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Notes

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Hawaiian drums of this small coconut shell form are called puniu and generally termed knee drums in art-historical literature. They were played on the drummer’s knee with a small flexible beater of plaited coconut fibre. The sharkskin tympanum is tensioned with 23 strings of fibre wrapped around the circular base ring. A small piece of kapa barkcloth is fitted between the shell and the base to cushion the shell and dampen the tone. This is one of ‘two drums from the Sandwich Islands’ described in Captain John Laskey's 1813 guide to the Museum (the other being GLAHM:E.437). It was purchased by William and John Hunter at the June 1781 auction of David Samwell’s collection, amassed during Captain James Cook’s third voyage of Pacific exploration (Lots 106 and 232).