DIET2016-005 - archaeological find
Çatalhöyük
Turkey - Konya Plain - Central Anatolia - Near East
Function not recorded
Source term: antler bullroarer
Among the worked-bone finds at Neolithic Çatalhöyük, in central Anatolia, the excavators identified a single antler bullroarer, recovered from a storage bin inside one of the houses, Building 52. It carries heavy polish and wear inside its perforation, on the edges beside the hole, and along one face, which led the analyst to suggest it had been worn on a cord when not being swung. The same bin held burned rib burnishers, unmodified metapodials, and antler points that may have served as pressure flakers. Nerissa Russell, who has worked the site's bone assemblage for years, observed that several of the roughly rectangular, crudely finished antler objects often catalogued as pendants look oddly unfinished compared with ordinary pendants, and that their wear shows they hung from a hole — leading her to suggest they may be weights, or bullroarers, rather than ornaments.
One, 11910.X1, is an antler bullroarer. The bullroarer shows significant polish and wear inside the perforation, on the edges near the perforation, and on one side, indicating that it might have been worn when not in use as a bullroarer.
Daly, Worked Bone, Çatalhöyük 2005 Archive Report
- Object
- The Çatalhöyük 2005 worked-bone report directly identifies item 11910.X1 from Building 52 as an antler bullroarer with polish and wear around the perforation.
- Function
- Source-explicit archaeological bullroarer object; original performance context is not directly observable.
- Map confidence
- medium - representative coordinate; source passage does not warrant a precise findspot
- Source location
- Çatalhöyük 2005 Archive Report, Worked Bone, Fig. 71 / item 11910.X1; Neo-Lithics 1/16 pp. 28-29