- Collection type
- Object
- Description
- Rare wooden carving with a head at each end, one inlaid with haliotis shell eyes [ZM 11/03/2015]
- Long description
- Carving, which is apparently rare and whose use is unclear. A head is carved at each end, the larger one of the two is usually described as female in the relevant literature. The shaft connecting the two heads has a rectangular recess that is pierced with two rectangular holes. In some of the literature objects like this are described as latrine bars but the evidence for this is lacking and it is also thought these could be from a canoe or house architecture (see comments from Hooper (2006) in the research notes) [ZM 11/03/2015]
- Geographical reference
- Cultural groups
- Māori
- Date / Period
- Date made: Before 1907
- Date collected
- Before 1907
- Acquisition information
- Purchased: 1907
- Materials and processes
- Material Wood Plant, Material Haliotis Shell, Process Carved, Process Inlaid, Process Repaired (local)
- Dimensions
- Width: max 70 mm, Length: max 304 mm, Depth: max 95 mm
- Object numbers
- Accession number: 1907.69.1
- Research and responses
The collections of the British Museum include an object very similar to this (museum number BM: 7361), which is reproduced in colour as figure 59 on page 125 of Steven Hooper, 2006, Pacific Encounters, London: British Museum Press. The accompanying caption on the same page states: 'Carving. New Zealand/ Aotearoa. Late eighteenth century. Wood, haliotis shell. L. 25.3 cm. London, BM: 7361. Acquired 1871 from the London dealer William Wareham. The original function of this rare type of object remains unclear. Often stated in the literature as being the ends of latrine bars, firm evidence is lacking and they could be from canoe or house architecture. A rectangular recess on both sides of the shaft is pierced with two rectangular holes. The main figure with a large head is female; her feet reach forward to grip the sides of the mouth. The smaller head at the opposite end belongs to a sinuous body carved along the shaft. There are Cook voyage examples in Cambridge (Tanner 1999: 23) and Gottingen (Hauser-Schaublin and Kruger 1998: 107, 302).' [ZM 11/03/2015]
In 1978, David Simmons recorded the holdings of Māori material in a number of museums in Europe and North America including, in May 1978, the Pitt Rivers Museum. (For copies of his notes and related correspondence, see RDF: Researchers: Simmons.) In 1996, Simmons put together the ‘draft catalogues’ he had prepared, depositing copies in, at least, the National Library of New Zealand / Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa and the British Museum. The ‘draft catalogue’ of the Māori material in the PRM, which includes photocopies of some of the relevant catalogue index cards and annotations supplied by PRM assistant curator Lynne Williamson in 1982, was included in ‘Draft Catalogues of Maori Material in English Museums II. Prepared by David Simmons from records made in 1978… Compiled in Auckland in 1996’. It is now widely accepted that Simmons’s assertions about the provenance and history of individual Māori objects are not to be trusted without further evidence and/or documentation. Nevertheless, as the entries in this document have been referred in the literature, in July 2016 I obtained from the British Museum scans of the pages devoted to the PRM’s collections (numbered by hand as pages 43 to 62), printing out a copy for the RDF. For the entry for this object, see page 62 (page 18 of Simmons's original list). [JC 29 7 2016]
Search terms: Figure, Carving, Dwelling, Navigation, Canoe Part, House-ornament