{"id":"MUS2026-110","label":"Riwi-riwi löchö, the dry-season insect","people_or_site":"Nias","country_current":"Indonesia","historic_region":"Lafau, Nias Island","macroregion":"Southeast Asia / Indonesia","local_name":"riwi-riwi löchö","source_term":"bull-roarer","source_language":"English","object_description":"Bull-roarer of the Nias, Smithsonian (NMNH/NMAI).","function_summary":"Not recorded for this object. The Nias instrument is named riwi-riwi löchö after a dry-season chirping insect, and it passed as a children's toy whose magical function — the imitation of ghostly voices — has lapsed.","attestation_type":"museum_specimen","source_key":"smithsonian","source_type":"museum_collection","source_url":"http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/3038a4bb8-2300-41e8-9496-88f2f48ac5d2","page_or_plate":"nmnhanthropology_8364793 / ark:/65665/3038a4bb8-2300-41e8-9496-88f2f48ac5d2","map_confidence":"medium","plot_status":"plot","coordinate_basis":"approximate culture/locality centroid","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"On Nias, off the western coast of Sumatra, the bull-roarer carries the name of a cricket that chirps through the dry season: riwi-riwi löchö. This one left the village of Lafau for the Smithsonian. On the island the instrument passed as a children's toy, its older work — the imitation of ghostly voices — lapsed.","pull_quote":"","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"","term_gloss":"riwi-riwi löchö: Nias name of the bullroarer and of the whizzing bow (Kunst, Music in Nias, 1939, p. 72); riwi-riwi is a cricket or chirping insect of the dry season.","cls":"play_practical","class_label":"Play / practical","color":"#24766D","is_candidate":false,"flags":["spirit_voice","toy_survival"],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":false,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":false,"sources":[{"citation":"Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, Anthropology, record 8364793 (Lafau, Nias); Jaap Kunst, Music in Nias (1939)","url":"http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/3038a4bb8-2300-41e8-9496-88f2f48ac5d2"}],"source_citations":"Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, Anthropology, record 8364793 (Lafau, Nias); Jaap Kunst, Music in Nias (1939)","source_display":"Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, Anthropology, record 8364793 (Lafau, Nias); Jaap Kunst, Music in Nias (1939)","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"Bull-roarer of the Nias, Smithsonian (NMNH/NMAI).","function_display":"Not recorded for this object. The Nias instrument is named riwi-riwi löchö after a dry-season chirping insect, and it passed as a children's toy whose magical function — the imitation of ghostly voices — has lapsed.","confidence_display":"medium","attestation_label":"museum specimen","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"nias","display_name":"Riwi-riwi löchö, the dry-season insect","image":{"full":"assets/objects/museum_harvest/bm_A_As1905-629.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/museum_harvest/thumbs/bm_A_As1905-629_thumb.jpg","alt":"A long curved wooden stick with a broad tapered blade tied near one end by cord.","credit":"© The Trustees of the British Museum (A/As1905-629)","license":"CC BY-NC-SA 4.0","source_page":"https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/A_As1905-629","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Gently curved stick with a narrow wooden blade bound by cord."},"slug":"mus2026-110-nias"}