{"id":"BUCKNER2004-001","label":"Ehing master of the forest","people_or_site":"Ehing","country_current":"Senegal","historic_region":"Lower Casamance, Ziguinchor Region (Bakunum)","macroregion":"Africa / West Africa","local_name":"","source_term":"rhombe ('maître de la forêt')","source_language":"French","object_description":"A bullroarer called the master of the forest, tied to a cord of specially prepared cotton.","function_summary":"The cotton for the forest master's cord may be prepared only by a girl who has not begun to menstruate or by a postmenopausal woman.","attestation_type":"ethnographic_attestation","source_key":"buckner2004_cloche_manjako","source_type":"scholarly_article","source_url":"https://doi.org/10.4000/lhomme.24896","page_or_plate":"p. 225 n. 12","map_confidence":"medium","plot_status":"plot_with_caveat","coordinate_basis":"Bakounou (GeoNames 2254422), taken as Schloss's Ehing field village Bakunum; the identification is inferred.","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"The cord that ties the Ehing master of the forest to the hand that swings it is made of cotton, and not just anyone may prepare that cotton: only a girl who has not yet begun to menstruate, or a woman past menopause. The master of the forest is a bullroarer. The Ehing of Lower Casamance divide the world in two, men with the dry season and palm wine, women with the rainy season and rice, and the cord passes only through the hands of women outside their fertile years. Across the border, their Kujamaat neighbours hear a master of the forest bellowing from the initiation grove.","pull_quote":"","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"","term_gloss":"maître de la forêt: 'master of the forest', the Ehing bullroarer.","cls":"restricted","class_label":"Restricted","color":"#A43C2F","is_candidate":false,"flags":["women_special"],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":false,"f_women_special":true,"f_snake":false,"sources":[{"citation":"Margaret Buckner, 'Ce que nous dit la cloche manjako,' L'Homme 171–172 (2004), p. 225 n. 12","url":"https://doi.org/10.4000/lhomme.24896"}],"source_citations":"Margaret Buckner, 'Ce que nous dit la cloche manjako,' L'Homme 171–172 (2004), p. 225 n. 12","source_display":"Margaret Buckner, 'Ce que nous dit la cloche manjako,' L'Homme 171–172 (2004), p. 225 n. 12","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"A bullroarer called the master of the forest, tied to a cord of specially prepared cotton.","function_display":"","confidence_display":"medium","attestation_label":"ethnographic attestation","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"ehing","display_name":"Ehing master of the forest","image":{"full":"assets/objects/PEPPER1969-001_pepper1969-001-ndut-gum-paxa-correa.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/PEPPER1969-001_pepper1969-001-ndut-gum-paxa-correa_thumb.jpg","alt":"Low-contrast catalogue-page photograph of an arm extending a thin cord over open ground, illustrating the Ndut gum paxa bullroarer; the blade itself is indistinct.","credit":"E. Correa / Herbert Pepper, Archives culturelles du Sénégal (1969), plate facing p. 108","license":"Rights reserved (E. Correa / ORSTOM–IRD); rehosted for non-commercial research","source_page":"https://horizon.documentation.ird.fr/exl-doc/pleins_textes/num-dakar-02/04918.pdf#page=155","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Ndut gum paxa bullroarer suspended on its cord","pool_id":"auto-PEPPER1969-001_pepper1969-001-ndut-gum-paxa-correa","auto_assigned":true,"last_modified":"2026-10-19"},"slug":"buckner2004-001-ehing"}