Description:
Powder horn inscribed “JOHN PARKER HIS HORN 1775” and decorated with a scene of a New Zealand war canoe. Many men named John Parker are listed in the militia rolls of 1775. The most famous is John Parker (1729-1775), who led the Minutemen to Lexington Green on April 19, 1775. Books, magazines, broadsides, and military commissions inspired horn carvers. The design source for this horn is an engraving based on an ink and wash drawing in the British Museum, "A New Zealand War Canoe," by Sydney Parkinson (1754-1771) made during the second of Captain James Cook’s three voyages to the Pacific from 1772-1775. William Hodges (1744-1797) accompanied Cook as the expedition's official draughtsman, along with his fellow shipmate officer and artist, Sydney Parkinson. This version of the scene, in which the canoe shown is much shorter and the number of rowers much fewer than in the Parkinson drawing, was originally engraved by J. J. Barralet, published 1772, and bound in with Hawkesworth's account of Cook's voyage to New Zealand published in 1773, "Account of the voyages undertaken by the order of His present Majesty for making discoveries in the southern hemisphere" The exact original for the engraved versions has never been found. The man in the bow of the canoe peers through a telescope. The horn came with a page from the September 1773 issue of "The Gentleman's Magazine: and Historical Chronicle" (HD 2005.20.46.2) illustrating the Baralett version.
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+2005.20.46.1 |
