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2010-04-04T13:46:00.001-11:00

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2010-02-19T08:29:00.002-11:00

Strangeness on Maungawhau
The Pou

The Maori inscription

The other inscription ??????

The sign

What on earth is this about?

The Last Spike

2009-05-31T10:03:00.003-11:00

The Last Spike - Feilding and District Historical Society, 2008. 138p ISBN 978-0-473-13715-1
Celebrating the 100th anniversary of the completion of the North Island main trunk railway.
A superb collection of photographs enliven the text. As a primer on the civil engineering methods and practices of the time this is hard to beat.

Great While Fleet again

2008-12-12T09:03:00.002-11:00

Heritage Matters have published a short article of mine - a much shortened version of the on-line paper.
Garry Law 2008 “The Great White Fleet in Auckland” Heritage Matters Issue 17:38-9.

TVNZ

2008-11-14T09:07:00.002-11:00

More scientific illiteracy at TVNZ. Last night they had the Hubble telescope seeing planets around a star in another galaxy. Oh dear - we will be waiting a while for that one to be true. It was of course another solar system. It's 25 light years away. The closest galaxy is a dwarf companion to our own and it is 42,000 light years away. The BBC got it right.
BBC story

2008-11-01T11:30:00.002-11:00

The Awa Book of New Zealand Science. Edited Rebecca Priestley, 2008, The Awa Press.

What a great book – extracts from papers and writing about science from through our history, embellished by some relevant pieces of our poetry. Of course much of the material is largely of local interest – the pieces by the likes Cockayne, Cotton, Guthrie-Smith will resonate with New Zealanders but less for people away from here. They are well chosen – Priestley has a good eye for what is readable as well as significant. For archaeologists the pieces by Rafter and Adds connect us to the bigger picture.

It is the bringing together here of the international contributions that is not often done. If one puts together the pieces by Rutherford and Marsden on the discovery of the atom’s nucleus, Tinsley on the nature of the universe, Wilkins on DNA, and Alan Wilson (with Rebecca Cann) on our recent African Genesis this is an astonishing contribution to knowledge of the fundamentals of our world and ourselves. The diaspora of New Zealand trained scientists has been a large one, and still is. Inevitably much of their work will be done away from here, but we can take some of the credit. For a country that does not often celebrate its achievements in science this is a little strange.

Priestley celebrates our science. All strength to her.

Footnote - in 2009 the Royal Society gave this book an inagural science writing award - well deserved.

Bookhabit - Abundance and Constraint: A Short History of Water Use in New Zealand. By Robert Garry Law - New Zealand has an abundance of water but still there has been conflict over its use. Maori managed water and asserted their right to its use partic

2008-07-23T05:36:00.002-11:00

Bookhabit - Abundance and Constraint: A Short History of Water Use in New Zealand

New Zealand has an abundance of water but still there has been conflict over its use. Maori managed water and asserted their right to its use particularly for fishing. Colonists soon came into conflict with Maori over water, disrupting traditional fishing through rafting logs, introducing new species and using waterways for wastes. Water was an important early source of power in colonial New Zealand used for milling a variety of products and in hydraulic mining. Gold mining was intimately connected to early hydroelectric development, a use which came to have the most profound effects on New Zealand's waterways. The Law followed the different forms of use of water as they developed. Through mining contamination many rivers were declared sludge canals and their banks taken into Crown ownership - the Queens Chain - to prevent court actions by the adjoining owners. Wetlands have been much affected by development and there is a sad list of lost or endangered waterbird species. Despite a long history of disputes over allocation New Zealand's Law on water allocation is little developed.
Illustrated with many historical pictures.

The first chapter is free - there is a small charge for downloading the whole book.

2008-06-30T14:03:00.003-11:00

NEW publication: Archaeology of the Bay of Plenty
By Garry Law. 149 p.

