NA-S1952-008 - ethnographic attestation
Luiseno assembly-signal bullroarer
United States - California - North America
Restricted
momlahpish English
Source term: bullroarer
When the Luiseño of southern California carried the images of their dead around the sacred enclosure, the chief did not call out for the singers to stop: he took up the mumlapish, a flat whirling-board on a string, and swung it three times. Every Luiseño ritual descends from a death — "it was after Ouiot died that they made all the rituals." Ouiot, the great captain of the first people, was bewitched by Wahawut the frog-woman and became the first being to die, promising that in three days he would rise in the east; since his death the spirits of the dead are sent to Piwish Ahuta, the Milky Way. The image ceremony the roarer conducts is, the neighboring Diegueño held, the first ceremony in the world — older, Kroeber judged, than the toloache religion of Chungichnish that later swept the region with its avenging rattlesnake, bear, and stinging weeds. The whirling-board itself was public apparatus: Philip Sparkman recorded the momlaxpish simply calling the people together to feasts.
Instead of telling them to stop singing, he whirls the board three times.
DuBois, The Religion of the Luiseño Indians (1908), p. 101
- Object
- 'A crude board,' 1 foot to nearly 2 feet long — Kroeber reads the size itself as diagnostic: 'Its size — from 1 foot to nearly 2 — stamps it as an implement for outdoor use.' Figured as Plate 44 item e, a long narrow blade with the cord through a hole at one end.
- Function
- Signal in the Luiseno Image mourning ceremony for the dead.
- Map confidence
- medium - regional_anchor: Representative Luiseno/Southern California anchor; no exact site in Seder summary
- Source location
- 51-54
- Death and rebirth