Kamilaroi and Kurnai explain that among the Kurnai, the standard rule was that “all young women ran off with their husbands.” A Tatungolung man provided a detailed illustration of how the corroboree facilitated this: a man from another tribe would see a girl he liked, and they would communicate subtly. “Then, at the corroboree in the evening, the young man would say, ‘I like you; we will run away, only not yet.’ Then they wait for the next corroboree and run off.”
This practice, while common, was not without its social consequences. The same account notes that after the elopement, “the father and brothers are very angry, and look out for him to fight him.”