What's it about?
This report summarises the state of knowledge of the archaeology of the Bay of Plenty, New Zealand, and reviews research themes and priorities of the past and for the future. The Bay of Plenty is favoured as a place to live today, but this has not always been the case. Its first settlement by Maori seems to have been sparse, whereas there are numerous sites from the later pre-European occupation period. The early economy was based around the marine resources and soils, which were well suited to cultivation of kumara.
The first European visitors took relatively little interest in the region as it generally lacked the gold and accessible timber resources that drove early growth elsewhere, and cobalt-deficient soils made pastoral farming unattractive in much of the area. The development of improved transport resulted in greater growth, and pastoral farming increased as the lowlands and swamps were drained. In the second half of the 20th century, exotic forestry, energy and horticulture were the main drivers of growth in the region, which now has a rapidly increasing population. All of these stories are illuminated by the archaeology of the region, and there is great potential to tell more. To do this, research strategies and plans need to focus on gaining a better understanding of Maori settlement and resource use away from the coast, examining the factors leading to the widespread adoption of pa from about AD 1500, and making better use of the archaeological material arising from mitigation excavations of Maori sites.
Comprehensive recording of historic archaeological sites is also needed.

The above new publication is now in press and can be downloaded from:
Here

Bookhabit - Auckland, August 1908: A Stop on the Great White Fleet World Cruise By Robert Garry Law - This booklet places the visit of the Great White Fleet to Auckland in its New Zealand context and its geopolitical context - that of great power riva

2008-05-29T04:52:00.000-11:00

Bookhabit - Auckland, August 1908: A Stop on the Great White Fleet World Cruise By Garry Law
eBook - published 2008. This booklet places the visit of the Great White Fleet to Auckland in its New Zealand context and its geopolitical context - that of great power rivalry over prestige, territorial ambitions and projection of force by battleship lead fleets. It shows the social context of Auckland 100 years ago. Illustrated with contemporary pictures, many drawn from colour printed post cards. 37 pages.
The first chapter is free - there is a small charge for downloading the whole book.

NYPL Digital Gallery | Browse Source Titles

2008-03-02T12:24:00.001-11:00

Description de l'Egypte NYPL Digital Gallery

Napoleon in Egypt

2008-03-02T10:32:00.006-11:00

Nina Burleigh 2007 Napoleon's Scientists and the Unveiling of Egypt. Harper Collins New York.
A popular and very readable account of the 1798 adventure by Napoleon to deny Egypt to the British. Hundreds of scholars and students accompanied the expeditions and were feted but eventually abandoned by Napoleon. Denon wrote an account of travels in upper and lower Egypt which was rapidly translated into English but the main output was the massive Description of Egypt published in several parts, initially under the authority of Napoleon, but after he was deposed under that of the restored monarch - this despite many of the scholars being treated abominably under the new regime. The book was one foundation of the incorporation of ancient Egyptian design elements into Empire Style. The Taschen edition (1990) is probably the most accessible, but it is also online. Along with many of the army, a sizeable proportion of the scholars were never to leave Egypt, dying there, many of the plague.

The early contribution of engineers the Egyptology was a surprise. A military engineer recognised the importance of the Rosetta Stone when it was found in work to strengthen a fortification. The records made of the monuments of Egypt were made the engineers, those best skilled to make measured drawings. It was unfortunate the standards they started did not persist in the rest of the century - justifiably called the rape of Egypt.

So you think the Rosetta Stone is black? After it was found it had ink applied to the surface and it was used directly for taking paper copies. Over the years many more materials were added to the surface. The grano-diorite has recently been cleaned British Museum page - it turns out to be pinkish grey with a pink strip. Photo after cleaning.

2008-01-29T11:54:00.004-11:00

Hamish Keith 2007 The Big Picture. A History of New Zealand Art from 1642. Random House, Auckland.

Hamish Keith has for long been claiming to have personally caused a revolution in the perception and handling of Maori art.

