Oldman Collection

Oldman Collection

In 1948, the New Zealand government purchased the Māori and Pacific collection of the London dealer W O Oldman. The collection was divided on indefinite loan among the four large New Zealand metropolitan museums (Auckland, the Dominion, Canterbury and Otago), with small amounts also going to smaller public museums. The Dominion Museum (now Te Papa) received the bulk of the Māori, Marquesan, New Caledonian, and Admiralty Island components of the collection together with small numbers of items from other island groups. Because these items had passed through various sale rooms in Britain, they often lack detailed information on their origins or historical context, but their quality is outstanding.

It is mainly ethnographic material but of considerable archaeological interest.

The collection was published as supplements in the Journal of the Polynesian Society (1936-44)(JPS online), then as two memoirs (1943, 1946) that have since been republished with new interpretive material by Neich and Davidson. A memoir has been published on hi collecting:

References Oldman, W.O. 2004 The Oldman Collection of Maori Artifacts. New Edition with introductory essay by Roger Neich and Janet Davidson, and finder list. Journal of the Polynesian Society Memoir Series.

Oldman, W.O. 2004 The Oldman Collection of Polynesian Artifacts. New Edition with introductory essay by Roger Neich and Janet Davidson, and finder list. Journal of the Polynesian Society Memoir Series.