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kadaitcha /kə′daɪtʃə/ n. (Spelling variants: kaditcha, kooditcha, kurdaitcha, etc.) [From Arrernte kwertatye, but possibly a recent (at the end of the nineteenth century) borrowing into this language from an unknown source.]
1. a. (Also kadaitcha man, kadaitcha spirit.) (In traditional Aboriginal belief) a malignant spirit.

1886 E.M. Curr Austral. Race I. 148 It was discovered in 1882, or thereabouts, that the Blacks to the westward of Lake Eyre  ..  wear a sort of shoe when they attack their enemies by stealth at night. Some of the tribes call these shoes Kooditcha, their name for an invisible spirit… The soles were made of the feathers of the emu, stuck together with a little human blood… The uppers were nets made of human hair. The object of these shoes is to prevent those who wear them from being tracked… It is only on the softest ground that they leave any mark, and even then it is impossible to distinguish the heel from the toe.   1901 G. White Across Aust. 28 During the night the blackboy rushed up to the fire crying out that the Kadaitcha was out after him with a spear and a firestick. The Kadaitcha is an evil spirit or ghost.   1920 C.H. Sayce Golden Buckles 99 ‘What is a Kadaitcha?’ ‘Oh—that’s a kind of avenging spirit—devil if you like—who deals out stoush to anyone who breaks the rule. He’s supposed to enter into one of the niggers, and the poor beggar can’t rest till the other chap is avenged.’ ‘A kind of blood-avenger’, suggested Tynan. ‘Yes, something of that kind.’   1936 ‘L. Kaye’ Black Wilderness 108 ‘Thos’ fellers like catch ’m me or Kombi. Fright of this country, me. All same kaditcha’… ‘Kaditcha’ he said in fear, as he trekked not through darkness filled with spearmen merely, but with things supernatural and terrible. The witch doctors and witch-craft of an alien tribe were out there in the night.   1944 M.J. O’Reilly Bowyangs & Boomerangs 142 There is one great Spirit, who is everywhere, knowing everything, even to the innermost thought of the Allatunga, or headman. The spirit is called ‘Kaditcha’. He controls the elements, sends good or bad seasons, according to the behaviour of the tribe.   1952 A.M. Duncan-Kemp Where Strange Paths go Down 151 ‘Kadaitcha’ really means—if one can read the aboriginal’s mind—the spirit of evil or anyone sneaking about with evil intent.   1952 A.W. Upfield New Shoe 13 A mopoke ‘Ma-parked’ at him  ..  and later still a curlew screamed like a kurdaitcha spirit is alleged to do when after an aborigine away from his camp at night.   1953 J.K. Ewers With Sun on my Back 171 If the children speak in wide-eyed wonder of ‘the Kurdaitcha’, it is no more than an environmental equivalent of the white youngsters’ ‘bogey-man’.   1957 F. Clune Fortune Hunters 68 The five murderers and Wong-we, overcoming their fear of the Kadaitcha who roam in the night, had sneaked from the camp-fire and escaped into the mulga scrub.   1987 Sydney Morning Herald 16 May (Good Weekend Suppl.) 65/1 Many Aborigines in Ntaria still believe in the kaditja—the revenge spirit—even though it, like the Aboriginal ceremonies, is still a taboo subject.   1999 P. Bulkeley Kadaitcha 29 And remember the Kadaitcha spirit lies within all of us waiting to awaken and bring justice to the earth.   2010 Sydney Morning Herald 24 Apr. (Traveller Section) 17/1 Over billy tea, a few smuggled chocolates and damper cooked in the coals of the fire we share stories of the Kadaitcha man, a mythical Aboriginal spirit-being who exists in folklore as the arbiter of justice.



1 b. (Also kadaitcha man.) A person who undertakes a mission of vengeance.

1927 Spencer & Gillen Arunta 458 We have met several Kurdaitcha men who claim to have killed their victim.   1952 Bulletin (Sydney) 23 Apr. 17/3 In primitive aboriginal society the kadaitcha man was the official killer.   1953 A.W. Upfield Murder must Wait 121 Those prints would be followed back to the tree, where the kurdaitcha put on his great boots and mounted a bike to go back to Mitford.   1961 J.W. Bleakely Aborigines of Aust. 61 The sorcerers, known as kadaitcha, seem to work as though members of a secret society.   1982 Bulletin (Sydney) 23 Mar. 42/1 The practice among Aborigines—most notably among the Kadaitcha men—of controlling their heart rate, breathing and body temperature.   1987 Sun News-Pictorial (Melbourne) 28 Feb. 29/3 The Kadaitcha Man wears boots made from emu feathers, with human hair and wallaby fur threaded through them.   2003 B. Randall Songman 23 As well as the ceremonial elders there are the kadaitcha, the Law Enforcers.   2006 A. Hyland Diamond Dove 234 ‘And this’, he said as he picked up a red chalcedony knife… ‘It’s the weapon a kadaicha man would have used to  ..  slice you open’.   2011 M. Groves Outback Life 123 He must have had some special magic, because he was always treated with a healthy respect by the other blacks. I believe he was the area’s kadaitcha man or devil-devil man.


2. (Also kadaitcha boot, kadaitcha shoe, kadaitcha slipper.) A shoe, worn esp. on a mission of vengeance, so made as to leave no trace of the wearer’s movements.

1886 E.M. Curr Austral. Race I. 148 The Blacks to the westward of Lake Eyre  ..  wear a sort of shoe when they attack their enemies by stealth at night. Some of the tribes call these shoes Kooditcha, their name for an invisible spirit… The soles were made of the feathers of the emu, stuck together with a little human blood… The uppers were nets made of human hair. The object of these shoes is to prevent those who wear them from being tracked… It is only on the softest ground that they leave any mark, and even then it is impossible to distinguish the heel from the toe.   1901 G. White Across Aust. 28 When a black is about some nefarious purpose he puts on Kadaitcha shoes, made of emu’s feathers, and leaving no track.   1920 Bulletin (Sydney) 8 July 26/2 The kiditcha boot, so called, is made so that the toe and heel are alike.   1933 F.E. Baume Tragedy Track 84 The dogs fail to hear the approach of the warriors who have been chosen to wear the trackless kaditcha boot of emu feathers stuck together with human blood and woven into a shoe without toe or heel, so that no one can tell from the tracks how a native is moving.   1952 Bulletin (Sydney) 23 Apr. 17/3 They are Kadaitcha slippers, not ‘boots’.   1970 K. Willey Naked Island 138 Whenever they found a patch of stony ground the party would put on the kadaitchas, spirit shoes of emu and turkey feathers which made the wearers’ tracks invisible.   1977 J. Carter All Things Wild 61 They seek out their victim by stealth, wearing magic kurdaitcha shoes, fashioned from kangaroo fur string and emu feathers. These leave no tracks.   1990 Harvey Reporter (Bunbury) 20 Nov. 6/6 The aboriginal artefacts were interesting, including the feather Kaditcha shoes.   1999 H. Wharton Yumba Days 44 Kadaitcha boots were made mostly from gum wax, blood and feathers, and had no toe or heel, which made it hard to tell whether the tracks were coming or going.   2002 Newcastle Herald 2 Aug. 9/5 Kurdaitcha shoes are made of human hair, string, emu feathers and human blood, worn when kurdaitcha man tracks the enemy.   2011 Austral. (Sydney) 19 Jan. 8/2 The institute offered the rest of the objects—including a didgeridoo, a woomera, clapsticks and kadaitcha shoes—to the Australian Museum.


3. a. A mission of vengeance; the ritual accompanying this. Also attrib.

1895 Proc. R. Soc. Vic. (1896) 66 The shoes themselves in this district are known by the name of ‘Urtathurta’, and the occasion on which they were used is spoken of as ‘Kūrdaitcha lūma’ (Kūrdaitcha—a bad or evil spirit, and luma, to walk). The wearing of the Urtathurta and going Kūrdaitcha lūma appears to have been the medium for a form of vendetta.   1896 B. Spencer Rep. Horn Sci. Exped. Central Aust. IV. 110 When a native for some reason desired to kill a member of another camp or another tribe he consulted the medicine man of his camp, and arrangements were made for a kurdaitcha luma.   1928 B. Spencer Wanderings in Wild Aust. 261 The Kurdaitcha is only a special one amongst many forms of magic and, like many other things, a great deal of humbug is associated with it.   1938 F.J. Hayter Deadly Magic 13 The Pointing Bone and the Pointing Stick serve the same general purpose but the former is usually made use of in cases of tribal reprisal for wrong doing, included in the native term Kurdaitcha.   1940 E. Hill Great Austral. Loneliness (ed. 2) 175 Kurdaitcha, the blood vengeance  ..  extends throughout the whole of unoccupied Central Australia.   1943 Coast to Coast 1942 167 ‘They mean to get him. Last night he found kaditcha tracks round his camp…’ ‘What do you mean? What sort of track…’ Dingo made a sound in his throat. ‘Call y’self desert bred—kaditcha, that’s what I said—meaning the shoes abos make themselves out of emu’s feathers stuck together with blood and hitched on with a bit of hair string; meaning likewise vengeance; sort of executioner’s mask.’   1959 L. Rose Country of Dead 29 ‘It seems to have been some tribal affair. You know, the sort of thing that will take Native Affairs weeks to unravel.’ ‘A kurdaitja killing, then?’   1962 V.C. Hall Dreamtime Justice 138 This water country would hold no tracks for the eyes of any men who walked the Kadaitja trail—the mission of revenge.   1972 M. Cassidy Dispossessed 95 Whatever the cost to himself in labour or in personal feelings he must keep the Kuradaitcha Oath.   1996 M. Mahood Bunch of Strays 71 If he gets an order to join a kadaicha party he's got to down tools.



3 b. Obs. In the phrase to go kadaitcha: to embark on a mission of vengeance.

1901 F.J. Gillen Diary 23 May (1968) 88 The members of a group fully realise that they cannot go Kurdaitja, that they cannot in fact impart to the feather shoes the magic properties which make them leave no track.   1927 Spencer & Gillen Arunta 458 Many will  ..  confess that they do go Kurdaitcha.