The Bullroarer Atlas

SUBSAH-011 - related instrument

Gabon

Gabon - Central Africa

Function not recorded

The Gabonese bromhout itself: a long, dark, weathered wooden blade with a raised relief rib running down its face.
The Gabonese bromhout itself: a long, dark, weathered wooden blade with a raised relief rib running down its face. Musical Instruments Museum, Brussels (RMAH), inv. 1976.038-06 — via MIMO CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 Image source

Source term: Bromhout

The Musical Instruments Museum in Brussels holds a wooden blade just over half a metre long — 52 centimetres by 8.4, and 2.6 thick — catalogued as a bullroarer from Gabon and dated only "before 1976." Nothing else is recorded: no people, no locality, no name for the rite or the spirit it was meant to summon. The museum lists it under the Dutch word "bromhout" — "buzz-wood," the ordinary Dutch term for a bullroarer — not under any name from Gabon. The country of origin is the only provenance the record carries.

Blaasinstrumenten / Bromhout / Bromhout ... Afrika > Midden-Afrika > Gabon ... voor 1976

Wind instruments / Buzz-wood / Buzz-wood ... Africa > Central Africa > Gabon ... before 1976

Muziekinstrumentenmuseum (Brussels), inv. 1976.038-06, MIMO record OAI_RMAH_95219_NL
Object
Bullroarer classified object before 1976
Function
Object evidence without group or locality
Map confidence
low - Gabon country anchor from MIMO/RMAH country-level object metadata; no original community, collector locality, or use context is stated.
Source location
MIMO OAI_RMAH_95219_NL / inventory 1976.038-06, public record checked 2026-06-01.

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