A Young Tahitian Woman Bringing a Present, drawing by Sydney Parkinson, 1769

Just as god images were wrapped to contain and signal their spiritual power, so were people. Cloaks and capes made of barkcloth and feathers not only signalled status, but bound the godly power contained within the wearer. Tattooing was used to the same effect.


In John Webber's drawing, a Tahitian girl is shown in the process of presenting gifts to Captain Cook. Her body is wrapped in a large amount of barkcloth, which is decorated with taumi (breastplates).

The cloth and breastplates were offered as presents to Cook who recorded in his journal that two women were conducted on board the ship and the cloth and breastplates, together with pigs and fruit, were offered to him as a present from the father of Tu - a powerful chief in Tahiti.

Wrapping barkcloth around the body and unwrapping it before recipients was, and still is, a widespread form of gift presentation in Polynesia.