SHIMKIN1986-001 - ethnographic attestation
Eastern Shoshone bull-roarer swung to bring a thaw
United States - Wind River country, western Wyoming (Wind River Reservation) - North America - Great Basin
Weather / fertility magic
Source term: bull-roarer
Power among the Wind River Shoshone worked through objects that compelled rather than asked, and Demitri Shimkin lists them in a row: an eagle feather to chase away clouds, a bull-roarer to bring about a thaw, antelope-hoof rattles to charm the herds. The roarer's job here is winter. Everywhere south of it in the Great Basin the instrument is swung for wind or for rain, which is what a dry country wants; on the Wyoming side of the divide what wants breaking is the ice.
Magic is often mediated through a compelling instrument, an eagle feather to chase away clouds, a bull-roarer to bring about a thaw, antelope-hoof rattles to charm herds
Shimkin, "Eastern Shoshone," Handbook of North American Indians vol. 11 (1986), p. 326.
- Object
- Not described. Shimkin names the instrument in a list of compelling objects and gives no material, form or dimensions.
- Function
- Weather magic, and specifically winter weather: the bull-roarer is swung to bring about a thaw. Shimkin sets it among instruments that compel rather than petition - an eagle feather to drive off clouds, antelope-hoof rattles to charm the herds.
- Source
- Demitri B. Shimkin, "Eastern Shoshone," in Warren L. d'Azevedo (ed.), Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 11: Great Basin (Smithsonian Institution, 1986), p. 326
- Source location
- HNAI 11, p. 326
- Source confidence
- medium Wind River Reservation anchor near Fort Washakie, Fremont County, Wyoming.
- Weather magic