Turkish toothed bullroarers, Eldivan (fırıldak)

fırıldak / vırıldak / kıcırdak

Source term: Bullroarer

Turkish names for the spinning blade. Fırıldak is the everyday word for a whirligig, pinwheel, weathervane or spinning top, built on the root fır- (to whirl); vırıldak and kıcırdak are onomatopoeic siblings, formed on Turkish sound-roots for a whirring and a creaking, grating noise.

Etymology. The Cambridge/Picken labels record firildak, virildak, and kicirdak for Turkish rotating-blade bullroarers. Fırıldak is the everyday Turkish word for a whirligig or spinning toy; virildak and kicirdak are its whirring and creaking siblings.

Three toothed wooden bullroarers from Eldivan in Çankırı province, made by local children — the plate in Laurence Picken's Folk Musical Instruments of Turkey names İsmail, Hasan and Ahmet Sarıca — from wood already dressed rather than worked from the rough, which is why, Picken notes, they are not entirely typical of the region's make. The names he recorded are toy-words: fırıldak, the everyday Turkish term for a whirligig, pinwheel or weathervane, with its onomatopoeic siblings vırıldak and kıcırdak. Each blade is cut with teeth along its edge, so the whirling strip of wood bites the air rather than slicing it cleanly; spun on a cord at arm's length, the toy's circle is sized to the child swinging it.

Bullroarers (firildak, virildak, kicirdak). All three toothed.

Cambridge MAA, accession 1977.220 (object record)

Particulars

Object

Toothed rotating-blade bullroarer, MAA 1977.220, from the Picken Turkish folk-instrument collection.

Function

Made by local children: these very blades are the work of İsmail, Hasan and Ahmet Sarıca, cut from previously dressed wood. The fırıldak is a toy whirled on its cord at arm's length, its circle sized to the child.