{"id":"NA-S1952-016","label":"Tanaina weather-magic bullroarer","people_or_site":"Tanaina / Dena'ina","country_current":"United States","historic_region":"Alaska / Mackenzie-Yukon edge","macroregion":"North America","local_name":"","source_term":"bullroarer","source_language":"English","object_description":"Bull-roarer whirled on a cord of mountain-sheep back sinew.","function_summary":"Swung on the beach when waves rolled in to bring fine weather.","attestation_type":"ethnographic_attestation","source_key":"seder1952oldworld","source_type":"source_catalog","source_url":"https://www.penn.museum/sites/bulletin/3526/","page_or_plate":"51-54","map_confidence":"low_medium","plot_status":"plot_with_caveat","coordinate_basis":"Broad Cook Inlet/Dena'ina regional anchor; the use is reported as former.","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"On the beaches of Cook Inlet, a Tanaina (Dena'ina) bull-roarer was swung when the waves came rolling in, to quiet the water and bring fine weather. Cornelius Osgood, who recorded the practice in the 1930s, also noted what the instrument was made from: when a mountain sheep was butchered, the sinew of its back was saved for bull-roarer strings, though the hide itself was never worn, for fear it would cripple the wearer.","pull_quote":"[The bull-roarer] is swung on the beach when the waves are rolling in in order to make fine weather.","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"Osgood 1937, The Ethnography of the Tanaina, p. 175","term_gloss":"","cls":"weather","class_label":"Weather / fertility magic","color":"#2F6FA3","is_candidate":false,"flags":["weather"],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":false,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":false,"sources":[{"citation":"Theodore A. Seder, 'Old World Overtones in the New World,' Museum Bulletin (University of Pennsylvania) XVI(4) (1952), pp. 51-54","url":"https://www.penn.museum/sites/bulletin/3526/","archive":"https://web.archive.org/web/20250316040643/https://www.penn.museum/sites/bulletin/3526/"},{"citation":"Osgood, The Ethnography of the Tanaina (1937), p. 175"}],"source_citations":"Theodore A. Seder, 'Old World Overtones in the New World,' Museum Bulletin (University of Pennsylvania) XVI(4) (1952), pp. 51-54; Osgood, The Ethnography of the Tanaina (1937), p. 175","source_display":"Theodore A. Seder, 'Old World Overtones in the New World,' Museum Bulletin (University of Pennsylvania) XVI(4) (1952), pp. 51-54; Osgood, The Ethnography of the Tanaina (1937), p. 175","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"Bull-roarer whirled on a cord of mountain-sheep back sinew.","function_display":"Swung on the beach when waves rolled in to bring fine weather.","confidence_display":"low to medium","attestation_label":"ethnographic attestation","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"tanaina","display_name":"Tanaina weather-magic bullroarer","image":{"full":"assets/objects/museum_harvest/ypm_ANT050129.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/museum_harvest/thumbs/ypm_ANT050129_thumb.jpg","alt":"Deg Hit’an (Ingalik) bull-roarer made by Billy Williams at Anvik, Alaska: a pale spruce blade with saw-toothed edges and a rawhide line wound around and across the blade.","credit":"Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History (YPM ANT 050129)","license":"CC0","source_page":"https://collections.peabody.yale.edu/search/Record/YPM-ANT-050129","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Deg Hit’an spruce bullroarer from Alaska.","pool_id":"auto-museum_harvest--ypm_ANT050129"},"slug":"na-s1952-016-tanaina-dena-ina"}