Bullroarer
ritual musical instrument used for communicating over great distances
The bullroarer, rhombus, or turndun is an ancient ritual musical instrument and a device historically used for communicating over great distances. It consists of a piece of wood attached to a string, which when swung in a large circle produces a roaring vibration sound.
It dates to the Paleolithic period, examples dating from 18,000 BC having been found in Ukraine. Anthropologist Michael Boyd, a bullroarer expert, documents a number found in Europe, Asia, Africa, the Americas, and Australia. In Ancient Greece, it was a sacred instrument used in the Dionysian Mysteries and is still used in rituals worldwide. It was a prominent musical technology among the Australian Aboriginal people, used in ceremonies and to communicate with different people groups across the continent.
Many different cultures believe that the sounds they make have the power to ward off evil influences.
Design and operation
A bullroarer consists of a weighted airfoil (a rectangular thin slat of wood about 15 to 60 centimetres (6 to 20 in) long and about 1.2 to 5 centimetres (0.5 to 2 in) wide) attached to a long cord. Typically, the wood slat is trimmed down to a sharp edge and serrations along the length of the wooden slat may or may not be used, depending on the cultural traditions of the region in question.
The cord is given a slight initial twist, and the roarer is then swung in a large circle in a horizontal plane, or in a smaller circle in a vertical plane.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 14, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q666971. The Library of Congress control number is sh97006054. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank.
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This entry incorporates text from “Bullroarer” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.