I take another example of modern survival in magic. Dr. Munro, perhaps,
would think wooden churinga, used for magical ends, "incongruous with the
earlier Scottish civilisation." But such objects have not proved to be
incongruous with the Scottish civilisation of the nineteenth century.
The term _churinga_, "sacred," is used by the Arunta to denote not only
the stone churinga nanja, a local peculiarity of the Arunta and Kaitish,
but also the decorated and widely diffused elongated wooden slats called
"Bull Roarers" by the English. These are swung at the end of a string,
and produce a whirring roar, supposed to be the voice of a supernormal
being, all over Australia and elsewhere.
I am speaking of _survivals_, and these wooden churinga, at least,
_survive_ in Scotland, and, in Aberdeenshire they are, or were lately
called "thunner spells" or "thunder bolts." "It was believed that the
use of this instrument during a thunderstorm saved one from being struck
by the thunner bolt." In North and South America the bull roarer, on the
other hand, is used, not to avert, but magically to produce thunder and
lightning. {91} Among the Kaitish thunder is caused by the churinga of
their "sky dweller," Atnatu.
Wherever the toy is used for a superstitious purpose, it is, so far,
_churinga_, and, so far, modern Aberdeenshire had the same _churinga
irula_ as the Arunta. The object was familiar to palaeolithic man.