The Bullroarer Atlas

NAAIN-015 - museum specimen

Yup'ik Norton Sound / Saint Michael

United States - Alaska - Norton Sound - North America - Arctic

Play / practical

A Yup'ik bullroarer kit from Norton Sound: a saw-toothed ivory blade incised with a barbed arrow, paired with a separate ivory swinging handle,...
A Yup'ik bullroarer kit from Norton Sound: a saw-toothed ivory blade incised with a barbed arrow, paired with a separate ivory swinging handle, both once joined by the same hide thong. National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution (2/9442) Image source

Source term: Bullroarer

A bullroarer of ivory and hide, collected on Saint Michael Island in Norton Sound and dated between 1850 and 1920, held at the National Museum of the American Indian, which files it under Yup'ik music and sound. Its path runs through Alaska: possibly gathered by the prospector-collector Ella Ongman, who worked in the territory between 1901 and 1908, then passed to Dr. Clemens F. Fulda, from whom George Heye bought it in 1912. The only use recorded for this people and place is secular. Edward William Nelson, who collected for the Smithsonian out of Saint Michael, set the local spinning device among the children's games and toys: a "buzz" of wood, ivory, or bone, a doubly perforated flattened disk strung on a cord whose ends are tied into a loop and held in both hands, twirled by tightening and slackening the grip. One he obtained at the post was cut from the adjoining finger bones of an animal, probably a seal, still joined at the cartilage; on that piece the string was a single cord of sinew made fast between the two middle bones, with a short cross-stick at each end for grasping. Whether the cataloged object is a true bullroarer or a buzz of that toy kind, the record carries no rite, no spirit's voice, and no restriction on who could see it.

I obtained one at St Michael made from the adjoining phalangeal bones of some animal, probably a seal, still united by their cartilage. The string is a single cord of sinew, which is made fast between the two middle bones

Nelson 1899, The Eskimo about Bering Strait (18th Ann. Rep. Bureau of American Ethnology):341
Object
Ivory and hide bullroarer dated 1850-1920
Function
Saint Michael spinning device recorded by Nelson as a children's buzz/toy, not a ritual instrument
Map confidence
high - representative on-land anchor at Yup'ik Norton Sound / Saint Michael (regional coordinate fell just offshore of the rendered coastline); not an exact findspot
Source location
NMAI object record NMAI_31501 / catalog 2/9442 / barcode 029442

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