flute, ikpali, ɔkpancile, ɔkpancina, émlà, émlàadà, ɔgba

Flute system employed by the Idoma people of Nigeria, described by Armstrong (1953) and Blench (1987). Armstrong describes Idoma flutes generally, saying they “usually have five or six notes” (874). Blench mentions several types of flutes used for surrogate speech: ikpali, a hollow palm-nut flute used by children “to communicate with one other”; ɔkpancile/ɔkpancina, a cane notch-flute with three or four fingerholes, used in royal contexts for ‘speaking’ the praise-names of the ruler”; and émlà/émlàadà/ɔgba, a wooden whistle with three notes “used for hunting, to encourage people at collective work-parties, for sending messages over a distance, for dance societies and for the royal music” (41). Armstrong analyzes the language to have three tonal registers, L M and H, and the system (as with other Idoma surrogate instruments) likely uses contrastive pitch to encode linguistic tones.Armstrong also reports that some flutes are used in secret society ceremonies.

Blench, R. (1987). Idoma musical instruments. African Music: Journal of the International Library of African Music, 6(4), 42–52. https://doi.org/10.21504/amj.v6i4.1260,Armstrong, R. G. (1953). 46. TALKING INSTRUMENTS IN WEST AFRICA. In T. A. Sebeok & J. Umiker-Sebeok (Eds.), Speech Surrogates: Drum and Whistle Systems. 1976. (pp. 865–878). De Gruyter Mouton. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110804423-017