Sleeping Mat

This finely woven mat may have been collected in Tonga during the voyages of English explorer Captain James Cook in the late eighteenth century. However, the colour and patterning of the weaving suggests that this mat is more typical of the islands of Kiribati.

Materials
The mat is a natural pandanus colour on one side and features elements that have been dyed dark brown on the other. The decorated side comprises of a diagonal grid of squares bordered with natural pandanus. Each square within this grid is further divided into four smaller squares equal in size but distinguishable from one another by a patterning consisting of alternating horizontal and vertical lines of dark brown pandanus.

Significance
The mat is significant for its quality and age. Its suggested association with Captain Cook and the nineteenth-century New Zealand collector and bibliophile Alexander Turnbull add to its cultural and historical value. The mat was presented to the Dominion Museum by the Trustees of the Turnbull Estate in 1918.