The Bullroarer Atlas

GRIGSON1938-001 - ethnographic attestation

Hill Maria ait, Abujhmarh

Abujhmarh, Bastar State - Central Provinces - South Asia - Central India

Play / practical

Elwin’s drawing of a Markabera Muria Gond bullroarer and its cord knot.
Representative — not this record’s object. · Elwin’s drawing of a Markabera Muria Gond bullroarer and its cord knot. · Public domain Image source
An Abujh Maria boy in Bastar, 1979, whirling a blade on a long cord from a pole tip to scare birds off the crops.
An Abujh Maria boy in Bastar, 1979, whirling a blade on a long cord from a pole tip to scare birds off the crops. Image source

ait

Source term: bull-roarer

ait: the Hill Maria (Abujhmarh) name for the bull-roarer, recorded by Grigson.

In the Abujhmarh hills the Hill Maria boys' roarer is called *ait*: a strip of split bamboo, one end sharpened and notched just below the point to take a bark string. The string loops round a finger and the blade goes round counter-clockwise until it roars. It is never pierced — where the roarers of Chota Nagpur are drilled and swung from a whip-handle, the Bastar blade is only notched, and spins from the fingers. There is no rite in it, no secret and no spirit. The *ait* sits with the spinning-top and the jew's-harp among the handful of amusements open to Hill Maria youth. Forty years on, Geneviève Dournon photographed the instrument at work in Bastar: a boy holding a pole taller than himself, a small leaf-shaped blade whirling from a long cord at its tip, put up — her caption says — to drive the birds off the crops.

…the bull-roarers, which Hill Maria boys call ait and make of a strip of split bamboo, pointing one end and notching it near the point for a bark string, with which, looped round one finger, they whirl the bull-roarer round counter-clockwise.

W. V. Grigson, The Maria Gonds of Bastar (1938), p. 183
Object
A strip of split bamboo, one end pointed and notched near the point to take a bark string; the string is looped round one finger and the blade whirled counter-clockwise. Grigson notes that none of the examples made for him were holed at the bottom. A 1979 field photograph by Geneviève Dournon (musée du quai Branly PF0147257) shows the same people's instrument at work in Bastar: a small leaf-shaped blade flying from a long cord at the end of a pole taller than its player, captioned by Dournon as a bullroarer for driving birds away from the crops.
Function
A boys' toy, made on request at various camps and whirled for the noise; Grigson found no religious or magical use for it. A 1979 field photograph records a long-handled form used to drive birds from the crops.
Source
W. V. Grigson, The Maria Gonds of Bastar (Oxford University Press, London, 1938), p. 183 (chapter on dancing and recreations), with a second mention at p. 187 and the term ait in the glossary; Grigson was Administrator of Bastar State and wrote from residence among the Hill Maria of the Abujhmarh hills
Source location
Page references

Grigson 1938, p. 183 (printed index: 'Bull-roarers, 183.'; running head 'DANCING 183'); also p. 187 (running head 'RECKONING TIME 187'); glossary entry for ait

Source confidence
medium to high Abujhmarh hills centroid, Narayanpur district, Chhattisgarh; Grigson gives no single village for the bull-roarers, which he saw made at several camps.

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