- Collection type
- Object
- Description
- Spear of hard wood shaft, with light wood foreshaft and bone barb and point. [MJD 18/10/2013]
- Long description
- Spear of hard wood shaft, with light wood foreshaft and bone barb and point. The end of the spear has a cavity for spear thrower. [MJD 18/10/2013]
- Geographical reference
- Cape York Peninsula Queensland
- Person
- Maker Unknown Maker
- Field collector E. Higgins
- PRM source Augustus Henry Lane Fox Pitt Rivers founding collection
- Date / Period
- Date made: Possibly before 1874
- Date collected
- ?By 1874
- Acquisition information
- Donated: 1884
- Materials and processes
- Material Wood Plant, Material Stingray Spine Fish, Material Resin Plant, Material Animal Sinew, Process Carved, Process Bound, Process Twisted, Material Kangaroo Bone Animal
- Dimensions
- Length: max 2735 mm, Width: max 24 mm, Depth: max 20 mm
- Object numbers
- Accession number: 1884.19.10 PR Cat other PR nos: 596
- Research and responses
It is a long odds possibility that E. Higgins could be Edmund Thomas Higgins [ca 1816 - 1891 surgeon who in 1867 took over business of Samuel Stevens a natural history dealer]. He is mentioned in an article about Robert Bruce Napoleon Walker [see ‘Robert Bruce Napoleon Walker, FRGS, FAS, FGS CMZS (1832 - 1901) West African trader, explorer, and collector of zoological specimens’ Nora McMillan, Dept of Zoology, NMGS Merseyside Liverpool Museum, Archives of Natural History 1996 23 (1) 125-141] [AP 01/09/2004]
This object was studied by Harry Allen, University of Auckland, on 21 October 2013. He noted that the bone was liable to be kangaroo. Possibly a tibia that has been carved down. [MJD 21/10/2013]
During a research visit in April 2025, Dany Williams from the Queensland Museum shared that the point of this spear might be a stingray barb rather than kangaroo bone. Closer examination is required in order to determine the correct material.
1884.19.10
Spear of hard wood shaft, with light wood foreshaft and bone barb and point. [MJD 18/10/2013]
1884.19.10
Digital asset copyright: Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford
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