The Bullroarer Atlas

No. SASIA-001

Khasi Hills bamboo bullroarer

Khasi Hills · South Asia · Northeast India

Sacred / spirit

Bamboo bullroarer from the Jaintia and Khasi Hills.
Plate I. Bamboo bullroarer from the Jaintia and Khasi Hills. Image source
Roy’s 1928 plate of six bullroarers from the Assam hills, suspended by cords from rods; no. 4 is the slim plain blade from the Khasi and Jaintia Hills.
Plate II. Roy’s 1928 plate of bull-roarers from the Assam hills; no. 4 is from the Khasi and Jaintia Hills. Public domain · Image source

Source term: bamboo bull-roarer

A bamboo blade from the Khasi and Jaintia Hills was believed, when swung on its cord, to carry pestilence into the hills — a bullroarer remembered not as play but as a bringer of sickness.

bamboo bull-roarer, Khasia Hills

Pitt Rivers Museum, Annual Report 1927, accessions presented by J. H. Hutton

Particulars

Object
A bamboo bullroarer 310 mm long, with its string attached, from the Khasi and Jaintia Hills; Roy's 1928 plate shows a second, 15-inch roarer from the same hills.
Function
Believed to cause pestilence.

Sources

  1. Pitt Rivers Museum, Annual Report 1927, accessions presented by J. H. Hutton View · archived
  2. S. C. Roy, Oraon Religion and Customs (Ranchi, 1928), plate 'Bull-roarers in use among the Nagas of Assam', item 4 View
  3. Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford, 1923.85.447 View · archived
  4. William Shaw, Notes on the Thadou Kukis, ed. J. H. Hutton (1929), p. 156 View

Part of The Bullroarer Atlas, companion to The Eve Theory of Consciousness.