IDNO

LS.120808.TC1

Description

On Catalogue Card: "Solomon Is. OC.III.C.65.
Sacred Image, Rubiana Lagoon.
Curved post - with human head - on heap of stone.
Man with sunshade sitting on latter." [manuscript in ink]

On Catalogue Card for duplicate print P.3115.ACH1: Sacred image, Rubiana.

Portrait of a man in a sun-shade (toropai) standing next to a carving (beku) at a shrine (hope) in Oneavesi on Roviana Lagoon by Charles M Woodford (first Resident Commissioner of Protectorate 1896-1915), circa 1886-1888 (see Charles M Woodford, "A Naturalist Among the Headhunters", pub. E.A.Petherick & Co., Sydney 1890). [Chris Wright, 2/7/2003, description from record P.3115.ACH1, JD 23/01/2018]

Place

Oceania Melanesia; Solomon Islands; New Georgia Island; Roviana; Roviana Lagoon; Oneavesi [Rubiana]

Cultural Affliation

Named Person

Photographer

Woodford, Charles Morris

Collector / Expedition

Date

circa 1885

Collection Name

Teaching Slide Collection

Source

Royal Geographic Society

Format

Lantern Slide Black & White

Primary Documentation

Other Information

Publication: A drawing based on this photograph was published in ‘Life in the Solomon Islands’, by C.M. Woodford. In Popular Science Monthly Volume 35, May - October, 1889, with the caption:
"Sacred image at Rubiana". [Source: http://archive.org, JD 7/6/2012]

Related Image: The same image is held at the British Museum and attributed to Charles Woodford. [Information by Ben Burt, British Museum, JD, 10/7/2013]

Publication: Image published in Woodford, C M. 'A Naturalist Among the Head-Hunters' 1890, plate 14, with the caption "Sacred Image at the village of Oneavesi, Rubiana Lagoon."
In the book Woodford notes that shrines such as those in this image have a small roof built over them and some sacred emblems are placed round or on it. [JD 15/01/2025]