Flights of fancy: The bird of paradise and its cultural impact

Abstract

The aim of this essay is to show through just one greatly valued trade item — in this case, the bird of paradise — how even the most distant and apparently isolated areas of the world could be linked to the major metropoles through trade. Yet this trade was anything but a simple bilateral exchange. It involved a complex series of networks that extended from the collectors to various levels of intermediaries and secondary ports, and then to foreign shippers bringing the desired product to its ultimate destination in various world markets. There is, however, another aspect of this essay which focuses not on the economic but the cultural value of trade. Most studies of the bird of paradise have commented on the cultural impact of its feathers on Western fashion, yet few have examined other cultural interpretations of the feathers that are closely associated with authority, fertility, and even invulnerability. These attitudes found in eastern Indonesia and New Guinea continue a tradition that has its roots in Southeast Asia in the early centuries of the Common Era.