Talking drum

“Talking drum” drum of a portion of W. Africa (the “bend”), used for transmitting messages. This is done, not by tapping out signals, but by sounding the actual words on 2 drums of different pitches; R. S. Rattray discovered that the high and low pitches of the drums used for this purpose corresponded to the high- and low-pitched vowels of local speech. This procedure is of course possible only when dealing with tonal languages. For details and sample messages see Source 162.