The Bullroarer Atlas

MINE2026-086 - ethnographic attestation

Ndembu / Wukengi Farm / Nyaluhana vicinage

Zambia - Wukengi Farm - Nyaluhana vicinage, Mwinilunga District, North-Western Province - South-Central Africa

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Representative—not this record’s object: a bullroarer collected in Angola.
Representative—not this record’s object: a bullroarer collected in Angola. © The Trustees of the British Museum (E/Af1937-0312-71) CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 Image source

ndumba mwila English

Source term: bull-roarer

ndumba mwila = the Ndembu Mukanda bullroarer named in Turner's observed lodge setting.

Behind the Ndembu Mukanda lodge at Wukengi, a junior guardian whirled ndumba mwila, a fish-shaped bullroarer carved from red mukula wood. Its growl terrified the novices and their mothers. The old explanation was worse: a monster had come to swallow the boys.

a 'bull-roarer,' a fish-shaped piece of carved mukula wood

Victor Turner, The Forest of Symbols (1967), pp. 188-189.
Object
A fish-shaped piece of carved mukula wood, whirled behind a Mukanda lodge.
Function
Used behind the Mukanda lodge to frighten novices and their mothers; the old explanation was that a monster had come to swallow the boys.
Map confidence
high - Kanongesha chiefdom proxy within Mwinilunga District; no recoverable coordinate for the mobile Wukengi Farm / Nyaluhana lodge setting.
Source location
pp. 188-189

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