NA-S1952-007 - ethnographic attestation
Diegueno assembly and curing bullroarer
United States - California - Baja borderlands - North America
Restricted
Source term: bullroarer
Among the Diegueño (Kumeyaay) of the San Diego backcountry the bull-roarer was, in T. T. Waterman's words, "a smooth, narrow piece of greasewood about three feet long, fastened end on to a short twisted rope of milkweed fibre"; swung rapidly around the head it gave out a deep booming or roaring sound. Its work was to gather people: down to recent years before Waterman wrote in 1910, it was sounded three times as the signal for an assembly for ceremonial purposes. The instrument also appears in the wider survey record of Southern California as a curing implement, listed as having curative properties among the shamans of the Diegueño alongside the Mono, Yokuts, Pomo, and others, though Waterman himself records only the summoning function.
The rhombus or bull-roarer was used by the Diegueno until recent years. It consists of a smooth, narrow piece of greasewood about three feet long, fastened end on to a short twisted rope of milkweed fibre. When swung rapidly around the head of the performer it gives out a deep booming or roaring sound. This instrument was formerly sounded three times as the signal for an assembly for ceremonial purposes.
Waterman 1910, The Religious Practices of the Diegueño Indians, p. 282
- Function
- Instrument used as assembly signal; also listed with shamanic curative properties
- Map confidence
- medium - regional_anchor: Representative Kumeyaay/Southern California anchor; exact subgroup/source remains broad in Seder
- Source location
- 51-54
- Forbidden to women