{"id":"MUS2026-005","label":"Chankabletuntunpi, a Lakota boy's toy","people_or_site":"Hunkpapa Lakota","country_current":"United States","historic_region":"North/South Dakota (Standing Rock)","macroregion":"North America / Plains","local_name":"","source_term":"bull-roarer","source_language":"English","object_description":"Bull-roarer of the Hunkpapa Lakota, carved from animal bone and notched along both edges; in the collection of the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI).","function_summary":"A boys' toy where Lakota use is recorded: the Teton chankabletuntunpi, \"wood having edges,\" whirled overhead on its hide strip to roar.","attestation_type":"museum_specimen","source_key":"smithsonian_nmai","source_type":"museum_collection","source_url":"https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1525/aa.1891.4.4.02a00070","page_or_plate":"Dorsey 1891, American Anthropologist o.s. 4(4):343; cf. Culin 1907 (BAE 24th Ann. Rep.) pp. 750-751, fig. 1008","map_confidence":"medium","plot_status":"plot","coordinate_basis":"approximate culture/locality centroid","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"A Hunkpapa Lakota bull-roarer carved from animal bone and notched like a saw along both edges, held in the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian. Where the Lakota use of the instrument is recorded, it is a boys' toy: J. Owen Dorsey, working among the Teton Dakota, set it down as chankabletuntunpi, \"wood having edges\" — a four-sided piece tied by a hide strip to a handle, which a boy grips and whirls around his head to make it roar. Collectors recorded the same among the neighboring Oglala (a boy's plaything) and Omaha. Tellingly, the ceremonial bull-roarer of the American West belonged to the Hopi, Zuni, Navaho, and Apache, not to the Sioux, for whom the documented life of the whirled slat was play, not cult.","pull_quote":"Chan'kabletuntun'pi, Wood having edges... A straight piece of wood is prepared, with four sides or edges, and is fastened by a strip of hide to another piece of wood which is used as a handle. The boy grasps the handle, whirls it around his head, making the four-cornered piece move rapidly with a whizzing noise.","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"J. Owen Dorsey, \"Games of Teton Dakota Children,\" American Anthropologist (o.s.) 4(4):343 (1891), as reproduced in Culin, Games of the North American Indians (1907), p. 750.","term_gloss":"chankabletuntunpi (Teton/Lakota): \"wood having edges,\" the Dakota name for the bull-roarer, a four-edged slat fastened by a hide strip to a handle and whirled to make a whizzing roar (Dorsey 1891).","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":"J. Owen Dorsey, 'Games of Teton Dakota Children,' American Anthropologist o.s. 4(4) (1891): 329-346, at p. 343; Stewart Culin, Games of the North American Indians (24th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, 1907), pp. 750-751","url":"https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1525/aa.1891.4.4.02a00070"}],"source_citations":"J. Owen Dorsey, 'Games of Teton Dakota Children,' American Anthropologist o.s. 4(4) (1891): 329-346, at p. 343; Stewart Culin, Games of the North American Indians (24th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, 1907), pp. 750-751","source_display":"J. Owen Dorsey, 'Games of Teton Dakota Children,' American Anthropologist o.s. 4(4) (1891): 329-346, at p. 343; Stewart Culin, Games of the North American Indians (24th Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, 1907), pp. 750-751","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"Bull-roarer of the Hunkpapa Lakota, carved from animal bone and notched along both edges; in the collection of the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI).","function_display":"","confidence_display":"medium","attestation_label":"museum specimen","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"hunkpapa lakota","display_name":"Chankabletuntunpi, a Lakota boy's toy","image":{"full":"assets/objects/MUS2026-005_nmai_19-5826_hunkpapa.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/MUS2026-005_nmai_19-5826_hunkpapa_thumb.jpg","alt":"Hunkpapa Lakota bone bullroarer with notches along both edges and a perforation near one end.","credit":"National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution (19/5826)","license":"Usage Conditions Apply (NMAI)","source_page":"https://americanindian.si.edu/collections-search/object/NMAI_208918","rehosted":true,"representative":false,"caption":"Hunkpapa Lakota bone bull-roarer — a slat with fine zigzag serration along both edges and a perforation at the narrow end."},"slug":"mus2026-005-hunkpapa-lakota"}