Feather headdress
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.The arch of this spectacular headdress evokes the vaulted dome of the sky. Its dazzling, cosmologically charged feathers and sec- tions of shell, which Polynesians valued for their rarity and shimmer, held the power to act as divine conduits. Thought to be directly descended from the first line of creator gods—described in origin chants as feathered beings—the warrior-chiefs who wore such headdresses did so to reinforce their sanctity and legitimize their right to rule.
Artwork Details
- Title: Feather headdress
- Date: Early 19th century
- Geography: Austral Islands, Ra’ivavae
- Medium: Feathers (various, including jungle fowl, Pacific black duck, and lorikeet [vini kura]), shell, barkcloth, human hair, cane, fiber (various)
- Dimensions: H. 43 5/16 × W. 43 5/16 × D. 8 1/4 in. (110 × 110 × 21 cm)
- Classification: Feathers-Costumes
- Credit Line: Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Gift of the Heirs of David Kimball, 1899
- Curatorial Department: The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing