Black currant

Scientific Name
Antidesma ghesaembilla
Category
Plants

Ripe purple-black fruit eaten from kudjewk to yekke. They are sweet and much sought after. The flesh stains the lips and mouth purple; purple dye made from boiling or soaking fruit in water for colouring pandanus fibre for manufacturing baskets and string bags; sought after by many birds and is also eaten by dingos (nakarndeken / dalkken) and wallabies.
The name an-kurlbay literally means 'having blood' as the juice of the berries is dark red.
One of the Kundedjnjenghmi terms is "an-kurbayi" which  literally means 'having blood' as the juice ofthe berries is dark red. The plant is associated with the blood of kangaroos and a 'clever men' would use the juice of the fruit in sorcery rituals to spray on tracks to make the legs and joints of a hunted kangaroo seize up making it easier for the hunter to catch his game 

Two popular sites for gathering these fruits in late wet season are Bilinjdje on the Tomkinson RIver flood plain and Kakunidjdji near Marrkolidjban.

Fireflies (yukkuyukkuh) tell us that the fruit is ready to pick.

In kunkurrng register it is called "minjuk"

Spreading semi-deciduous shrub or small tree to 8 m high. Leaves alternate, smooth, broadly oval to nearly round, blade 20-105 mm long x 20-60 mm wide, shiny dark green above, paler underneath. Flowers male and female flowers on separate plants; very small, cream-yellow or green-white, 1-2 mm long. Fruit small smooth flattened fleshy drupes, 5-7 mm long, very short stalk, purple-black when ripe. Found in lowland and sandstone country.

Atlas of Living Australia

https://bie.ala.org.au/species/http://id.biodiversity.org.au/node/apni/2906004

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Kunwinjku term
an-djurrukumarlba
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Kundjeyhmi term
an-djurrukumarlba / an-kurlbayi
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Kuninjku term
man-djulukkun
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Kune/Mayali term
man-djulukkun
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Kundedjnjenghmi term
an-djurlukkunmarlbam / an-djurlukkun
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Do you have photographs of plants and animals from Kakadu and western Arnhem Land?

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