{"id":"MINE2026-087","label":"Trumai kuth / huri huri bullroarer, Upper Xingu","people_or_site":"Trumai","country_current":"Brazil","historic_region":"Upper Xingu, Mato Grosso","macroregion":"South America / Amazonia","local_name":"kuth; uríuri (shared with Kamayurá); huri huri","source_term":"bull roarer / zunidor","source_language":"English; Portuguese","object_description":"Three wooden blades in Leipzig: 15 cm, painted black and still tied to its cord; 34 cm, painted black, with a twisted black cord knotted on for whirling; and 40 cm, its paint faded and its cord lost.","function_summary":"Defunct by 1938. Dancing in the Trumai village came first; then everyone went on to the Kamayurá village for the rite. The roarer's making-ritual, huri huri wal, is remembered as part of the pequi festival.","attestation_type":"ethnographic_attestation","source_key":"MURPHYQUAIN1955_TRUMAI_BULLROARER","source_type":"book","source_url":"https://etnolinguistica.wdfiles.com/local--files/biblio%3Amurphy-1955-trumai/Murphy%26Quain_1955_trumai.pdf","page_or_plate":"Murphy & Quain 1955, pp. 9, 71; Guirardello-Damian 2011, pp. 144-145, 150-151","map_confidence":"medium_high","plot_status":"plot_with_caveat","coordinate_basis":"Aldeia Três Lagoas, a current Trumai village anchor; the sources are culture-wide, not site-specific.","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"By 1938 the Trumai told Buell Quain that they had “buried the kuth”: the rite was no longer performed, but most of the men remembered travelling to the Kamayurá village for ceremonies where they “did things that the women cannot see” — and afterwards, “a great deal of wrestling and copulation.” The bullroarer’s name survives as uríuri or huri huri, along with the remembered pequi-festival rite for making it. The instruments themselves outlived the rite: three blades Herrmann Meyer collected near the Rio Culuene in the mid-1890s — one still carrying its whirling cord — sit today in Leipzig's GRASSI museum.","pull_quote":"Yati, Maibu, and Tun played a ceremonial role known only to them, while Yati, Oirupa, and Nitvary sang certain songs at night when everyone was asleep.","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"Murphy & Quain, The Trumai Indians of Central Brazil (1955), p. 71.","term_gloss":"kuth = the Trumai bull roarer, its rites 'buried'; uríuri = the word for bull roarer in both Kamayurá and Trumai (Murphy & Quain 1955, p. 9); huri huri = the same name as recorded in Guirardello-Damian 2011, with huri huri wal the zunidor-making ritual.","cls":"restricted","class_label":"Restricted","color":"#A43C2F","is_candidate":false,"flags":["snake","women_taboo","agriculture"],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":true,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":true,"sources":[{"citation":"Robert F. Murphy and Buell Quain, The Trumai Indians of Central Brazil (1955), pp. 9 and 71; Raquel Guirardello-Damian, 'Léxico comparativo: explorando aspectos da história trumai,' in B. Franchetto (org.), Alto Xingu: uma sociedade multilíngue (2011), pp. 144-145","url":"https://etnolinguistica.wdfiles.com/local--files/biblio%3Amurphy-1955-trumai/Murphy%26Quain_1955_trumai.pdf","archive":"https://web.archive.org/web/20260814094118/https://etnolinguistica.wdfiles.com/local--files/biblio%3Amurphy-1955-trumai/Murphy%26Quain_1955_trumai.pdf"}],"source_citations":"Robert F. Murphy and Buell Quain, The Trumai Indians of Central Brazil (1955), pp. 9 and 71; Raquel Guirardello-Damian, 'Léxico comparativo: explorando aspectos da história trumai,' in B. Franchetto (org.), Alto Xingu: uma sociedade multilíngue (2011), pp. 144-145","source_display":"Robert F. Murphy and Buell Quain, The Trumai Indians of Central Brazil (1955), pp. 9 and 71; Raquel Guirardello-Damian, 'Léxico comparativo: explorando aspectos da história trumai,' in B. Franchetto (org.), Alto Xingu: uma sociedade multilíngue (2011), pp. 144-145","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"Three wooden blades in Leipzig: 15 cm, painted black and still tied to its cord; 34 cm, painted black, with a twisted black cord knotted on for whirling; and 40 cm, its paint faded and its cord lost.","function_display":"Defunct by 1938. Dancing in the Trumai village came first; then everyone went on to the Kamayurá village for the rite. The roarer's making-ritual, huri huri wal, is remembered as part of the pequi festival.","confidence_display":"medium to high","attestation_label":"ethnographic attestation","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"trumai","display_name":"Trumai kuth / huri huri bullroarer, Upper Xingu","image":{"full":"assets/objects/MINE2026-087_mine2026-087-trumai-sam05568.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/MINE2026-087_mine2026-087-trumai-sam05568_thumb.jpg","alt":"A Trumai blade from the Rio Culuene with a broad black zigzag painted across its brown wood, still tied to its cord.","credit":"GRASSI Museum für Völkerkunde zu Leipzig / Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden, SAm 05568","license":"Rights reserved (© Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden); free access, reproduction/publication by agreement; proposed for non-commercial research","source_page":"https://skd-online-collection.skd.museum/Details/Index/4555490","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"A Trumai blade from the Rio Culuene, painted black, still tied to its cord."},"slug":"mine2026-087-trumai"}