{"id":"RIDLEY1875-001","label":"Dhurumbulum, the sight that makes men","people_or_site":"Guïnberai / Koinberi, Burburgate","country_current":"Australia","historic_region":"Burburgate / Namoi River near Gunnedah, New South Wales","macroregion":"Australia / Southeast","local_name":"dhūrumbulum","source_term":"stick or wand; sacred wand","source_language":"English","object_description":"Bullroarer, described to Ridley as a sacred stick or wand, waved by elders before Bora candidates.","function_summary":"Exhibited and waved before Bora candidates to impart manhood; regarded as Baiame’s gift.","attestation_type":"ethnographic_attestation","source_key":"ridley1875_burburgate_dhurumbulum","source_type":"primary_ethnography","source_url":"https://transcripts.sl.nsw.gov.au/node/40064","page_or_plate":"Ridley1873 pp.269–270; Ridley1875 pp.140–141,153,156; Mathews1898 pp.55–56; Frazer1901 pp.318–319; Marett1914 p.162","map_confidence":"medium_high","plot_status":"plot_with_caveat","coordinate_basis":"Approximate historical Burburgate affiliation on the Namoi, near Gunnedah, New South Wales. Rounded TLCMap Historical Australian Places layer549 itemtb7d32 (-30.9002877,150.2518380); corroborated by Mathews1898 p55, about ten miles downstream of Gunnedah. No particular Bora ground is located.","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"At the Bora the old men waved the dhurumbulum in sight of the candidates, and the sight alone made them men. Billy Murri Bundar, a very old man of Burburgate on the Namoi, told William Ridley this “as a great favour”: others had withheld it as too sacred for a white man. The wand was Baiame’s gift, Billy said, and Baiame had commanded the Bora; it would go on throughout the country, because its ground was his. Six hundred miles away at Twofold Bay, another man told Ridley that Dhurumbulum was the name of the Creator of all things.","pull_quote":"the sight of this wand as waved by the old men in sight of the candidates imparts manly qualities.","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"William Ridley, Kámilarói, and Other Australian Languages (1875), p.156","term_gloss":"dhūrumbulum: the sacred Bora implement that Billy Murri Bundar said Baiame gave his people.","cls":"restricted","class_label":"Restricted","color":"#A43C2F","is_candidate":false,"flags":["initiation","women_taboo"],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":true,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":false,"sources":[{"citation":"William Ridley, “Report on Australian Languages and Traditions,” JAI2 (1873), pp.269–270","url":"https://zenodo.org/records/2479161","archive":"https://web.archive.org/web/20250426070910/https://zenodo.org/records/2479161"},{"citation":"William Ridley, Kámilarói, and Other Australian Languages, 2nd ed. (1875), pp.140–141,153,156","url":"https://transcripts.sl.nsw.gov.au/node/40064","archive":"https://web.archive.org/web/20260119020615/https://transcripts.sl.nsw.gov.au/node/40064"},{"citation":"R. H. Mathews, “Bullroarers used by the Australian Aborigines,” JAI27 (1898), pp.55–56","url":"https://zenodo.org/records/1685976"}],"source_citations":"William Ridley, “Report on Australian Languages and Traditions,” JAI2 (1873), pp.269–270; William Ridley, Kámilarói, and Other Australian Languages, 2nd ed. (1875), pp.140–141,153,156; R. H. Mathews, “Bullroarers used by the Australian Aborigines,” JAI27 (1898), pp.55–56","source_display":"William Ridley, “Report on Australian Languages and Traditions,” JAI2 (1873), pp.269–270; William Ridley, Kámilarói, and Other Australian Languages, 2nd ed. (1875), pp.140–141,153,156; R. H. Mathews, “Bullroarers used by the Australian Aborigines,” JAI27 (1898), pp.55–56","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"Bullroarer, described to Ridley as a sacred stick or wand, waved by elders before Bora candidates.","function_display":"Exhibited and waved before Bora candidates to impart manhood; regarded as Baiame’s gift.","confidence_display":"medium to high","attestation_label":"ethnographic attestation","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"nberai","display_name":"Dhurumbulum, the sight that makes men","image":{"full":"assets/objects/pd_plates/MAT1898-005.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/pd_plates/MAT1898-005_thumb.jpg","alt":"Line drawing of a long bullroarer with rounded ends, irregularly notched edges, and a cord hole at the left.","credit":"R. H. Mathews, Notes on the Aborigines of New South Wales (1907), Plate 9, fig. 5","license":"Public domain (published 1907)","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Notes_on_the_Aborigines_of_New_South_Wales_-_Plate_9_Bull-roarers_used_by_the_Australian_Aborigines.jpg","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Kamilaroi murrawan from the Weir River, drawn by R. H. Mathews.","pool_id":"auto-pd_plates--MAT1898-005"},"slug":"ridley1875-001-guinberai-koinberi-burburgate"}