The Bullroarer Atlas

No. CAPELL1956-011

Yan-nhaŋu djurbur

Australia · Crocodile Islands (Milingimbi, Murrungga, Rapuma) off north-central Arnhem Land, Northern Territory

Function not recorded

Schmeltz's Plate IV, fig. 16
Plate I. Representative — not this record’s object. Schmeltz's Plate IV, fig. 16 Public domain · Image source

djurbur

Source term: BULLROARER: djurbur

djurbur: bullroarer (Capell 1956, p. 18, BULLROARER column)

Yan-nhaŋu speakers of the Crocodile Islands called the bullroarer djurbur, a word they shared with the Wangurri clans to the east. Their islands, Milingimbi, Murrungga and Rapuma among them, lie off the Arnhem Land coast west of Elcho Island. In the ceremonies of Milingimbi and the mainland opposite, the roaring of the blades was the voice of the great python.

The sounds they make are the voice of the snake.

W. Lloyd Warner, A Black Civilization (rev. ed., 1964), p. 291

Particulars

Object
A bullroarer, called djurbur; its form is not recorded.
Function
Not recorded for this language. In the ceremonies of Milingimbi, in Yan-nhaŋu island country, the bullroarers sound the voice of the snake.

Sources

  1. Arthur Capell, A Vocabulary of 600 Words in Forty North Australian Languages (typescript, Sydney, 1956), State Library of New South Wales A 6929, p. 18 View
  2. W. Lloyd Warner, A Black Civilization: A Social Study of an Australian Tribe (rev. ed., New York: Harper Torchbooks, 1964), pp. 282, 291 View
  • Alawa dudugulindjiAustralia · Southern tributaries of the Roper River, upstream of the Hodgson River mouth, Northern Territory · Function not recorded
  • Burarra maralbindiAustralia · Coast on both sides of the Blyth River mouth, east to Cape Stewart, north-central Arnhem Land, Northern Territory · Function not recorded
  • Djinang maralbindiAustralia · Crocodile Islands and Milingimbi south to the middle Blyth River and east to the Glyde River, north-central Arnhem Land, Northern Territory · Function not recorded
  • Djinba malaidjaraAustralia · Inland from the northern Arafura Swamp to the upper Goyder River, central Arnhem Land, Northern Territory · Function not recorded
  • Wandarang wugunabibiAustralia · Inland from the Phelp River coast, west toward Mount Leane, south-eastern Arnhem Land, Northern Territory · Function not recorded
  • Gunwinggu gubarAustralia · Western Arnhem Land stone country, Liverpool River to Oenpelli (Gunbalanya), Northern Territory · Function not recorded

Part of The Bullroarer Atlas, companion to The Eve Theory of Consciousness.