Pottery from Collingwood Bay in the Official collection from British New Guinea: the Wanigela style and the social relations of its distribution

Abstract

During the late nineteenth century, a substantial assemblage of pottery was acquired by William MacGregor for the British New Guinea Official collection from the Collingwood Bay region in the north-eastern region of the colony. The group is highly significant because these ceramic styles are absent from most other museum collections dating to this period. Analyses of the manufacturing and decorative styles represented in the assemblage show that they belong to a style currently associated with the contemporary locality called Wanigela, a placename not used at the time MacGregor was exploring the area. Reconstructing the region of pottery manufacture versus the locations it was distributed through exchange, contributes to an understanding of social relations across the region at a date when there are few ethnographic accounts. This approach also provides an important example of how indigenous groups asserted their agency in their dealings with outsiders, even one as powerful as the representative of the British government.