SUBSAH-007 - museum specimen

Basa / Basaa

Southern Cameroon - Basaa Centre-Littoral region - Central Africa

Sacred / spirit

Two Basa bullroarers called mbam um reached Harvard from George Schwab's Cameroon field collection, but their cards gave no ceremony. Basel preserves the missing context in separate Bassa records: one bullroarer was used by medicine men at mask dances before war, its sight meant to disorient opponents; another was recorded as belonging to the women's Isango Ko association. Those cards sharpen the cultural setting without pretending they are the same objects as Schwab's mbam um, or that an association name proves a women's taboo.

Bull roarer of wood with fibre thongs (mbam um)

Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, object 35-31-50/1176 (eMuseum record 121960)

Object

Peabody 121960/121961 are exact Basa mbam um objects; Sarasin's 1915 Mawn inventory from Sakbayeme independently lists a small corded bullroarer.

Function

The Peabody mbam um objects record no use. MKB III 4340 says a Bassa bullroarer was used by medicine men at mask dances before war to confuse opponents; MKB III 26084 is labelled as belonging to the women's Isango Ko association.

Map confidence

low_medium - Broad Basa/Basaa southern Cameroon anchor near Edea/Sanaga-Maritime from the public Basaa geography trail and Nominatim/OSM city coordinate; Peabody gives southern Cameroon, not a village or collection locality.

Source location

Peabody objects/details/121960, object number 35-31-50/1176; sibling objects/details/121961, object number 35-31-50/1177; accession 35-31 = George W. Schwab Cameroon collection, 1934-1935.; Sarasin 1915, pp. 250-251 (source p. 251)

• Female-origin myth

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