MUS2026-149 - museum specimen
Fang (Amvam)
Gabon - Woleu-Ntem - Oyem - Central Africa
Restricted
evuntere French
Source term: Bullroarer (MIMO controlled vocabulary)
evuntere = Fang name in the MIMO object record; no gloss recovered
Not a secret-society voice but a household terror. After dark, Fang men and older boys whirled a slat like this on its cord until its eerie drone became the cry of the edibongo, the "child-eater" — the bogeyman conjured to frighten unruly children into obedience. Gunter Tessmann, who lived among the Fang around 1908, pointedly filed the roarer not with their musical instruments but among the noises and switches parents used to discipline the young. This specimen was made near Oyem before 1960.
Bullroarer of the Fang, Gabon
MIMO controlled vocabulary / object OAI_GAB_GAB483656
- Object
- The exact MIMO object is a terminal-hole wooden plate with cord; Tessmann's 1913 field figure shows both handstick-rigged and cord-only Fang bullroarers, with the cord wound around the wood before use.
- Function
- After dark Fang men and older boys whirled it as the cry of the edibongo, the "child-eater" summoned to frighten children into obedience; Tessmann filed it with the disciplinary noises, not the musical instruments (Tessmann 1913).
- Map confidence
- high - MIMO-published GeoNames point for Amvam village.
- Source location
- MATG60.01.051; Tessmann 1913, pp. 287-288, fig. 86
- Spirit voice