ABSTRACT
When I first met Emily Margaret Horneville (18827–1979), known to the locals as Mrs Oinable or Mrs Ornable, she was lying bedridden in her tiny corrugated-iron house on the outskirts of the Goodooga Aboriginal Reserve. That was in July 1972, when I was on a field trip with Janet Mathews. Janet had previously recorded Emily and had come especially to introduce me to her since she was practically the sole surviving speaker of Muruwari, a language I had been commissioned by the Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies to salvage. Janet had warned me that Mrs Horneville’s reception of us could be unpredictable, stimulating, even vitriolic, as she was of uncertain temper. Should we arrive on a day when, for her, the sun was not shining, we were likely to be told to depart in no uncertain terms. But all was well, she received us happily. After Janet had recorded, I commenced my first session of ‘sitting at her feet’ to be taught the language. In actual fact, I sat perched on the end of her bed. The tape recorder was balanced precariously on an upturned oil drum on the uneven dirt floor, and I handled my note pad and pencil on my lap with whatever dexterity I could muster.