His latest:

The two cultures might not yet have come together, but they were now at least standing on the banks of the same contemporary river. It would be another twenty years before the Te Maori exhibition would restore to Maori art the same history, value and context that pioneer art historians had given to contemporary Pakeha artists.
The 1984 Te Maori exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York was a powerful watershed, not in the making of Maori art, but in the public perception of it. Te Maori launched the great treasures of Maori art into the modern world in the context of one of the world's great art museums. Its organisers intentions were subversive ... to lift the shroud of the fictitious past that New Zealand's natural history museums had laid over it and reconnect it with the present as a living part of New Zealand's culture ... all of New Zealand's culture, not just the Maori bit.
Until Te Maori, Maori art in a museum context was presented as either belonging to a prehistoric past or as a snapshot of a moment in historical time, 1769, when Captain James Cook and Joseph Banks first encountered it. So total was this view that even modern historians had trouble accepting that the different glimpse of it provided by Tasmans draughtsman Isaac Gilsemans, in 1642, had any validity.
Whenever it was made, art is a living part of now. It is not just evidence of the past or something addressed to a vague posterity. But with the museum sanctioned coats of red paint and the historical implications of its presentation, a powerful and entirely false idea was established that all Maori art belonged to a vanished, hunter-gatherer past. As a result any meaningful contemporary conversation with Maori works of art was hard to come by. As the African writer Franz Fanon has pointed out, one of the processes of colonisation is to mummify the art of a colonised people in museums and present it as belonging only to the past and closed to the future.
One of the great defining moments of Te Maori was when the Pukeroa waharoa held by Auckland Museum emerged from its coats of concealing red enamel in the full red, green and white glory of its 19th-century colours. After Te Maori nothing about Maori art would seem the same. The exhibition restored to Maori art a continuity that revealed the possibility of a clear and consistent evolution into the 20th century.
The great carved and painted houses could now be seen not as remnants of a distant past but standing clearly at the beginnings of the modem world. They were the works of a culture not oppressed or defeated by contact, but defiant and radical in the response to challenge and change.

Whew ... well lets look at some of these claims.

It would be another twenty years before the Te Maori exhibition would restore to Maori art the same history, value and context that pioneer art historians had given to contemporary Pakeha artists.

Up until about 1970 there had been far more published about Maori art than there had been in the way of historical analysis of Pakeha artists. Nothing to be restored. Contemporary Maori Art was alive and well in 1984, with its connection to past art well established. It too did not need restoring.

The 1984 Te Maori exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York was a powerful watershed, not in the making of Maori art, but in the public perception of it. Te Maori launched the great treasures of Maori art into the modern world in the context of one of the world's great art museums. Its organisers' intentions were subversive ... to lift the shroud of the fictitious past that New Zealand's natural history museums had laid over it and reconnect it with the present as a living part of New Zealand's culture ... all of New Zealand's culture, not just the Maori bit.

Keith was of course an organiser of Te Maori so he is not an independent observer of its importance. So Maori art was only recognised as important in New Zealand by a showing at the Met? Many great treasures of 17th and 18th century Maori art are resident outside New Zealand and are treasured and displayed by the institutions that own them. Those in New Zealand were displayed and treasured. Te Maori certainly assembled many of the very best from around the country, but few New Zealanders saw it in New York, most experienced it through publications, and in its final exhibition on tour in New Zealand, where it was seen by an estimated 920,000. Surely a bit of cultural cringe to say it needed the Met to do this? The local tour was great.

Until Te Maori, Maori art in a museum context was presented as either belonging to a prehistoric past or as a snapshot of a moment in historical time, 1769, when Captain James Cook and Joseph Banks first encountered it. So total was this view that even modern historians had trouble accepting that the different glimpse of it provided by Tasman's draughtsman Isaac Gilsemans, in 1642, had any validity.

Maori culture is presented in Museums as a culture. The average museum viewer needs to see it as a coherent whole, not taken into details of regional differentiation or change in the historical period. Largely that is still how museums present it. The big change is that the modern Maori community is engaged in how it is presented. That had started before Te Maori but it had a big part in settling it.

