Dakka Sama Mum Langa ancestral-voice bullroarer

Langa

Source term: Schwirrholzer

Langa: Dakka name for the sacred bullroarers; the same term includes silent iron forms and sounded wooden instruments

Among the Dakka, wooden Langa were swung on sacred days while iron examples rested silent in a shrine urn. Their sound was the voice of the fathers: at harvest women and children hid indoors, while boys at circumcision were told that the old grandfathers were crying.

Dagegen werden die Schwirrholzer an den entsprechenden heiligen Tagen geschwungen.

The wooden bullroarers are swung on the corresponding sacred days.

Frobenius 1925:42

Particulars

Object

Wooden bullroarers explicitly swung on sacred days; iron forms remained in a shrine urn.

Function

Swung on sacred days as the voice of the fathers; sounded at harvest, circumcision, and the death of a king or Kameni.