Wulwulam Mary River discarded initiation bullroarers

Source term: Schwirrhölzer

Used once, then thrown away: in the many ceremonies before a Wulwulam boy’s circumcision, bullroarers and clapsticks saw extensive use, and once the consecration was complete the whirled sticks were discarded. Women and children could not be present; a boy who had watched was left uncircumcised. Before admission the elders took each novice into the solitude of the bush to learn the tribe’s laws and customs, hut-building, and fire-making; at the operation itself a wad — sometimes the little pouch that would afterwards hold his own foreskin — was pushed into his mouth to stop his screaming.

Bei einigen finden Schwirrhölzer und Klapperstäbe ... eine ausgedehnte Verwendung. Die benutzten Stäbe werden nach vollzogener Weihe weggeworfen.

In some of them, bullroarers and clapsticks find extensive use. The sticks that have been used are thrown away once the consecration is complete.

Eylmann, Die Eingeborenen der Kolonie Südaustralien (1908), p. 258

Particulars

Object

Bullroarers (Schwirrhölzer, 'whirring woods'), used together with clapsticks.