{"id":"BERGSLAND1994-001","label":"Nikolski stone roarer","people_or_site":"Eastern Unangan (Aleut) of Nikolski","country_current":"United States","historic_region":"Alaska / Aleutian Islands / Umnak Island / Nikolski","macroregion":"North America / Arctic","local_name":"tunulaada-lix (verb)","source_term":"bull-roarer (long flat stone)","source_language":"Unangam Tunuu / English","object_description":"A long flat stone sounded as a bullroarer.","function_summary":"Sounded for its noise; no further purpose recorded.","attestation_type":"lexical_attestation","source_key":"bergsland1994_aleut_dictionary_tunulaada","source_type":"language_dictionary","source_url":"https://uafanlc.alaska.edu/Online/AL950B1994a/bergsland-1994-aleut_dictionary-smaller.pdf","page_or_plate":"p. 408 (PDF 457); key p. vi","map_confidence":"medium","plot_status":"plot","coordinate_basis":"Nikolski village, Umnak Island, per the dictionary's dialect tag En; not a specimen findspot.","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"On Umnak Island in the eastern Aleutians, the bullroarer was a long flat stone. Unangan speakers at Nikolski had a single verb for sounding it, tunulaada-lix, 'to make noise with a bull-roarer'. It grows from the same stem as tunuχ, talk, and tununi-lix, to make a drum resound. An Eastern Aleut text of 1909 already speaks of making something 'sound like a bull-roarer'.","pull_quote":"","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"","term_gloss":"tunulaada-lix: 'to make noise with a bull-roarer (long flat stone)', Nikolski, 1950; from the stem tunu-, as in tunuχ 'talk' and tununi-lix 'to make resound'.","cls":"unknown","class_label":"Function not recorded","color":"#6B7884","is_candidate":false,"flags":[],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":false,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":false,"sources":[{"citation":"Knut Bergsland, Aleut Dictionary / Unangam Tunudgusii (Alaska Native Language Center, 1994), p. 408","url":"https://uafanlc.alaska.edu/Online/AL950B1994a/bergsland-1994-aleut_dictionary-smaller.pdf"}],"source_citations":"Knut Bergsland, Aleut Dictionary / Unangam Tunudgusii (Alaska Native Language Center, 1994), p. 408","source_display":"Knut Bergsland, Aleut Dictionary / Unangam Tunudgusii (Alaska Native Language Center, 1994), p. 408","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"A long flat stone sounded as a bullroarer.","function_display":"Sounded for its noise; no further purpose recorded.","confidence_display":"medium","attestation_label":"lexical attestation","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"eastern unangan","display_name":"Nikolski stone roarer","image":{"full":"assets/objects/HONIGMANN1954-001_honigmann1954-p114-bullroarer-crop.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/HONIGMANN1954-001_honigmann1954-p114-bullroarer-crop_thumb.jpg","alt":"Excerpt from Honigmann describing a bull-roarer swung for magical help in chipping stone and bringing milder weather.","credit":"John J. Honigmann, The Kaska Indians (Yale University Publications in Anthropology 51, 1954), p. 114, HRAF microfiche","license":"© Yale University; page crop of cited text under the cited-figure rule — rights not cleared","source_page":"https://archive.org/details/micro_IA41160220_0006","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Honigmann's line: the bull-roarer","pool_id":"auto-HONIGMANN1954-001_honigmann1954-p114-bullroarer-crop","auto_assigned":true,"last_modified":"2026-10-19"},"slug":"bergsland1994-001-eastern-unangan-aleut-of-nikolski"}