 While there is no doubt the manufacture and form of the "toas" are Aboriginal and that they mythologically encode place names, it is suggested that they were made at the mission in response to an easy supply of surplus gypsum and the active interest of an inquiring German missionary.As such they are now regarded as precursors of the Western Desert Painting Movement.The origin of the word "toas" for these objects is probably an idiosyncratic usage by Reuther, perhaps in a mission pidgin, extending terms (from the Bilatapa language as well as of Diyari) which imply burying, covering up, inserting, or sticking into the ground.