{"id":"EXH2026-003","label":"Sakalava","people_or_site":"Sakalava","country_current":"Madagascar","historic_region":"SW Madagascar, districts of Beroroha and Sakaraha","macroregion":"Africa / Madagascar","local_name":"kitambovo (Beroroha); tambovo (Sakaraha)","source_term":"bullroarer / kitambovo / tambovo","source_language":"French","object_description":"Blades of bamboo, dry bark, calabash pieces or hazomalany (camphor) wood, swung on a cord.","function_summary":"Children's toy; bird-scarer protecting sown seed. By 1938 it had passed out of the world of magic.","attestation_type":"secondary_catalog","source_key":"exhaustiveness2026","source_type":"secondary_literature","source_url":"https://www.tde-journal.org/index.php/tde/article/download/6334/6173/14244","page_or_plate":"p. 62","map_confidence":"medium","plot_status":"plot_with_caveat","coordinate_basis":"midpoint of Beroroha (-21.67,45.16) and Sakaraha (-22.91,44.53) districts","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"By the time Curt Sachs compiled his survey of Malagasy instruments in 1938, the bullroarer had nearly vanished from the island and slipped out of adult hands altogether, surviving as a child's plaything or a scarecrow set to frighten birds away from sown seed. Among the Sakalava the blade was cut from bamboo, dry bark, a piece of calabash, or hazomalany, the camphorwood; the district reports gave its name as kitambovo around Beroroha and tambovo around Sakaraha. The Tanala instrument Sachs recorded was a flat strip of bamboo pointed at both ends, about thirteen centimeters long and two wide, its cord fixed to a stick.","pull_quote":"Removed from its domain, the world of magic, it seems to be extremely rare on Madagascar and is no longer found in the hands of adults. It has become a simple children's toy or, at best, a scarecrow for birds menacing the seeds.","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"Curt Sachs, The Musical Instruments of Madagascar [1938], trans. in Translingual Discourse in Ethnomusicology 6 (2020), p. 62","term_gloss":"kitambovo (district of Beroroha) and tambovo (district of Sakaraha): the Sakalava names for the bullroarer, a blade of bamboo, dry bark, calabash, or hazomalany (camphorwood) swung on a cord.","cls":"play_practical","class_label":"Play / practical","color":"#24766D","is_candidate":false,"flags":["toy_survival"],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":false,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":false,"sources":[{"citation":"Curt Sachs, Les instruments de musique de Madagascar (1938), p. 62; English translation, The Musical Instruments of Madagascar, Translingual Discourse in Ethnomusicology 6 (2020), p. 62","url":"https://www.tde-journal.org/index.php/tde/article/download/6334/6173/14244","archive":"https://web.archive.org/web/20260416054412/https://www.tde-journal.org/index.php/tde/article/download/6334/6173/14244"}],"source_citations":"Curt Sachs, Les instruments de musique de Madagascar (1938), p. 62; English translation, The Musical Instruments of Madagascar, Translingual Discourse in Ethnomusicology 6 (2020), p. 62","source_display":"Curt Sachs, Les instruments de musique de Madagascar (1938), p. 62; English translation, The Musical Instruments of Madagascar, Translingual Discourse in Ethnomusicology 6 (2020), p. 62","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"Blades of bamboo, dry bark, calabash pieces or hazomalany (camphor) wood, swung on a cord.","function_display":"Children's toy; bird-scarer protecting sown seed. By 1938 it had passed out of the world of magic.","confidence_display":"medium","attestation_label":"secondary catalog","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"sakalava","display_name":"Sakalava","image":{"full":"assets/objects/pd_plates/EXH2026-002.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/pd_plates/EXH2026-002_thumb.jpg","alt":"Fig. 26c, a drawing of the Tanala tavovoka: a slender blade connected by a long cord to the tip of a bowed swinging stick.","credit":"Linton, The Tanala, a Hill Tribe of Madagascar (Field Museum Publ. 317), 1933, Fig. 26 (item c)","license":"Public domain (published 1933; Field Museum 'no known copyright')","source_page":"https://archive.org/details/tanalahilltribeo22lint","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Tanala tavovoka toy with blade and long cord.","pool_id":"auto-pd_plates--EXH2026-002"},"slug":"exh2026-003-sakalava"}