The Bullroarer Atlas

TUCCI1969-008 - ethnographic attestation

Marzi whip-handled bullroarer

Calabria - Cosenza - Europe - Northeast Italy

Play / practical

Tucci's drawing of the Marzi rig — the bored blade on its cord, tied to the long whip-handle.
Tucci's drawing of the Marzi rig — the bored blade on its cord, tied to the long whip-handle. Image source

At Marzi in the Cosenza mountains boys kept two elaborate rombi side by side, each under its own name, and the finer of them put the whirling blade on the end of a whip: a flat slat, bored and corded, tied to a long handle, so the player swung it in circles like a lash.

Le due forme riscontrate contemporaneamente a Marzi (Cosenza), e per ciascuna i ragazzi usano una denominazione diversa.

The two forms were found together at Marzi (Cosenza), and for each the boys use a different name.

Giovanni Tucci, 'Studi e ricerche sul rombo in Italia', Rivista di Etnografia XXIII (1969), pp. 372-373
Object
Flat rectangular blade, terminal cord-hole, the single cord tied to a long handle-stick so the blade is swung in circles like a lash; a cane-cylinder variant existed beside it.
Function
Boys' toy in a complex whip-handled form; two elaborate rombi coexisted at Marzi, each under its own name.
Map confidence
medium - Marzi town, Cosenza province.
Source location
Tucci 1969, p. 373 with figure

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