{"id":"LOEB1929-020","label":"Coast Miwok bullroarer","people_or_site":"Coast Miwok","country_current":"United States","historic_region":"Central California coast","macroregion":"North America / California","local_name":"umul","source_term":"umul","source_language":"Coast Miwok","object_description":"","function_summary":"Sounded in the boys' Ghost initiation; in the secret society's pololo memorial dance, two men swung it as the voice of thunder.","attestation_type":"ethnographic_attestation","source_key":"loeb1929","source_type":"comparative_secondary","source_url":"https://digicoll.lib.berkeley.edu/record/82839/files/ucp025-004.pdf","page_or_plate":"p. 269","map_confidence":"low_medium","plot_status":"plot_with_caveat","coordinate_basis":"representative coordinate for named people, place, or region in Loeb","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"In central California the bullroarer belonged to two peoples only, the Pomo and the Coast Miwok, Edwin Loeb found; among the Maidu, on Dixon's authority, it was only a child's toy. Loeb groups the Coast Miwok with the Pomo, Yuki, and Huchnom inside the Ghost ceremony, the masked tribal initiation in which boys lay down as if dead, were covered with straw, then roused to life and bathed. His detailed account of bullroarers in that rite is Pomo: they sounded inside the subterranean ghost house while the women and children kept outside were told the noise was the voices of the dead. The Coast Miwok staged it the same way: their ghosts, the walipo, came down from the hills with fire burning in their hair, while the boys lay painted black on the ground and were now and then thrown over the fire.","pull_quote":"Bullroarers (umul) were whirled in the ceremonial house, and the women believed the roaring to be the voices of the ghosts.","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"Edwin M. Loeb, The Western Kuksu Cult, UCPAAE 33(1) (1932), p. 116","term_gloss":"","cls":"sacred","class_label":"Sacred / spirit","color":"#8A5A2B","is_candidate":false,"flags":["spirit_voice","initiation","death_rebirth","women_taboo"],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":true,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":false,"sources":[{"citation":"Edwin M. Loeb, Tribal Initiations and Secret Societies, University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 25(3):249-288 (1929), pp. 267, 269; Edwin M. Loeb, The Western Kuksu Cult, University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 33(1):1-137 (1932), pp. 115-118","url":"https://digicoll.lib.berkeley.edu/record/82839/files/ucp025-004.pdf","archive":"https://web.archive.org/web/20250411091854/https://digicoll.lib.berkeley.edu/record/82839/files/ucp025-004.pdf"}],"source_citations":"Edwin M. Loeb, Tribal Initiations and Secret Societies, University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 25(3):249-288 (1929), pp. 267, 269; Edwin M. Loeb, The Western Kuksu Cult, University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 33(1):1-137 (1932), pp. 115-118","source_display":"Edwin M. Loeb, Tribal Initiations and Secret Societies, University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 25(3):249-288 (1929), pp. 267, 269; Edwin M. Loeb, The Western Kuksu Cult, University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology 33(1):1-137 (1932), pp. 115-118","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"","function_display":"Sounded in the boys' Ghost initiation; in the secret society's pololo memorial dance, two men swung it as the voice of thunder.","confidence_display":"low to medium","attestation_label":"ethnographic attestation","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"coast miwok","display_name":"Coast Miwok bullroarer","image":{"full":"assets/objects/NAMER-012_hearst_pomo_1-2679.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/NAMER-012_hearst_pomo_1-2679_thumb.jpg","alt":"A Pomo bullroarer from Coyote Valley Rancheria, with a long dark tapered blade and a loose coil of cord attached near its narrow end.","credit":"Hearst Museum of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley (1-2679)","license":"© Hearst Museum of Anthropology, UC Berkeley","source_page":"https://portal.hearstmuseum.berkeley.edu/catalog/089ace52-ebf5-4a8b-96ff-240568138422","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Pomo bullroarer from Coyote Valley Rancheria.","pool_id":"auto-NAMER-012_hearst_pomo_1-2679"},"slug":"loeb1929-020-coast-miwok"}