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• Auction House:
  Mossgreen
• Sale Name:
  Australian Indigenous & Oceanic Art
• Sale Date:
  21 Jul 2015 ~ 6.30pm
• Lot #:
  126
• Lot Description:
  An Early Rainforest Shield and Sword Club
  Cairns Region, Queensland (late nineteenth century)
  carved hardwood, natural earth pigments and cane binding repair
  137 cm; 80 cm high (2)
• Provenance:
  Private Collection, Queensland ; Private Collection, Queensland (acquired from above 1973)
• Notes:
  A characteristic kidney shaped shield and sword club that form the fighting armoury of men of the rainforests of the Cairns region, on the north eastern coast of Cape York Peninsula. The shield bears a distinctive symmetrical design in yellow and red ochres, outlined in black, and a central boss to enhance the strength of the weapon. Such shields are made from the buttress roots of the native fig tree and hardwood which were painted by two men working from opposite ends of the shield simultaneously. The shield would be given to a young man for his initiation. The abstracted designs of such shields are conventionalised images of totemic plant and animal species. The sword club is typically undecorated. Both the shield and the sword club bear evidence of use, the sword club having been repaired with kangaroo gut binding. For similar objects in public collections see: two shields and a sword club in the collection of the Australian Museum in Davies, S.M. with R. Stack, Collected: 150 Years of Aboriginal Art and Artifacts at the Macleay Museum, Sydney: The University of Sydney, 2002, p.76, plates 85 and 86; the Prince Davey shield, collected in 1913, in the collection of the Queensland Museum in Queensland Art Gallery, Story Place: Indigenous art of Cape York and the Rainforest, Brisbane: Queensland Art Gallery, 2003, p. 154; McCarthy, F.D., Australian Aboriginal Decorative Art, Sydney: Australian Museum, 1974, p. 26, fig. 19; and Cooper, C. et al., Aboriginal Australia, Sydney: Australian Gallery Directors Council, 1981, pp. 171-3, plates N275-N282. Wally Caruana
• Estimate:
  A$25,000 - 35,000
• Realised Price:
  *****
  

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• Category:
  Tribal

This Sale has been held and this item is no longer available. Details are provided for information purposes only.