horn, trumpet

Horn system used by the Lokele people of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, described in Carrington (1944). The instrument itself is an “ivory or other animal horn” with a lateral hole which when covered by the thumb produces a higher pitch contrasting with its lower open pitch (540). Evidently, “[e]xactly the same system of message transmission as that in use on the two-toned slit drum bouŋgu is used for transmitting information… on the two-toned horn” (540).

Carrington, J. F. (1976). The Drum Language of the Lokele Tribe. In T. A. Sebeok & J. Umiker-Sebeok, Speech Surrogates: Drum and Whistle Systems. 1976. (pp. 591–668). De Gruyter Mouton. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110804423-001