The Bullroarer Atlas

No. SEA-013

Thai-Lue children's pipe-bundle bullroarer, Phaed

Phaed Village, Chiengkham District (then Chiengrai Province), North Thailand · Southeast Asia · Mainland

Play / practical

The Phaed whirler: bamboo pipes round a hollow stem, capped with a chocolate-bar wrapper, on its long twirling cord.
Plate I. The Phaed whirler: bamboo pipes round a hollow stem, capped with a chocolate-bar wrapper, on its long twirling cord. CC0 · Image source
A cluster of pale bamboo pipes of staggered lengths, attached to a long fibre cord with red tassels; the open pipe mouths face the viewer.
Plate II. The mouths of the pipes, set round the hollow stem in black pitch. CC0 · Image source

In Phaed village in northern Thailand, Thai-Lue children spun a bullroarer built as a bundle: seven short bamboo pipes set in pitch around a hollow stem, so the whole cluster sounds at once on its long twirling cord. Its maker finished it with what was at hand, pressing the red-and-gold wrapper of a chocolate bar over the top for decoration and tying a tail of red cloth to the cord's end. A children's toy.

Particulars

Object
Seven short bamboo pipes fixed with pitch around a hollow bamboo stem, decorated with a chocolate-bar wrapper, with a separate long twirling cord ending in a red cloth tail (Yale Peabody Museum YPM ANT 207238).
Function
Children's toy.

Source

Yale Peabody Museum YPM ANT 207238, 'Bull-roarer of seven short bamboo pipes... Children's toy', Thai-Lue Tribe, Phaed Village, Chiengkham District, Chiengrai Province

View the source · archived

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