BELL1977-001 - lexical attestation
Tanga (Tanga Islands)
Papua New Guinea - Tanga Islands (Boang, Malendok, Lif, Tefa) - New Ireland Province - former German New Guinea - Oceania - Sahul
Function not recorded
tangalop (common term); tomlulur (small); burrarumarum (large, swung on a bamboo pole); tom-mis-mis (largest) Tanga / English
Source term: bull-roarer
tangalop: Tanga common term for bullroarer, about 11 inches long; tomlulur: small type, about 5 inches; burrarumarum: large type, swung on a bamboo pole; tom-mis-mis: largest type, 2'6" long
On the Tanga Islands off New Ireland, size told you what you were hearing. Tangalop was the common bullroarer, about eleven inches of whirled wood. Tomlulur, barely five inches, was the small type; tom-mis-mis, at two and a half feet, the largest. Burrarumarum outgrew them all -- too big to swing by hand, it was whirled instead on the end of a bamboo pole. A single English gloss could not hold what Tanga speakers heard as four distinct instruments.
BURRARUMARUM larger type of bull-roarer than the tangalop, swung by means of a bamboo pole.
Bell 1977:198
- Object
- Four size grades of wooden bullroarer distinguished by Tanga speakers: tomlulur, about 5 inches, the small type; tangalop, about 11 inches, the common term; burrarumarum, larger than tangalop and swung from a bamboo pole rather than by hand; and tom-mis-mis, the largest type, 2'6" long. No blade shape, cord length, or object figure is supplied.
- Function
- Four named size grades; the largest, burrarumarum, was swung from a bamboo pole. No ceremony recorded.
- Map confidence
- high - Reuses this catalog's existing Nominatim/OpenStreetMap-resolved Tanga Island point (see PNG169); Bell's dictionary covers the whole Tanga language area, matching the source's own scope rather than a single village.
- Source location
- printed p. 198