JSTEWARD1941-010 - primary ethnography
Ely Shoshoni toy bullroarer
United States - Ely, Steptoe Valley, White Pine County, Nevada - North America - Great Basin
Play / practical
Source term: Bull-roarer
At Ely, in the Steptoe Valley, the bullroarer was a plaything — the easternmost place in Nevada where Steward heard that answer. The interest is in what lay just north of it. On the Humboldt the same instrument was swung at the sky: anyone might sound one in early spring to fetch the warm wind, and at Battle Mountain boys whirled theirs in hot weather to set the air moving, one of them made from an antelope kneecap on a string. Ely is where the toy country ends.
- Object
- Recorded as present without description of the object itself.
- Function
- A child's toy.
- Source
- Steward 1941, printed p. 307, element 1870 'Bull-roarer' + for column Si, with sub-element 1873 'used as toy' also +. Informant dossier, printed p. 213: 'AR, half-blood (?) Shoshoni woman, born ca. 1870 or 1875 at Ely, Nevada; now lives at Ely. English fair; knowledge limited; some guessing was evident; The list S-Ely is not only incomplete but somewhat…
- Source location
Page references
printed p. 307, element 1870 and sub-element 1873 (column Si); informant p. 213
- Source confidence
- medium Ely, Steptoe Valley, White Pine County, Nevada. Territory anchor for the named people; not a use site.
- Toy / secular survival