Hunting as praxis provides an opportunity to investigate how humans and animals meet economically and ontologically. It also provides a window into how societies may ritually construct, manipulate and navigate the human-animal divide as a liminal and permeable boundary. Founded upon the ontological status of prey as kin, marine mammal hunters often establish interpersonal dialogue with prey to aid hunting success. It is usually through the senses that communicative conduits are established so hunters can better know what prey are thinking and cognitively control prey behaviour. Significantly, this dialogue is often mediated ritually by material culture that incorporates prey body parts, particularly sensory organs of the head. This spiritual dimension of marine mammal hunting is explored archaeologically using dugong ear bones found within mounded ritual deposits of dugong bones in Torres Strait, north-east Australia. Ethnographic and archaeological data reveal that ear bones were purposefully extracted from dugong skulls and used as hunting charms to ritually mediate dialogue between hunters and prey. These rituals of sensory allurement provide new avenues for exploring the ontological relationship of ancient hunters to prey.
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