Rattle Drum History

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Rattle drum are shaken membranophones, and, as their name indicates, they combine elements of both the rattle and the drum, and percussion is either by impact of the knotted ends of attached cords or leather thongs, or by partly filling the drum with pebbles.
The former rattle drum type is referred to as a drum with external percussion and the latter one is known as internal percussion.
Today these drums are found in Asia from India to Japan and in Syria and Lebanon as well as Egypt and also among Amerinds of the Americas.
As studies have shown: “The ancient practice of placing or suspending votive objects in the interior of drums has been suggested as a possible origin for these curious instruments, whose history can be traced to the Shang …show more content…

In ancient times, however, it consisted of two or more drums impaled on a handle; two wax balls are suspended from the drum by cords so they will strike against the heads when the drum is twirled; its principal use is by itinerant vendors or as a child's toy.”
In the older form the drums were superposed.

In India and Tibet hourglass drums are transformed to rattle drums.
Among the Yemeni rattle drums were still known in the eighteenth century but are now extinct. A third form is in use in the Eastern churches of modern Egypt as well as by Syrian Christians and Lebanese Maronites. The internal percussion rattle drum is known from South America via Central America, where the Puralla of Guatemala makes it, to North America. The Chippewa and the Cree have a unique two-headed frame drum filled with pebbles; when making the drum, instead of cutting off the excess board after the frame is completed, and extra length is left to form a

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