The Bullroarer Atlas

PNG78 - ethnographic attestation

Topura

Papua New Guinea - Milne Bay - Oceania - Sahul

Sacred / spirit

A reddish-brown blade, plain only toward its pointed tip, the lower two-thirds carved with white-infilled star-and-diamond panels, a cord scrap...
Representative image. A reddish-brown blade, plain only toward its pointed tip, the lower two-thirds carved with white-infilled star-and-diamond panels, a cord scrap looped through the drilled, fan-notched butt; shown for the general New Guinea type, not the Topura object or culture documented here. Science Museum Group (acc. A242490) Image source

Source term: bullroarer / sacred flute / slit-gong flags

Here the bullroarer spoke for one act only. As the fasting men of the Taupota coast, east of Bartle Bay near the island's far southeastern tip, planted the tall posts of the walaga — the grandest feast of the district, drawing in even hostile villages — they swung the roarers without pause, while medicine men crouched at every post-hole and sucked the shade of the dead out of the timber, so no lingering ghost would be crushed as the pile went down. Then the roarers stopped. They were used at no other time, Seligman was told, and no reason for them could be given.

Object
bullroarer occurrence; bullroarer use
Function
Gourlay source-catalog row with bullroarer use in PNG/Melanesia.
Map confidence
high - geocoded
Source location
Table 1, row 78

View source Open this point on the interactive map

  • TaupotaPapua New Guinea - Milne Bay - Sacred / spirit
  • AwalamaPapua New Guinea - Milne Bay - Function not recorded
  • UtuwalaPapua New Guinea - Milne Bay - Function not recorded
  • Astrolabe BayPapua New Guinea - Madang - Sacred / spirit
  • Bagabag IslandPapua New Guinea - Madang - Sacred / spirit
  • BaskenPapua New Guinea - Madang - Sacred / spirit