No. MUS2026-189
Johannesburg sandstorm bullroarer
South Africa · Johannesburg · Witwatersrand, Transvaal Colony · Southern Africa
Play / practical
Source term: bullroarer / 412.22 whirling aerophone
In Johannesburg around 1905, a boy carved a flat wooden blade nearly half a metre long, tied on a fibre cord, and set it roaring — and as he swung, a sandstorm rose, 'to the great joy of the maker.' Did he mean to call the wind, or did he simply glory in the coincidence? The anthropologist A. C. Haddon preserved the story along with the object, and the Horniman Museum bought both from him in 1912, the cord still knotted in place.
Particulars
- Object
- Flat wooden blade, 440 x 47 x 17 mm, tapering toward the proximal end where a 1.25 m vegetable-fibre cord is tied.
- Function
- A boy's own making, swung for the joy of it.
Source
Horniman Museum and Gardens, London, 12.161 (register note initialled A.C.H.)