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Crocodile canoe prow
Crocodile canoe prow

Crocodile canoe prow

Date20th century
Label TextOn the Sepik River, canoes often look like crocodiles and transport people through their home waters to some of the world's largest salt- and freshwater crocodile populations. Living there, one becomes accustomed to seeing the crocodile's eyes, ears, and nostrils while its massive body is hidden under water. In this head, the teeth are set in jaws with muscles that are known to exert up to one ton of force, a sign of the "ruling reptiles" that survived the disaster that wiped out dinosaurs sixty-five million years ago. For Iatmul people, the river is their mother and a crocodile ancestor once carried Earth from the primeval occean up on its back to create their island home. Sitting in a canoe with this prow, people rode on the back of a powerful creature to merge with a river with its many relatives.
Object number81.17.1466
Credit LineGift of Katherine White and the Boeing Company
Dimensions7 3/4 x 39 x 16 in. (19.7 x 99.1 x 40.6cm)
MediumWood and shell
Photo: Paul Macapia
Melanesian
19th century
Object number: 81.17.1443
Canoe-Prow Splashboard (Rajim)
Melanesian
early 20th Century
Object number: 70.120
Canoe Prow Ornament (Musumusu)
Melanesian
prior to 1897
Object number: 67.57
Suspension Hook
Melanesian
Object number: 65.77
Melanesian
Object number: 81.17.1470
Melanesian
Object number: 81.17.1471
Photo: Paul Macapia
Nigerian/Cameroonian
Object number: 81.17.507
Crocodile Effigy
Melanesian
late 19th century
Object number: 69.69
Object number: 2001.199
Bird Image
Melanesian
19th century
Object number: 70.3