The Bullroarer Atlas

SASIA-001 - ethnographic attestation

Khasi Hills bamboo bullroarer

Khasi Hills - South Asia - Northeast India

Sacred / spirit

Bamboo bullroarer from the Jainta and Khasi Hills, Pitt Rivers Museum 1923.85.447.
Bamboo bullroarer from the Jainta and Khasi Hills, Pitt Rivers Museum 1923.85.447. Image source
Roy’s 1928 plate of a Khasi and Jaintia Hills bullroarer, no. 4.
Roy’s 1928 plate of a Khasi and Jaintia Hills bullroarer, no. 4. · Public domain Image source

Source term: bamboo bull-roarer

A fifteen-inch 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 by Loan (J.P. Mills collection)
Object
Bamboo bullroarer from the Khasia and Jaintia Hills; Roy's 1928 Hutton plate is supported by PRM 1923.85.447, a separate 310 mm bamboo terminal-cord slat from the Jainta and Khasi Hills.
Function
Believed to cause pestilence (Roy 1928 plate caption for the Khasia-Jaintia Hills specimen, from J.H. Hutton)
Map confidence
medium - Shillong/Khasi Hills public regional anchor not museum
Source location
Page references

1927 Annual Report, Accessions presented by J.H. Hutton | Roy 1928, plate (Hutton specimens), item 4; PRM 1923.85.447

View source Open this point on the interactive map