Tongiaki to Kalia: The Micronesian-rigged Voyaging-canoes of Fiji and Western Polynesia and their Tangaloan-rigged Forebears

Authors

  • Fergus Clunie Sainsbury Research Unit, Sainsbury Centre For Visual Arts, University of East Anglia

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15286/jps.124.4.335-418

Keywords:

Tangaloan rigging, Micronesian rigging, autochthonous Fijian, Melanesian hulls, Tongan/Fijian gods

Abstract

This article draws upon a wide ranging combination of historical traditions, documentary history and archaeology to demonstrate that Tangaloan-rigged Tongan tongiaki and hamatefua voyaging canoes were of mixed autochthonous Melanesian and intrusive Tangaloan descent, and that the Micronesian-rigged drua/kalia and camakau/hamatefua voyaging canoes which succeeded them in Fiji and Western Polynesia were developed from them as an outcome of Tongan adoption of the Micronesian rig in the 18th century, and the corresponding transfer of voyaging canoe construction from Samoa to Fiji.

Author Biography

Fergus Clunie, Sainsbury Research Unit, Sainsbury Centre For Visual Arts, University of East Anglia

Fergus Clunie, who worked for the Fiji Museum from 1969-87, is a Sydney-based research associate of the Sainsbury Research Unit, University of East Anglia, UK. He is particularly interested in Fijian material culture, and in tracing cultural, spiritual and historical linkages between Fiji and Western Polynesia. Besides conducting ongoing research into the history and consequences of Tu‘i Tonga embroilment in Fiji and Samoa in the 16th century, he is currently investigating the artistic and scientific heritage of the voyage of HMS Herald to the southwest Pacific in the 1850s.

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Published

2016-01-29

Issue

Vol. 124 No. 4 (2015)

Section

Articles

License

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