RAY1942-006 - ethnographic attestation
Lillooet bull-roarer
Canada - Fraser River at Lillooet, southern British Columbia - North America - Plateau
Play / practical
Source term: bull-roarer
The Lillooet bullroarer was wooden, of cedar, whirled from the bare hand, and a child's toy. No power over the weather is attested for it — though none was denied either, as it was among the Kalispel and Shuswap — and so the Lillooet stand with their downriver neighbours in the Plateau's toy province, where the instrument belonged to children and the sky was left alone.
- Object
- A wooden blade, of cedar, whirled on a cord held in the hand.
- Source
- Verner F. Ray, "Culture Element Distributions: XXII, Plateau," University of California Anthropological Records 8:2 (Berkeley, 1942), printed p. 184. The bullroarer block is elements 4094-4103 and Ray sub-divides the function, which is unusual: 4094 Bull-roarer; 4097 Deer rib; 4099 Child's toy; 4100 Influences the weather; 4101 "Calls" Chinook (warm) wind…
- Source location
- printed p. 184, elements 4094-4103
- Source confidence
- medium Lillooet on the Fraser, southern British Columbia. Territory anchor for the named people; not a use site.
- Toy / secular survival