{"id":"JSTEWARD1943-004","label":"The feathered Gosiute whirrer of Skull Valley","people_or_site":"Gosiute of Skull Valley","country_current":"United States","historic_region":"Skull Valley, west of the Great Salt Lake, Utah","macroregion":"North America / Great Basin","local_name":"","source_term":"bull-roarer","source_language":"English","object_description":"A whirrer carrying a feather, fitted with a wooden handle; the blade material is not recorded.","function_summary":"Swung as a children's toy and swung to bring warm wind.","attestation_type":"ethnographic_attestation","source_key":"steward1943_ced23_northern_gosiute_shoshoni","source_type":"culture_element_distribution","source_url":"https://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/anthpubs/ucb/text/ucar008-004.pdf","page_or_plate":"Steward 1943, pp. 265, 333, 357","map_confidence":"medium","plot_status":"plot","coordinate_basis":"Skull Valley, Utah, the territory Steward assigns the list. He notes it 'was sparsely settled at the few sources of water', so a single valley-centre dot stands for a scatter of springs. Not a use site.","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"The Gosiute of Skull Valley lived at the few springs of a dry valley west of the Great Salt Lake, and theirs is the only bullroarer in Steward's northern survey with a feather on it. It is also the only one whose material he never recorded. It hung from a wooden handle, but the blade was not wood, and not the sheep horn every informant in the volume denied outright. So what actually whirred at the end of that cord goes unnamed. Children played with it, and it was swung to bring the warm wind; whether only someone born in summer could do that, as at Promontory across the lake, the old man could not say.","pull_quote":"Gosiute are indistinguishable from Western Shoshoni. Their name is from gosip (dust).","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"Steward, Culture Element Distributions: XXIII, Northern and Gosiute Shoshoni (1943), p. 265","term_gloss":"","cls":"weather","class_label":"Weather / fertility magic","color":"#2F6FA3","is_candidate":false,"flags":["weather","toy_survival"],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":false,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":false,"sources":[{"citation":"Julian H. Steward, 'Culture Element Distributions: XXIII, Northern and Gosiute Shoshoni,' Anthropological Records 8:3 (1943), pp. 265, 333 (elements 1974-1981) and 357","url":"https://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/anthpubs/ucb/text/ucar008-004.pdf","archive":"https://web.archive.org/web/20260814094033/https://digitalassets.lib.berkeley.edu/anthpubs/ucb/text/ucar008-004.pdf"}],"source_citations":"Julian H. Steward, 'Culture Element Distributions: XXIII, Northern and Gosiute Shoshoni,' Anthropological Records 8:3 (1943), pp. 265, 333 (elements 1974-1981) and 357","source_display":"Julian H. Steward, 'Culture Element Distributions: XXIII, Northern and Gosiute Shoshoni,' Anthropological Records 8:3 (1943), pp. 265, 333 (elements 1974-1981) and 357","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"A whirrer carrying a feather, fitted with a wooden handle; the blade material is not recorded.","function_display":"","confidence_display":"medium","attestation_label":"ethnographic attestation","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"gosiute skull","display_name":"The feathered Gosiute whirrer of Skull Valley","image":{"full":"assets/objects/expansion_2026_07/nmnh_E360251.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/expansion_2026_07/thumbs/nmnh_E360251_thumb.jpg","alt":"Pima painted-wood bullroarer with cord and handle, Smithsonian.","credit":"Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution (E360251)","license":"No rights statement on record page (Smithsonian Terms of Use)","source_page":"https://collections.si.edu/search/detail/edanmdm:nmnhanthropology_8407053","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Pima painted-wood bullroarer with cord and handle, Smithsonian.","pool_id":"american-west-pima-complete-rig","last_modified":"2026-08-11"},"slug":"jsteward1943-004-gosiute-of-skull-valley"}