PNG80 - ethnographic attestation
Taupota
Papua New Guinea - Milne Bay - Oceania - Sahul
Sacred / spirit
Source term: bullroarer / sacred flute / slit-gong flags
At Awaiama and Taupota, east of Bartle Bay, the bull-roarer belonged to the walaga, the largest feast of the district, built around a great dancing platform raised on piles. As the fasting men stepped the supporting posts into their dug holes, they swung bull-roarers the whole time, while medicine men rubbed the posts and sucked loudly through their cupped hands to draw out the arua, the shade of any dead man that might be lodged in the timber, so the soul should not be injured when the post was erected. The roarers were used at no other moment, though Seligman's party could elicit no reason for their use.
At Awaiama and Taupota, to the east of Bartle Bay, bull-roarers are said to be swung by the fasting men all the time that the posts are being stepped; they were said to be used at no other time and no reason for their use could be elicited on this particular occasion.
Seligman 1910, The Melanesians of British New Guinea, p. 592
- Object
- bullroarer occurrence
- Function
- Bull-roarers swung throughout the walaga feast as the dancing-platform posts are raised, while medicine men draw the arua (shade of a dead man) out of the timber so the soul is not injured.
- Map confidence
- high - geocoded
- Source location
- Table 1, row 80