IDNO

P.87280.VH

Description

On Catalogue Card for duplicate image LS.120979.TC1: “Fiji.
Interior of District Chief (Ratu Pope’s) house on Mbau Is.
Cross-beams, wrapped in sinnet; reeds bound in sinnet form the walls. Screen at back decorated in painted bark-cloth. Mats made from a kind of pandanus.”

Raphael Tuck & Sons postcard [1924] featuring the inside of the house of Ratu Pope and Yadi Torika at Bau, with its blend of Fijian and European furnishings. The beams are wrapped in multicoloured magimagi coconut fibre cordage in accordance with ancient tradition concerning spirithouses and high chief’s houses, whilst the walls are lined with decorative reed panels. A European innovation is the partition screen, covered with patterned barkcloth.
Fiji government public relations photograph. [Fergus Clunie, 26/7/2003]

Place

Oceania Polynesia; Fiji; Bau

Cultural Affliation

Named Person

Ratu Pope; Yadi Torika

Photographer

Raphael Tuck & Sons Ltd [Publishers]

Collector / Expedition

von Hügel, Anatole (Baron)

Date

circa 1920 - 1924

Collection Name

Von Hugel Collection

Source

Format

Postcard Black & White

Primary Documentation

Other Information

P.87278.VH to P.87283.VH were in the print envelope now numbered C512/1/. This envelope came from the Museum’s paper archive envelope VH1/4/7, which has now been re-numbered C512/.

Publication: On Rod Ewins’ internet site ‘www.justpacific.com’:
““Interior of Chief’s Home, Fiji”.
Tuck’s Post Card. Publisher Raphael Tuck & Sons Ltd., Art Publishers to Their Majesties the King and Queen”. On the reverse has the caption: “One of the highest Chiefs in Fiji in his home constructed without the use of a nail. Wall covered with native cloth, floor with native mats.”
The bark-cloth on the wall and cross-members is from Cakaudrove Province, NE Fiji. This may suggest that the chief concerned is from there, and if he was one of the highest in the land this would suggest he was the Tuicakau. However it is also possible that he was the Vuni-ivalu of Bau, since Bau made/makes no barkcloth of its own and has strong affinal connections with Cakaudrove. The floormat is of the “biskete” design, woven throughout the Group (See Rod Ewins 1982 “Matweaving in Gau, Fiji” Suva, Fiji Museum p.19).” [Alex Nadin, 30/9/2003]

Publication: Duplicates of this postcard are on the websites ‘www.janeresture.com/fijihome/postcards.htm’ and
‘www.justpacific.com’ in the section concerning the photographs used on Fijian postcards. [Alex Nadin, 30/9/2003]

Publication: A copy of this postcard is published in Fiji’s Past on Picture Postcards, Elsie Stephenson (1997), fig.219, p.234. [Alex Nadin, 30/9/2003]

Related Image: This print or negative appears to be the original image within the MAA Photograph Collections. [JD 26/12/2011]

This print has been catalogued with the support of the Getty Grant Program One. [Alex Nadin, 30/9/2003]