NAGA-009 - museum specimen
Konyak Naga rain-making bullroarer, Wakching
Nagaland - Mon District - Wakching - South Asia - Northeast India
Weather / fertility magic
Source term: Bullroarer
Among the Konyak Naga of Wakching, in the Mon District hills of Nagaland, a flat piece of wood that widens toward one end and trails a fibrous cord was whirled to make rain. Spun on its cord it gives off a humming sound, and the Cambridge catalog records its purpose plainly: rain-making. Christoph von Fürer-Haimendorf collected it during his 1936-1937 fieldwork among the Konyak — and carried off a second Wakching rain-caller besides, a bamboo bullroarer now in Vienna, recorded there too as an instrument for the ritual summoning of rain. The Konyak name for the instrument was not written down.
When twirled around on its cord it produces a humming sound. Used for Rain-making.
Cambridge Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, object 1937.1086
- Object
- Flat wooden bullroarer widening toward the end with attached fibrous cord; twirled on its cord to produce a humming sound.
- Function
- Used for rain-making; a second Wakching bullroarer in Vienna carries the same rain-calling record.
- Map confidence
- medium_high - Wakching village/area representative anchor in Mon District; not an exact findspot.
- Source location
- MAA 1937.1086
- Weather magic