IDNO

P.85330.MUS

Description

Documentary photograph of two cylindical drums with hide skins held in place by plaited fibre lashings.

Possibly on left is 1888.53; Z 6034:
"Small cylindrical, covered with shark’s skin. Wood body hollowed out. Open work base to which sennit cords." [from MAA Object record 1888.53; Z 6034]

On the right is D 1914.26:
"Cylindrical drum with fish-skin tympanium and openwork base. Elaborate sennit lashings hold skin in place, running down to base. Drumhead tearing and brittle.
Additional description: Tall, narrow, cylindrical drum. The base is cut into six short legs, which stand on a circular pedestal of about 3 cm high. The sennit bindings are lashed around the base and plaited. Old label attached to drum. (J. Tanner, June 1998)." [from MAA Object record D 1914.26, JD 19/8/2010]

Place

Oceania Polynesia; Europe British Isles; French Polynesia; United Kingdom; Society Islands; Tahiti; England; Cambridgeshire; Cambridge [Society Islands]

Cultural Affliation

Named Person

Photographer

None

Collector / Expedition

?Jammrach, Charles; ?Jamrach; Cook Collection; Trinity College; Sandwich Collection [Object Collector and Donor]

Date

Collection Name

Museum Objects and Galleries

Source

Format

Print Black & White

Primary Documentation

Other Information

P.85326 to P.85347 were found inside envelope now numbered C414/17/ which came from the box formerly numbered 162, now re-numbered C414/.

Publication: See ‘Artificial Curiosities’ (1978), A. Kaeppler, p.140. Evidence: Sandwich collection. Given by Cook. First or second voyage. On the subject of Tahitian musical instruments Kaeppler states (p.138), ‘Musical instruments collected and depicted on Cook’s voyages were drums and nose flutes. Drums were of various sizes, the larger the size the deeper the tone’. (J.Tanner, May 1998). See ‘From Pacific Shores: Eighteenth-century Ethnographic Collections at Cambridge - The Voyages of Cook, Vancouver and the First Fleet’ (J. Tanner, 1999:19).

Cook Collection: Captain James Cook undertook three world voyages around the globe from 1768 - 1779. The stated purpose of the first voyage (1768-1771) on the HMS Endeavour was to send a Royal Society team to observe the transit of the planet Venus from the vantage point of newly discovered Tahiti. However, the primary governmental motivation behind the first expedition was to establish the existence of 'Terra Australis Incognita' or the 'Great Southern Continent', which was believed to exist in order to balance the great northern land mass. Cook set sail from Plymouth on Friday 26th August 1768 and headed to South America, round Cape Horn and westwards to carry out the experiment in Tahiti, and then went on to circumnavigate the globe in pursuit of the presumed continent. The purpose of the second voyage (1772-1775) on the HMS Resolution and the HMS Adventure was to extend the search for the 'southern continent'. They sailed from Plymouth on 27 June 1772 and headed directly south past Cape Town and then set out on an eastward course of circumnavigation, crossing the Antartic Circle several times en route in an effort to seek the imagined continent. The third voyage (1776-1780) on the HMS Resolution and the HMS Discovery, was concerned with the search for a Northwest Passage between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. They sailed from Plymouth on 13th July 1772, heading first for the Society Islands from whence they set course to search for the Northwest Passage. However, Cook was killed in Hawaii in 1779 and his command was taken up by Charles Clerke.
More than 2000 extant pieces can be traced from Cook's voyages (Kaeppler:1978), of which UCMAA has 215 identified objects. The majority of the material at UCMAA was collected from the Pacific, but also includes objects from the Pacific Northwest Coast of North America, the Northeast Coast of Asia and Tierra del Fuego in South America. Furthermore, all the three voyages are represented by objects in UCMAA's collection.
(J. Tanner, 1999). cf. Drum (smaller) in "James Cook: Gifts and Treasures from the South Seas" (1998), edited by Brigitta Hauser-Schäublin and Gundolf Krüger, p. 297, fig. 82. (J. Tanner;1999).