bark, the girls warn that he will never see them again if they do so. He dismisses the warning and threatens them. Each strikes a different pine; the trees grow upward, carrying the two women beyond his reach. At the sky, the other five sisters call to them and draw them from the treetops to live together forever. The ending identifies the reunited seven with the Pleiades. The account does not explain how the five reached the sky, name the sisters individually, or describe their captivity as consensual marriage.
Origins & earliest records
K. Langloh Parker, Australian Legendary Tales (1896), Meamei the Seven Sisters. Narran-region collection, individual speaker unspecified.
Records & interpretation
Complete published English narrative; distinct encountered beings and the seven-sister ending are retained as this collection’s account.
Selected bibliography
Documented works and useful reading. This is not a list of every appearance.
- 01
Australian Legendary Tales: Meamei the Seven Sisters
Complete selected chapter. Hostile abduction, welcoming eyeless stranger and briefly encountered bark figure remain distinct.
Family, evolution & connections
The seven Meamei sisters — Parker’s account
Complete Meamei the Seven Sisters narrative.
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- Seven Meamei sisters (group, not a parent)
Seven girls expressly called sisters, divided temporarily into two abducted and five departed sisters. The root represents sibling membership, not a parent. No individual names, parental identities or birth order are supplied. Wurrunnah’s coercive wife claim is not incorporated as a consensual marriage.
Seven unnamed Meamei sisters
The account calls the seven girls sisters. Two are abducted while the other five depart, then all seven reunite in the sky. No parents, individual names or birth order are supplied; the captor’s imposed wife claim does not establish consensual marriage.
Wurrawilberoo, the Sons Beside the Sky Trees
Both Parker accounts carry relatives upward with trees. Meamei’s two captives reach their five sisters through growing pines; Mooregoo’s two sons are carried with uprooted trees by their father’s whirlwind. The shared image does not make them one family or prove borrowing.
References
Sources supporting this profile. Linked pages have their own scope and editorial standards.
- Primary historical collected narrativeParker: Meamei the Seven SistersResearch access: 2026-10-05
Image credits
A sourced illustration has not yet been added. This gap is included in the coverage record.