model building/structure
- Museum number
- Oc1904,1206.1
- Description
-
Model meeting house made of wood. The roof is made from strips of bark.
- Dimensions
-
Height: 41 centimetres
-
Width: 54 centimetres
-
Depth: 50 centimetres
- Curator's comments
- Starzecka, Neich and Pendergrast 2010
105 Colour plate 4
Model house, whare whakairo
1904.12-6.1. Length 52 cm.
Wooden house: sides, back and roof of vertical strips of bark held in place by horizontal twigs. Front and porch carved and stained red. Koruru with teeth painted white and painted black-and-white eyes; maihi with plain wheku figure near koruru, taratara-a-kai spirals and manaia at ends. Each amo with standing figure:face similar to koruru, rauponga on bodies, threefingered hands on chest, one figure holding black mere; another face, below, similar to koruru. Paepae with alternating plain takarangi spirals and plain manaia. Inside porch carved poupou, epa, pare, pane and whakawae, window frame plain; rafters with white-on-red kowhaiwhai.
Provenance: Purchased from Elder & Co.
Register: ‘Made to scale by a native named Piwiki’ (i.e. Piwiki Horohau of Ngati Raukawa; Neich 1991: 79).
Comments: Ngati Raukawa, early 1900s (RN).
The model Maori House commissioned for the Museum is begun but that is about all. Piwiki the carver has been away for a long time at various ‘tangis’ & native meetings. He has all the material together & has I believe done some of the carving but it will be many months before the complete House is done.
(BM PE correspondence: A.H. Turnbull, 26 May 1898)
You may perhaps remember that you asked me, when you were here, whether I could get carved a similar model Maori house to that you saw in my collection. Well, after all this time, it is at last finished and herewith you will find a photo of it.
(BM PE correspondence: A.H. Turnbull, 10 May 1901)
Dear Mr Edge-Partington, at last I have got the little Maori House completed and packed, and I am despatching it on the 11th inst. by the S.S. ‘Athenic’.
(BM PE correspondence: A.H. Turnbull, 11 December 1902)
References: Neich 2004: 58.
- Location
- On display (G24/dc1)
- Acquisition date
- 1904
- Acquisition notes
- Information in register: 'Purchased Elder & Co. Made to scale by a native, named Piwiki.'
- Department
- Africa, Oceania and the Americas
- Registration number
- Oc1904,1206.1