Keith deals with the subject elsewhere in his book:

Gilsemans has been widely criticised for getting things wrong (p19).

In support of the view of modern historians only Michael King is quoted in the book, pp19-20.The King reference is to The Penguin History of New Zealand,
(King 2003: 97-98). King says nothing of the sort. The only matter on which Keith disagrees with King is that King says the lack of moko in the Gilsemans depiction may have been because the people were not seen close up. Keith disagrees saying it was a close encounter. Yes it was for the boat that was rammed and the people in it that were clubbed, but the boat was between the ships and Gilsemans was not on it. King doesn’t say he got things wrong, only that he may not have seen. Keith suggests there may not have been any moko. Kings expectation that there might have been was well founded and not just based on 18th century and later depictions of Maori. We know that the first Maori practiced tattooing (King 2003:65).

This claim about modern historians views of Gilsemans looks like sloppy scholarship.

Whenever it was made, art is a living part of now. It is not just evidence of the past or something addressed to a vague posterity. But with the museum-sanctioned coats of red paint and the historical implications of its presentation, a powerful and entirely false idea was established that all Maori art belonged to a vanished, hunter-gatherer past. As a result any meaningful contemporary conversation with Maori works of art was hard to come by.

No, art is not a new focus. The presentation standards have not greatly changed just as a result of Te Maori. The museum most influenced was Te Papa. Its displays that mixed dates and cultures were much criticised and have for the most part been removed. Its Maori section that had tiny almost illegible labelling; we were supposed to enjoy the form alone of the items on display; has not been followed elsewhere ... thank goodness.

Hunter-gatherer

... good grief. Keith has spent too much time in art museums.

One of the great defining moments of Te Maori was when the Pukeroa waharoa held by Auckland Museum emerged from its coats of concealing red enamel in the full red, green and white glory of its 19th century colours. After Te Maori nothing about Maori art would seem the same. The exhibition restored to Maori art a continuity that revealed the possibility of a clear and consistent evolution into the 20th century.

Auckland Museum started removing red paint from carvings well before Te Maori.
It started on this in 1981 and made the decision to treat the Pukeroa gateway in
1982 (Barton 1984:182). The removal commenced in 1982 (Barton 1983:7). Te Maori was not the watershed in recovering original surfaces - that had already
started. The display of the gateway was rightly a central part of Te Maori, but
the show was not the genesis of its recovery.

Nor was time
differentiation new; that was well alive already in scholarship.

Keiths piece is simply self-aggrandisement and poor scholarship.

References

King, Michael
2003 The Penguin History of New Zealand.

Barton, Gerry 1983 Te Maori Exhibition - Conseration tretments undertaken by the Auckland Museum conservation department. AGMANZ News 14(4):7-10.
Barton, Gerry 1984 Conservation Considerations on Four Maori Carvings at
Auckland Museum, New Zealand. Studies in Conservation, 29(4):
181-186.

Waimarino County and Other Excursions - Martin Edmond

2007-12-30T11:54:00.000-11:00

Readers of Martin Edmond's Chronicle of the Unsung (2004) will have picked up his interest in archaeology and pacific prehistory.

The autobiographical parts of his latest book Waimarino County and Other Excursions (Martin Edmond, Auckland University Press 2007) give us more on how he came to that.
"I recall when my mother stopped her red and white Hillman Imp on a suburban street in Huntly one day and said, What's it you are going to be, a doctor or a lawyer? replying, Actualy I want to be an archaeologist."

Edmond had a 1972/73 holiday job at Takatu and spent some of his spare time looking at and digging in archaeological sites. "I drew a map of the pa site and sent it to Auckland Musuem, my sole contribution to archaeology."

It is easy to disagree. His writing is rich in landscape, history and their connection. This book has a startling example: an account of his accidental personal discovery of the Tongapurutu rock carvings (p81). It is a fine piece of writing which exposes his emotional response to the site. Surely not all archaeological contributions need to be as prosaic as maps.