{"id":"SIBER-001","label":"Even owl-speaking bullroarer North Asia","people_or_site":"Even","country_current":"Russia","historic_region":"East Siberia / northern Yakutia","macroregion":"Siberia / East Siberia","local_name":"","source_term":"bullroarer","source_language":"English","object_description":"Bullroarer described as sound of an owl speaking","function_summary":"Traditional Even instrument with animal-sound symbolism","attestation_type":"secondary_catalog","source_key":"SHAMAN_2005_EVEN_OWL_BULLROARER","source_type":"academic_pdf","source_url":"https://www.isars.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ShamanVol13_2005_dld.pdf","page_or_plate":"Shaman Vol. 13 (2005), printed p. 168 (PDF page 168)","map_confidence":"medium","plot_status":"plot_with_caveat","coordinate_basis":"Even northern Yakutia regional anchor not publication location","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"Among the Even of northern Yakutia, the bullroarer was heard as the voice of an owl \"speaking.\" Players could layer in further sounds, perhaps to mimic a wood grouse. Marilyn Walker heard this from Even informants, one of them a shaman's daughter, who set the instrument inside a wider world of imitative sound: the herder's staff that whistles when thrown, the hide pouch hung with reindeer hooves, an instrument said to mimic the wind that moves the grass, which the Evenks held to be the work of spirits. Children listened to the bullroarer and had to guess whose voice it was making. Learning to recognize all these sounds of nature, and to build the instruments that reproduced them, was a child's musical education in Even families.","pull_quote":"Traditional Even instruments included the bullroarer which is the sound of an owl \"speaking.\" Sometimes peoples added other sounds to the basic bullroarer sound, perhaps to produce the sound of a wood grouse.","pull_quote_translation":"","pull_quote_cite":"Walker 2005:168 (Shaman, Vol. 13)","term_gloss":"","cls":"sacred","class_label":"Sacred / spirit","color":"#8A5A2B","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":"Shaman: Journal of the International Society for Academic Research on Shamanism 13 (2005), p. 168","url":"https://www.isars.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ShamanVol13_2005_dld.pdf","archive":"https://web.archive.org/web/20260521172326/https://www.isars.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/ShamanVol13_2005_dld.pdf"}],"source_citations":"Shaman: Journal of the International Society for Academic Research on Shamanism 13 (2005), p. 168","source_display":"Shaman: Journal of the International Society for Academic Research on Shamanism 13 (2005), p. 168","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"Bullroarer described as sound of an owl speaking","function_display":"Traditional Even instrument with animal-sound symbolism","confidence_display":"medium","attestation_label":"secondary catalog","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"even","display_name":"Even owl-speaking bullroarer North Asia","image":{"full":"assets/objects/expansion_2026_07/sheikin2019_chukchi_vyutkunen_fig4.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/expansion_2026_07/sheikin2019_chukchi_vyutkunen_fig4_thumb.jpg","alt":"Chukchi vyutkunen drawing: a feather-form blade with slanting marks along its edges and a looping cord joining it to a smaller narrow piece.","credit":"Sheikin, Dobzhanskaya & Ignateva, \"Звуковые орудия и музыкальные инструменты чукчей\", Традиционная культура 20:4 (2019), fig. 4","license":"In copyright — open-access journal figure, rehosted low-res for non-commercial research","source_page":"https://trad-culture.ru/","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"A Chukchi feather-form bullroarer drawing.","pool_id":"siberia-chukchi"},"slug":"siber-001-even"}