Flute/whistle

The Maori developed several forms of musical instruments (see Anderson, 1934), and his type, with a curving terminal, has often been erroneously identified as a “nose flute”, because it was formerly thought that it was nose-blown through the small aperture at the curved-end. However, it is now clear that it was mouth-blown through at the larger aperture in a similar manner to the tubular koauau flute, which has been discussed in detail by McLean (1968). Both instruments were apparently used to accompany waiata, sung poems. This fine, boldly carved example has four spots, two towards the mouthpiece and two at the curved end, one of which is encircled by a Haliotis shell ring. A further stop close to the mouthpiece has been carefully plugged and the mouth of the main figure carved on the opposite side is recessed behind the tongue to form a lug for a suspension cord. An unusual feature of the flute is that the curving terminal is joined to the main body of the instrument. The straight-bored interior and crisply finished carving suggest metal tool work of the first part of the nineteenth century, and the flute most probably originated from the Bay of Islands area of Northland, for it exhibits two carving styles distinctive to that region, firstly meandering raised parallel lines enclosing notches and secondly the unaunahi “rolling spiral” design on the limbs of the main figure (see Mead, 1984: 186).