Hohen Viecheln whirring device

Source term: Schwirrgerät

Schwirrgerät: German, "whirring device" - the standard archaeological term for a bullroarer.

At the north end of the Schweriner See, one Mesolithic object from Hohen Viecheln was proposed as a whirring device - and the proposal came with its own doubt attached. Klaus-Peter Koch put it in his list of whirled aerophones but printed a question mark beside it, and in his text called it a piece that can be read as a Schwirrgerät only conditionally. He then set it apart from the rest: the long oval bone blades pierced at the broad end, the shape he gives for every other Mesolithic find in the group, are described with Hohen Viecheln expressly excepted. Whatever its shape, it was not theirs. A perforated bone rod from the same place turns up in Koch's very next list.

Die Form der mesolithischen Funde ist, sieht man von einem nur bedingt als Schwirrgerät zu deutenden Exemplar aus Hohen Viecheln ab, länglich-oval mit Tendenz zur Stromlinienform.

The form of the Mesolithic finds is - leaving aside one specimen from Hohen Viecheln that can be interpreted as a whirring device only conditionally - elongated-oval with a tendency towards a streamlined shape.

Koch 1992:119

Particulars

Object

Mesolithic bone find, like the rest of Koch's group, but expressly excepted from its elongated-oval, streamlined form with a perforation at the broader end.

Function

Not recorded.