{"id":"ZERRIES1964-001","label":"Waika alabaco, Mahekodotedi","people_or_site":"Waika (Yanoama; today’s Yanomami)","country_current":"Venezuela","historic_region":"Upper Orinoco / Mahekodotedi (El Platanal)","macroregion":"South America / Orinoco","local_name":"alabaco","source_term":"Schwirrholz","source_language":"German","object_description":"Elongated-oval wooden blade, 32 by 4 cm, painted with simple geometric designs in onoto; the whirling cord is fixed either through a perforation or to a small peg.","function_summary":"A children’s toy, and an uncommon one. Zerries records that among the Waika the bullroarer had sunk wholly into the profane, against its initiation role among many other peoples.","attestation_type":"ethnographic_attestation","source_key":"zerries1964_waika_alabaco","source_type":"ethnographic_monograph","source_url":"https://www.samorini.it/doc1/alt_aut/sz/zerries-waika-die-kulturgeschichtliche-stellung-der-waika-indianer.pdf","page_or_plate":"p. 202 (PDF p. 203)","map_confidence":"medium_high","plot_status":"plot","coordinate_basis":"Zerries’s historical position for Mahekodotedi / El Platanal: 64°55′ W, 2°25′ N; a 1954–55 location, not a current-village claim.","jade_complex_role":"","blurb":"At Mahekodotedi in 1954–55, children whirled the alabaco: an oval blade a forearm long, painted with geometric designs in onoto, the red annatto pigment, its cord tied through a hole or to a little peg. Otto Zerries called it an uncommon toy. In his account the Waika, now generally called Yanomami, otherwise had no musical instruments; where the bullroarer belonged to boys’ initiation among many other peoples, here it belonged to play. He knew of no report from another Yanomami group at the time.","pull_quote":"kennen die Waika — in diesem Falle ein echtes Randvolk — keinerlei Musik-Instrumente, jedoch ist bei den Leuten von Mahekodo-tedi das Schwirrholz, „alabaco“ mit Namen, ein nicht sehr häufiges Spielzeug","pull_quote_translation":"The Waika know no musical instruments whatsoever; yet among the people of Mahekodotedi there is the bullroarer, alabaco by name, a not very common toy.","pull_quote_cite":"Otto Zerries, Waika (1964), p. 202.","term_gloss":"alabaco = the Waika name for the Mahekodotedi bullroarer.","cls":"play_practical","class_label":"Play / practical","color":"#24766D","is_candidate":false,"flags":["toy_survival"],"f_jade_complex":false,"f_women_taboo":false,"f_women_special":false,"f_snake":false,"sources":[{"citation":"Otto Zerries, Waika: Die kulturgeschichtliche Stellung der Waika-Indianer des oberen Orinoco im Rahmen der Völkerkunde Südamerikas (Munich: Klaus Renner, 1964), p. 202","url":"https://www.samorini.it/doc1/alt_aut/sz/zerries-waika-die-kulturgeschichtliche-stellung-der-waika-indianer.pdf","archive":"https://web.archive.org/web/20221125044950/https://www.samorini.it/doc1/alt_aut/sz/zerries-waika-die-kulturgeschichtliche-stellung-der-waika-indianer.pdf"}],"source_citations":"Otto Zerries, Waika: Die kulturgeschichtliche Stellung der Waika-Indianer des oberen Orinoco im Rahmen der Völkerkunde Südamerikas (Munich: Klaus Renner, 1964), p. 202","source_display":"Otto Zerries, Waika: Die kulturgeschichtliche Stellung der Waika-Indianer des oberen Orinoco im Rahmen der Völkerkunde Südamerikas (Munich: Klaus Renner, 1964), p. 202","date_citation_display":"","object_display":"Elongated-oval wooden blade, 32 by 4 cm, painted with simple geometric designs in onoto; the whirling cord is fixed either through a perforation or to a small peg.","function_display":"A children’s toy, and an uncommon one. Zerries records that among the Waika the bullroarer had sunk wholly into the profane, against its initiation role among many other peoples.","confidence_display":"medium to high","attestation_label":"ethnographic attestation","etymology_hedge":"","people_key":"waika yanoama","display_name":"Waika alabaco, Mahekodotedi","image":{"full":"assets/objects/prm/prm_39597.jpg","thumb":"assets/objects/prm/thumbs/prm_39597_thumb.jpg","alt":"Sanumá bullroarer in the Pitt Rivers Museum: a pale wooden blade widening from its corded narrow end to a flat broad end, painted with crossing brown strokes and groups of dots.","credit":"© Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (acc. 1981.33.75)","license":"© Pitt Rivers Museum — non-commercial/educational reuse with attribution","source_page":"https://prm.ox.ac.uk/collections-online#/item/prm-object-39597","rehosted":true,"representative":true,"caption":"Sanumá bullroarer from the northern Yanomami region.","pool_id":"orinoco-sanuma"},"slug":"zerries1964-001-waika-yanoama-today-s-yanomami"}