{"id":"SHIMKIN1986-001","label":"Eastern Shoshone bull-roarer swung to bring a thaw","people_or_site":"Eastern Shoshone (Wind River Shoshone)","country_current":"United States","historic_region":"Wind River country, western Wyoming (Wind River Reservation)","macroregion":"North America / Great Basin","local_name":"","source_term":"bull-roarer","source_language":"English","object_description":"Not described.","function_summary":"Weather magic: swung to bring about a thaw.","attestation_type":"ethnographic_attestation","source_key":"shimkin1986_hnai11_eastern_shoshone","source_type":"ethnographic_attestation","source_url":"https://archive.org/details/handbookofnorth011stur/page/326","page_or_plate":"HNAI 11, p. 326","map_confidence":"medium","plot_status":"plot","coordinate_basis":"Wind River Reservation anchor near Fort Washakie, Fremont County, Wyoming.","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"Power among the Wind River Shoshone worked through objects that compelled rather than asked, and Demitri Shimkin lists them in a row: an eagle feather to chase away clouds, a bull-roarer to bring about a thaw, antelope-hoof rattles to charm the herds. The roarer's job here is winter. Across the northern Great Basin the instrument is swung for wind, often a warm wind to clear the snow; on the Wyoming side of the divide what wants breaking is the ice.","pull_quote":"Magic is often mediated through a compelling instrument","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"Shimkin, \"Eastern Shoshone,\" Handbook of North American Indians vol. 11 (1986), p. 326.","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":"Demitri B. Shimkin, \"Eastern Shoshone,\" in Warren L. d'Azevedo (ed.), Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 11: Great Basin (Smithsonian Institution, 1986), p. 326","url":"https://archive.org/details/handbookofnorth011stur/page/326"}],"source_citations":"Demitri B. Shimkin, \"Eastern Shoshone,\" in Warren L. d'Azevedo (ed.), Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 11: Great Basin (Smithsonian Institution, 1986), p. 326","source_display":"Demitri B. Shimkin, \"Eastern Shoshone,\" in Warren L. d'Azevedo (ed.), Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 11: Great Basin (Smithsonian Institution, 1986), p. 326","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"Not described.","function_display":"Weather magic: swung to bring about a thaw.","confidence_display":"medium","attestation_label":"ethnographic attestation","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"eastern shoshone","display_name":"Eastern Shoshone bull-roarer swung to bring a thaw","image":{"full":"assets/objects/NA-S1952-013.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/NA-S1952-013_thumb.jpg","alt":"Navajo (Diné) bullroarer in a nineteenth-century published engraving.","credit":"The Franciscan Fathers, St Michaels, Arizona (1910)","license":"Public domain","source_page":"https://archive.org/details/ethologicnavaho00editrich","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Navajo (Diné) bullroarer in a nineteenth-century published engraving.","pool_id":"american-west-navajo-engraving","last_modified":"2026-08-11"},"slug":"shimkin1986-001-eastern-shoshone-wind-river-shoshone"}