The Royal Navy in Indigenous Australia, 1795-1855: Maritime Encounters and British Museum Collections

ISBN-13: 9783030600990 / Angielski / Miękka / 2022 / 332 str.

Daniel Simpson

Spis treści

Contents

Chapter 1   Introduction 

Part I                   Departures

Chapter 2    The Science of Naval Collecting

Chapter 3    Commissioning Indigenous Australia

Chapter 4    Discipline and Authority

Part II        Coastal Collecting

Chapter 5    Beaches

Chapter 6    Sounds

Chapter 7    Islands and Peninsulas

Part III       Disembarkation

Chapter 8    The Customs House      

Chapter 9    The Naval Hospital

Chapter 10  The Museum

Chapter 11 Conclusion

Appendix

Index 

O autorze

Daniel Simpson is Honorary Research Associate at Royal Holloway, University of London, UK. His research explores the history of maritime encounters and naval ethnographic collecting in Australia and the South Pacific. 

Blurb

This book offers the first in-depth enquiry into the origins of the 135 Indigenous Australian objects acquired by the Royal Navy between 1795 and 1855, and held now by the British Museum. In response to increasing calls for the ‘decolonisation’ of museums, and the restitution of ethnographic collections, the book seeks to return knowledge of the moments, methods, and motivations whereby Indigenous Australian objects were first collected, and sent to Britain. By structuring its discussion in terms of the three main ‘stages’ of a typical naval voyage to Australia – departure from British shores, arrival on the continent’s coasts, and final return to port – the book offers a composite and complete understanding of the pathways first followed by these 135 objects. The book explores numerous new understandings of Indigenous Australian peoples’ reactions to British visitors, and furthermore contributes a series of important and original insights into the provenance and meaning of many of the world’s oldest Indigenous Australian object collections.