The Bullroarer Atlas

BRUGGEMANN1896-001 - ethnographic attestation

Boys of Stolzenau

Germany - Stolzenau - Kingdom of Hanover - modern Lower Saxony - Central Europe

Play / practical

Bruggemann's Stolzenau account remembers the familiar boys' toy and the cattle it could send bolting.
Bruggemann's Stolzenau account remembers the familiar boys' toy and the cattle it could send bolting. Fr. Bruggemann, Das Schwirrholz im Hannoverschen, Globus 70 (1896), p. 388 Public domain Image source

Source term: Schwirrholz

Schwirrholz: generic German bullroarer term; no special Stolzenau name is recorded

In Stolzenau in the 1860s, the Schwirrholz was a familiar boys' toy: a ruler-like wooden slat, notched near one end, looped to a whip and swept in a circle. Its roar could spill into village mischief too, sending the cattle of disliked herders bolting across the fields.

ein bekanntes und beliebtes Spielzeug

a familiar and popular toy

Bruggemann 1896:388
Object
Elongated ruler-like wooden slat with both narrow edges notched at one end, attached to a whip by a simple loop and swung in a circle; Bruggemann says its manufacture exactly matched Figura's mechanically explicit Galician example.
Function
Familiar and popular childhood toy; boys sometimes used it to make the cattle of disliked herders bolt.
Map confidence
high - Stolzenau town anchor; the source records no exact childhood play site.
Source location
printed p. 388

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