Description
Twenty-five years after Captain Cook, the London Missionary Society sent its first representatives to the South Seas. Their goal was to eradicate heathenism and idolatry, but unwittingly, they became agents for the preservation of Polynesian culture through their diligent recording of language and religious practices. They even preserved a number of religious artifacts, which they sent back to England for exhibition in the Mission Museum in London. This book focuses on these artifacts, the idols that avoided the flames. With the scientist’s belief in letting the evidence speak for itself, the author, a biochemist, has mined a wide range of primary sources to bring together a wealth of new information on a generally unpopular subject, the missionary endeavour. Eighty five colour plates illustrate missionary subjects, Polynesian ‘temples’, and numerous idols. The majority of this material is published here for the first time.
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Curious, meticulous, and deeply interested in the history and cultures of the Pacific, King, a biochemist affiliated with the U. of California, Berkeley, turned his attention to objects gathered by British missionaries in Polynesia in the 1800s. Ironically, the missionaries were present to try to eradicate indigenous beliefs, and they did plenty of that, including making bonfires of religious objects, or idols; but some objects were collected and shipped to London, where they sat in the British Museum relatively undisturbed and unexamined for more than a century. King relates the history and context of such collecting activities, sets the objects in their cultural context, and examines the details of their construction out of stone, feathers, wood) and, more importantly, their meanings. This is an elegantly produced, abundantly illustrated volume. Distribution in the US is the U. of Washington Press. Annotation ©2011 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
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