Plate 20 from the official atlas to Captain Cook's third voyage
Artist: after John Webber (1751–1793), official artist to the voyage ("J. Webber del.")
Engraver: William Sharp (1749–1824) ("W. Sharp sculp.")
Place today: Tongatapu, Kingdom of Tonga
People: Tongan
Published: London, G. Nicol and T. Cadell, plate first issued 1784 for A Voyage to the Pacific Ocean by Captain James Cook and Captain James King
Technique: copperplate engraving on wove paper
Plate mark: 16 x 10.5 in (40 x 26 cm)
Sheet: 21.5 x 16 in (55 x 40 cm)
One of the great ceremonial scenes of the voyage. Inside a vast open-sided house, its curved thatched roof carried on lashed timber beams, a crowd of Tongan men sits cross-legged in a wide semicircle on patterned mats. At the centre Poulaho, the paramount chief, sits beside a large woven kava bowl on its curved stand while a man bows to the floor before him in an act of obeisance. Around the ring, faces turn toward the ceremony, one man holding a fly whisk, others passing leaf cups. William Sharp, one of the finest line engravers of his generation, gives every figure, mat and roof rib its own texture.
Cook's ships lay at Tongatapu from June 10 to July 10, 1777, and Webber witnessed this ceremony at Mu'a, the seat of the Tu'i Tonga. Poulaho was Fatafehi Paulaho, the 36th Tu'i Tonga, whom Cook had first met at Ha'apai and found "a Sedate sensible man." Kava, a mildly narcotic drink made from the root of the pepper plant Piper methysticum, was prepared and shared in a strict order of rank, with the highest chief served first. The ceremony remains central to Tongan life today, and this plate is one of the earliest European records of it.
Condition: a strong, crisp impression on a clean, bright sheet with its original yellow gilt edge. A small tear of about 1 in (2.5 cm) runs into the right margin, well clear of the image. There is a soft crease across one lower corner, and a few tiny specks in the margins. Please see the photos.
References: Beddie 1743-20; Joppien & Smith 3.55A.
Collections: impressions of this plate are held at Royal Museums Greenwich, London, the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, the Wellcome Collection, London, and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia.
This is an original antique copperplate engraving, not a reproduction.
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