IDNO

P.99997.VH

Description

Pair of F.H. Dufty studio portraits of Ratu Isikeli Tabakaucoro, Roko Tui Viwa, who was based at this time at Nabukadra, Nakorotubu, on the east coast of Vitilevu about 10 miles north of Mt Tova. [He was not Rokotui Bau or the non-existent Ratu Tui Mba as the pencil captions claim.] The deliberate profile and half frontal views, suggest that Dufty was being influenced by clients with physical anthropology leanings - with Baron von Hugel, Theodor Kleinschmidt (collector for the Godeffroy Museum) and Rev. Lorimer Fison the most likely contenders. For Ratu Isikeli, see also P.87212. and P.87348.VH, etc. [Fergus Clunie, 14/7/2003]

A profile and oblique profile Dufty studio portraits of “Ratu Isikeli, Roko Tui Viwa, Son of Namosimalua.”
Ratu Isikeli Tabakaucoro, the Rokotui Viwa, was indeed a son of Namosimalua or Naqarase, the notorious high chief of Viwa, a small but influential island that lies near Bau, and which like it lies just off the east coast of Vitilevu.
He is dressed in an isuluvakatoga of brown patterned gatu barkcloth, worn in the Tongan style favoured by the high chiefs when not actively engaged, doubled and wrapped high up under his ribs, and secured by a white barkcloth ioro waistband. Leaning against his chair is an iirimasei fan, borne by chiefs and priests as a symbol of rank and as a sunshade, and made from a single leaf of the niumasei or fan-palm, Pritchardia pacifica. See P.87348.VH for a more frontal view of Ratu Isikeli.
1870s. [Fergus Clunie, 26/7/2003, from record P.87212., updated JD 28/11/2011]

Physical Condition: Print mounted onto card.

Place

Oceania Polynesia; Fiji; Ovalau Island; Levuka; Viwa; Vitilevu; Mt Tova; Nakorotubu; Nabukadra

Cultural Affliation

Named Person

Ratu Isikeli Tabakaucoro

Photographer

Dufty, Francis Herbert (Dufty Brothers, Levuka)

Collector / Expedition

von Hügel, Anatole (Baron)

Date

circa 1875 - 1876

Collection Name

von Hügel Collection

Source

von Hügel, Anatole (Baron)

Format

Print Black & White Mounted

Primary Documentation

Other Information

P.99726.VH to P.100050.VH were in the belted folder now numbered C539/3/. This was formerly kept in paper archive Large Box G; VH1/4/5. It has now been transferred to the photo archive. The lists describing the contents of this box have been returned to the Paper Archive.

Named Person: The man is named as Ratu Isikeli Tabakaucoro on the reverse of P.87212.VH. [Alex Nadin, 30/9/2003]

Publication: A similar print of this man is published in ‘The Fiji Journals of Baron Anatole Von Hugel 1875 - 1877’, edited by Jane Roth and Steven Hooper (1990), plate 43d, p.331, and captioned “Ratu Isikeli Tabakaucoro, of Nabukadra, (Nakorotubu), c. 1875-80”. [Alex Nadin, 30/9/2003]

Photographer: The use of this specific iirimasei fan, with an edging of a double roll and triangular cut? leaves, as a studio prop (see P.87396.VH for full detail of three of the iirimasei used), along with the wooden chair, are recognisable as used by Duftys’ Studio, Levuka, circa 1875 - 1876. The Photographer, Date, and Place fields have been amended accordingly. [JD 26/3/2012]

This print has been catalogued with the support of the Getty Grant Fund. [A. Nadin, 13/10/2003]